RIP Shell Belle

Thursday Morning at apprx 2am The Hub's mom died.

It was a huge shock.. no one expected it quite this fast.

It's been a very heartbreaking week all around. I'm very grately that he was able to be home and spend the last week of her life with her. I wish I would've been able to be home to support him. Unfortunitely that didn't happen.

As I wrote in my last post the doctors had given her a longer life expectancy than it actually turned out to be. After surgery everyone was very positive that she would be able to have somewhat of a coherent quality of life. The first 2 days after surgery, she was able to somewhat talk ,sit up and eat very puree'd food.

Unfortunitely she ended up having an Acute Mol Siezure.(i think I spelled that right).

After that she basically stopped responding and stopped eating.. the doctors told my Hub and family she had about 48 hours. They moved her into hospice and tried to make her as comfortable as possible. The Hub, his dad and his sis.. basically moved into the Hospital and waited. Almost exactly 48 hours from the time of the last prognosis.. she went to sleep for the last time.

Shell was a kick ass lady. She was well loved and will be greatly missed. She pulled no punches and took no shit from anyone. Hub's from a very small town and his family has lived there for decades. She used to own the only beauty parlor in town. She cut everyone's hair and knew everyone. Hub's mom and dad have been together since she was 14 and he was 17 and have shared everything together. I can't even begin to imagine what his loss must be like. When the Hub and I first started dating years ago, she used to call me a cradle-robber cuz I was 20 and he was 18. She'd say that I was always out to corrupt her little boy, if she only knew it was already too late.

I'm sorry that she won't be able to see her grandkids grow up.I'm sad the punkin will have no memories of her grandma. Shell was so excited about us moving so close to home. I'm so sorry and sad for my Hubby's loss..I know he is being so strong for his family... and I wish there was more I could do for him. I can't imagine what the rest of our lives are going to be like without her. It's very sad.

RIP MOM WE LOVE YOU AND YOU'LL BE MISSED.

Now in the next 3 days,opposed to sending him home,they are sending him back to Iraq... for less than a month. Basically he gets theres packs up and then gets sent here. Give a guy a break... he just lost his mom and he's got less than a month left of his deployment. I'm worried. I'm afraid he's gonna completely flip his shit when he gets back there. Seriously, what a waste of time and taxpayer money. I think the whole thing is just ridiculous... and I would love to see the Army just once NOT be a bunch of douschebags. That'll never happen.

When it Rains it Pours.

Well the Hub is at home in NJ...he landed yesterday. Someone being sent home from Iraq and not for R&R means one thing... very bad news.
The Hub's mom was just diagnosed with a Brain Tumor... prognosis..bad, very bad. Let's just say this New Year hasn't turned out so well so far.

Hub's mom in the past 6 years or so has been a very sickly woman. She had major surgery to insert metal rods in her neck, where they didn't know if she was going to live, when he was in Iraq the first time so they sent him home on emergency leave. A few years ago she had a pain pump inserted, so this way they could administer the doses themselves whenever the pain got too bad. Over the years she had started to do things that everyone chalked up to the medication like mood swings, randomly falling asleep and other things that I'm not to sure of.

Well recently the pain had gotten really bad, so they went in to adjust her pain pump.. and on Christmas Eve.. she apparently wasn't really responding to anyone and started throwing up. So they thought she was going into overdose.. and went to the ER to adjust her pump again.

So the day after Christmas... I don't really know what happened but they had to take her back to the ER. At this point they decided to do a CAT scan. The results of the CAT scan showed that she had this tumor.

That night the Hub's sis called me at 730pm my time so I knew something was wrong. That phone call came right in the middle of the giant island wide blackout. From that point on the past week has been nothing but non stop hecticness.

The hub pretty much has instant access to the computer in Iraq.. so I text messaged his email to call me ASAP it was about his mom. Then proceeded to try and send a red cross message. It took almost 2 days for the red cross message to get through and only 2 hours for my hub to call me back. Telling him that his mom had a brain tumor.. and it was pretty bad, was one of the hardest things I ever had to do. Especially him being over there... I felt and still feel terribly helpless.

At this point.. the doctors have the prognosis at very bad.. and the doctors Red Cross message stats that "Life expectancy is poor". I see those words, know how sick she is and think. Bad.

Apparently his commander saw those words and said...

" Not good enough,, I need a better definition of 'life expectancy is poor. what does that mean exactly"

ARE YOU KIDDING ME?????

Now.. let me say something. My hub has done his year in the sandbox...he was one of the lucky suckers that got suck in this 15 month rotation bullshit..that only truly affected a few Brigades. What's 2 months off 15.. you seriously can't function the last 2 months without one soldier.

Ok. so now the hub is beside himself. He hasn't been able to see his mom since the punkin was born. Thats' almost 2 1/2 years.. if something happens before he gets home.. I don't know what he'll do.

I'm pisst off.. and think this is complete bull. The fight to get my hub home starts. To see the emails coming through about how upset he is and how he doesn't know what to do kills me. It makes me feel more helpless. So I do what anyone else in my position would do. I start making phone calls. Not Army bullshit phone calls .. f that. I go above that.

Lets just say some phone calls got made.. like Senate phone calls. Needless to say the phone calls didn't really go anywhere... but when I told my Hub that I was doing that.. his packet got signed and he was on his way home in 12 hours.

Don't mess with me or my family... I'll take you down how we do in Jersey.... Politically.

Now that the Hub is home .. I've gotten better details. Sadly, the type of tumor she has is the worst tumor you could possibly get. It's about the size of a Mango. The doctors removed only about 40% of it because they wanted her to have the best quality of life she can for the short amount of time she has. They give her anywhere from 3 months, if they do nothing... 19 months if they try and shrink with the chemo.

I'm not going home. I got permission to go from work as long as I was back for inventory by the 11th.Which really irratated me that I had to be back for that.They sent my Husband home from a war zone but no one can run my inventory. whatever.

I had gotten my plane tickets.. booked the whole 9. The punkin and I were supposed to leave tomorrow. Hubby told us not to come home. He says it's not that he doesn't want us there.. he just doesn't think its a good idea. He gave lots of valid reasons. cost of the ticket, most of the time he'll be at the hospital, what happens if I fly out there and she passes and then then have to fly right back, him and his sister don't want anyone to see her looking the way she looks, etc. I just want to be there for him.. if it was me.. I'd want him there. So as much as it hurts my feelings, I honored his wishes, canceled my tickets and are staying behind.

Now.. here's the next thing.. when his leave is up.. they are sending him back to the box. Is it me.. or does it make no sense that he'll have about 1 month left.. but they are still going to spend the money to fly him ALLL the way back to iraq only to fly him ALLL the way to Hawaii a month later. Wouldn't it make more sense to just send him here. Ohhh our tax dollars at work.

So that's whats up.. sorry my first post of the year is a big sad bummer post. I'm not a religious person.. but if anyone wants to send some prayers this way.. they'll always be appreciated.

I really hope 2009 isn't going to be too terrible.

The Rain on Christmas

Well Merry Christmas (and a belated Happy Thanksgiving)to all. I know it's been a while but the hecticness of Christmas at the mall is finally over... hence the first blog in over a month. I seriously haven't even opened this sight in like a month.

Today was a very mellow day.... I sat home.. just me and the kid, completely enjoyimg the solitude of it all. Again it rained on and off all day so best bet was to stay inside and that's exactly what we did.

A bunch of stuff happened in the last month... so I'll bullet point it and catch everyone up.
So here it is in no particular order

~Went to the base Christmas tree lighting.. always strikes me as kinda crazy when you get to watch the Christmas tree get lit in shorts and a tee and it's like 70 degrees.


There was a grammar school choir who sang a jingle bells song version of Santa being fat and the 60 year old choir director decided to do a solo and she was terrible. I taped her and actually thought about putting her up on YouTube. The punkin loves the lights so everynight we drive past the tree on the way home.. Since I didn't put up a tree this year, it's like our own tradition.. just the 2 of us.

~The Hub got promoted and finally made his E5... and we got our report date for West Point..so we'll be back east by August.. so if anyone wants to hang .. let me know.

~Dec 6 .. he was officially gone a year..and that means I've been writing this blog for a year. It went by way faster than I thought it would.. and now we are at the less than 2 month mark from home. I have to admit I do kind of dred having to share my house and bathroom with another person again , even if it is the Hub .For those who started late on my blog (and are actually still reading it).. here's the first post.. And so it begins..... I was a way more entertaining blogger back than.

~The squatter asked if he could move back in with us when they get back from Iraq.. and was told a resounding NO! The hubby blamed me, but it was him.. it's ok, he can blame me all he wants.

~Work was insane.. people are crazy this time of year. Black Friday was ridiculous, I had a girl pass out in the store at 845am waiting in line because she didnt eat. Since she was only 15 and was shopping with her friend .She was an unaccompanied minor and had to be taken away in the ambulance. She was fine.... just stupid. We did over 20 grand that day and were the #11 store in the company that day. Oh the craziness.

~There were 2 rushings of the punkin to the ACC. One for pink eye.. the other for an inflamed tonsil. The pink eye didn't worry me so much but the tonsil was so big in the back of her throat I completely freaked. Then she had a reaction to her medicine.. nothing serious but it just seems to be 1thing after the other. Her tonsil is still crazy big... i wonder if it doesn't go down if they'll have to take them out.

~My friend *J* threw a Christmas party at her house and turned the air down to like 60 so it was freezing cold and felt like winter. It was a blast and I finally learned the true definition of a "white elephant" gift .

~We've had 2 Video conference things to see my hubby since the one on Halloween. The last one was terrible.. the signal kept dropping and towards the end I couldn't hear him. It didn't really matter though... he got to see the punkin run around and stuff.

~I got totally obsessed with the Twilight craze... granted I had jumped on the bandwagon way before everyone else.(TEAM JACOB-CUZ REAL MEN DON'T SPARKLE DAMMIT!) I do have to admit I was way disappointed by the movie. So I'm kinda over it. I have started reading her book The Host.. started out kinda slow but now not so bad.

~Both my neighbors upstairs have moved out and they are completely renovating both apts. New screen doors, ceiling fans, the whole nine.. I think they are getting hardwood floors. It sure sounds like they are getting floors.. its really loud. This whole place is like unbelievably empty.... ever since the other Brigade left... even all the wives went home. I'm like one of 7 or 8 people left on my block.. but hey at least there's no traffic

~ I did the punkins xmas pictures for the christmas cards myself.. they came out pretty kick butt. I posted the semi fuzzy /far awayish ones.. just cuz you all know I don't like to post pics of the fam or the kid. Yay for snapfish and their very cool card selections. Yes that bottom one is right outside my patio gate.

Otherwise I think that is really everything. I am going to try and make a more conscience effort to blog... hopefully it will make these last 2 months go by super fast.

Merry Christmas all... hope you are all doing well. I'll try and catch up on all your lives in the next few days.

Decisions, Decisions

So I meant to blog yesterday but I fell asleep .. and then I meant to blog the day before but my power went out. So fingers crossed I'll finish this blog.

I've decided that I'm going to continue blogging, I'm sure that within the upcoming months with the hubby coming home and the PCS move I'll prolly need to vent and bitch. My current blogs may be as spuratic as they are now.. but they'll be around.

Next I've decided that I'm quitting my job. Probably not long after Christmas, my date is very tentative. I love my job but my last few months here, I'd really like to be able to spend it with the Hub, the punkin and really just enjoy Hawaii. Once I get back over to the mainland I'm sure I'll start back up again.. maybe even try something different. I'm not sure what but I guess time will tell.

I'm just getting to the point where I'm ready to move on from here. Once I finally leave here, I will never come back.

Hawaii has been a huge part of my life for the last ten years but the memories and friends (Good and bad) will be with me forever but I'm ready for it all to finally be in the past. A lot of my memories here ....I basically was alone. Yet, there are some memories that no matter how hard I try.. they ain't going anywhere. I also know that once I leave here there will be some people that I will never keep in touch with... that's sad to me but a fact of life. Another sad fact is.. I'm kinda okay with that.

I'm ready to go.

Homeward Bound

Well today is re-enlistment day. The Hub is officially staying a soldier for another 6 years. God help us... well .. help me. LOL.

They are doing some Veteran's Day Re-Up ceremony.. so Hubby was all over that and had to re-enlist to be part of that. There was another reason why Hubby had to re-enlist basically ASAP.

Since the hub had passed the promotion board, we had been throwing around a lot of ideas on where we should go next. Whether he wanted to change his MOS. He wanted to stay here... I told him if he re-enlisted to stay on this island.. he'd be staying by himself cuz I was not spending another 3 years here. Needless to stay he passed on that idea.

He also wanted to go to a non-deploying unit. He felt like he missed so much of the punkin's early days that he didn't want to miss anything else...so it began.

I wanted to go south.. he wanted to go back to Jersey. I didn't want to go back to Jersey... I just came from there. I wanted to be close to home..but far enough away to not be bothered all the time. He said middle east coast VA/DC/MD. We bounced around a couple of places and finally decided on a place. Then was he going to be able to get into a non-deploying slot. Oh the Drama.

The place we decided on was closed .. so he had to apply to see if there was going to be a slot open at the time ,we were due to peace out of this place. He said usually you get a yes or no answer within like a day or 2.

A week and a half ago he put in for the slot... and we waited. Day one and 2 passed with no word. Hub said that was normal. Then day 3 and 4 passed.. with still no word. I started to get discouraged but the Hub said not getting an immediate response was a good sign cuz if the slot was closed they would've came right back and said no. Another whole day went by when at like 4 am the following morning i get this text message:

"Guess what? We be going to West Point, I got the notice today. Luv you"

That's right we are headed to West Point. Which is super exciting for me... since it basically is only an hour drive from home for us. After spending all this time alone.. I get to hang out with my friends and fam AND the Hub is not deploying. Everyone back home is really happy. I think they are more excited to see our kid then actually us,LOL. Hub is just excited for Army football and the close distance to Yankee Stadium. Oh the priority.

The hub is locked-in but needed to re-up sooner than later to make sure it stays ours. So today is that day... and hopefully the Army doesn't screw anything up within the next 8 months.

Now I've been to visit West Point and gone to Bear Mountain a few times, but if anyone (all 4 of you that still read my terrible blog) has any suggestions, advice or just general info I could use I'll gladly take it.

The countdowns begin.

Another day, another post.

So on thursday the punkin turned 2! I bought her an Alice in Wonderland dress and that was her birthday dress.(Benefit of a Halloweenish birthday!) She was so cute.

Hard to believe that my little girl is 2, it went by so fast I can't believe it.
This whole year went by super fast.. which I guess is a good thing.. considering my hubby left in December. Only a few months left.

For Halloween she was Minnie Mouse.I never post pics but I am breaking my rule cuz she just looked so adorable!!!She was totally amused with the whole concept of trick or treating thing. When she got tired I would have to carry her from house to house... but always wanted to walk up to the house herself.



Lastly after trick or treating.. we had our first VTC(video teleconference) with the hubby in Iraq. His computer is not completely working so hence no webcam. This was the first time we got to see each other since he was home in April. He got to see the punkin all dressed up in her costume. It was really great to see him, I miss him bunches.

Only like 3 more months... I hope it goes fast.

I do want to post... I think.

Most days I don't want to write. It feels more like a chore than anything else.

I can't decide if it's just the fall funk or if I really don't want to do this anymore.

This time of year always gets me like super bummed. There's never enough time, work is always insane and even though fall is my favorite season... this is the worst time of year for me emotionally. It really doesn't help that my hubby is deployed and I'm stuck out here pretty much by myself

Maybe it's just that I don't have time or I just don't think I have anything really worth blogging about. I've been debating whether or not I want to keep blogging for the past month or so now.

This deployment is slowly coming to an end and the whole point of the blog was to have a place to vent, bitch, yada yada throughout the whole thing. Apparently (knock on wood) it's been way more uneventful than I thought it was going to be.

So now I've come to a crossroads.. and I'm still debating.

Sigh