Long time

It has gone a long time since I wrote on this blog. A lot has happened in this five, soon six, month.

My Mom got a massive heart attack the 26th of June and did never recover from that. She died, 86 years old, the 23rd of September and after that I’ve had a lot to take care of.

I’ve been helping her with her invoices and other bank matters for some years now so it was me who took care of the paper work after her death too. Hopefully everything will be ready before the New Year is coming up. Otherwise I’ve to make her declaration two more years, 2013 and 2014.

I’ve also contacted a lawyer who is doing the inventory of her belongings and assets, and now I’m waiting for these papers to come back from the Swedish Tax Agency so I’m able to close everything after my Mom.

Mom’s apartment is emptied and clean, so now I only have to hand over the keys to the landlord one day the coming week.

It feels very strange and sad to know that this is the finally end. No more “fika” (coffee time/break) on Friday afternoons when I made her hair. I’ve done that for as long as I can remember.

When my Dad lived (he died in 2006) I used to fix his hair too, with haircut and sometimes his hair sprawled in all directions so I put some hair mousse in it so he looked more respectable.

My in-laws have also taken a lot of my time the last year actually. My mother-in-law has at last, after a lot of persuasion, a place on the elderly section in the service home they have lived at for the last six years. She has been there for a week now, and is not satisfied. She’s demented and doesn’t know/understand what’s best for her, she’s 89 years old.

I’ve also had to get some help for my father-in-law who’s 93. Now when he’s alone he needs to be looking after too. The home care service is coming daily to look after him, and that’s nice to know.

Hopefully I’ll get some time over for things I want to do for my self now when they are taken care of and my Mom (sadly) no longer is here. But that’s of cores only wishful thinking.

Bertil is getting more and more dependent on me because of his brain tumor. After four and a half years the illness is taking out the last of his strength. He has been taking/eating so much medicine (cytostatic) over these years so now it seems to knock back instead of helping him.

He has difficulties to walk, rise up from sitting to standing, is dizzy, and has got diabetes from all the cortisone, and thrombosis because of the cancer.

Most of the time I’ve hard to understand what he says and what he’s talking about. He’s fabricating own words and thinks that I’m able to understand them. According to him there’s nothing wrong with his talking, and I’m the one that is “sick” in my head. Every day is a challenge with him. Is he in a good or bad mood? Will he be able to get up from his bed today or do I have to call for help…? How long will it be like this and how long am I able to get along before I need help?! So far I’ve had the strength to keep my mind up, and that I’m grateful for.

He lies on his bed most of the day and is also sleeping a lot. His car has been standing unmoved for the last month and that is very reliving to know.

I really, really do not wish to see him “go”, but how long can a body be able to function on such low flame. It’s so very hard to see a person you have lived together with for 45 years be so helpless and most of the time very black hearted.

We met in 1966, I was 15 and he 19 years old. We were together as often as we could (read every day). He should know by now that I will do and are doing everything that I’m able to do for him, but in his eyes I’m not doing a shit.

It’s strange, I know him in and out, but after all these years he hasn’t a clew who I am in any way at all. Perhaps that’s a typical manly thing, I don't know.

On the bright side, today anyhow, is that I’ve been at a dance show. Agnes is participating in a dancing group for kids, “Funky Kids”. All the kids were dancing very good and seemed to have very fun on the stage.

Grandma's sweetheart

Agnes will be 8 years old on New Years Eve.

HAVE A NICE DAY!

KRAM EVA

Well at last!

Bertil and I have had some kind of influenza. I think it was our grandchildren who “gave” it to us. I started and then I probably transferred it to Bertil.
Poor guy, he ended up at the infection clinic in Helsingborg for three days about two weeks ago. He had difficulties with his breathing and was really sick. He had got the flu and a mild pneumonia.
I have had a prolix coughing and also a stubborn sinusitis, and an aching tooth (probably the root canal). I went to three doctors and the third gave me – at last- antibiotics.
Yes I know, I shouldn’t take antibiotics more than necessary, but I know my self, and when the pain from my head gets unbearable it’s time for medicine!
I had used nasal spray with cortisone for nearly 14 days without any improvement, so it was time for stronger medical supplies.
Now we are getting better and better for each day, but this has been the worst cold we have had ever!
Further on I think we have to be more careful when we know the children or someone else for that matter, are sick in any way, or are having colds.
Bertil is getting more and more vulnerable for this kind of infections because of his illness and all the treatments he gets.
Well, the main thing is that we are getting better, and I’m really optimistic because the spring is on its way here in the northern parts of the world – AT LAST! We have had winter for six month, and for a short time I thought it would stay that way for ever and ever.
So, now I’m hoping for a long nice spring. That’s the time of the year that I like the most. Not to hot and not to cold, and everything is new and fresh in the nature. Mmmm!

HAVE A NICE DAY!

Kram Eva

Pain, cold and a nasty cough

Pain, cold and a nasty cough is what I have to put up with right now. Not surprising perhaps, since Agnes and Tintin have been very ill last week. Now they are on the mend (thankfully), but it was a bit dramatic last Tuesday when Tintin had a seizure due to a rapid temperature decrease. Hopefully, it was both the first and last time he should have to experience something like that. Both children and parents did see a doctor to get a helping hand. Agnes had a severe respiratory infection and had antibiotics. Tintin did not need any medicine.

Otherwise, life has been about as usual, except that my husband also has a cold and coughs a lot.
Today he was on his usual MRI screening on Ängelholm's hospital, which is made about every three months.
We will get the result from this screening next week, 6 April, when he's (we) going to Lund to visit his doctor at the neurological section.

It is equally unpleasant each time before we get to know what it looks like inside Bertil's head. It's a little more than three years now, since we got to know about his brain tumor, so he has made a several of these screenings by now. He had unfortunately one set-back about a year ago when the tumor started to grow again. Then he had to start with chemotherapy monthly for five days each time. Since then it hasn't change. So far so good! Knock on wood!

The weather is still cold here, but fortunately we haven't got more snow anyway. The sun is peeping through now and then, but not more than a day now and then.
As we use to say:
"He who waits for something good never waits too long".

Have a nice day!
Kram Eva

Long Time

Well it’s been a long time since I updated my blog, but I'm still here =). I've had a lot to do with our move to our new apartment the 13th of January.

I thought that I’d cleared out all the things that we didn’t needed, but I just fooled my self. I’ve had a lot of work to make place for all our chattels, and I think that soon I’ll have everything in its right place.

A new sofa, a chest of drawers, a dinner table, some chairs and some other things has been purchased at the new IKEA department store in Helsingborg.

More snow is falling here in Skåne right now. It’s freezing cold outside and I’m really tired of this long and cold winter. It started already in the beginning of November and has its hold on us still. The other day we had about +3 degrees C, and it almost felt like it was spring in the air.
I'm longing for some green grass and spring flowers, but it seems like we have to wait for that for a long time yet.

The main thing anyhow is that we have come in place, our house got sold and I’m not longing for the house a bit. Honestly I haven’t given it a thought since we moved out. So I now we made the right thing when we decided to sell.

Bertil is still fighting with his brain tumor. Some days are worse then the others. Right now he’s going through the annual five days/month of treatment with anti tumor therapy. The first day of this treatment is often the worst, and then it sort of flattens out.

The day before yesterday he was really sick when he woke up in the morning, and when he went out for the morning paper he fell headlong down on the ground and strike up one of his knees. Today he has taken it easy all day long, and that’s good. He needs to slow down his life, but can’t really realize that.

There aren’t many of the persons we know and meet daily, who think that he really is as sick as he is because he looks very well. He has got the characteristic “moon-face” and a big belly from all the cortisone he has to take every day. In other words, he looks like he has a good life, eating with a good appetite, but instead he’s lost a lot of muscles that has transformed into fat on his belly instead. That’s a side effect from the cortisone too.

Besides of all this, life is good to us right now. We have a new home, nice people next door, and hopefully the spring will show up again with all its beautifulness.

My favourite month of the year is May.

Ingelstorp's harbor 10 February, 2010

HAVE A NICE DAY!

Bored, bored, bored...

That sounded very negative, but that's how I feel right now. Every day seems to be the same at the moment.
Making breakfast, reading the morning paper, do the washing-up, make the beds, remind Bertil to take all his medicine, answer all his questions about the medicine, what they are good for, how do they work. (Same questions and answers every day). Why do I take this pill, and this one, and this one...
Same, same and same over and over again! On top of it all it has been snowing all day long today! I hate when the snow comes this early in the wintertime. Hopefully it will be gone until tomorrow morning because I haven't got the winter tyres on my car yet.

Bertil is in a new five days (cycle - 23 days without cytostatic and five whit) of cytostatic so he's not feeling 100% at the moment. He feels nauseous, dizzy and is tired early in the morning during these cycles, and sadly it seems that it gets worse and worse for every new cycle. Poor guy, and here I'm complaining of being bored. Sigh!
The thing is, I think, that I feel that life is running away from me. Hard to explain, but it fells like our lives are in a stage of waiting. Waiting for something that we don't know what it is. Well we do know that we are going to move to a new home after New Year, but what will come after that.
For how long is Bertil able to go on with his medication. Is there a limit, and if there is, when has he reached that limit?
Only time can give us the answer to all these questions, and this "time" that we do not know anything about, is corrosive for one's mental health. Nerve-wracking and close to impossible to take into your mind. It's plainly an unreal situation and feeling. Sometimes it feels like I'm "going in to the wall", and are not able to take any more.
Then a new day is breaking through, and that day comes and goes like the days before that, and so on, and so on...

Hugs Eva!

Feeling better =)

The sinusitis is almost gone now, but I still need to use the steroid nasal spray twice a day. I'm not happy about that, but I rather take the spray then having sinusitis.

The snow is melting down day by day, but here's still plenty. The sun has showed up now and then too. The other day I washed my car. Haven't been able to do that since October last year!!!!!!! The temps has been below zero almost every day since then. I've always washed my cars "by hand". Only once I have used a car wash, but I didn't liked the result, so never again!

Now I'm longing for the spring, and these small lovely beatuties. Perhaps they are under the snow cover, who knows?

 Snowdrops from last year.

Tintin and Bertil.

These two guys are doing their best to help the snow to melt in the sun ;-)

HAVE A NICE DAY!

 Visit my Swedish Blog - Hovdamen

and use the Google Translater ;-)

Congratulations in arrears! Grattis i efterskott!

Agnes and Tintin are celebrating their Grandpa in the local news paper (NST) today ;-)
I think Bertil was about 4 years old when this picture was taken.
Tintin is a little copy of his grandpa (in my eyes anyhow).

Agnes always names her Grandpa Muffin.

Morfar Muffins.

Tintin

HAVE A NICE DAY!

Happy Birthday Bertil!

Today it’s Bertil’s 62nd birthday, so Happy Birthday!
He didn’t want to be celebrated, so this day has been a day as any other day. Of cores he has had some phone calls from close relatives, and a post card from old friends, but nothing else.
No birthday cake or birthday gifts. Very boring in my opinion, but that’s how he wanted to have his day.

The pictures below were taken about 14 days ago, but I think that they were suitable for the day.

Grandpa and Tintin are eating marzipan and chocolate cakes

Agnes is coloring My Little ponies.

Concentration.

A really work of art.

This is Pongo and Perdita from the movie

"One Hundred and One Dalmatians."

HOPE YOU WILL HAVE A NICE DAY!

One year since...

Idag är det precis ett år sedan vi fick veta att Bertil hade/har en tumör på vänster sida av hans hjärna strax ovanför örat. Varför jag skriver hade/har är för att vid operationen den 24 februari 2008 i Lund, kunde de ta bort det mesta av tumören, men inte till 100%. Vid den här sortens hjärntumörer, Glioblastoma Multiforme, sitter det liksom trådar kvar (ungefär som en spindel) som inte går att få bort helt utan att kanske skada hjärnan. Utifrån dessa trådar växer det ut en ny tumör, men ingen kan säga när detta kommer att ske. Det kan gå snabbt och det kan ta ett till kanske tio år. Mycket frustrerande och nervpåfrestande för psyket, men ändå på samma gång ganska så överkomligt när man väl har accepterat situationen. Det bästa är att försöka leva så mycket som man brukar att göra.
Naturligtvis blir det mycket frågor, diskussioner och snack runt hans sjukdom, behandlingar, mediciner m.m. här hemma mellan oss två. Ibland kan jag bli riktigt irriterad eftersom han inte kommer ihåg från den ena stunden till den andra vilka mediciner han tar och vad de är bra för o.s.v.
Hans närminne är inte som det har varit, men däremot allt som hände för många år tillbaka kommer han ihåg mycket bättre än vad jag gör. Jag är jätte dålig på att komma ihåg vad som skedde för 10, 20, 30 år sedan. Däremot har jag ganska bra koll på nuet.
Även Bertils personlighet har ändrats ganska mycket de senaste åren. Han är envis till tusen och allt som han säger och gör är rätt, och alla vi andra kan ingenting enligt honom!!
Trots allt det som han har fått gå igenom det senaste året, så mår han ”oförskämt” bra. Det framgår kanske lite grann av bilderna här nedan. Det bästa han vet är barnbarnen, att få jobba med kroppen och att få vara ute i friska luften. Att ”ligga på soffan” är absolut inte hans grej. Det gör han bara om han är absolut tvungen, som vid en kraftig förkylningsinfluensa eller en maginfluensa, och naturligtvis när han låg nere i Lund och hade blivit opererad för sin tumör.
De flesta som genomgått både strålning och cellgiftsbehandling är nog ganska så dåliga både fysiskt och psykisk, men inte Bertil. Han tyckte till och med att han mådde bättre när han tog dessa giftpiller.
Vad Bertil än säger så har han ändå tacklat av en del det här senaste året, men det är ju inte så konstigt. Så nu får vi verkligen hoppas att det kommande året inte kommer att innehålla några komplikationer eller andra tråkigheter. Varje MR undersökning utan några som helst förändringar av tumören blir en enorm lättnad.

Today it’s exactly one year ago we got to know that Bertil had/has a tumor at the left side of his brain just above the ear. Why I write have/had is because at the surgery February 24, 2008 in Lund, they couldn’t remove the whole tumor at 100%. With this kind of brain tumors, Glioblastoma Multiforme, there are like threads left (like a spider) that can not be removed completely without perhaps damaging the brain. From these threads there will grow a new tumor, but no one can say when this will happen. It can go quickly and it may take one to perhaps ten years.
It's very frustrating and nerve-racking for the mind, but at the same time quite surmountable once you have accepted the situation. The main thing is to live as normal as possible. Of course, it has been many questions, discussions and talks about his disease, treatments, medicines, etc. here at home between us two. Sometimes I get really irritated because he doesn’t remember from one moment to the next which medications he takes and what they are good for, etc. His short-term memory is not what it has been, but everything that happened many years ago he remember much better than I do. I am really bad at remembering what happened 10, 20, 30 years ago. However, I have pretty good eye on the present.
Even Bertil’s personality has changed quite a lot in this recent year. He is very stubborn and everything he says and does is the right thing to do, and we, all others don’t understand a thing! Despite all that he has gone through this last year, he is doing "remarkably" well. It maybe appears a bit at the pictures above. The best thing he knows is the grandchildren, to work with his body and be in the open air. To "lie on the couch" is definitely not his thing. That he does only if he is absolutely compelled to do so, as if he has a severe cold or if he has stomach flu, and of course when he got the surgery in Lund a year ago.
Most people who have gone through both radiation and chemotherapy are probably quite poor both physically and mentally, but not Bertil. He said that he felt better when he took the “poison pills”. Whatever Bertil says, he has tackled off a bit this past year, but that’s not surprisingly at all.
So, we are now hoping for a new whole year without any complications or other bad things. Every MRI screening he’s doing without any grows of the tumor will be very relieving.

HOPE YOU WILL HAVE A NICE LIFE!

You and I Grandpa!

What's inside the little house?

Grandpa and Tintin are investigating the house...

...and found a small toy animal ;-)

Give me five!

"We are having fun Grandpa", Tintin seems to say. Tintin is only 1½ year old, and he hasn't started to speak - yet. He’s pointing and says “eehe”, to almost everything =). So we just have to guess what he's saying, thinking and want us to do, or what he wants to do.

You and I Grandpa.

Agnes is having a cold (and so is Tintin). She looks a little bit tired, but she's laughing at the crazy lads anyhow =))))))

HAVE A LAUGHING DAY!

Two good things!

This morning at about 7.00 am Bertil and I went to Ängelholm’s hospital. It was time for a new MRI examination for him today at 7.55 am. It is three month since the last one.
It’s always a nerve-racking time before we get to know the answer from these MRI’s. It use to take about 1-3 weeks, but today the doctor that Bertil has in Lund called him at 17.30 pm and reported that the MRI looked very good. No change on the tumor at all.
What a relief – for this time anyhow! Now there’s three whole month to the next MRI. Physically he’s feeling just fine. Mentally he’s quite ok too, but of course not all the time. I think he’s thinking about his illness (GBM rate 4) more than he’s telling me. His memory is very bad sometimes, especially when it comes to people and names.
Now we are able to “breathe out” for some weeks.

The second good thing is that I’ve now lost 20 kilograms (44,09 pounds) in nearly exact one year. I keep on eating my LCHF diet and am feeling better than I’ve done in many, many years ;-)
This is the best thing that I’ve ever have done in my whole life, except for having my three lovely kids of cores =)
Hopefully I will lose another 20 kilograms the following year. Then I will have about the same weight as I had 25 years ago. If I don’t lose another 20 kg I have to be more than satisfied anyhow.
A year ago I didn’t thought that this was possible for me. Of cores I won’t LOOK the same as I did 25 years ago if I lose more weight, but hopefully I will feel a little bit younger.

HOPE YOU HAVE HAD A VERY GOOD DAY!
MINE HAVE BEEN FANTASTIC!

Lots of fun today!

Yesterday evening we had a smaller snowstorm here. The wind suddenly run up and we got some centimeters of snow. Today most of the snow had gone, but we had a smaller amount left on our lawn at the front of our house.
We have had Agnes and Tintin here for some hours today, and in the afternoon we just had to go out in the sunny weather and have some fun in the “snow”.
Bertil and I dragged Agnes and Tintin round and round at the lawn, and they both laughed a lot. Tintin thought that it was more fun to fall off the plastic sledge than be sitting on it =)

Bertil, Agnes and Tintin.

Agnes and Bertil

Tintin.

Tintin.

Tintin.

Agnes.

HAVE A NICE DAY!

Leaving for the big city

Well, today I and my mother are flying to Stockholm because tomorrow, the 19th the funeral for her brother that so tragically died the 1st of November, is taking place. It will be nice to see some of my relatives again, but it had been nicer under other circumstance.
Don’t remember exactly when I visited the "big city" recently. Perhaps it’s 8-10 years since I was there.
Bertil is (I think) a little bit anxious to be left alone, but I think he’s more capable then he think he is. He’s taken some medicine at the moment, and for him that’s more complicated then it really is. I’ve written a lot of instructions, so I’m not worried. His medical condition at the moment is very good, it’s just that he’s so forgetful and don’t believe in him self anymore. His ego is very low, but when he really has to do things by his own I actually think that he’s capable of doing it. He’s very dependent on me, so he really needs to be by his own for a couple of days, (I think anyhow).

This is what I'm looking at when I'm sitting at my computer. My grandchildren in "double edition", so to say ;-)Vincent and Embla is kind of grandchildren too of cores =)))))

HAVE A NICE DAY!

Who do you think won this fishing game?

Agnes and grandpa Bertil are playing, and who do you think won this game? My tip is - look at the table ;-)

4th December 2008.

HAVE A NICE DAY!

Forenoon

This forenoon we had Agnes and Tintin here for some hours. Even grandpa had time to play for a while.

Agnes is playing with Auty Maria's old My Little Pony Baby House.

She just loves to play with the little ponies and all the small things that belongs to them.

Here, one of the ponies are getting some gruel.

Concentration.

We are having fun grandpa, Agnes says.

Tintin and grandpa is playing with crayons.

What a back of neck =)

You and me grandpa!

HAVE A NICE DAY!

Washing, rubbing, cleaning and waxing...

...that's what I've done all day long so my nails are black-bordered, my fingers are aching and so is also my poor back.

I vacuumed the inside of the car for almost two hours, so my old vacuum cleaner got on fire. Luckily the cleaner was outside the car. I felt an awful smell and when I looked up and out of the car window I saw a thick sticky smoke. I got out of the car very hasty and took off the switch, put the cleaner out in the middle of the courtyard, and then I went inside and fetch another old vacuum cleaner.

You see, I never trough away things unnecessarily, but now I don't have any more old vacuum cleaners in store =)

We are going to sell my father and mother-in-law's car, so I had to wash, clean and wax it. Bertil has never been any "car cleaner" so I, as always, had to do it. He's very good in mucking them up though =/
The two pictures are taken with about one month variance and with two different cameras. That's why the color at the car not is the same.
Can you see any difference (except for the color)? It took me a whole working day (eight hours) to get it in acceptably condition, both inside and outside, again! We already have a buyer and the "deal" will be on Monday afternoon =)

I hope they will be satisfied with the car.

( Sorry, but Blogger doesn't let me enlarge this picture)

30th of May

28th of June
**************************************************

Otherwise life is going on as 'usually'. Bertil started a new cytostatic period of five days this Wednesday, 25th, so now there's only one more day for this time.
He’s managing this kind of treatment remarkably well. Some people feel very sick/nausea when they take this kind of pills, but not Bertil, and that we are very thankful for.

When this treatment period is over, he will be free from the pills for three weeks. Then a new round with five days is coming up, and so on for six month. After that we just have to wait and see what’s happening. Hopefully nothing for a long time.
In about two weeks time they are going to make a new MR x-ray again, and that's comforting to know.

HAVE A NICE DAY!

My Husband in His Real Element!

The border at our garage is rotten so it needed to be changed.

So here he is, my husband in his real element.

The carpenter ;-)

His radiation and cytostatic treatment is over for this time, so now he has one month of recreation before a new period will start with cytostatic and injections with his own tumor that they have made some kind of vaccine of. It’s a new kind of treatment that they are testing in Lund on brain tumor patients. Hopefully it will do some benefit on the bad glioma tumor that he has.
As you can see he’s feeling fine at the moment and he also tolerated the hard treatment very good. The most tiring for him was the daily trips to Lund, 220 km (136,70 miles) back and forth, by taxi to the radiation treatments every weekday for six weeks.
He's a real fighter that man. I just hope that it will be like this for a long, long, long... time!

HAVE A NICE DAY AND TAKE CARE OF EACH OTHER.

YOU NEVER KNOW HOW LONG YOU WILL BE GOING AT THIS WONDERFUL GLOBE!