Friday, October 15, 2010

Overwhelmed

Sometimes I get so overwhelmed I just can't deal with the simplest of tasks.

Holding my girl
The heater in our apartment doesn't work again and we need to tell our landlord ASAP. Normally something like this would not stress me out too much, but with T going through cancer treatment and her immunity being compromised as a result, has me worried that we will spend yet another winter with a heater that works occasionally at best. 

That jerk my landlord hired to buy and install this heater took advantage of her, she got swindled by her "repair man" who got this non returnable heater for her...we call him Mr. Magoo. He's actually a cross between Mr. Magoo and Archie Bunker and never EVER admits he's clueless.

I hope she doesn't use him again and just chooses to buy a good heater herself from sears or where ever? They deliver, they install, and they guarantee their stuff and if something is wrong they will either fix or replace it....Mr. Magoo who is quite frankly a jack ass better not try and take advantage of her again. She and we deserve better.

T has developed a new side effect. The palms of her hands feel as if she burned them on a hot frying pan. They are tender, red, and tingle. This raises new problems. The new chemotherapy she's supposed to start in a week causes the problem she's already having with her hands, which means it could make it worse.....so off to a neurologist we go to find out exactly what is causing this side effect just to make sure.

The neurologist will determine the cause, the oncologist will then have to re-think the type of chemo she can give T....oh and that might mean chemo every single week with extra medicine to try and control the side effects. This means we also have to worry about how accommodating T's work will be with her needing treatment EVERY week.

If that's not enough, we are seeing the surgeon next Thursday late in the afternoon to decide if it's time for surgery yet. If it is, we have to pray her work will accommodate us being as they are not allowing her to even apply for FMLA until November (because she qualified months ago but missed the 5 day window to sign up that they never told her about).....so will she have a job and keep her insurance or not? 

I don't want to put off her surgery until she can sign up for FMLA, if they don’t accommodate us, I'm gonna be pissed....sooooo worried about that.

All this is preventing me from enjoying the bit of happy news we got which is that the chemo is working. The tumors are smaller.....even the nodes in her lungs which we don't know if they are cancer or not have shrunk, SOME of the lymph nodes even disappeared......what the doctors are doing is working, and I don't want T's f#cking job to interfere with that, even though the doctors will work with us either way....

I want to be happy, cry out of frustration, and scream all at once to express a dozen conflicting emotions at once.

This all hit me at once and......I just shut down for a few hours to get my sh!t together before I could do anything.....sounds stupid......silly even.....but I just couldn't deal. My world is out of control and that's really hard for someone like me who tries to think of every possible scenario so I can have a plan for each and every one.

I just want to do some fun things with my girl as much as possible to help us both get through this. She's a tough cookie, my girl......stronger then she thinks she is and while I fear EVERYTHING, I long for the day we can look back on all this as a distant memory.

3 comments:

  1. OK - maybe I missed something and maybe this is none of my business but. FMLA (Federal Family Leave Act) requires that you have been employed FT and worked 12 consecutive months. You don't "sign up" for it. It's a federal law and entitles you to up two 12 weeks of unpaid leave (you can take it in 15 min increments but that is another story). I'll apologize for this too, I missed what state you live in, but if it's CT they have the CTFMLA which entitles you to 16 weeks but it is offset by what you take under the FMLA but it means ultimately that if you live in CT your T's job (or an equivilant in hours and salary is gauranteed for 16 weeks. The only thing you need is a medical note saying she has a medical condition and a letter formally requesting the leave of absense. If you haven't read this it might help. http://jobsearch.about.com/cs/employmentlaw/a/fmla.htm

    You comment about missing the enrollment - maybe what you meant was enrollment for short term or long term disability coverage that you employer offers which would pay T will she is on Leave.

    One more thing - and god forbid it should happen, but if she were medically unable to work for 6 months she would be eligible to Social Security Disability Benefits.

    I used to handle all LTD,FMLA, WC, and Disability for 10 years so if you need any help or info I can probably point you in the right direction. FYI - Tina, Jess and Katie L all have my email feel free to get it from them

    ReplyDelete
  2. Thank you CAB. Your right, I miss spoke. It's the short term and long term disability they are making her wait for even though she qualified quite awhile ago.

    The FMLA she can and will sign up for mid-November.

    I am always very grateful for any advice and info. Thanks so much for taking the time to comment...and thanks for the links too, gonna go check them out today.

    My email is katpop@snet.net. I may just take you up on picking your brain in the next month or so, if that's O.K.

    Much love to you.

    ReplyDelete
  3. You're welcome - I just sent you an email so you have mine.

    ReplyDelete