Grandma's Pearls

Family

Yesterday started out just fine. The rain was just about gone, but it was getting cold again. I was going to have the time to get some stuff done around the house. I haven't had a lot of time to do house work because I have been the family taxi. I can't take everyone that needs to go somewhere all at the same time. I have a truck, so, only 2 other people can ride. That means that if my daughter needs a ride, I have to wait until her husband gets home to watch the kids or one of them has to stay home with my son.Needless to say, that causes problems with my granddaughters because both of them want to ride with grandma. But, I'm getting off track. I have been driving everyone here and there, so the house has been getting neglected and I thought I would be able to get caught up on some of it yesterday. NOT!
Around 11:00 a.m., I got a phone call from one of my sisters. She informed me that our sisters husband was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. He is going to have surgery this coming Monday. So far, it is localized. It hasn't spread to any other organs but with cancer, it can spread like wild fire once it is exposed to the air. Especially if it is small cell cancer. Like I said, he is supposed to have surgery this coming Monday. They don't know if they can remove it or if they will have to remove his pancreas. Right now it is blocking access to his kidneys and that is not a good thing. So, I called my other sister. She is very upset that this has happened. At this point in time, they are currently seperated and a divorce is imminent. They just fell out of love with each other. Truthfully, he killed the love that she had for him. After all of the years of his constant name calling, bitching, griping, complaining and blaming, she just couldn't take it anymore. The straw that broke the camels back, so to speak, was that he was too concerned with his many projects to take a few days off from them and come to our mom's funeral. They could afford it. It wasn't like my husband, we just couldn't afford for him to take the time off from work and I understand that. But, they could afford it and it wouldn't have affected thier income in any way. But, he just couldn't make himself take the time to be there for his wife when she needed him the most. That was the beginning of the end for them. After all that she has done for him, working and supporting him and his kids and herself and her kids for all of the years that they have been together, taking care of his kids like they were hers, solving all the little problems that crop up when you have 2 sets of kids, keeping the money coming in and insurance for the family because he was trying to start a real estate monopoly and that wasn't bringing in any money, and all kinds of other stuff. She took care of him for years and years. She raised his sons and her daughters. She did the whole mom thing, cookies, homework, projects, special events, all of that stuff that moms all over the world do for thier families every day.
All he did was work on his projects and spend her money and complain that there wasn't enough of it, call her names, choose his kids version of events over hers, blame her daughters for things his sons did, etc. So, after over 20 years of this, she finally had enough and left him. The kids are grown and have thier own families to take care of these days.
So, since she finally had someplace that she could go and live there, she did. He still calls her to complain about the business, the kids, and any other thing that he feels she might be blamed for, on top of telling her that she is spending too much of his money. Right now, he sends her 500.00 a month. With that she is supposed to pay the bills at moms place(which is her place now), buy groceries and put gas in her car, etc.... There is no way she can do that on such a small amount of money. Just the bills use up most of the money that he gives her. There isn't any extra money for groceries or for gas in the car and the car needs to go into the shop because the fuel injectors need to be replaced.
On top of dealing with all of that and him being sick, the boys are treating her like crap. They have forgotten about all of the times that she interveened(?) and saved them from the wrath of dad. They have forgotten about all of the things she did for them when they were little and as they got older. They forgot that she still loves them like her own and that she didn't leave them, she left her husband, not her children. The boys are treating her just like thier dad did. They are calling her names, cussing her out and blaming her for thier dad getting sick. They honestly believe that if she had not left thier dad that he would not be sick now. After all that she has been through this past year and all of the bullsh%* that she has had to deal with over the years and now they want to do the same thing to her that he did. It is just too much!! I don't know what else to say. That just floors me. The sheer audacity of those boys to treat someone who gave so much of herself to them and now she is no better than a stranger on the street asking for a hand out. I just don't understand it! How can they be so cold hearted? How can they say such mean things about her to her daughters and expect them to understand? Her girls would never do that to them. As far as they are concerned, the boys are thier brothers and they would never treat them like they are treating her. It just hurts my heart and there isn't anything I can do to help her or them. All I can do is be there for my sister and listen to her. That just doesn't seem like enough but it is all I can do. Can't offer advice because I haven't been where she is, all I can do is support her and let her know that it is not her fault that he got sick. It would have happened anyway. Life is too short and too precious to waste it on a life of misery. Everyone deserves a little bit of happiness in thier lives and my sister is no exception.
As much as I would like to have more money than I could ever need, it will probably never happen and if it did, all of the problems would not go away. Money doesn't make everything better, it just makes it easier to deal with everything and it makes life easier to live. Guess that is the moral of this blog today. Money just makes life easier to live, it doesn't always make everything better. Sometimes it makes things worse.