Lately I have been feeling stressed and overwhelmed and once again my old friend anxiety seems to be close at hand.  At times it feels like there is no air and taking a deep breath is impossible.  I have been juggling even more than the usual-house repairs, bills, money, legal issues, doctor appointments and tests for both Robby and myself and an endless line of grown up decisions.  I have also found myself having to defend my decisions regarding Robert’s health care.  And sleep, well that’s something that has not been close at hand.  I feel like I am just running and running and running and my fear is that if I stop I will fall face down. 

You see in addition to all the ‘normal’ stress in my life, my son Robby’s health is declining.  His underlying condition is degenerative and changes are not unexpected, but that doesn’t make them any easier.  I have felt blessed over the past few years, Robby was only expected to live to 16 years of age and this year he turned 29.  I see all those years are a gift, every year on his birthday I am thankful for another year with him.  

But now as I said things are changing and I feel helpless because I can’t stop it or fix it.  But a lot of the time I feel overwhelmed by the stress of making the right decisions for him.  It is a fine line between treatments that can help or at least make him comfortable and treatments that will be too hard on him or even cause him pain.  I wish his father was here with us, but in a way he his, when Robby’s problems were diagnosed we sat down and discussed what we wanted and didn’t want for our son.  We decided that we wanted three things for him; one was to be as pain free as possible, to be happy wherever he is at mentally and to be at home-his home.  Those decisions still feel right to me today, so what I am trying to remember is that I am not making all these decisions alone, Robert and I made them together and that does give me some comfort and even at times a little peace of mind.