to my DH -- a rem

Dear Sweetie --

Thank you so much for being so supportive both before and after my surgery for prolapsed bladder. Thank you for encouraging me to get the surgery done sooner than later, so it wouldn't get worse. Thank you for taking the first two weeks off after surgery til my sister could get here to help me out.

Now what I need you to remember is how independent you and our 17 year old son were when I was bed-bound! You both fed yourselves, got your clothes washed and dried and put away, packed your own lunches, got your own breakfasts. I heard you talking to our son about continuing to be independent once I got back on my feet. I was so proud of both of you for jumping in and doing what was needed to keep the home running.

Once my sister got here, though, you both started to depend more and more on her, now me. I will still be working in the kitchen at night, or folding laundry, or cleaning or -- or -- or --- while you're watching tv and our son is on youtube or facebook (or maybe actually doing homework!) --- and I have to go back to work for a few short weeks. Can't wait! More work to do and being tired as well. The silver lining is that it's an elementary school and I will only have a few weeks to work before having the summer off.

Today has been a really great day with lots of energy and being busy and making the house look good, but also I'm getting sick of of being alone all day -- but at the same time, the thought of going back to work and not being able to rest when I want to or need to is daunting. Just now I started boo-hooing like I haven't in a long time.

What broke me down today was a lot of things: waiting to hear from our daughter about her scholarship, waiting to make sure she got back to college safely (had to come to our home town to be interviewed for the scholarship and she was driving a friend's car down here and back up), trying to coordinate when to go get her when college lets out for the summer (she's getting back from a mission trip to Haiti, the coordinator expects them to arrive at 3 AM) -- thinking about swinging by where my parents and dear aunt are buried and taking flowers (the classic fake ones) --- and then having a crying bout because my parents are gone and my aunt (who was like a second Mama to me) is too, and she shouldn't have had to die as young as she did...now my daughter just called and she didn't make the cut on the scholarship. She's understandably disappointed, but they told her to apply next year, so that's good. I really didn't expect her to get it because she is a rising sophomore in the nursing college, and its a nursing scholarship, so they probably wanted someone who's already taking nursing classes. But it was the trying to figure out how to get up to see my parents' and aunt's gravesites that rore me up the most. I miss them so much, but especially my aunt, because she became desperately ill very rapidly and in the course of one year died.

DH, I need your support right now. I pray that, when you come home, you will not make a joke and try to get me to laugh and forget my worries, but will just hug me and listen.

Your DW --