Mental illness is something that we deal with at 911 on a daily basis.  We either talk to the mentally ill, to their concerned friends, or to their families.  When talking to the mentally ill they rarely realize that their thinking does not make sense to anyone but themselves & others with their disorders.  On the rare occasions when they do realize they are not “right” it is difficult to listen to their desperation and devastation.  Friends call when they believe that their mentally ill friend will hurt themself or someone else without medical intervention.  When family calls it is because the mentally ill relative has made life so unbearable that family members need help to find just a moment of peace.  They usually feel guilty for calling the police on their relative.  Guilty because they are calling on their child & somehow they are to blame for their child’s mental illness.  They are devastated at the breakdown in their relationships caused by the mental illness.

My mother is probably in need of medication to balance her moods.  She gets deeply depressed & worries almost constantly.  She has a very low self-esteem & is easily manipulated by guilt.  But she is kind & gentle & good.

My sister is mentally ill.  Recently she has seen a state sponsored counselor & now takes some sort of medication but I do not know what type.  In these counseling sessions she recovered memories that led her to realize that our dad is not to blame for all the problems in her life….   all the problems & all of the grief & all of the pain & all of the things that have kept her from having a happy & successful life can be traced back to my birth (yes at the tender age of 3-1/2 my sisters life was ruined by the birth of a sibling).  I believe she is bipolar but may have more serious issues.  It is a long story & has been a part of our lives for a very long time.  My family walked on eggshells around her to keep from sending her into a fit of rage.  While my father was alive he sort of kept her in check, at least from heaping emotional abuse on my mother.

About a year ago my sister married a man that I believe is dangerous.  He has far more serious emotional issues.  What I don’t get is why the state has her see a counselor & get on medication & not him.  Oh wait, I know why–he’s a psychopath & is remarkably good at faking it when he wishes.  After they had been dating awhile he & Rachel asked my mom if his 17 year old daughter could live with Rachel & my mom for 3 months until she went off to a job corps type program.  The first night she was there he asked if he could stay the night so he could spend a little more time with her.  Guess what, he never left.  Later he married my sister & they continued living with my mom.  When the 17 year old finished her program she moved in with her dad & my mom.  This presumption and manipulation continues to this day.  They use mom’s car, they have filled her house with junk, they make her feel guilty for coming to visit her grandchildren in Vancouver.

Backing up just a little, My family was not invited to their wedding (no skin off my back as I thought the whole affair was WRONG) because I dared to mention to the 17 year old that perhaps I would be more excited about the wedding if I knew that they knew how they were going to support themselves & where they were going to live (not with my mother).  They were horrified that I would say such a thing to their poor delicate (nearly adult) little girl.  After they were married we reached out & tried to befriend them although it was always tense & uncomfortable.  Our dog who loves everyone would growl at Tony & shy away from him in fear.  Tony would act super nice to my kids & then just change into some sort of evil manipulative thing & would berate them & discipline them (when no discipline was needed)–of course he only did this when I was not home.  I had a gut instinct from the very beginning that caused me to tell my mom & husband–Don’t ever leave Abby alone in the room with him).  Mom’s have to trust that feeling when it comes up. Anyway, the last time they were at our house we had gone out of our way to be nice & not object to their bad behavior (i.e. setting grape pieces (so that they leaked liquid) on my sons new book–and leaving them there–accusing my son of damaging the clarinet we had borrowed from my sister and not taking care of it when that could not be further from the truth–it was a lie Tony made up to manipulate my sister into a rage.  The last straw came when we were eating pizza (that is another event in and of itself) and Tony kept feeding the cat sausage & crap from the table.  I asked him to please not feed the cat from the table as scraps were bad for their digestion.  He stood up, slammed his chair back, smacked his hands on the table & stomped off to the basement.  By now my mom, myself & my children were all in tears.  My mom & I decided that they needed to leave immediately.  It was just a horrible heartbreaking event.  Since then we have been unable to visit my mother’s house because we fear incurring the wrath of Tony (and lesser the wrath of Rachel–but that’s just part of life).  My daughter has vivid memories of Grandma’s house. Even today we were in the store & she mentioned that Grandma’s garden is muddy.  It breaks my heart that I cannot return to my home because it has been commandeered by the mentally ill.  They control us by fear and intimidation.  I also do not want to force issues and make the situation more difficult for my mother.

It has been my mom’s plan since shortly after my dad died, to move up here when she can get Medicare at the age of 65. We had mentioned this to my sister in the past as had mom’s friends and other family members,  every time my sister & Tony said “no she won’t.”  They refused to acknowledge it as a future reality. She thinks living in our household would be too stressful (we have a different family dynamic that she & my dad had in their relationship), but she does not like the idea of living very far from us.  Ideally we hoped that the small house next to ours would come up for sale and she would be able to buy it. The people who lived there had rented the home for 20 years.  We weren’t expecting that to change anytime soon when lo and behold they moved.  We asked the owner what his plans for the place were & he said that he was planning to rent it but would sell it if the right buyer came along.  We hooked him up with my mom & finally my mom began the process of getting a loan.  As part of that process they have to do an appraisal of her house.  So, mom told them what she was doing (attempting to buy the house in Vancouver).

At first my sister seemed to accept it, but today things changed.  Now my sister is accusing my mom of abandoning her & favoring me.  She is heaping guilt on my mom & beating her down emotionally.  She is stressing the unfairness of life.  She claims that if mom buys the house next to us & sells her home then at such a time as my mom dies my sister will be left with nothing & I will get everything.  Well, trust me that was the last thing on MY mind.  I have no intention when the time comes of leaving my sister with the short end of the stick. Do we want to end up with the house, sure–it would be a great addition to our property, but I would have to purchase it from my mom or buy my sister out of her half when the estate is settled.  I don’t even like talking about this subject.  My mom needs to live forever I can’t live without her.

Anyway, what has led me to this dissertation or rant as you may call it, is the sadness, the hopelessness in my mothers voice when I talked to her tonight.  She stole a few minutes to talk to me while Rachel & Tony had gone into a store.  (yeah she never calls me when they are around–the last time I talked to her she had gone into the bathroom & started to run a tub & was whispering so that they wouldn’t hear her).  She tearfully told me that if it were not for Abby (my 4 year old daughter) she would just go off and disappear.  I hope you can sense how that broke my heart.  I know that being up with us is not perfect & that in an ideal world (for my mom) we would live near her & she could continue to live in the house she shared with my father.  From this point i do not know how to express the pain that I am feeling, the fear for my mothers emotional and physical safety, the grief this has brought up for the loss of my father and the devastation I feel that in order to keep peace in her household of uninvited guests my mother has to pretend that I don’t exist, because whenever I make an appearance into their world of denial my mom suffers at the hand of angry and jealous outbursts.  I don’t care about myself & my relationship with my sister–what sister– I lost her decades ago.  I care deeply for my mom and at this moment I am terrified that my sisters words and manipulation will turn my mom from the course she had chosen & was coming to peace with.  I am angry that she & Tony act as if my mother has done nothing for them & everything for me.  I am still paying my student loans– my parents paid off my sisters.  They have paid off her credit cards & other debts.  They have purchased vehicles for her & filled her tank with gas.  They have loaned their cars to her for which she has had no respect & has driven hard & fast & caused serious damage to aging them beyond their years.  She has shown no respect for my mother’s very special car purchased during her grieving for my father, carrying animals and hay, etc in it & leaving garbage & junk all over it.  My mother spends the majority of her time in her bedroom trying to stay out of their way because they have taken over her house.  They monopolize my mother’s computer, read her emails (so that she can no longer email me anything personal if anything at all-I used to get daily emails).  They asked to use my mom’s dell account to get a computer & she finally agreed (although they have misused her money in the past) then she found out they bought a very expensive computer.  They had $300 already in mom’s account to go toward the computer (that would be about 1/5 the cost) and while mom was at our house last weekend she discovered that my sister had just spent $198 of that on Pampered Chef.  My mom worries a great deal about money.  She is afraid that she cannot afford the house over the next two years until she sells hers.  The plan as we understand it is for us to rent it out (which is going to be easy as its a cute house in a nice neighborhood).  We promised that if for some reason the payment with taxes & insurance is higher than the amount we can rent it for we will make up the difference (in fact she would never even know that had happened).

There are a few things that I could have done to improve the appraisal value of mom’s house & relieve some of her fears.  There are definitely things we could do over the next few years (with our money) to improve the resale value of her house as she prepares to put it on the market, but due to my sisters insanity & her husbands insanity we cannot go to help her.  The family cannot come in and make quick repairs and touch up paint & remove excess junk so that the appraiser can see the real space & beauty of her house (its full of junk and clutter–and I do mean junk–like yard sale rejects Rachel got for free over the years).  Should anyone suggest any of this to my sister or Tony they will go into a frightening rage.

This is not a way to live, and I can do nothing but pray & ask for others to pray.

It’s been a busy February here.  I attribute it to the unseasonably spring-like weather we’ve been having.  I’m also working weekends which lends itself to business.  I feel unsettled and restless after coming home from work tonight.  Miss Abby was sleeping when I got home and my husband has an early morning so needed to go right to bed.  Probably for the best. I’m a little out of sorts.  I don’t have a good explanation.  We didn’t have any traumatic incidents or otherwise out of the ordinary calls.  I sat call taking and did a few breaks for the 6 hours I worked tonight (I took some time off today).  I took a whole lot of calls.  Maybe its just my mind processing through the ones that I didn’t have time to think about while I was taking them? I don’t really have anything specific to write about.  I just needed to put down somewhere that I feel unsettled.  Maybe its the complaint that was filed against me by a user agency last night.  Yes, I missed something and I’m willing to take responsibility for that but there are so many factors involved that I can’t help wishing they could see that too.  Of course, I can’t go into details.  It doesn’t matter what the contributing factors are in this line of work.  Wrong is wrong. There are no mistakes.  That’s not why I feel unsettled though.  That’s just life.  Maybe its because I’ve been sick, for weeks? Everytime I get over this cough it just morphs into a different type of cough just as disruptive (ever tried taking an emergency call & having to click off multiple times to cough?) to the job.  Maybe its this headache that has been dogging me all day? I don’t know. Just more excuses.  There are dishes in the sink that need to be loaded in the dishwasher..which needs to be emptied.  The living room is full of laundry that has been folded but not put away & laundry that needs to be folded.  There is stuff everywhere.  I need to take care of it.  But I’m tired.  Really really tired.  And my head hurts.  It’s not going to get done tonight, again.  I really hope no one reads my blog.  I just needed to get this out to find some peace so I can rest tonight.  If  I lock it up here in this file then I don’t have to lock it up in me.  I hope I don’t get called in early tomorrow morning.  I’m going to try to go to a ladies group before work..  It means an early morning, but its something I really need.  Goodnight.

Just found this in my drafts.  It’s from a few weeks (like 3?) ago.

It’s a lovely cold and foggy Sunday morning here in the Northwest. My family is up & fed, but we decided to just lounge about. We have nowhere to go. Well, we’d like to be at church, but alas, we are prisoners to road construction. The city is for some reason doing their sewer work Saturday & Sunday mornings for a few weeks. They are preparing for the repaving & installation of curbs & sidewalks on our otherwise outdated residential neighborhood. Yesterday, which I think would have been a good day for them to start early & end late (like the no parking signs said – 8am-5pm), they quit before noon. We are now hoping for that today so that we can make it to the second service. I keep peering out the front door lights to see if we could possibly back out & leave in one direction or another, but there is no way. There’s a big ditch on one side & lots of work & equipment on the other. It might have been nice if the letter they sent telling us they would be doing work would have included “it may be impossible for you to leave your house by motorized vehicle during this time, so if you will need to leave please park your vehicle elsewhere and walk out. I’m also very thankfully for our super efficiency doors & windows we had installed this fall. The construction seems very loud, I can only imagine it would be deafening! It is very cold outside so we will enjoy the coziness of the indoors.

So today I feel a little silly for being so hard on myself.  I came and looked up the call from last night & see that it was only 3 minutes from my call until the first officers arrived & 5 minutes until fire was on scene (or less) It sure felt like 15 minutes!!! While in a perfect world I would have responded differently I really wasn’t such a loser.  I also see now that its not a minivan, but it sure looked like it when I was crouched beneath!  I hope that the driver is recovering well.  My prayers are with you.  I have learned a few things.  I will always carry clean dry cloths in my car (easily accessible) and I have located my first aid kit which was in my trunk.  It’s all about being prepared next time.

I guess I am hoping no one reads this. I am really frustrated with myself. On my way home from work today a minivan flipped in front of me & landed on its side. Idiot SUV ran a red light dinged her (I get this info from other people on scene) and she flipped. I had the presence of mind to call 911 & give the supervisor pretty good info, but that’s about it. I got on the ground next to her & determined the expanding pool of blood was only coming from her completely crushed finger. What I’m kicking myself for is that I didn’t even try to stop the blood. Now I could try to justify this & say well I was crouched next to a minivan laying on the drivers side sort of wondering if it was stable or going to fall over on me. I didnt want to damage the finger any more by touching it…she wasn’t bleeding to death…What exactly do I think I was going to stop the blood with??? I didn’t have a clean dry cloth (nor did I ask if any1 else had one)…LAMMMMMMEEEE. I just dropped the ball. When the officers arrived I quickly excused myself & ran off. Then I realized oh duh..blood..stop bleeding. crap. Okay I am done w/ the self-loathing. Must move on.

“I’m off to save the world” is what I have jokingly told my family each night as I head off to my job as a 911 dispatcher. It eased the awkwardness of leaving my small child, husband and preteen home alone to put themselves to bed & get themselves up in the morning. It gave them a reason to let me go & to be proud that mommy makes tough decisions so that she can help people. Dispatcher’s aren’t saving the world or doing anything great. I think we all relate to the Five for Fighting Song “Superman,” but none of us think we’re heroes. In fact, most of us think we never quite get it right, never quite do enough and never quite make a difference.

I go through life rather isolated because unlike most people, my job is part of who I am, its not just a job. The biggest part of dispatcher stress is also the thing that makes us good at our job. It’s called “Ready Alert Status,” and it allows us to act fast and decisively as one emergency after another rolls on for 10-12 hours at a time with little downtime in between to process what has happened & restore mind body & soul. The problem with “Ready Alert Status” is that after awhile it becomes part of you & is nearly impossible to turn off. My poor family, I apologize for the years you will have to spend in therapy It’s very isolating. You don’t want to take charge away from work, so you avoid situations such as neighborhood association meetings, parent teacher organizations, etc because you no longer are able to let people fumble their way to a solution that is obvious to you because you have a very highly trained, honed sense of judgement. You know that sometimes, away from work people’s feelings get hurt by your directness when this is never your intention. So you isolate.

It’s hard to have relationships with people who have relatively “simple” lives. The descriptor “simple” isn’t meant to detract from the complexity & beauty of their lives. I don’t wish the path I have chosen on anyone else. I just mean to say that no one understands and the only ones that will begin to understand are the few who care enough to spend time experiencing your life, sitting at the console with you, seeing you handle chaos with clarity & calm, seeing the tears in your eyes & hearing the slight catch in your voice as you talk to the person or child experiencing what no one should experience. But few people want to work that hard to develop a relationship with you when it is so easy to befriend ordinary people.

So, I have started this blog to work out the hows and whys of my life. Read if you wish. I wouldn’t expect it to interest anyone but me.