uh-oh

Seems as though the cardiac nurse, with whom I have a history, is more offended by me than I am upset by feeling not heard during our first phone and in-person contacts.

Yesterday was cardio rehab again.  We sit and chat outside the rehab room until they let us in.  That nurse arrived to open the door and she talked and laughed with everyone except me.  Four patients and a husband were greeted and chatted up.  Me, not so much, in fact, she never made eye contact with me and studiously ignored me the entire session. 

My lesson from this is to stop trying to have a conversation where I can explain myself and ask questions.  Kind of sad, as I thought that gently moving into interacting with the folk in my life was an improvement to being passive and simply agreeing with whatever someone else tells me.  I want,desperately, to believe that she was invested in sharing what she feels is the proper information and that my questions to clarify some things seemed like I was challenging her.  I really think that is what happened.  Anyway, I have no intention of trying to mend our professional relationship

So there is that. 

I do not think this would have bothered me so much had not I been grieving so much from the death of my ex.  I hate feeling this vulnerable and unable to take any kind of control over what happens to me. 

My daughter and I went out for lunch today, to, not celebrate, but at least sort of acknowledge her birthday.  I bought her some funny socks from the little store attached to the vegetarian restaurant where we ate.  We talked a bit about her father/my ex and we shared that each of us had gone on-line to find information about how to manage our grief.  She to look for information for people who's parent had been estranged from them, and me to search out help for people experiencing the death of an ex-spouse.  We both found that this grieving will most likely take a year, perhaps more.

I can believe that, as I am not yet able to begin to sort out all of the feelings I am having.  It is clear that each of us is mourning his death, but maybe more importantly the loss of opportunities to have been able to reconnect or some damn thing.

Well, anyway, I am off to find some Ella Fitzgerald and some upbeat jazz for my exercise-focal MP3 player, for when I exercise.  The fitness club I joined (free Silver Sneakers membership, via my insurance) had cable television screen attached to the treadmills.  Maybe I will watch some whilst I finish my 10,000 steps for the day.  That total is not easy to reach, and I am missing it by so much each day.  I wish the process would let you do the maximum over two days.  Then I would be over.  Yay.

technology 0

Me, 1.

I am taking this whole cardiac rehab seriously.  I am going to the hospital three days a week and a fitness club the other two.

Quite frankly, I am hoping my fanny off that I can keep this commitment.  For one thing, I have to get up very early, at least for me, to make it to rehab.  I can go to the club anytime I want.  They are open 24 hours.  Round the clock.  Eliminates the excuse of not finding the time to go there.

Rehab is going well, but it is clear that the dork from the evaluation appointment has "spoken" to the rest of the staff.  My guess that this is some kind of payback for calling her on her over-the-phone lies, or maybe is simply clueless about what a stellar dork she actually is.  They are all treating me weirdly, but I am just going to ignore all of it, go there and benefit from the program.  I kind of would like to shake my finger at her, scolding the whole time.  Alas.

So, anyway, now I have shoes for exercising...first time in my life.  Huge surprise, huh?  And, I have arranged to sell that investment; the paperwork came on Saturday.  That, at least, is settled and I can stop stressing about the money.  It is a ginormous blessing to have an investment to sell.  There is nothing quite like a card from one of the best insurance companies to ensure you get the best treatment available.

Let's see.  I bought a FitBit healthy activity tracker thing.  That is where I won against technology.  The FB web site is a little tricky, but I finally figured out what to do and have set up my account, installed the sync thingy and will be able to check it at the end of each day.  Yay me!

On to sadder news.  Today is my daughter's birthday.  We are not celebrating and when I just sent her a message, a short string of hearts, she did not reply.  I do not feel like celebrating either.  Two  weekends past, whilst I was having surgery, my ex died.

The information came to us in a round-about way, reluctantly.  The only reason our daughter was contacted is that she is his next of kin, and the only person able to sign all the paperwork.

I am surprised at how much I am grieving the loss of him.  I never stopped loving him, I just could not stay with him, it just was not safe.  And, I wanted to live.  This past two weeks have confirmed that I do want to keep on living for a long time. 

I think that one of the worst parts of his death is that it has eliminated all of the possibilities for which I have been hoping and praying since the day I left. 

No more chance that he would reach out to our daughter and have a relationship with her.  No more chances for some kind of a chance encounter that would facilitate that.

But, the very worst thing is that she has lost her father in a more permanent way than having him out of her life.  Her grief is greater than mine.  We have spoken about this and she knows that when, or if, she is ready to talk with me, that I am here, at her service.

Part of this is my fault because I never said bad things about her father.  I never shared with her what happened.  All she know is what he and his family told her.  I was so certain that keeping all of that away from her was the right thing to do, and I still think that, but doing so has isolated her in a way that I never anticipated.  All of this is just the worst.