Overwhelmed to Overcomer Chapter Seven

The final chapter and tying up loose ends .....
September 4th 2017 .... thid will kind of be a "post script" for chapter's 1 -6
   In between all these situations .... there were a lot of emotions and life changing feelings that were dying off and some new ones coming alive through a series of UP's and DOWN's . Death of some dyed in the wool feelings, emotions, ideals and attitudes were VERY PAINFUL!! .... BUT OH SO  ... necessary!! I am going to write some of the things I have been through in this dying & coming alive process ... they may not be in chronological order but here they are ......

#1) The day after Christmas 2016 .... we discovered a large lump in the side of our Chocolate lab Molly's side .... trip to the vet confirmed our worst fears .... INOPERABLE TUMOR on her spleen .. it had already spread onto other areas of her organs .... Hubby was a mess, he was a broken soul, loosing his best friend and nothing could console him .... days turned into weeks of crying and depression for him ... I was worried sick for him .... Molly passed away @ home February 12th 2017 We had been blessed with her the day after Christmas 2008 when she wandered into my apartment complex cold and hungry and homeless ...... we had her for 9 years.

#2) Around December 30th 2016 ... I received a call from my sister ... Mom was being hospitalized ... she had had a bad cough for some time .... the short story is .... they found a tumor on her thymus gland ... a HUGE TUMOR .... she remained hospitalized for two weeks as they ran tests ..... she needed surgery!! As the tests rolled in we learned it was laying across her heart & lungs!! We also learned it was cancerous. .... my 83 year old Mom was in serious trouble!! ... THIS IS WHERE PRAYER WORKS!! calls went out all over the globe literally .... with a brother in California, and a sister who use to live on the other side of the world ... a prayer chain was set up of magnificent per portions!! ..... Her surgery would be a go on March 17th 2017 if she passed all the endurance tests she had to .... ENDURE!! to see if she could withstand this major surgery. The tumor was 6 inches in diameter and 9 inches long laying cross ways in her chest .,..... (plus it was cancerous) ......

#3) At the end of February several weeks after Molly passed away .... Hubby insisted I look @ a picture on his computer .... I thought it was Molly .... It wasn't .... SIGH .... I had encouraged him to wait about 3 months before getting another dog .... I felt he needed time to grieve and get past the depression ..... He felt he needed another dog ..... so off to Lexington KY he headed to look @ this other dog ...... Thor Hersey Chance Melee .... a registered Chocolate Field Lab .... an OX of massive proportions .... we decided Chance would be his called name .... he was not quite 2 years old ..... SIGH!! have you ever had a 2 yr old Lab? they are still a puppy all 85 pounds of his huge bouncy inquisitive huge block head frame!!! He had a love of anything plastic ... so everything plastic was at risk !! and FOOD ... he can open doors, he inhales food .... like a vacuum cleaner .... some of his new less then fond nicknames are "NO CHANCE", BLOCKHEAD, VACUUM CLEANER ....

#3) I took in a homeless lady around late February 2017 ... who was brought to my apartment complex by someone from Saint Vincent DePaul's society, they had put her up in a local motel and could not carry her bill any longer .... one of the lady's at the motel took her in ... God bless her .... for about two weeks .... then she came to me ... SIGH .... Dr Jekyll / Dr Hyde split personality .... stayed up all night and was HATEFUL .... OK ... I needed this slap in the face to wake up and see I didn't need to take in these kind of people!!! .... I was already dealing with SO MUCH !! then I took her in .... (side note: Fanny and Harry were still here with Pixie & Bubby) ..... and I had my poor stepmom Susie to contend with as she tried to survive in this atmosphere of CHAOS!!! (with Dementia it was not easy) .....

#4) I had been planning to go to New York for my Mom's surgery .... God was gracious and my sweet Hubby agreed to let me take his truck .... (side note: this was decided when I was determined to pack out all my daughter's belongings she had left here when she came to stay with us in October of 2014 before Hubby had his open heart surgery, to be here to help out .... ) I spent day's packing and repacking up Daughter's belongings .... BY MYSELF .... although I'd ask for help .... Hubby was in such a state of depression he was helpless and useless @ this point!! .... so I lugged and lugged and heaved everything and stacked everything in the truck .... Finally finished it in the evening of the 12th of March .... The game plan was .... Pull out the early morning of the 15th and arrive in New York the evening of the 15th ... have all day the 16th to recoup from the trip and do some visiting then on the 17th head to the hospital with Mom spend the week with her and head back home the 22nd.

#4)  ..... BUT GAME PLANS CAN GO OUT THE WINDOW FAST !!!! .... on the morning of the the Monday the 13th .... I was up @ my usual mid-wee hour dogs out run .... about 2AM .... my nerves were soooo jangled I couldn't go back to sleep .... I sat up in my Prayer Room, had some Chamomile tea and wrote in my journal .... checked the wood stove and it was Ok ..... about 3:30AM I got up and smelled smoke .... went out and the hallway was full .... SIGH!!! NOW WHAT?? wood stove chimney appeared to be leaking ??? .... NOT!! it was coming from the LAUNDRY ROOM and we had a house fire .... woke everyone up and said "GET OUT NOW"!!! Fire department arrived in minutes (we are about 5 miles from them .... ) .... God is so amazing!! .... JUST AWESOME .... the rest of this story ... some years ago we put all our water lines in the ceiling .... except into the laundry room and we ran them under the wall cabinets and into the water heater room. It was this decision that God was able to utilize in the saving of our home!!  The fire ... which was in the lint hose running to the outside had melted the hot water line and water was spraying on the fire and keeping it contained and downsized. .... I will try and explain the 2nd miracle in this picture ... the water lines ran on top of each other ... the cold line was on the bottom and the hot line was on top .... yet the hot water line melted .... which left our cold water in tack through out the house ... (maybe no hot water ... but we could still flush the toilets and have water to cook with and heat up if we needed to freshen up a bit ... This was for 8 of us ... living here .... ) SO GOD WAS GOOD!! .... 

#5) .... DECISIONS .... DECISIONS !!! the week prior to this the news media started talking about a weather front headed EAST! .... as we watched it and kept in the "KNOW" we realized that this storm was of massive BLIZZARD proportions and would hit around the 14th or 15th of March in upstate New York!!! the morning of the fire, I was watching this storm system and realized that God had, had me pack up early by the evening of the 12th and get my office in order prior to leaving work that Friday on the 10th. I made a decision to leave for New York on the 13th instead .... I was on the road by 12:30PM ... stopped by McDonald's grabbed 2 fish sandwiches some fries and a drink and I was out on the interstate ..... AGAIN ... God is soooo GOOD!! .... my bladder held, I required few stops except for gas and was in Northern Ohio by 6PM on Interstate 90 heading east ... as I paid for my gas and shared where i was headed the attendant informed me the storm was 20 minutes out behind me ... I hit the road rollin and ready!! LOTS OF PRAYER for no SNOW, NO FLAKES AND CLEAR AHEAD ...  I began praying in 5 mile increments .... "Thank You Lord of the next 5 miles all clear & no snow .... " .... after squeezing out about 100 miles like this I was getting weary!! It was then I heard God say ...  WHY don't you trust Me for this whole trip?? We've been doing 5 miles at a time ... " I saw my foolishness and lack of faith ... so I just handed over to HIM the rest of the trip!!
rest of the story ..... I arrived in N.V. New York at 10:30PM on the 13th .... NO SNOW yet and clear weather !! (sidenote ... I was going to stay @ my brothers in the Corning NY area but we all decided to have me go onto my hometown where my daughter lives ..... ) The snow hit @ 11:00PM and by about 3AM  on the 14th of March 2017 there was over a foot of snow that had dropped. Roads were impassable!! .... I stayed till Sunday the 19th of March .... another storm from was headed in on the 20th ......

#6) Mom's surgery .... The doctor was able to successfully remove the full tumor .... taking numerous biopsies as he went .... the tumor had adhered to the sack around her heart so tedious removal without puncturing the sack was imperative ... then onto off the lungs and the tumor was also wrapped around a major artery so delicate removal was again imparitive to her recovery ..... a long day for all of us .... BUT .... we she had an awesome doctor .... Dr. Khan ... incredible doctor and an incredible person!
Mom's stay was about 2 weeks in length ... the tumor had mis-shapened her heart so now it had to learn to function again without this heavy tumor laying on it .... She was discharged and went home to stay with my brother and sister in law .... all I can say is taking care of Mom was a new experience for them .... and Mom wasn't a happy camper ... she felt she needed to be UP AND DOING WHAT SHE WANTED TO DO .... SIGH!! .... lot's of prayers went up for my brother and sister in law .... and they were SAINTS through this whole experience!! She finally was able to go home after about 6 weeks .... The biopsies were all clear and no sign of cancer!! .... We were told that the cancer had stayed capsuled inside the tumor!! ISN'T GOD AWESOME!! Mom celebrated her 84th birthday @ my brother's .... PRAYER WORKS!!

PAST MARCH 2017 

#7) Fanny's older son had left a 25' camper trailer in our side yard when Fanny & Harry first moved in July 2016 .... we had been ask if they could "PUT IT HERE " for a few days ..... they (as in her son & daughter in law & 2 grandkids) ended up they wanted to live in it here .... about 2 weeks in and they left ... WITHOUT THE CAMPER .... forward to July 2017 >> It was still here and we wanted to find it a "forever home elsewhere" .... Missy K ( who is Pixie and Bubby's 1/2 sister, and her year old baby had been staying @ her Gpa's place @ my apartment complex. ... I gave her to June 1st to "get processed to live there" she never did .... her "WHINE WAS" I'm homeless with nowhere to go" ..... so like a fool for a sob story that I was .... I told her she could stay in the camper .... Along she came with her IDIOT boyfriend .... we told her he could visit but not LIVE HERE!! .... yep like she listened!! ... NOT!! ... the SHORT of this kinda long story was .... her IDIOT hooked up the camper and towed it out .... along with our floor jack for a car (one of the big garage types) our motorcycle jack ($300.00 one), two 6 man tents, a 12 x 12 canopy, a car radio that the front came off (expensive one) from our Jeep, a air hops with the air chuck on it, and numerous tools we have found to be missing ....  I filed a police report ....

#8) Lots of Move Ins and Move Outs @ my apartment property, lots of drama .... happening at work .

#9) on April 4th 2017 I fired Mike the maintenance guy ... originally when I hired him he was working for another person doing maintenance .... I told him "as long as this other job didn't interfere with the job he was doing for me"  One year down the road Mr Mike was working 24/7 toting his "superman abilities" and failing miserably and lying and stealing from the property, he was a bit delusional!! ... and to clarify the lying part ... he would tell me he did something and NOT DO IT .... again he was becoming more and more delusional as the days went by .... his mentally challenged brother also worked part time for me doing landscaping .... Mr. Mike was very verbally abusive to him and continually degraded him in front of the tenant's .... NOT A GOOD SCENE!! Everything came to blows on March 20th 2017 when I arrived back from New York ... piles of dead tree limbs and brush were still where they had been shortly after the wind storm we had gotten March 1st .... I walked Mr. "P" around the property and showed him what needed picking up ... he kept saying "I tried but Mike won't let me " ..... I told him to go get the wheel burrow and take them to the backside of the property and dump them .... that's when he told me ... the wheel burrow wasn't there ... Mike had taken it home ..... SAY WHAT??? about then MR MIKE came around from the maintenance shop .... telling Mr. "P" to get the garbage can and start picking up branches !! and THEN I exploded @ him "YOU GO GET THAT WHEEL BURROW AND GET IT NOW !!!! " ... MR MIKE ABOUT RAN TO HIS TRUCK ..... from this point on it was down hill .... Mr. Mike made Mr. "P" quit. When Mr Mike brought back the wheel burrow along came our power washer also ..... 

#10) I hired a guy that use to live @ my apartment complex .... Wayne .... he lasted about 3 to 4 weeks and was a NO CALL NO SHOW .... last I spoke with him, he was en route to hospital with his G'Friend.  ... Then I hired a friend's husband ..... he needed a job ..... SIGH!! BABYSITTING CITY!! this poor guy couldn't function without his wife holding his hand .... and she literally did the first couple of weeks then I said "HE NEEDS TO FLY SOLO or else!!! well ... that ended that he had a hard time showing up @ work ... FIRED!! ... SIGH !!! again .... then a girl walked in asking for an application .... I ask her if it was for a job or an apartment ??? she got wide eyed and said "WOULD YOU HIRE ME ??" I said here's the application let's see ..... YEP I HIRED HER !! ... and she's doing good so far .... Then I hired an "AS NEEDED" repair guy .... YEP He's working out good too 

Overwhelmed to Overcomer Chapter Six

April 3rd 2017

        Forgiveness is and can be a strange bedfellow ….. It can take you places you would have never considered or even felt you wanted to go …. YET …. there it is …. unexpected and creeping in …. Sigh!! ….. You want to …. NO !! …. you become determined to set your heart against such a thing again ….. You say it’s not a matter of forgiveness it’s a matter of I AM NOT A DOORMAT!! …. AGAIN …. reluctantly … there it is oozing it’s way across the surface of resilience and determination …. softening it like a cap of fabric softener in a load of wool blankets …. I feel bound and helpless as kindness and love slowly descend again into the places I chased it out of ….. PLEASE GOD!! I cry out; why??  WHY WHY WHY ??? Then I humbly fall and cry in agony as I get that flash photo of Christ on the cross and my life swirling around Him as the soldiers continue driving in those nails and pushing on that crown of thorns on His head …..  again my cry is WHY?? ….. I have forgiven over and over and others in my household have become fed up with my forgiveness and want “IT” all to end!! ….. and oh … we are so close to ending it …. this whole drama we have been put through, years of disrespect and verbal abuse, years of unkindness and outright insanity, years of being verbally slapped repeatedly in the face ….. then I hear this soft voice speaking gently in my ear ….. “You have begun to understand what I forgive my child” …. even in your life …. I have forgiven you ….. thus you have to forgive them …. I will teach you a new way … not the same old road but a new road that you will travel ….. 

     For every action and reaction there is a consequence it is the WORD! …. Nothing goes unnoticed …. NOTHING …. “Vengeance is mine saith the Lord I will repay”  

April 23rd 2017 

       Twenty days ago ..... but not all the story ..... not trying to steal a "quote"  ... here is the rest of the story ..... Actually this story began to unfold in December .... being housebound due to colder weather & being ill with pneumonia & bronchitis I suppose can alter and change people ..... BUT ..... the winds of personalities began to shift too .... Harry's paranoia started to surface and a low brewing undercurrent was detected .... Harry has always had a bit of a battle with paranoia ... long years of drug misuse, being abused as a child & mental illness had taken it's toll over the years. (to put it mildly) .... and Fanny thought her love for him would change him and heal him ... (and so did all his other female companions .... ) but she had married him. Fanny was his first wife and still is ..... Sometime after Thanksgiving and before Christmas Harry and Fanny got into it one night and Fanny went back to her sister's ..... she came back eventually .... then again both Fanny & Annie left .... this time Fanny came back but Annie stayed with her aunt. .... the atmosphere change .... to a brewing tension filled house .... 

Fanny turned on us ... as if it was our fault .... Harry's paranoia's became aggressively worse ..... he began to feel we were trying to "usurp his authority" yet he spent every waking moment in his room on his cell phone playing games and reading Facebook ... when he was home .... demanding Fanny stay in there 24/7 cause his Jealous Monster was rearing it's head too ... another ugly side of his uncontrolled paranoia .... Fanny wasn't allowed out and about the house unless he was home .... his fear of her "cheating" on him became his PARANOID INSANITY!! .... 

   
So forward to today .....    Monday September 4th 2017
  This chapter in my book of life has closed ..... and here is the rest of the story .....
Harry and Fanny moved out around June 1st 2017 ..... bought them a 38 ft camper trailer with their tax money. They moved it to a piece of property where Fanny's old drug buddies lived way out in the middle of nowhere ..... It was a black cloud hanging over our place till they moved ...... winds had shifted. They had becone even more reclusive, and easily aggatated .... the smallest things would trigger them into an explosive angry mess!! Then there is Bubby and Pixie .... caught in the wildfire of aggression and anger from Harry (Daddy) and stepmom Fanny towards Grandma & Poppy.The kids spent most of their waking hours watching TV, video's and playing outside.
     When they left, they left behind almost all the kids clothes and most of their toys ... first HUGE RED FLAG #1 went up .... plus they left some of their clothes ..... The bedroom was still set up with the kids bunkbeds  & thier queen size bed. Somewhere around August 28th Harry called me to see if I wanted the kids .... I said YES! ... around that time he was to bring them over ... he claimed  he had a bad tire .... yet he was seen picking up a girl by the name of Jessie and taking her 10 miles to another small town to buy drugs .... hummmm ??? RED FLAG #2 .... I decided I wanted the kids so I got him a tire @ my expense $35.00 .... SIGH!! He finally delivered the kids .... The 1st week of July was Bible Camp, the kids had gone the year before so I signed them up to go and they were able to go ... hallelujah!! a good break from the situation they had been in .... I had been hearing horror stories from their camper !! Fanny sleeping all the time .... Harry quiting his job .... the kids in the same clothes day after day .... no running water, little food, and a mean ornery stepmother, and having to stay outside everyday all day long. .... RED FLAG #3 ..... Then Pixie started to talk to everyone and anyone who would listen .... it was like a dam bursting open .... She told of the drug usage her and Bubby was exposed to on a daily basis ..... and the horrible treatment of Bubby and her by Fanny.
   On July 19th about 8AM in the morning I recieved a call from Harry, the cops were their @ the camper and they were doing a drug raid! .... "Please come and get the kids"!! .... I was on my way, had to get their older sister Missy K to go with me, as I had not a clue where they lived and she did. When we arrived there were state police and a social worker .... I was handed two very scared and happy kids!! "They handcuffed Daddy & Mommy" they said ....
     The days that followed were meeting with their case worker, I informed her that their "foster parents" who had them when they werer babies would galdly take them back .... and I was not able to keep them long term .... On August 4th 2017 a VERY EXCITED AND HAPPY Pixie and Bubby went to live with 2 very happy foster parents!!
    Harry and Fanny have been charged with 2 counts of 1st degree possession of a controlled substance, one count of 3rd degree possession of a conctrolled substance, Drug Paraphinilia, and child endangerment. .... they are currently NOT ENCARRCERATED .... and go to court in a couple of weeks ..... they said in court when the kids were "handed over to the state" they were getting divorced ..... Harry has currently missed two court ordered visitations ..... and Pixie and Bubby are adjusting to a very happy ending in their young lives!