Glenn links to this interesting post at Dr. Helen's site about Grandparents who don't have time to grandparent, based on this article. He asks if these are the same parents who were too busy to be parents, and Dr. Helen wonders if the lack of relationship between children and the extended family keeps them from understanding close human interactions or makes them believe that love is really only about material things. The answer is: well, DUH.

I can just see these women who don't want to be Grandma. Twenty years ago, these were the self-obsessed, career driven mothers of my friends. Trying to be there for the after-school pick up and the PTA, but not worrying overly much if the kids had to walk home or the PTA brownies came from the grocery store. Too busy with their own lives to consider that the "safe" neighborhood the kids walked home through was still dangerous after dark, that the grocery store brownies told all the other kids that you didn't really care, that you were too busy for your kid.

And Hell Yes, we made fun of those kids.

The 80s was all about the Superwoman. Could Mom work outside the home and still have a clean house and take care of the kids? The consensus was that something had to give. For a lot of these women, it was the precious moments with their kids, the small kindnesses that mean so much, and the closeness that the rest of us shared with our moms. Yet they fooled themselves that because the house was clean and the kids were doing well in school that they could have it all.

Somehow it was never important to be there, to make time. And now that their children are parents, these now grown-up children realize what they missed, and they want that for their own children. So they make time, they skip meetings and make brownies, they ask Grandma and Grandpa to spend time with the kids, and they are still disappointed.

But it's more than that. Being Grandma is being old. Hell, most of our grandmothers were at least in their 70s. For the most part, they weren't active, independently wealthy, and still working in their chosen career. Our grandmas were cooks and knitters and nurturers, with their silver hair and never ending fount of kleenex and hard candies. Today's grandmas are tech-saavy, go to work every morning, and command respect outside the home. If you were a balls-to-the-wall coroporate type, would you want to be called ANYTHING that brings to mind a blue haired woman in a rocker?

And being Grandma is an imposition. After all, it wasn't their choice to have babies, toddlers, and children around again. Their kids did this to them. The author of the article even says this in reference to her grandchildren:

Look, I'd love to nip over and whisper secrets into 1-month-old Maggie's ears, or to dress 2-year-old Ryan in the black leather jacket I bought her recently and take her to look for late blackberries in Golden Gate Park on my bike (with its deluxe new kid seat). But I have a job. I'm a reporter, I have two books to write, a husband who wants to go to France, and I just bought an investment property in Portland, Oregon. I love my grandchildren, but being a grandmother got added to my to-do list.
[emphasis mine]

Added to her to-do list. As if she only is Grandma because she has to be. As if she never expected her own children to grow up and have children of their own. Maybe she just doesn't see her own children as self-actualized individuals with lives and loves of their own. Or maybe she didn't want her children to be tied down the way she was. Another Grandma in the article is quoted as saying (paraphrasing here) that while she loves her grandbabies and wants to be a part of their lives, she's not willing to give up her life to deal with them.

If being a grandma is so damn inconvenient, it's a wonder some of the parents of these grandkids were even born so their moms could be grandmas. Hell, Roe has been the law of the land for more than 30 years.

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Peanut's Home!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

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Meet Margi and Koolaid's little Peanut.  Mommy's home, but baby is going to stay in the NICU to bulk up a little. They'll let him go home when he hits his fighting weight

Congrats again, you two.  You did good!

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Specifically those of you close to the finish line (Deb, Dana, Mrs. Phin, etc.)...

Don't let this give you any ideas about bringing another blog-baby into the world this week

Welcome to the world, Barrett Elijah (Paladin)!  You must have been in a real hurry, to come out after only 7 hours!

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More encouraging news about Mikey!

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Smash has a fabulous AAR from his visit in the hospital with Mikey.
Mikey is definitely in there, responding to touch and to words, and fighting hard to get better and come back to us as the Mikey we all know.
Keep praying folks, he's a long way from out of the woods...... And keep hitting the PayPal button (on the sidebar here), almost $1000 donated so far!

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Margi's Little Peanut made his debut this afternoon weighing in at 4 lbs and 15 oz and is 18
inches long.  Small but feisty.

Little man and Mommy are both doing well!  More to come as soon as Koolaid can tear himself away!

It's a good day for blog babies, today is also Draco Esmay's 1st birthday

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Smash and Da Goddess have set up a PayPal fund to help out Mikey's family.  Although they have insurance, there's a hefty deductible, and Mikey won't be bringing in a paycheck for a long time.  Mrs. Mikey can't work either, as she is staying by his side.  Every little bit you can drop in the bucket helps.

The button is on the sidebar.  Click early and often!!

Come on folks, you donated almost $100,000 in 11 days to Soldier's Angels, surely we can raise enough to buy gas and groceries for a few weeks!

If you's like to send a card, Smash has generously made his PO Box available.  The address is:

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Koolaid took Margi to the hospital today.  No baby yet, they just want to watch her closely as the pre-eclampsia signs are starting to ramp up and the little man will probably be asked to make his grand entrance by this weekend.

Keep the Lowrys in your prayers as they wait for their special delivery!

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GOOD NEWS!

from DaGoddess:

"I spoke with Mrs. Mikey a while ago and this is the update I received:

Sedation was lowered and Mikey responded. The nurse was wiping his
face with a cloth, he seemed to like it, and turned toward her. She
told him to turn his head back the other way but he wouldn't do so.
Mrs. Mikey told him to turn his head toward her, and he did!

At one point, Mrs. Mikey was talking to her friend about him and he
pulled her arm. She asked him if he wanted her to stop talking about
him and he pulled her arm again. She stopped talking about him and he
relaxed.

They've reduced his blood pressure medication because his blood pressure has come down. Yay!

His blood pressure and his ICP are lowest when his daughter is by his side.

This is all good news. Very good news. Still, he's not out of the
woods yet. The doctor has told Mrs. Mikey that there is brain damage,
no doubt about it. How much? They don't know yet. And the stroke
occurred in the part of the brain that controls personality and
cognitive ability. Mikey may not be the same guy he was before."

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Pixy has set up a post on Mikey's blog where you can leave your thoughts and prayers for his wife.

To do so, go here.  And go here for updates as they come in.

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From Da Goddess:

"Mikey had surgery tonight to remove the blood clot and stop other bleeding. His intracranial pressure is rising (not a good sign) and he remains in a medically induced coma. His wife is trying her best to be strong, but it's difficult. She's scared and confused."

Da Goddess will update her page as soon as she gets more news. Please keep up the good wishes and prayers for Mikey and his family, as it seems he needs them now more than ever!

You can drop by Mikey's page or Da Goddess's to leave messages of support for Mikey's family.

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I was the only child, you see, and the youngest grandchild on both sides by a minimum of 10 years, so stories like this are foreign to me....

This happened at Bou's house tonight:

"Today the boys informed me they were going to have Bones put on his Hulk costume and then shoot nerf stuff at his butt to see if he could feel it. Nice. The crap they come up with amazes me.

So I'm in the kitchen making a salad and I hear, "Let's punch him now and see if he feels it!"

Yeah, that's never a good thing to hear.

I was in that room within fractions of a second to find my youngest standing in the middle of the room, but almost looking bow legged. I shouted, "STOP! There WILL BE NO PUNCHING!"

They know the rules: the Be No's of this home. There will be no punching. There will be no kicking. There will be no spitting. Or typically as I say it, "There will be no punching, kicking, hitting, spitting or beating of each other!"

All three of them looked at me blank faced like, "Are YOU talking TO ME?" Like they were innocent. I heard them. I HEARD THEM!

Finally one of the eldest said, "Mom, we're going to hit him in the weenie; he can't feel it. He's wearing 20 pairs of underwear"

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As most of you know, my Dad was recently hospitalized for MAJOR surgery to remove a tumor.  Due to some complications (edema and pneumonia), his total hospital stay was 21 days, including 4 in the ICU and 2 more in "telemetry step down", which is similar, but less closely monitored.

In any case, the total bill was (get ready for it) $196,787.63.

Yes, you read that right.

Now, my parents are lucky enough to have fabulous insurance, a PPO plan that includes $0 co-pay for inpatient services and  considers the hospital Dad was treated in as a preferred provider.

The insurance paid $51,975.00.  The hospital considers the bill paid under their PPO agreement.

Imagine if they had no insurance or minimal insurance.  They would have had to sell the house to save Dad's life.

Clearly the hospitals have jacked up the prices so far that they're still breaking even (and probably doing well) taking in just 26.4% of the bill.  And it's no anomaly.  Their insurance plan is one of the major plans in town, as Mom's employer is the largest in the county.  The hospital expects that the majority of their patients will be under a PPO plan.  So why jack up the prices that high?  To screw the poor and uninsured?  To make them choose between saving their life and caring for their family?

No wonder the insurance companies are complaining.  If this wasn't a PPO  provider, and the insurance paid 80% (what my last plan would have paid for a non-PPO inpatient stay), the insurance company would have been out $157,430.104, more than 3 times what they paid....

The system is out of control.   But socialized medicine isn't the answer either.  So what should be done?

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An open series of questions to any of you with blogs, we'll call this the last audience participation special of National De-Lurking Week:

Do you blog under your real name?
Do your family/ off-line friends know about the blog?
Is that a reason you don't use your real name?
If you blog anonymously, have your off-line friends who know about the blog ever outed you to someone you'd prefer to keep away from your blog?
Doesn't it piss you off when people cross your personal blog boundaries?
How do you go about handling something like that (which is really an invasion of your privacy)?

I ask this because dear Helen just experienced a major betrayal of her boundaries at an incredibly bad time, and I had a similar, though not nearly so devastating experience recently, and I know others who have (or are about to) run screaming from their old blogs because of trolls they knew in real life (you know who you are).

Your thoughts?  Any advice for Helen?  I really am interested to hear what you have to say. Email me if you don't feel all that comfortable leaving a comment....

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To my wonderful Mother and my dear friend A.

And to adorable Brandon, too.

Here's to a better year than the last and many many more.

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At least, according to this lovely lady (from whom I stoleborrowed this graphic).

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...that Margi tagged me with, and I was watching the PC about the miner who went to the hospital, when a woman ran up to Anderson Cooper screaming that all the other miners were dead.  Seems that just when they told us all was well, the worst possible thing happened.  And I'm sobbing.  Just sobbing.

How in God's name did they fuck this up so badly?  We were wondering why we didn't see the miners come out, why the ambulances weren't running, why the hospital only received one patient.

Now we know.  What kind of cruel bastard would let this happen to these poor people who have suffered so much over the last two days?  How could they have been taken from the depths of despair to utter joy, back to horrified pain again?

The president of the mine company is on TV right now, eating a big shit sandwich.  Trying to cover his ass, but frankly the man is going to burn for it.  He says his company never said everyone was alive.  But in reality, they never said that they weren't either.  His company could have avoided this SNAFU by saying that they COULD NOT CONFIRM that there were any survivors.

Now he's spinning like a top.  Your ass is SO toast buddy.  Your company is going down in a blaze of courtroom glory.

Anyway, maybe tomorrow I'll answer that meme and Fight On! for USC, but tonight, I just don't have the heart.

Let your dear ones know you love them everyday.  You never know which day is the one when they won't come back to you.

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