Utter Exhaustion

It's friday and I have spent all day anticipating a nap, but once home I am too tired to sleep. It has a been a long week of decision making. I've found a few paying jobs doing research so I had to seriously weigh the option of going back to get my M.Sc versus making a lot more money doing something that is hopefully challenging and enjoyable.

Family life has been a bit strenuous, to say the least. My sister has a seizure disorder that is progressively getting worse. She is on a waiting list to get with the doctor who can put her on a waiting list to start the tests in order to be considered for a surgery which she has been told she needs. Health care can be so unBELIEVABLY frustrating. This morning, as we bustle around getting ready for school & work she falls into a bad seizure (hers are not the 'grande mal' as they are sometimes known but are called complex-partial absence seizures). She is on meds which prevent her from going as deeply unconscious, but I now am not sure how I feel about the meds either (she's tried endless combinations and numbers of meds, non work). She cannot communicate or understand any language before, during or after any seizure, and today the seizure wouldn't stop. The seizure wouldn't stop and she started to cry. Though she couldn't even send facial expressions to us to tell us how she was feeling, the seizure had been long enough to feel like it wasn't going to end, she was conscious enough to feel fear and start to cry. My heart has been broken all day.

To add to the drama, my mothers sister has the rarest and most aggressive type of breast cancer and she is not emotionally well to begin with. She has been over here almost every day and my mom is a wreck. At the moment her surgical incisions from the mastectomy are retaining fluid after the removal of her shunts and she is in a lot of pain, even while medicated (because of this they cannot start the chemo she so desperately needs because she has to be loaded up with antibiotics to make sure the incisions and ceromas do not get infected).
My Mother is exhausted having been her 24/7 caregiver for the past month, my Father is stressed right along side her and sometimes I wonder if the overall emotional health of a home can be a source of sickness in itself.

I spend all day working with children who have severe multiple disabilites, which sometimes makes our problems seem small and insignificant; but some days I feel like I bear the weight of so many and just wish I could shut it all off (explaining the search for a new job).

Thank god we can take therapy outdoors now that spring is officially here - today it was the only thing keeping me awake and sane.... that and the endless smiles and cuddles children throw at you.

I am escaping south to Nevada in about a week for 5 days of frivolous fun - but before then I will post my latest thoughts (not just listing the things contributing to my tiredness).