Sometimes life sucks so much I can barely stand living it. Sometimes the dark is so full and hopeless, I can't see an end to it. Sometimes I just want to curl up and sleep until things are better.

My husband's mom is dying. She's a wonderful, beautiful, amazing woman. Kind. Sweet. Caring. Funny. We thought she had 4-6 months, more with chemo, but it's not looking good. She isn't doing well and my FIL said J should visit her this weekend. Just to be safe. They'll pay for his plane ticket, which is so wonderful. I'm very grateful.

I will be on my own. My hubby does everything for me; makes me dinner, walks the dog 2x a day, feeds the cats, cleans the litter boxes. I'm very pregnant, some of these things I cannot do, some I just need help with. He asked if someone in my family could come help out while he's away. I called my mom.

She tells me - Oh, dear, I just told my friend I'd watch her dog for her.

Excuse me?

My husband's mom is dying. I need my mom here. Her friend's dog is apparently more important than than either of those things.

Oh, but her friend has no one else, and her friend asked her first. You know what? I have no one else either. No one else is my Mom.

If one of us, between the two of us, her friend and I, should have to find or make other plans, shouldn't it be the friend?

I told her I couldn't even talk to her right now. That I didn't know why she couldn't just tell her friend something came up. I'm sure the woman would understand, under the circumstances.

I'm family. I'm the GD pregnant daughter. I need help and my mom won't be there for me.

I can't even describe how hurt and angry I'm feeling right now. There are no words capable of encompassing these feelings.

I am undone.


Edit: My mom did call her friend, who boarded her dog for the weekend, and my mom came here to keep me company. It was very good to have her here as my mother-in-law passed away early Sunday morning. It was awful and I'm glad I wasn't alone.

In shock

I'm a bit in shock. We just got some bad news. Bad isn't even really the word for it. Horrible. Awful. Tragic.

My husband's mom has cancer. And it's stage 4. Inoperable. Barely treatable. They can do chemo and it may prolong her life a few months. Without the chemo it's something like 6-8 months, with it, she could have 10. Maybe longer. With these things, the docs can't ever really be certain.

When we were visiting she wasn't feeling well and had finally gone to the doctor. Apparently she'd been not feeling well for a while but like many people, didn't want to go to the doctor. Not that a few months would have made much difference. It's likely this has been growing for 2 years or so. She went to the doctor who ordered an ultrasound. The results came back the same day we were leaving, spots on her liver. A CT scan was scheduled.

Someone said - Could it be cancer? I don't remember who. I think it was my 11 yr old niece. I forget. We all shook our heads - No, I'm sure it's not. No... My MIL really likes to drink her wine and has indulged herself in that regard for a number of years now. She's not a drunk, she just enjoys drinking. And really, who doesn't? I do. My first thought on the ultrasound results was cirrhosis, and she said the same thing - Maybe it's cirrhosis. I said, Well that seems more likely. She chided me and I laughed, telling her I'd never had said it if she hadn't said it first. This is what I thought it was. I really, truly didn't consider cancer as an actual possibility. I should know better by now.

The CT scan results came back last week and they weren't good. The doc was saying cancer, tumors on her liver and upper stomach. An appt. was made with an oncologist.

We were still positive. Cancer can be beaten, right? We don't know anything yet, we don't even know what kind of cancer it is. We'll just wait and see. I'm sure everything will be fine.

Then the news today. And things are definitely not going to be fine.

We lost my dad in March. We had a while to prepare. We knew his time was limited and we made the most of it. I think that was helpful. I'm glad we have that for my MIL as well. At least we have some time. Time to process, to say what we want to say, do things we want to do, make the time count. I only wish we lived closer to her. She was going to be out this Winter, to get away from the cold. If she's in treatment though, I'm sure that won't be happening. She may visit, and I hope she does.

My husband was upset last week, today so far he's stoic. I haven't seen him yet, just spoke to him on the phone. He didn't want to talk about it right then and I can understand that. He's at work. I'm surprised he didn't come home but maybe he just wanted the day to seem normal. I know that feeling.

He was really sad last week thinking that Maia won't get to know her Grandma. She'll never know my dad either. I don't know what her other Grandpa is going to do. His plans were with her. They were his plans but always with her. I worry about him. I worry about my husband. I'm so sad about all of this.

If there's one thing I really hate, it's fighting about money. I hate it. I know it's a typical couples thing but it freaking sucks. It's like dirty dishes - never ending.

In my past my family has struggled with money. It's not something we really talk about and I don't know how many people know about it, but there were a lot of times that it was really hard. I was 12-13 when I remember it getting really bad, when the landlord called and told me my parents were behind on the rent and we were going to lose our home and they'd better call him back. When the creditors started calling. When I'd see my dad come home from work and just sit in the car for 20+ minutes before coming in, looking worried. When I thought my parents might actually get divorced. And when no one would really talk to me about what was going on.

My family has not been good with money and I just sort of got programmed deep down that I was never going to be like that, never going to put myself in that same situation, not if I could help it. When I found myself with more debt than I could feasibly pay for, 15 or so years ago, I got a 2nd job, and then a 3rd. I looked around for what I might be able to sell. I have worked 2 jobs pretty much ever since. When I got married I worked really hard to make sure we didn't go into debt to pay for our wedding. Afterwards, when my husband and I combined our debt, I had him get a 2nd job and we both worked to pay it off. Then in celebration, we saved for a few months and went on a trip of a lifetime - to Italy. We spent a lot of money and it didn't matter because we'd saved up for months to do just that.

Unfortunately, even with the best intentions, somehow we've found ourselves in a bit of credit card debt again. Not nearly so bad as when we were first married, but still more than I'm comfortable with. And now there's a baby on the way. And what are we going to do? I can't afford to quit my job, and we can't afford childcare. It's not worth working if I'm just paying someone to watch the baby while I work. What's the point of that? But I can't not work. I've looked at the budget, it's just not feasible. There's not only the money from my job that we'd lose but my cell phone, the reimbursement for our Internet, and most importantly my insurance.

While the baby isn't here yet and money isn't scarce, I'm in full on "we need to watch our pennies!" mode. So then I find myself arguing with my husband over stupid stuff like a small bag of trail mix. He said it was on sale. I said it still wasn't a good deal. He said he was buying it anyway. I said fine. I did point out that he could get a much bigger bag at another store and it'd be a better value. I also pointed out we already had an almost full bag of trail mix at home. Then, in line at the checkout, I threw him a box of candy I was going to pay for myself (it was expensive and not something I needed, so I didn't think it should have to come out of our grocey budget, I was willing to buy it for myself, with my allowance). I told him if we were buying him a "treat" then I should get one too, and we should pay for my candy. He didn't agree, said it was candy. I said so what, it's a treat. You got something, I should get something. He said it wasn't the same, I said it was. He said he wanted something to eat while at work, food. I said I wasn't arguing about that, just that I thought he'd made a poor choice.

Rather than pay for my candy he stalked off and put the trail mix back. I actually did not expect that. I figured I'd get my candy, he'd get his trail mix. So I bought my own candy, as I was planning to do anyhow, and he didn't get the trail mix. But after that, the drive home was depressing and the idea of dinner... I didn't want to eat his anger filled food so I asked if he could cook tomorrow and I had cereal for dinner. He went off on his own and ate out I think, I don't know. He wasn't really talking to me. Over trail mix.

I know it's so stupid. Part of me feels badly, but the other part of me is like - I didn't say he couldn't buy it, it was his choice to put it back. And it WAS expensive, for a very small amount. And if we don't start saving some money or getting some of that debt paid off before the baby gets here, we're going to have big problems. The kind of problems I promised myself I'd never have.

I know he thinks it's about the trail mix. He probably also thinks it's about control. It's not. (And he could have freaking bought the GD trail mix! Argh!) It's about trying to stick to a budget, and trying to make it work NOW so that it's something we're used to and maybe even good at by the time it actually becomes necessary. We have a budget for groceries and for going out, but we haven't actually stuck to it in probably a year. Every time I would get on his case about it he'd have all sorts of reasons why it doesn't work, why we should increase the budget rather than try to stick to it, why it didn't matter because we had the money. Well now it matters. Now it's really going to be important, and I don't want to have the bank calling because we missed a house payment, or a car payment, or have the fear of bankruptcy hanging over my head in a year because we can't learn to live within our means. I won't do it.

I just want him to be on my side. I want us to be working together towards the same goal. I want us to be a team. He just wants expensive trail mix.