You must be this high to ride the rollercoaster.

Warning: Heavy content below. If you are looking for lighthearted banter, sarcastic Meghan comments or general snarki-ness on the state of the world, today's entry is probably not for you

I started this blog a long time ago with the intention of keeping it private, just someplace for me to get all of the crap out of my head and somewhere else -- in this case, the intertron.
It has over the years evolved from a private dumping ground to a running commentary on being single in Des Moines, the perils of online dating, the drama in my life and just my take on things.
I think it is fair to say that over the last week the drama factor has elevated just a few levels.

We will start with the big dog, as that makes the second half of this entry way more logical.
As I have referenced a few times in this space, my mom has cancer. We have been dealing with this in some form or another for roughly 7 years. She had her original diagnosis back in 2000. Breast Cancer.
So there was surgery, radiation and chemo. All the statistics pointed to a full recovery with a great chance for not having to deal with it again. Fast forward to 2004. What starts out as a pain in her side ultimately becomes a new diagnosis, Stage IV Metastatic Breast Cancer. Which means it has moved, to her bones, and it doesn't go away. Ever.
So we have spent the last 2 1/2 years working on keeping things status quo and keeping her healthy. That has meant a series of surgeries, ongoing chemo and lots of pain management. I tend to get rather flippant about the whole thing because it just becomes part of your total existence. "Yeah, my mom has cancer." It was like saying, "It's raining outside".
So Tuesday I get the phone call that I **think** that I have prepped myself for.
They met with her oncologist last week after a whole slew of tests of varying acronyms. MRI, PET, etc...

The message in a nutshell: chemo is not working, cancer is now everywhere in her skeletal system and has moved to her liver. We are out of options. Words like, time lines, hospice and quality of life have now entered into the dialog.
Just like that.
I mean, I saw that the call was from my sister, so I answered the phone with a "What up bitch?"
And then the freakin' hammer just dropped.
More like a 50 ton rock.
Like I said, we have been talking about this for so long, you think maybe you have a handle on it.
For the record, you don't. Its one thing to talk about something like this in the abstract. Its another all together to have it smack you upside your head.
And I know there are families that have gone through this, yet you still feel like you are the only one in the world this is happening to.
Of course, the phone has been ringing off the hook for the last few days. Please understand this is not a bad thing. Frankly, its the silver lining in all this. Its pretty amazing that the minute that things get rough, my family -- all of it -- has rallied like nobodies business. Its just that you have the same conversation like, 12 times. But I will deal with that.
I honestly don't think that I have really processed all of this yet. I haven't had "the breakdown" yet. I am sure it is coming. And I know it will be U-G-L-Y when it does. I think more than anything right now I am just pissed off.
The word I have been using up to this point is sucks. But that is no where near big enough for this. It sucks times a ga-zillion.
Which segues into the other rollercoaster moment this last week. And this one has been building for a little bit.
I had a roommate once -- this was years ago in Omaha -- who offered me a sage bit of wisdom when I was in the process of breaking up with my then boyfriend.

"You know Meghan, its hard to break-up with someone when you keep sleeping with
them"

And for the record, it was then.
And it is now.
- and yes, we are going for unprecedented honesty in this post. Why they hell not at this point?
So Joe and I have been, erm, "seeing" each other for the last few weeks. And in all fairness, I was willing to let things happen the way they were. But I was never totally comfortable with it.
I mean, I was either going to be in his life or not. But this periphery crap was not going to make it long term.
So I get the call about my mom on Tuesday. I know that Joe is out of town with friends on Tues & Wed. I send him a text that said basically, give me a call when you get back, I have had a horrible week. So, he finally surfaces on Thursday night. At about 1:30 AM -- somewhat intoxicated. For what ever reason, I go and pick him and his roommate up. He was like, I saw your text, what is up? I give him the its been a really shitty week and we can talk about it after we get his roommate home. I drop them off. Joe is like, lets go to your place. And I just let it all go. I tell him about my mom, I tell him I can't keep doing this -- whatever we are doing, and the options at this point are simple. Either we are going to make a go at this for real or it is all coming to a halt. There was a lot of other stuff in between, but that was the crux of the conversation. Keep in mind, he is still intoxicated and I am not really awake. So I say, listen. I have to work at the Cafe tomorrow night, lets get together after work and talk about this for real. He agreed. And we did go home to my house, but nothing happened. I dropped him off Friday morning before work, I was like, "we are still on for tonight, right". I get a yes. And off I go. I can't say that I felt good about the day, but at least I felt like we were going to get this worked out.
End of the night at the cafe, I shot him a text, "you done with work yet?". He replied -- this was a good sign -- that no, he wasn't done yet. I write back, and was like, just give me a shout when you are done and we can meet up.
Never heard from him.
At all.
All weekend.
After all that, after telling him what was going on and that I needed him to be strong for me, he bailed. Like a total chicken shit. He didn't even really bail, he freakin' ran for the hills and didn't even bother to say a word about it.
I don't have the energy to deal with all this right now. I mean, you can't hack it, say so and let me move on. But this... this just sucked. Again with the suck word being used, and not quite meeting the appropriate level of suckiness.
In summary kids, you must be at least 5'4" to ride the MeghanCoaster. And the ride these days is a bit of a motherfucker.

There it all is. I promise future posts will not be so intense as this one, but I will be using this to help communicate what is going on with my mom. Keeps everyone in the loop. But with my next post I promise to return to your regularly scheduled programming.
Same bat time, same bat channel.

Now Listening: Pink Moon by Nick Drake