Surgery is Approaching and Becoming Real

Randy's surgery is coming up faster than we realized, and although I thought that I would be ready, I don't think I will ever be. Yes the presents are all bought and most the of them are wrapped, although I seriously doubt that I will be getting anything shipped to the great white north before then. The laundry is all caught up and the house is relatively tidy (still have to vacuum and change the sheets) and the grocery list is being compiled for the last minute run on Thursday.

I thought that having all of those things taken care off and done would make me feel ready.

Well it didn't work. So today I decided that I would decorate the house - knowing full well that, although this activity will keep me busy and possibly occupy my mind, it will do nothing to make me feel more "READY".

The thought of my husband, my best friend, father of my children, confidant, caretaker and soul mate going in for yet another surgery, with again the shadow of Cancer hovering above it almost unbearable. He is my rock, the strong one and to see him a a hospital bed has always pushes me over the edge (even back before we were married back in Canada - he was in the ER after a cycling accident with his brother Jody, and I swear I felt my knees buckle under when I saw him lying there), I can be very strong for just about anything else, my Mom's death, bathing and shaving my Grand Father after he died while my Dad was going to pick up my Grandmother. I'm good and I can keep it pretty much together.

But with Randy it cuts to the bones.

It is all becoming very real very quickly. The sleepless nights started last week, the bitchiest is full blown and usually ends up being directed at the one I am so worried about(yes I can hear Leslie "Be nice to him he has Cancer...").The nausea appeared over the weekend (I am trying to see the nausea as a positive - maybe just maybe I can loose some of this 60+ pounds I have gained). Whoops, hold please, BRB

- Ok the nausea just turned into full blown throwing up - looks like soda water for me from now on...

We still haven't told the kids (supposed to have last night but didn't) so hopefully will tonight.

Our wedding vows over 17 years ago came from the Velveteen Rabbit-it was all about "becoming real" -


"What is REAL?" asked the Rabbit one day, when they were lying side by side near the nursery fender, before Nana came to tidy the room. "Does it mean having things that buzz inside you and a stick-out handle?"
"Real isn't how you are made," said the Skin Horse. "It's a thing that happens to you. When a child loves you for a long, long time, not just to play with, but REALLY loves you, then you become Real."
"Does it hurt?" asked the Rabbit.
"Sometimes," said the Skin Horse, for he was always truthful. "When you are Real you don't mind being hurt."
"Does it happen all at once, like being wound up," he asked, "or bit by bit?"
"It doesn't happen all at once," said the Skin Horse. "You become. It takes a long time. That's why it doesn't happen often to people who break easily, or have sharp edges, or who have to be carefully kept. Generally, by the time you are Real, most of your hair has been loved off, and your eyes drop out and you get loose in your joints and very shabby. But these things don't matter at all, because once you are Real you can't be ugly, except to people who don't understand."
"I suppose you are real?" said the Rabbit. And then he wished he had not said it, for he thought the Skin Horse might be sensitive. But the Skin Horse only smiled.
"The Boy's Uncle made me Real," he said. "That was a great many years ago; but once you are Real you can't become unreal again. It lasts for always."