January 17, 2017

Greetings My Friend, Junior has been on the cranky side recently and I had about enough of it. I give him grace for having PTSD and anger is part of it etc. but at some point I need to say enough. My PTSD will only handle so much harsh words before I begin to push back and I finally pushed back. Prior to my push back I had been asking God to help me deal with what was going on with Junior. Through the years I have taught myself to not get too involved with his pain, I learn to turn it off due to the fact the more I try to comfort him the more irritated he gets. He wants to be left alone to deal with his pain and will usually come out of his crankiness on his own. By not seeing what work he does outside I have a hard time knowing if he is stressing his back out. While I was in prayer God laid on my heart that Junior's back was hurting and he is also dealing with pain in regards to my health. Both he and I know where Parkinson's tends to end up, the patient is not able to do anything for themselves which means that I will be a lot to deal with. It is scary for me and it is scary for him too. Up until this point I have been "me" focused, learning what I can about my disease, putting into practice the things I have learned that will help maybe even prolong the disease process to some extent etc. When God laid Junior's struggle in regards to my health I understood that I will need to encourage him to get a support system in place for him. After I gave Junior a piece of my mind and we had settled down we began this discussion. We talked about a few options came up with he does very poorly in support groups due to his anger issues and then realized we know 2 other couples who are struggling with PD too. I suggested that Junior begin a conversation with the caregivers. I then reminded him that I need information when he is hurting since I am not able to see the work he is doing that may be stressing his back out. I have learned to not bring it up all the time and at the same time I still need a little warning. He has had a few days not stressing his back out, today we went out to exchange the chainsaw he had for another one and prayerfully this one won't bother him as he pulls to start the saw. His real good saw is in the shop getting fixed and the one he picked up was not that good, it was all the store had so he went with it. We had an extremely cold spell so he was cutting up wood more, now we are warming up for a few days I hope he is able to get ahead on the wood. The other hard lesson I have learned is when you have disabilities working in a straightforward manner is not possible. Junior changes jobs he is working on throughout the day because it helps his back. Gone are the days where he stays with a project until it is done which is why the wood is not all cut up for winter use. We chose not to buy already cut wood this year because we have so much wood on our property we can cut up and use. We have learned each others "had enough" points and we back off until we can be rational. I am grateful to learn that fighting does not mean there will be no end to it. We learned this in a lot of workshops, reading the Bible and praying. May God bless you and keep you make His face shine on you. Love Janet