First, let me start off with I'm officially a grandma! Woooohoooo! My daughter gave birth to a 10lb 2oz baby girl on October 3rd. Savannah Lorene (a southern family name) was born via C-section due to being breech and everyone is doing great. Of course the baby is practically 5 months old now and the size of a 1 year old. She's big y'all. Taking after both her parents who were both chunky monkeys and continuously in the 110th percentile on size and weight. It's no wonder.
So after the birth in New Jersey, I came back to South Carolina for my hip revision surgery on November 6th. It went very well. In fact it went so well, I was dismissed the next day and walking without a walker, crutch or cane within 4 days. All those concerns about my permanent disability turned out to be a bunch of unnecessary worry. But I did get an eye-opening reality check.
By my first month visit, the doctor pretty much told me I could resume my normal every-day activity. His speech about how I was now on restriction for the rest of my life was thrown out the door. I called him out on that. He said given my age and the amount of years I had my hip, he had to heavily caution me about activity. Listen doc....I get it! I never ever ever want to go through that kind of pain again in my life, I WILL most definitely not try to stretch in weird positions ever again. Even for sex. There's plenty of 'normal' stuff that still gets the job done.
So earlier this month, the hubby and I went on a cruise. And yes we did several excursions including the ziplining obstacle course. I think my doctor thought I was kidding when I asked if I was cleared for ziplining. Yeah ok. I'm also back to running. Or..... more like a slow jog. I'm trying to get the first rental kid to do a 5k race with me in March or April, so I figured I better start back to running if I want to finish in a decent amount of time.
Speaking of rental kids, we have taken on yet another one. We are now the proud renters of rental kid #2. She is Hannah's younger (but not little) sister, Emily. She too is now 18 years of age and no longer under her mother's care with no place to live, but still trying to finish out high school. She now resides in Guest Room #2.
Why on earth people have kids and don't see their responsibilities through to adulthood is beyond me. Although since Hannah has moved in with us last year, their mom has kept a full-time job at UPS and actually manage to get both girls on her insurance. And I believe she is no longer living in her car. Not sure if she's staying sober, but to keep a job is a promising step. So I believe she is doing the best she can and having insurance is BIG, especially since Hannah was no longer eligible for Medicaid when she graduated high school last year. So there's that.
Its only been 2 weeks, but so far things are working out with Emily. She is a very smart and attractive young lady. But it amazes me how different she is from her sister. Where Hannah is 100% basic white girl material (5'4", blonde hair, lives on Chik-Fil-A and Starbucks and a time consuming love of social media), Emily is complete opposite. Standing 5'9" with streaked darkish blonde hair and a nose ring, she plays guitar in a band. She is also a vegan with no need for social media and dresses in an edgy grunge style with complete confidence. I like her. I'm sure the next few months will be interesting. I'm hoping that her level of independence will rub off on her older sister. I've seen a slight change in Hannah already since Emily moved in. Just noticing that she's starting to do a little bit more for herself these days. Also I can't help but feel it reinforces my thoughts that Hannah was capable of doing more but wouldn't. Even when I didn't have time or I was out-of-commission, she often asked if I was making dinner or if I could take her shopping or to doctor appointments. I think she viewed those things as the care she never received as a child and was trying to get her fill. And not that I minded doing those things, but our goal is to make her more independent so we can send her back out into the real world with the tools she needs to be a productive member of society.
Hannah is on her second semester of college and doing much better than last semester. I think she is over the initial shock of how much studying and research and written work there is in the law field. She seems to be grasping the whole study idea much better now. I'm very happy about this. But again, I also can't help but wonder if she's making more of an effort now because her sister is now here to see how she's handling college life. For the record, her sister is on year 2 of college while still in high school. Her field is art, but we are hoping to see where we can lead her with that.
So that's what's been going on. Now for my next entry.... Part 2. Just a simple list of all the road trips and things we did last year. Some day I'll look back on it and say - wow.... we were the REAL ROAD WARRIORS, weren't we?
8:47 a.m. - 2019-02-22
Recent entries:
Pre to Eve of Thanksgiving - 2019-11-26
Can I get a little help here please? - 2019-06-27
Am I Cranky Or Are you an Asshole - 2019-04-29
Part 2 - Just a Review of 2018 Places and Things - 2019-02-22
Along Comes Rental Kid #2 - Entry 1 of 2 - 2019-02-22
My profile
Archives
Notes
Diaryland
Random
RSS
others:
jimbostaxi
alwayshiding
misfitstray
catsoul
astitchaway
sundaygirl
blah-g
Barefoot Ruby
gr8legs
starkitten01
curious-me
matt
nineofswords.
dangerspouse
tomatogirl