Diary.. Phyllis Griffiths, August 2003 It's has been an exceptionally hard month.. so the raw and mixed up postings are here. From wo286@victoria.tc.ca Sun Aug 3 11:24:58 2003 Subject: devistated... Our landlord dropped by Don's workplace yesterday.. we have been given two months to get out so the place can be bulldozed. Out by Sept 30th.. Oh we get our damage deposit plus 13yrs of intrest and a very good reference as to our being good tenents.. but beyond that. Please keep my family in your prayers. I know that a person has to meet God half way on things.. that is do what you can and trust that God will make the rest happen. I'm hoping for a little, out of the way place where I can have my garden and my cats and not be disturbed at all hours by loud louts spewing hate and obscenities down the street, construction sounds, booming car stereo systems, screeching tires and roaring motors.. loud parties and screaming idiots. I go into sensory overload fat too easily, and startled far to easily. I can't help that. I'm so scared that I will end up in a noisy apartment with no garden spot and none of my precious kitties. I will die if that happens. Huggs Phyllis -- ~*~ From wo286@victoria.tc.ca Sun Aug 3 11:53:54 2003 My body is in a state of rebellion again.. so I am doing the only thing a PWC can do. Agressive Rest Therapy. I'm doing my email from bed ;o]. I have cat-supervised ART.. does this make it CART??!! The cats have been taking turns on the bed with me since yesterday. Don laughed at the gang. Yesterday afternoon and evening was bad. My body felt toxic.. the kind that hits with food posioning or a body hangover. Immodium and gravol time. i was having problems walking and in using a knife and fork. Being upright for very long and the world was spinning. what a mess. I told Don that if he wanted to drag me out to see a place I'd need at least a half-hour warning for the gravol to take effect. ugh.. Don has some leads on possible places to purchase, but his boss is gone on vacation for the week so there won't be much happening until he is back.. since the boss has offered to help finance buying a starter home. Don has laid a guilt trip on our landlord and his real estate agent, and Don got an email from the agent saying that "everyone" wants to help us get a place.. look at the listings and pick one and it will be arranged. Listings were included. There are several possibilities in our general area. The big thing will be how long it takes to take possession of the place since it is not going to be possible for us to wrangle an extra month from the bulldozer. It's amazing to me how a person can do creative financing and buy a house when they have no money. So later this week we will look at a few places and see if there is anything we like. Meanwhile I must rest because I can't do anything else :o{ Rest and trust in God, the Universe, and the power of love and prayer.. Huggs Phyllis -- ~*~ From wo286@victoria.tc.ca Sun Aug 10 2003 I haven't had the energy to be online much, and my vision makes the screen swimmy which doesn't help the vertigo any. But I'm still here. No progress really on any front.. Huggs Phyllis -- ~*~ From wo286@victoria.tc.ca Tues Aug 26 2003 Hi Dear friend I haven't been able to be online much of late, between bouts of vertigo with hot flushes, exhaustion, vision trouble and bouts of deep, dark depression I haven't been able to do much of anything. :'^{ My cats have been working hard to keep me from tumbling down the stairs, herd me off to bed when I'm in need of being there, and urging me up in the mornings once the morning meds take effect. MaoMau even herded me off for a bath and stayed with me in the bathroom until I was out and then he herded me back to the bedroom. Very un-MaoMau like behaviour. We are waiting on pins and needles to hear if our mortgage application has been approved or denied. Meanwhile we are packing up the place because we have to be out of here before Oct 1st. Actually, it is really our son's mortgage application since he has the credit rating and largest income.. he's the primary and we are the co- whatever-they-call-its. We have to have financing in place by the 29th. We found the place we had been looking for, an older house in a quiet area with a full suite in the basement. Chris will take the suite and Don and I get the upstairs. But for the month of October Don and I + cats will be in the lower suite because the tenants upstrairs need two months notice.. and the owner was living in the basement so it will be free. Then come the end of october they move out, we go up, and Chris moves into the lower. This is all dependant upon the bank giving us a mortgage. we seem to be falling into this.. buying a house with no money. High finance.. my mind tilts trying to understand this. and if not.. plan B is to find a rental somewhere, put our applinces into storage with other things of importance, give as many cats as we have to up for adoption.. and keep looking for a place to purchase that we can afford to buy. Plan C.. we lose all the cats, put everything into storage, and live out of our Volvo. I'm scared half out of my mind. But I'm strong enough today to fill some boxes. We have to pack. Our current home as an appointment with a bulldozer. The rental and purchase market here is crazy. For the price of a run down shack or slummy apartment per month mortgage payments are cheaper. But either way the trick is in finding a place. Demand is high, so rents are high, and houses sell fast. Rentals are usually filled before the ads hit the newspapers. My world continues to spin out of control and I am doing my best to hang on for the ride.. Huggs Phyllis -- ~*~ From wo286@victoria.tc.ca Wed Aug 27 14:23:06 2003 Subject: Re: Update on my move :'-( The mortgage was refused. we don't seem to have any sort of credit rating so the bank wants a down payment of $12K that we do not have. Unless some miracle happens before friday's deadline we are back looking for a home again. Don is trying to find a source of a second mortgage to cover the extra $15K we will need overall. Chris is trying too. But things do not look good for the Griffiths family. We had to borrow money to get the initial deposit in for the offer on the place. We had one shot.. and it missed. I knew in my heart that the place was too good to be true, too perfect. The realtors thought we had a good shot at getting approved.. but the banks make their own descions and the only one doing the $0 down payement thing says no. I'm using my digital camera to make a photo-album of my home and all my cats. I am thinking of doing up bio sheets with pics for all of the cats so that when I have to give them up whomever adopts them will be able to know a bit about them. Spooky will go back with Chris, so at least he will be kept with the family. They love me so much that it hurts to see the love and trust in their eyes. They are loving having their pictures taken. I did manage to pack up two boxes yesterday. Boxes of books. The cats keep climbing into the empty boxes.. it's so cute it's heart wrentching. I'm doing my best to hang in and keep going.. and I do not know if I can manage to do this. Last night I wanted to do up my cat bios, then do up good-bye letters.. and swallow a bottle of pills and just go to sleep. I managed to not do that last night.. but I don't know about tonight or tomorrow night or the day when I give up my cats and pack all we have into a storage locker somewhere. I have lost all hope. I don't know where I will get the strength to get through this. I'm trying to hang in long enough to get everything in order, to pack up as much as I can and to make sure that the cats I love so much will be safe and loved. I have no idea what will happen to my pots of herbs I have so lovingly tended. I don't know anyone who would want them. That's part of my problem.. but for my husband and kids I don't know anyone in the physical world around me. My world is 75% my house, my garden, my cats.. and I am losing them all. I'm dying inside. I'm dying of a broken heart. I don't even know if I will have a phone line so I can have at least minimal internet, and if I do will I be able to see the screen or have the cognative abilities to reach out to you folks for the support I will need to keep on going through the heartbreak. That will make my world will be 98% gone. All that anchors me in time and space will be gone. I don't know how I will adapt to an entirely new "world". We have a month left until we are thrown out on the street if he have not found a place to move to. The rental market is tight.. and many rental units are up for sale. Most of the places listed for sale are tenanted, so even if we did find some way for Chris to "buy" us a mobile home somewhere it wouldn't be vacant by the end of Sept. I am beyond terrified. So we rent a place.. it's up for sale and two months later we have to move again. Move again and again.. I don't have the physical strength for this and I sure don't have the mental strength either. I've caught myself twice going mindlessly for the pill bottles already. I now understand why suicide happens so much among pwc's. My doctor doesn't want to put me on any meds for depression yet. I can't do SSRI's or trycyclics so there isn't much to try anyways. Don knows how close I am to giving up on living. I'm writing this I guess as the good-bye letter I so wanted to send out last night. I love you all and just want you to understand what is happening so you will have so idea of what happened if I suddenly disappear from cyberspace. I am reaching out for help.. for support.. some sort of anchor for my world, my reality. I have no one else to turn to. Huggs Phyllis -- ~*~ Date: Fri, 29 Aug 2003 12:58:36 -0700 (PDT) Hi Susie.. yes I remember you, dear heart. Thank you for your kind words. Today I am trying to keep as calm and fear free as possible. I know I must keep on believing that we will get through this time as we have aloways gotten through things.. by some miracle at the last minute that pulls us through. Thank you for keeping me in your prayers. I know that prays can work miracles, that ways appear where none was seen to be before. Waiting is hard.. and I am praying that we will have good news today. Don and I had a long talk last evening where he reassured me that we would get through this because just too many people are working so hard and so many people are praying so hard, and giving so much into this that it cannot not happen. If this house falls through, there is another even better place that will materialize for us.. so I am not to fear. Don is so stressed and tired. In the past, I was the dominant one who took the lead on finding accomadation, packing things up, taking care of household business. I told Don how much it hurts to no longer be able to do much of anything and to be unable to help him.. do my share of the work. I want to help but my body will not let me. I'm clinging onto a big rock face today.. the massive cloud of doom has turned into a big smooth rounded rock, with hand and toe holds. Last night I felt it was the rock face I was going to be smashed upon by some raging torrent or water or wind. Today I realize that this rock is my anchor rock. It is made up of the love, compassion, good will, prayers, hopes, concerns of all the people who care about me. It may not be a rock at all.. but maybe I am clinging onto a giant tortous who is slowly and gently taking me (and my kittys) to safety. Huggs Phyllis -- ~*~ Date: Fri, 29 Aug 2003 17:25:13 -0700 (PDT) Subject: WE GOT A MORTGAGE!!!!!!! Dear friends.. I am excited and happy and pinching myself to be sure I'm not dreaming.. but through hard work, much love, begging, borrowing, and the gifts of money from gaurdian angel friends I have the before me a copy of a fax approving the mortgage of the house.... It was approved last minute through the hard and fast work of our Realtor, Jason Kyhl. He called in some favors for this. Thank you, thank you, thank you to all who helped me hang on and hang in.. to all who have prayed for me and my family and for the miracle that continues to unfold around me.. and thank you to my gaurdian angels who have come forward to help out for that down payment. We will have a home to move into Sept 30, 2003. I told Don that maybe I should change his name to George Bailey. He grinned and said once we get settled.. that would be getting close to Christmas since come Oct 31 Chris moves in downstairs and we move upstairs.. that we hold a party in honour of all those who are making this miracle possible. I think some of our honourees will have to attend via webcam ;-) thankyouthankyouthankyouthankyouthankyouthankyouthankyouthankyou Please keep praying that we hit no further snags, hurtles or crisis. There is a great deal of work yet to be sorted out, more fees that we will need to find money for and endless boxes to pack and move. But everything feels so much more doable knowing that we will have a house to go to.. a place where I can have my cats and my garden.. Huggs phyllis -- ~*~ Date: Fri, 29 Aug 2003 21:49:02 -0700 (PDT) Subject: Re: [PWChat] WE GOT A MORTGAGE!!!!!!! My head is spinning.. we signed a paper with the real estate agent this evening.. now it's up to Chris to see about getting the insurance and see about what tax rebates and home owners stuff is available and for us to gather up the moneies we have so that in a few weeks when the lawyer calls and says "please bring in a certified cheque for $X,000.00" that we have it ready for him. Meanwhile we pack.. Don's head is spinning too. It has been a wild day.. we are both numb.. I told Don that we still have two more months to get through before everyone is moved in safe and sound.. two more months of stress. Ugh.. Then we have a whole batch of home repairs.. but it will be repairs on our home. ;-] How nice that sounds. I'm feeling exhausted.. but happy and hopeful.. Thank-you.. HHUUGGSS Phyllis -- ~*~ Date: Sat, 30 Aug 2003 15:51:07 -0700 (PDT) Thank you for your love and support everyone.. Today I have jelly for muscles, the relief has sucked the tension away from them. Last night was another round of spinning world, hot surges and cold valleys.. kitties close and comforting. Poor little loves, some have been so worried that their fur is falling by the handful. I hope that we won't have any bald cats by the time all the shuffling about is done. With the panic gone for now.. rest is possible to get. Rest is good.. the body likes rest. The vibration that filled my entire being has calmed. The tremors are still active, but maybe they will fade again over time or I'll learn how to adapt around them :'/ This all seems like a dream.. or a novel. Don and I keep looking for a white rabbit to appear. We are so blessed to have the family and friends that we do. This is going to be one of those stories that people are going to have a hard time believing... even if there are "here' while the story unfolds. I love you guyz.. Huggs phyllis -- ~*~