Need to RANT big time!!!

Normally, I pride myself on being a rather non-confrentational type. I don't like to cause problems with people and often won't say anything if I'm getting ticked off. When I got home today, though, I was sorely tempted. The situation was as follows.

First of all, it bears mentioning that I'm now working two jobs...the second one is more complicated to understand than the first, if you can believe that. What it amounts to is I'm essentially a part time Nanny. Yea pretty unexpected if anyone knows me but some old friends of mine were in a bind and couldn't get a daycare or anything so I stepped in to care for a one year old all day, for most of the week. I don't mind playing with the little guy but I don't like the stinky moments and the SCREAMING. His name is Ian and he has a set of pipes like you wouldn't believe....and some kind of early onset abandonment issues.....essentially you can't leave him alone...even in his crib or playpen or whatever and leave his sight. If he can't see you he screams. I show up for this new little endevor by 7:30 pretty much every weekday morning but tuesday. From there I play with Ian, Feed Him, Rock him to sleep ect until his folks get home (usually between 5:30 and 6) so it's a long grueling day. In addition...I still have my regular job that needs doing so after I leave Babytown (not it's really name but I call it that sometimes) I head to the office to get caught up with paperwork, make calls, send faxes ect to make sure everything is ready for the next day. So it's a long LONG day just about every day and I'm worn out....and before you think this means I actually have money...I think it bears mentioning that this exhausting week only yielded 130 bucks...not enough to cover the big bills I have next week.

So you will understand why this next part of the story, today's little misadventure, is more than I really care to fool with. Now I have been packing some DVDs for Ian to watch during the day, some new stimulation for his brain, he's at that age where he needs to be absorbing information constantly, so I'm trying to help with that. Well, while packing my dvd container for the day, I noticed about half my collection is just gone...I thought that rather odd considering I'm quite sure I did nothing with it, and I keep it all rather well organized...so it's pretty clear that there's a ton missing. I thought about it and I hadn't loaned anything to anyone. So the most likely culprits were my brothers...both of which were asked if they had seen a couple of the ones I knew were part of the cashe of seemingly vanished items. Both claimed to have nothing to do with any of it. I work really hard for every cent I have....the things that I have spend money on in the last several years are, in essense, things I worked my butt of for. For someone to think they have the right to just take things that I worked for and bought with my hard earned money is just mean. And to lie about it is worse.

I knew it wasn't Forrest...he never takes without asking and always returns things he borrows. So that means the other one................which is bad. I don't know how many of you know my other brother but he is an extremely disagreeable fellow when crossed....or you know...if you happen to breath funny in his direction...he's easly offended and not terribly reliable. The other thing is he is a slob....I don't mean forgets to take the trash out once in a while or doesn't make his bed or dust or sort papers...those are things which busy people just push off....no...he is in a league all his own...he makes horders look like neat freaks....piles of clothes, shoes...garbage and junk cover his room in piles which are just about waste deep all the way around. The whole place smells of rotten things and it's pretty obvious that he has things which don't belong to him. Sure, maybe I am just being critical...after all...my appartment isn't sunshine and roses but my stuff is organized chaos...everything has a place and I know where it is at most of the time. That's why I was so shocked to notice I was missing things....it's my complusion of sorts that I keep them neatly stacked and packed away in their own little cabinet that is just for them. His space is like 100 suitcases just blew up. That and several fastfood joints. Now I love my brother...but sometimes ARG he's just got this way of doing things which just seems to be completely idiotic. Well anyway...I sneak in looking for that dvd I wanted to show Ian...hoping I was wrong about it being in that black hole of crap. I wasn't...but I couldn't find it...DVDs (mostly mine but several belonging to my folks) randomly scattered about...cases steped on and crushed...a pile where they are all in the wrong cases, a pile where the cases are all empty random disks....dvd's, video games...just stacked haphasardly. I'm shocked for a moment at just how much of my stuff is there and RUINED. These things cost me money...money I've worked for all my adult life...pennies I saved for something special...things I happily fished out of a discount bin not believing my luck. All of it just disgarded like the pizza box on top of the back seat from his car which...amazingly is not in the car at all...nope...upstairs in his room covered in crap. Proves he not only has no respect for anyone elses stuff but has no respect for his own either. I salvaged what I could quickly...many of my things left there to rot as I couldn't find one or both components of them. I was seething by the time they got home but said nothing....even after what I heard from them coming up the stairs.....

I've had an impossibly hard day....I've had to clean up baby poo off Ian's back....which didn't even make sense.....and pick up cherieos and do anything possible to stop the screaming which errupts randomly for no reason what so ever, sung softly till baby barbell nodded off (yea I call him that sometimes...but he's sooo heavy!!!) my nerves are fried from that and all the angry phone calls from my regular job all day........so coming up the stairs is bob and jess having some kinda conversation...I'm not really listening until I hear something that is rather personal.

Well she says something about "adrenal crash" and bob scoffs and replys that instead of being sick, I'm mearly lazy, fat and pidgeon toed. Now, I've been working my butt off all day, only to find my stuff getting ruined and now my own brother is telling his girlfriend (who I actually get along with most of the time) that I'm a fat lazy lier...Now I want to get this set straight...

First of All, even in light of all this I did nothing, I didn't attack him or get pissed or start yelling or screaming or anything....why? because I'm an adult and I don't do stuff like that (or at least I try really hard to be diplomatic about things) At that moment though, I was so close to acting like a tween ager and pitching a fit.

Secondly, just because I can't afford to be on the medication I need to get better doesn't mean I stopped being ill in the first place. I actually did suffer an adrenal crash in high school...which apparently went unoticed for 5 years by the people who make claim to know me so well (they don't by the way but that's an entirely different problem from the one I'm working with at the moment) which means I no longer have a functioning adrenal system. Which is bad all by itself..but combined with hypertension, an accelerated pulse rate and a pretty severe thyroid problem and you have a really really big problem. And one that I've beaten before. Which begs the question why can't I do it now? Before it took me three months of essentially rest with no class...work...or anything. I was so bored, you've no idea...but it helped me get stablized and then the rest was just medication and trying to take it easy and not over tax myself....this time that isn't an option...the meds aren't an option...and even if they were you have to take them the same time everyday...something that isn't possible to do without food and drink...which is, at best, a wishful thinking idea most of the time for me. I can't afford to eat three meals a day, even if I could, I couldn't do it around the baby unless he was sleeping which definately doesn't happen at the same time everyday. He isn't exactly forgiving when it comes to people eating things around him. He gets very umm cranky I guess is the best word.

So I'm not taking the medicine that I should and it's just getting worse and worse. But it hasn't just up and vanished...that's a dumb thing for him to think....most of my family is like that...they think because I'm not complaining 24/7 that there's nothing wrong. When, in reality, I'm just trying to get the things done that I know I need to and hope I can continue to funtion at a semi regular level. I'm so busy lately I have to scedule with friends if I want to spend some time with them...that just stinks....I haven't seen some of them in a while now because I just can't manage it. I'm so dead on my feet before the day begins...never mind at the end of the whole thing. I don't sleep well if at all, usually jolting up at odd hours. For some reason, though, I sleep best at dawn...a problem if I have to be somewhere by 7:15. And all I hear from the people I do have time to see is that they don't have any clue what's going on and think I'm just making everything up...what do I need to do? carry around doctor's notices??? I shouldn't have to carry around documentation to prove to my own family that I'm not lying.

And to hear that my brother not only abuses my things, steals from me and lies about it, but that he and his lady fair have jokes at my expense just sucks....it makes me want to cry or scream or maybe both and it really isn't fair. I know I sound like 12 years old but I just don't understand why my friends get me and the people I've know all my life don't and, moreover, are so convinced they do. That's probably the worst part, they think they know me so well, and when I tell them they're wrong about something...they just say I'm insane and move forward...kinda how you pet the dog when he's worried instead of trying to find what's bothering him. It's not how you treat family.

Maybe it's just me.....but that seems like common sense.