Just venting a bit

JanJan63

I just started a job a couple of weeks ago. It's dental reception which is a job I've done for years but haven't done in three years. They use a program I'm not familiar with so I'm having to learn it. I don't know if it's the chemo brain or just being over 50 but I've really been struggling with learning it. I'm so grateful to the dentist for giving me the job. Usually they like to hire cute young chicks at the front and I'd told him I had cancer so he really took a chance on me. Now I feel like I'm letting him down and I'm really stressed while I'm there. I'm so scared I'm going to lose the job. I haven't worked at all in over a year and had my own business pevious to that for a year and a half. I sometimes feel like crying while I'm there when I'm struggling with the program. I'm also not very technologically savvy and struggle with that as well.

I have the CT scan coming up in November to see if the spots on my lung have grown. I'm getting more and more scared as that's getting closer. It's been so nice the past little while to not be dealing with cancer bs or anything else as I have other health issues going on. By the time I have the ct scan I'll have gone over a month without having a test or procedure. Wow! I pray every night that it isn't mets. They can't do surgery if it is and I'm not a candidate for chemo again because of the blood clot issue.

Tomorrow we're putting our oldest dog down. He's fourteen and is a big guy and is having trouble with pain and getting up and down stairs and is getting worse daily. I had him booked a couple of months ago but backed out and now I have to do it. I'm just heartbroken and have been crying all day. I've been through this before and I know its the kindest thing to do rather than letting him get more and more crippled and upset but I hate being the one to have to decide that my dog is going to die. He walks around crying a lot and has anxiety from it so he also huffs and pants a lot. He's miserable and I know it but with having come so close to death with the blood clot I had I'm having a really hard time doing this. But I want him to see me as the last thing he sees and to know that he's loved. I don't want him to be scared. My husband will be with me so that will help a bit. 

I just need a break emotionally. The cancer and blood clot roller coaster has been a nightmare. This whole thing has been financially devastating. I still have my stepson living with us as I've mentioned before so that's another huge stressor.

Okay, whine over. Toughen up like I've been doing all this time. I wish we could all have a holiday from cancer. It's so freaking hard. I see all this stuff on facebook about people with cancer and fighting the battle and those who have lost and I feel like I have an overload of it. A friend of a friend passed away the other day from uterine cancer. She was still well enough that she was working so it was very sudden. I feel like I just can't do this anymore.

Jan

Trubrit

Have some wine with your whine

Actually, I think you shuold have chocolate. I'm not sure the wine is the best thing.

About the job, this is what happened to me - Back in March of this year, my old boss returns to our little rural town, one day a week, just like before (rural Podiatrist). He quit coming the month before I was diagnosed. So, he comes back and he wants me to work for him again. I sat him down, I told him my problems with some lingering side effects, mostly the chemo brain and neuropathy, and he said he had no problem working with me, as long as I ddin't make any major mistakes (think drawing meds for shots). And now I am doing really well. 

So, if your boss is willing to be patient with you, I think you need to be patient with yourself. 

You've had a VERY rough ride. Be patient. If you are slow and your boss doesn't mine, run with it. You will get better as the weeks go by. You will pick up the new program, it might take you a bit longer, but you will do it. 

Life is great. Life is hard. They both go hand in hand I think. 

Cyber hugs.

Sue - Trubrit

JanJan63

Trubrit said:

Have some wine with your whine

Actually, I think you shuold have chocolate. I'm not sure the wine is the best thing.

About the job, this is what happened to me - Back in March of this year, my old boss returns to our little rural town, one day a week, just like before (rural Podiatrist). He quit coming the month before I was diagnosed. So, he comes back and he wants me to work for him again. I sat him down, I told him my problems with some lingering side effects, mostly the chemo brain and neuropathy, and he said he had no problem working with me, as long as I ddin't make any major mistakes (think drawing meds for shots). And now I am doing really well. 

So, if your boss is willing to be patient with you, I think you need to be patient with yourself. 

You've had a VERY rough ride. Be patient. If you are slow and your boss doesn't mine, run with it. You will get better as the weeks go by. You will pick up the new program, it might take you a bit longer, but you will do it. 

Life is great. Life is hard. They both go hand in hand I think. 

Cyber hugs.

Sue - Trubrit

Thank you Sue. I think I'm

Thank you Sue. I think I'm just all doom and gloom these days. I had the cancer and then two abcesses at the resection site which put me in the hospital twice and an infection in the incision site that prevented me from having the mop up chemo when I should have and then the blood clot and having to relearn everything physical. I feel like I have no luck. I look at the blood clot situation where I should have died and they couldn't explain how I survived five cardiac arrests and then came back without mental issues. I ask myself am I lucky and blessed because I survived what should have been unsurvivable or am I unlucky because it happened at all? I can't seem to get past this feeling that I'm kind of cursed.

Jan

lp1964

Dear Friend,

I'm a dentist myself and I hate those softwares. They are a pain..... Relax, take your time. Sounds like your employer is a great person. Maybe look it up on YouTube. this is how I learn a lot of stuff. 

I know sometimes life gives us too much to handle. The last 2-3 years is a neverending struggle for me too. What do you do? You suck it up and keep going. I always say: trouble will always find us, it sneaks in through the key hole. But the good thing we have to search, find and stop to enjoy. I'm hoping soon I will have the time and energy to do that more. 

Take care,

Laz

JanJan63

lp1964 said:

Dear Friend,

I'm a dentist myself and I hate those softwares. They are a pain..... Relax, take your time. Sounds like your employer is a great person. Maybe look it up on YouTube. this is how I learn a lot of stuff. 

I know sometimes life gives us too much to handle. The last 2-3 years is a neverending struggle for me too. What do you do? You suck it up and keep going. I always say: trouble will always find us, it sneaks in through the key hole. But the good thing we have to search, find and stop to enjoy. I'm hoping soon I will have the time and energy to do that more. 

Take care,

Laz

Thank you Laz. I appreciate

Thank you Laz. I appreciate the support.

Jan

BillO60

Becoming Tech Savvy is just a matter of experience

I've been doing IT and computers since the early 1980's.  People thought I had a talent for it when in fact I just kept at things until I learned them and that meant literally hundreds of hours of hands on use and a lot of reading.  I also asked questions and many times I asked the same question repeatedly until what I needed to know finally sunk in.

Learning is learning and whether its a computer program or any other skill it just takes time and repetition.  Stress, of course, affects memory and can make it more difficult to learn. But, for sophisticated office automation programs, it can take dozens of hours to learn the basics and hundreds of hours to become proficient so even if you think you're not learning quick enough you are probably being too hard on yourself. 

I know I'm stating the obvious here but you have alot going on that's causing you stress and that is going to magnify any issue, cause you to worry, which in turn causes you more stress.  No quick answer to that of course but you are the only one that can figure out what you can do to reduce the effects of stress even if you can't eliminate the things that cause you to be stressed in the first place. 

One thing that we all have to try to do is be selective about what we worry about.  I can't tell you not to worry because to some degree that comes with the territory.  But to quote a line from Desiderata "But do not distress yourself with imaginings. Many fears are born of fatigue and loneliness. Beyond a wholesome discipline, be gentle with yourself."

I don't believe in luck so I can't say if you have been lucky or unlucky in your journey with all of the challenges you've had to face. I do know that you've survived what's been thrown at you and that you've overcome some major medical issues and that you are, today, still alive and breathing. That's an accomplishment worth focusing on and celebrating even though you still have the other issues to deal with. 

Bill

 

 

jen2012

Jan,  I'm sorry about your

Jan,  I'm sorry about your dog  I know how hard it is.  I can tell he is your baby.  Just think of the good life you have given him and the love he has known.  

You need a break - maybe just a good book to lose yourself in.  Maybe a night out with your husband or a friend, but yes you need to do something fun.  Can you get away for a short vacation?  A change of scenery is always good.

JanJan63

BillO60 said:

Becoming Tech Savvy is just a matter of experience

I've been doing IT and computers since the early 1980's.  People thought I had a talent for it when in fact I just kept at things until I learned them and that meant literally hundreds of hours of hands on use and a lot of reading.  I also asked questions and many times I asked the same question repeatedly until what I needed to know finally sunk in.

Learning is learning and whether its a computer program or any other skill it just takes time and repetition.  Stress, of course, affects memory and can make it more difficult to learn. But, for sophisticated office automation programs, it can take dozens of hours to learn the basics and hundreds of hours to become proficient so even if you think you're not learning quick enough you are probably being too hard on yourself. 

I know I'm stating the obvious here but you have alot going on that's causing you stress and that is going to magnify any issue, cause you to worry, which in turn causes you more stress.  No quick answer to that of course but you are the only one that can figure out what you can do to reduce the effects of stress even if you can't eliminate the things that cause you to be stressed in the first place. 

One thing that we all have to try to do is be selective about what we worry about.  I can't tell you not to worry because to some degree that comes with the territory.  But to quote a line from Desiderata "But do not distress yourself with imaginings. Many fears are born of fatigue and loneliness. Beyond a wholesome discipline, be gentle with yourself."

I don't believe in luck so I can't say if you have been lucky or unlucky in your journey with all of the challenges you've had to face. I do know that you've survived what's been thrown at you and that you've overcome some major medical issues and that you are, today, still alive and breathing. That's an accomplishment worth focusing on and celebrating even though you still have the other issues to deal with. 

Bill

 

 

Thank you Bill for the well

Thank you Bill for the well thought out response. I suspct I'm just turning into a negative Nellie. And I am being hard on myself. But I'm also scared of more bad things happeneing in the future.

Jan 

JanJan63

jen2012 said:

Jan,  I'm sorry about your

Jan,  I'm sorry about your dog  I know how hard it is.  I can tell he is your baby.  Just think of the good life you have given him and the love he has known.  

You need a break - maybe just a good book to lose yourself in.  Maybe a night out with your husband or a friend, but yes you need to do something fun.  Can you get away for a short vacation?  A change of scenery is always good.

Thanks Jen. I do spend some

Thanks Jen. I do spend some nice quiet time on a regular basis and I read a lot. My dog is gone now, we did it several hours ago. We took him for one last walk and he got to eat what he wanted this morning. Bacon and weiners. PLus a last walk. He went quickly. I was holding his face between my hands and telling him what a good boy he'd been and sudddenly his head just dropped and he was asleep. Fourteen years old is a long life for a big dog. 

I think my problem these days is just that it seems like so many things went wrong over the last year and a half that I just expect it now. I feel like it's just a matter of time until things go south again.

Jan

jen2012

JanJan63 said:

Thanks Jen. I do spend some

Thanks Jen. I do spend some nice quiet time on a regular basis and I read a lot. My dog is gone now, we did it several hours ago. We took him for one last walk and he got to eat what he wanted this morning. Bacon and weiners. PLus a last walk. He went quickly. I was holding his face between my hands and telling him what a good boy he'd been and sudddenly his head just dropped and he was asleep. Fourteen years old is a long life for a big dog. 

I think my problem these days is just that it seems like so many things went wrong over the last year and a half that I just expect it now. I feel like it's just a matter of time until things go south again.

Jan

I'm sorry, but yes he had a

I'm sorry, but yes he had a long life for a big dog.

And I get expecting things to go wrong.  The last 3 years have been unbelievable for us ... really difficult.  But there is always someone worse off.   There is a lady in our community that was diagnosed with ALS while pregnant with her first child.  That baby will never know her mom - terribly sad.  I don't want to say I feel better hearing of others worse off, but it certainly makes me feel less alone.  I know of another lady with stage 4 cancer that also lost a child to cancer - a nightmare.  Horrible accidents, horrible illnesses, ISIS...there is a lot of heartache and heartbreak.  

Try to enjoy the good days and count your blessings for what good you have.   And I hope I'm not coming off as preachy - I'm giving myself the same advice that I give to you.  I know it's easier said than done!   Once when I was telling my teenager daughter - there is always someone that has it worse, her response was "mom, you know we are "those people" that people refer to having it worse than them.  Kind of funny, kind of sad and probably not true, though it feels like it often.  

 

 

JanJan63

jen2012 said:

I'm sorry, but yes he had a

I'm sorry, but yes he had a long life for a big dog.

And I get expecting things to go wrong.  The last 3 years have been unbelievable for us ... really difficult.  But there is always someone worse off.   There is a lady in our community that was diagnosed with ALS while pregnant with her first child.  That baby will never know her mom - terribly sad.  I don't want to say I feel better hearing of others worse off, but it certainly makes me feel less alone.  I know of another lady with stage 4 cancer that also lost a child to cancer - a nightmare.  Horrible accidents, horrible illnesses, ISIS...there is a lot of heartache and heartbreak.  

Try to enjoy the good days and count your blessings for what good you have.   And I hope I'm not coming off as preachy - I'm giving myself the same advice that I give to you.  I know it's easier said than done!   Once when I was telling my teenager daughter - there is always someone that has it worse, her response was "mom, you know we are "those people" that people refer to having it worse than them.  Kind of funny, kind of sad and probably not true, though it feels like it often.  

 

 

Thanks Jen, you didn't sound

Thanks Jen, you didn't sound preachy at all. I agree with what you've said. When I was in the hospital earlier this year and was in physio learning to walk again my husband asked me if I pray to get better. I told him I didn't because there were people worse off than me who need His help more. My husband said what could be worse than being paralyzed. I told him I know I'll eventually get better but there are people who won't and people who are living in terrible conditions and suffering who are much worse off. My husband used to be a non believer until he prayed for me to get better when I was in a coma in December and I woke up from it the next day.

I should add that the last several weeks I was in the hospital this year I befriended a man who had MS. He's almost completely unable to move and is in a wheelchair that he manipulates with his one finger that is usable. He's very hard to understand and has to be fed by somone else. His wife rarely visited him and his teenage daughter refused to come and see him. But he still has a sense of humour and is fun to be around. By the time I met him I was able to walk up to ten feet with a walker and was no longer in a diaper. I was getting better. He's my age. Sadly, he's now in a nursing home and I can't visit him unless I'm put on the list of visitors and I never met his wife so I have no way of doing so.