Rollercoaster

After Mom's bad days the first part of this week, she's had a few good days lately - kind of up and down like a rollercoaster. She's been up and about with a trip to Target with me and a trip out with her sister, Rallet. Our time at Target was interesting since I had my pouty 4-year-old with me...and my mom kept rolling herself away in her wheelchair. I don't usually bribe my kids for good behavior but the $$ I spent on a toy for Jack-Jack that day was worth every penny!

The last few days she's been feeling better but she's also been pretty fiesty. She says she feels like we are trying to railroad her into doing things she doesn't want to do. It's hard to know when to stop helping - like for instance when I picked out an outfit for her and she said she wanted to save it for a nice occasion (?? It wasn't fancy!) I told her she could wear it anytime she wanted and she told me to stop pressuring her!

She has so many up and down days that it's hard to pull back from helping on the up days. I'll tell her that I can do the dishes and she feels like I'm telling her what to do. Yet on other days, she doesn't feel well enough to even get out of bed for very long. I feel like a jerk for ever letting her do the dishes, even when she insists! Tareq says to not take any of it personally and I don't--I'm just trying to do the right thing for her. It's difficult.

So anyway, I walk in today to sit with Mom while my dad goes to church and, with a big smile, Mom says, "You are going to love meeting your Grandpa Christiansen some day! He'll tell you he is so proud of you and give you a great big bear hug!" And I get a little misty-eyed because she's talking about a grandfather I've never met...and because she's thinking about seeing him again.

And then she tells me all about her outing with her sister where they stopped a missle from exploding at the last minute. Either that was a very exciting afternoon with Aunt Rallet or it was the ending to the movie she watched last night. Either way, it's a rollercoaster everyday!