Henry is home again

While we were gone we were hoping that the hospital would keep Henry to be able to give Christena the break. She does not cope well when she can't have time to herself (not that I can blame her, I would be EXACTLY the same way, I am sure). No such luck. Henry did not have pneumonia again, the nebulizer was keeping his airways clear. This time he was severely dehydrated (the man doesn't drink anything other than tea and coffee which only serve to further dehydrate). They kept him in to rehydrate him.

We did learn that the cancer is continuing to advance. Christena really wants to investigate to find out how much it has changed but Henry was clear (at a time when he was able to be clear) that he did not want any further treatment. Because we are planning to treat the cancer, they are willing to spend the money on more testing. Quite frankly, I suspect the treatment would kill him faster than the disease anyway. He took a huge medical beating last time and he went in to that treatment otherwise healthy.

Anyway, Henry is home and life is back to what it was last week. Amazing how fast things return to normal.

The boys are happy we are home and loved the gifts we got them. Apparently they had a riot with Nani and Papa and now Quinn is happily riding a two-wheeler, thanks to some help from his big brother.
Have a great week.

The attractions we didn't go to

but that the boys would REALLY like us to go back and check out (with them in tow of course)

US

To prove we were there and didn't just buy a couple of postcards, we finally thought to have someone take our picture yesterday morning. This is just down from our hotel and the American Falls are in the background.

The weather was GORGEOUS and we had a great time walking and talking and holding hands! Doug did spend some time by himself taking pictures while I went and had a WONDERFUL massage!!! I would have loved to hang out with him, holding his lens cap but the massage table was calling me.

What a GREAT weekend!!!

To say thank you will never cover it all! We had such a wonderful time and so here are some pictures that we took while we were there. This won't be wordy, just pretty!

Picture #1: the view from our room
Picture #2: a view of our room
Picture #3: another view of our room

(PS - Yes, that's Doug's computer on in the one shot. He had a couple of hours work to do in order to be able to have the weekend off.)

Henry is back in hospital

We thought perhaps his pneumonia was back but apparently not. The nebulizing treatments he has been receiving have kept his lungs in better health. The doctor last night (when we took him in) thought that is was an advancement of the cancer. Unfortunately this also means an advancement of the Alzheimer's disease. They are keeping him for now and have mentioned perhaps putting him into palliative care. It is my understanding though, that palliative care does not have the facilities to house or accommodate his wandering tendencies, etc. due to the Alzheimer's. I do not know, at this time, how things will unfold.

I will not be home to post an update over the weekend (as you will know if you have read other blog entries) as this is OUR ROMANTIC WEEKEND AWAY!! I will post again Monday or so if there are any changes.

I am off to finish waxing my legs and maybe have a nap. It would be terrible to get to Niagara Falls only to sleep the weekend away from fatigue!

What world is this?

I posted to a group of AMAZING and wonderful on-line friends (whom I have been extremely close to since we "met" even though there are many of these incredible womyn that I have not actually MET IRL) about Kristin setting Doug and I up for the night in Niagara Falls. That, in an of itself continues to blow my mind!!

After posting about how blessed I felt these womyn took it upon themselves to further fill my cup to overflowing and pitched in to give us an extra night. Now Doug and I have two nights away in Niagara Falls while the boys get to spend the weekend with my parents.

I was stunned speechless . . . and you know me . . . that's no easy feat! Then I started to cry. (Again, no surprise there!)

For everyone who contributed, thank you from the bottom of our hearts. For those who have simply sent positive energy our way to allow us to have the stars line up in such a way that we can manage to swing time off together to make sure our marriage stays on track, THANK YOU! We have been feeling your love and support over the past several months and we want you to know that we know and that we appreciate it.

Sheraton On The Falls

The web address for the hotel we will be staying in is linked here: Sheraton
(I hope this works because I don't do it often enough to be confident.)

Anyway, we have been gifted with a room that has:

2 Queen Beds Traditional Non-smoking, City View, Sweet Sleeper Bed, Large Marble Bathroom, 330 Sqft Room With Cherrywood Furnishings, Oval Table With Chairs, Overlooks City Of Niagara And Famous Clifton Hill

Thank you again Kristin! This is the nicest thing EVER!!!!

The chocolate is wearing off . . .

Good morning.

Things with Henry are about the same. It is a steady decline in his abilities to do anything. He broke down crying last week because, in a momentary period of cognizance, he realized he can no longer do the little things (like get dressed or shave) himself. It was quite sad. Christena still doesn't know how to handle him and she spends a great deal of time losing her patience with him. It is infuriating but there isn't much we can do until a space becomes available for him in a care facility and we aren't the primary caregivers for him.

Right now the biggest challenge is getting her to understand that we agreed, when he came home, that she needed to be with him *ALL* of the time, unless she had arranged for respite care to come in. Our lives are *so* busy that we can't be counted on to drop everything and go sit with him while he looks at the television. She still decides, on a whim, that she needs to go to the drugstore and will just come up and announce that she is going out. She does not get that he can't be left at home alone, at all. It isn't safe for him or for everyone else. We struggle with that and she gets angry with me when I tell her she can't just go out. I think I have posted this frustration before though and so will leave it.

Last week I had a client killed in a car accident. It was HORRIFIC! She was due on April 26 and her husband was driving. He spent the week and Sunnybrook and is slowly recovering. She and the baby went to Trillium, to deliver the baby to try to save it before she died but had no luck. Both mom and baby died as a result. I asked Doug to come with me to the wake on the weekend and it was a Catholic wake. The casket was open with mom and baby laying together, holding the rosary. I don't think Doug will ever be the same. It REALLY upset him. He wasn't upset that they would do that, rather it bothered him to see the mother and baby together.

With all the has gone on here in the recent past Doug and I have decided to get away for a night. My parents have agreed to take the boys to their place the weekend of the 21st so that Doug and I can go away. We can't even do that here because Christena thinks nothing of coming upstairs to vent if she is feeling frustrated. I was out for coffee last night with a past client/now friend and was telling her we were going to Niagara Falls for the night. I explained that we had never really been before (other than to do a 5 minute viewing of the water) and when I got up this morning I found an email from her explaining that she used some of her travel points to book us a room at the Sheraton On The Falls hotel. It was so sweet. I started crying. It seems silly but there has been SO much stress lately that this seemed like the sweetest thing anyone could ever do for us.

Anyway, other than the colds that all of us seem to have, life is pretty much the same. How are YOU doing????

Noni and Chris

bought their first house. (For those of you who don't know Noni -- or Rhonda, for short -- she is my sister.) This is a picture of them on the floor (before the floors were were sanded, stained and verathaned) in their living room. I was there yesterday to see the new house and it is beautiful. They have great plans for it too.
CONGRATS Noni and Chris!!!

A brief update

A friend just asked me about Henry and I realized I haven't posted here for a while. It can be hard to keep up sometimes (with life just moving along at a break-neck pace) and this week has been especially hard. I learned that one of my clients, a woman from Mississauga who happens to be a nurse at Trillium Health Centre, was killed in an auto collision last weekend. She was still pregnant at the time and was due to deliver around the end of April. I can not tell you how profoundly this has hit me. Her partner is at Sunnybrook with serious injuries and I hope he has recovered enough to be able to attend the wake tonight and tomorrow as well as the funeral on Monday. He will need these opportunities to work through his grief. Doug has agreed to come with me to the wake tonight so that I have a support network of my own.

In any case, with that going on I have forgotten to keep you informed of changes happening here. Now that Henry is home again I think Christena is understanding why we encouraged her to allow him to stay in long-term care. It is more of a full-time job than she realized. This is especially true given that most nights, regardless of being both "tranquilized" AND "sedated" (with two different medications) he does not sleep through the night. When he doesn't sleep at night, neither does she . . . or any other adult in the house (Fergus and Quinn seem to be able to sleep through ANYTHING). Henry is most confused at night and so is louder and angrier at that time of day. It is certainly difficult for both of them.

She is also having trouble with the idea that he can't be left alone. At all! And this has happened a couple of times this week. I can't seem to get through to her. This morning I was still sleeping when I heard her come up and ask Fergus to tell me that she had gone out to the drug store for something. She has him locked in downstairs (I can get in easily, but he can't get out because we know he has a tendency to wander) and left him sleeping on the chesterfield. I couldn't do that with the boys and she needs to learn that she can't do that with him. It's like leaving a toddler home alone. I just went down to sit with him while she was gone -- even though he was sleeping -- in case he woke up.

Henry started his day program this week. It is like day care and it gives Christena a break two days a week; not to mention that it's a social and stimulating environment for him. We have someone from the local Red Cross come to pick him up at 8 in the morning. They feed him and keep him entertained and then bring him back around 3:3o in the afternoon. This is on Tuesdays and Fridays and is to give her some time to go out and run errands or catch up on lost sleep. He didn't mind going and she felt like she got a lot accomplished.

Physically he is in the same place he has been since he got out of hospital. We are hopeful that we can keep the pneumonia away with him being nebulized 6 times a day. We'll have to wait and see.

For those who celebrate Christian Easter, Happy Easter. For those who celebrate the Pagan "Hiding and finding of eggs brought by a rabbit (the symbol of fertility)," good egg-hunting to you!

FERGUS is 9!!!!!

He stayed in bed until 9:00, although he REALLY wanted to get up at 7:30. That's too early for him so I reminded him that he wanted the energy for staying up later. Now I have the whole morning to plan for the party.

We are off to pick up friends in Guelph (about 35 minutes away) this afternoon to have them come back here and have a big play. Ferg's best friend, Adam will be here when we come home from Guelph. They are planning to have a play outside, a treasure hunt and then pizza. Fergus has also asked for a dessert pizza instead of cake so we will see how that goes over. Presents will finish off the home portion of the party before we pack them in the cars and take them to see Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles at the movie theatre.

All in all I think all of us are equally excited about the party plans. I am even going to take Fergus out for lunch this afternoon so that I get some time alone with my birthday boy. He and I rarely get time one-on-one and so this is more for me then it is for him. He is very much "my" son in that his personality is much like my own so I don't think he will mind having to spend time with just his mom.

Downstairs, Henry is okay with being home. It is FAR more work than Christena thought it would be. I know he has only been gone for a few weeks but the difference in his abilities is dramatic as are his medical needs. I have spent no fewer than 3 hours tracking down all of the medications he now needs to take. He is being nebulized 6 times a day and that takes timing and patience.

Henry asks after his brothers and sisters many times a day. He does not understand that Canada is not Scotland (or Wales). He asks if we have seen Robert or Jack or Tillie or Maisie. We try not to further confuse him (because there just is no way to correct him and make him understand) so we tell him that they must be at work or out or something. When we have tried to tell him the truth he has become angry and he doesn't want that any more than we do. I am glad he thinks about his family though.

It is a glorious spring day and I am going to go out and enjoy it! I hope you are well.

He's coming home again

The long-term care facility that Christena looked at last week with Douglas and Jennifer is 50 kms. from our home. As I mentioned, Christena does not drive and would have had to take two different types of transit to travel one way. This coupled with the fact that she was convinced that others would look at her and assume she put Henry into care because she didn't want the responsibility anymore and she has decided to have him come home.

I know she never wanted him to go into care in the first place. I have tried to help her understand that no one would EVER judge her for putting him into long-term care because it is extremely emotionally and physically difficult to look after someone who is as mentally and physically incapacitated as Henry has become in the last couple of months. She didn't hear me though. She didn't hear Doug or Jennifer when they said the same thing. She is worried about how it looks and I am sure that is as much a product of the age she grew up in as anything.

If she wants him to be at home for now, until a bed becomes available at the local facility, then Doug and I are certainly happy to help her achieve that goal. She wants him home. She believes he wants to be at home. She may very well be right. The hardest part is that he doesn't know anywhere to be home anymore. She told him that she was going to bring him home and he was confused. He told her he "was home." The next day he told her he wanted to get out of there and go home.

She misses him and I don't blame her. They have been married for 43 years (April 25) and that is a long time to live with someone. I am sure I would miss Doug too and would do whatever I could to keep him home.

Henry will come home with a variety of new medications and machines to help look after him and people to come in and help out but at least he will be here. That will be easier for all of us, I am sure of that.

Hug your family!!!

Happy Ostara

Warm spring wishes to all of you! It is a typical spring day here in southern Ontario. It dawned cold and sunny and warmed up, clouded over and is now raining mid-afternoon. Goddess only knows what tonight will bring.

Henry is still in Georgetown. We know that he will be moved out of town when the next available bed comes available but we are not able to know what community he will be in. We have asked for consideration because Christena does not drive and we shall see if that is recognised at all. We acknowledge that the local hospital is not equipped to look after him as they do not have secure facilities. Yesterday afternoon he wandered out while the staff was on lunch. Thankfully he didn't get too far before they stopped and redirected him.

This reminds me of stories my parents would tell when my grandmother first went into long-term care. She was there for some time before the decision was made to place her in the secure unit as she made her way out "to go home" on a few occasions. That's what Henry was up to. He was "going home" when they found him. The challenge is that he doesn't know where home is. Even when he was here he would ask when they were going home.

Jennifer has gone back to Calgary. I am certain it was excruciating to have to leave with all that transpired while she was here. She has so much work to do that I know she is feeling grossly torn between all that she wants to be able to do. It was lovely to have her here though and to be able to spend some time together.

My irises are starting to poke their small, leafy heads through the soil in the front garden. I was looking this morning at the new bed I put in around the front tree and wondered if I should get to work at it before the ground gets too hard. I think I need the temperature to increase a little though. There's something about working the soil with your hands that rinses the worries of the world away.

Happy Spring/Ostara to all of you!!!

How Often Does It Happen

that we make a point to speak with the people most important in our lives about our wishes for the future? Nestled in bed, safe behind the cloak of darkness you reveal your secret worries to the person you love the most. Is it the future? Is it a fear of not being able to pay the bills? Is it a desire to be something you are not? Is it a longing to have more time to connect with the family you adore?

I hear many people pledge to their loved ones a commitment to stay home, a promise that no matter what, they will never be placed in a long-term care facility (previously known as a "nursing home" -- although that sounds funny to me as a breastfeeding educator). How can we ask that of the people we love? How can we even begin to know what may still lay ahead of us?

I ask these questions at this time as we are facing something monumental in our home. The doctors at the hospital are worried about the combination of Henry's lung cancer (and it seems to be advancing faster than we thought) and his Alzheimer's disease. They do not feel it is safe or wise for us to bring him home once his current bout of pneumonia passes.

To that end, Christena and I met with the hospital administrators about what was required from us, as the family, to begin the process of having him transferred to a long-term care facility. We also wondered about the costs, the locations of such places, and whether or not we would be allowed to bring him home from time to time over the holidays or something. The two women we met with (Sylvie and Brenda) were lovely. They understood how difficult it was to have to talk about these concerns and were nothing short of patient with both of us.

We have left it now in their capable hands. We know, and are slowly trying to come to terms with the idea that Henry is not ever going to live with us again. I am certain this is not what he wants. Christena feels desperately sad that she can no longer handle his care on her own. It is unbelievably sad to see how much he has changed. He no longer knows where he is living let alone who the people are in the house he lives in. Except Douglas. He always seems to know his son. That will change too, I am sure. It breaks our hearts to watch him go from confused, to angry and then cognitively completely unavailable in rapid succession. It must break his heart to that he has no control over this. Somewhere, in a recesses of his brain, I wonder if any part of him has an inkling as to what is happening to his body and his mind. It's impossible to know. I truly hope that he has no idea.

If anyone -- family or otherwise -- has any questions or would like more information about Henry's health, please email me or leave a comment here for me to advise me to get back to you.

Take care of yourselves!

Quinn followed Grandpa's example

Quinn decided he wanted to try having his picture taken like Grandpa. This is what he came up with. Given how hardy our laughs were, we were all glad Aunt Jen arrived Saturday afternoon with her various hats to choose from. This was the hat with the rhinestone skull and crossbones on the side (which is unfortunately, not visible in this image).

I wanted to post this quick note to update family overseas about Henry's health. He appears to be suffering from pneumonia again and we had him admitted to hospital last evening. His breathing became quite shallow and his oxygen levels seemed to be dropping so, despite his desire to stay home the decision was made to have his lungs looked at. The X-ray revealed what we had suspected and had been warned would likely happen. The pneumonia was back. The doctor (different than the doctors we saw a month ago with him) thought the pneumonia was quite bad and was somewhat upset that we had waited so long. He did not compare to the X-rays from last month's time in hospital so I don't know if it is worse this time or not.

Henry continues to be his feisty self and would rather be home than in hospital. After his experience of getting out and wandering around the neighbourhood last week (he was looking for his childhood home in Glasgow) we felt it important to warn the hospital staff in case he decided to pick up and leave. I feel badly for him being kept against his will. It is so hard because we know that the hospital is a better and safer place for him to be.

Henry is having a good day

What we consider to be a good day is that Henry is willing to come up and have dinner with us at our house and is not getting too impatient about getting home.

He was even willing to let Quinn stick his plastic ball on his chin and Aunt Jen's hat on his head.

We are enjoying having some time to spend together as a family as we make some monumental decisions about what the future holds for all of us.

Take care

Today seems better, so far . . .

I woke today to find myself sleeping in my own bed. That's a great start to the day. Hopefully that means that the sedatives we had ordered for Henry for nighttime did what they were supposed to do. Hopefully that means that Christena finally had the chance to have a full night's sleep.

Quinn shows fewer scars over yesterday's call to the paramedics than I do I think. His lip still has a bit of a discolouration on its right side and his finger still has a VERY small spot from the glucometre. Other than that, he has completely recovered. I think I will carry the wounds for a few more days.

Anyway, after such a crappy start to yesterday I thought I would report that today the sun is shining, the birds, well, the birds are too flaming cold to be outside as it is still only -11C here (not including the wind chill) and everything seems to be happily moving forward. Things are great this morning and we plan to have a fun day instead of a stressful one.

Thanks to all who sent words of support, encouragement, and more. Don't think I haven't seriously considered following through on the suggestion to go to the Bahamas. My only concern is that I would have to contend with the crowds of gaping tourists who have flocked there to watch the funeral procession and burial of Anna Nicole Smith. Maybe Barbados would be a better idea. Oh right, there is that pesky concern about the cost. Oh well, a girl can dream, can't she???

Here's the 4-1-1 er, um I mean the 9-1-1

Well, what have I done today??? Well my day first started at 6:00 a.m. (which may seem like a normal time for some of you to get up but for this night-owl it is a few hours too early for me) when I heard my mother-in-law, Christena trying to help my father-in-law, Henry understand that the rest of the house was trying to sleep. How my boys sleep through these conversations they have in the middle of the night, I don't know.

Henry has not been sleeping well and despite trying to give him something to encourage sleeping he has been waking every hour or so through the night for most of the last several months. It has escalated in the last couple of weeks. I don't know the last time Christena was able to sleep straight through from night to morning. He wakes and gets dressed, goes into her room and turns on the lights, fumbles through her dresser, comes upstairs "to see Douglas," and tells her he wants her to get up with him so they "can get going home." You can imagine, I am sure, how hard this would be if you were a well-rested person. Now try to imagine your frustration with sleep deprivation. Remember what it was like when you first brought your baby home from the hospital and wondered if you would ever sleep again? It's kind of like that only there is an added layer of stress as you try to work through the fact that although he is old enough to know better, he *doesn't* know any better.

This morning, after I woke to them talking loudly, I moved out to the sofa and to sleep some more. Around 7:45 I heard Henry come to the kitchen door and try to open it but we had had the foresight to lock it when going to bed last night. He went back downstairs for a while. A short time later he was back at the door but this time he knocked. I answered it and told him Douglas was in the shower and then would be going to work. He said he was going back downstairs but when Douglas came out of the bathroom he saw Henry continuing to stand at the top of the stairs.

Sometime after that (so any time after 8 a.m.) Henry let himself out the back door and left the property. He was dressed in a turtleneck and a cardigan with his pyjamas under his dress pants. Ordinarily on a March day that would be enough to keep him warm except we are in the middle of a cold spell and he went out with the temperatures around -20 C. Apparently a woman saw him walking along the road and convinced him to get into her car. She wrapped him in a blanket and called 9-1-1. (9-9-9 in the UK) Around 9:10 a.m. the police managed to find out his name and called to let us know they were bringing him home. I have no idea how long he was out in those frigid temperatures.

Once Henry was home the boys got up and moved around doing normal morning things. Fergus was anxious to get back outside to work on his "fort" so I sent them out around 11:00 to get some fresh air, Vitamin D and exercise. I watched them run around and play, listened (while I worked) to them carving away at the frozen snow beside our house and just trusted that they were enjoying themselves.

While they were outside I was checking my work email and discovered that I can anticipate a minimum $3500.00 pay cut from the hospital this year. YAY! You can imagine that I was in a wonderful emotional space when Fergus and Quinn knocked on the door at 11:54 a.m. asking to come in.

Quinn had blood on his face and I saw there was a cut on his lip. I asked him what had happened and he let me know that it was ice that cut his lip. At this point I was having trouble putting everything together and assumed he fell on the ice and cut his lip. He told me he wanted to see what his face looked like and so once we had his snow clothes off, I took him into our room to have a good look. The blood was smeared up his cheek and looked to be more substantial than I knew it was.

We moved into the bathroom to wash his face off so I could get a better look at his lip. He was trying to tell me what had gone on but then said, "Mommy I can't really see."

"What do you mean you can't really see?" voice rising rapidly.

"I can't see, Mommy!" fear and panic in his voice.

I looked over to ask again what he meant and I saw his body convulsing and he lost consciousness in my arms (I am so thankful I was there to catch him). I grabbed him and took him to the floor in the living room. I was yelling his name and his face was white as a sheet.

Fergus got Christena and then the found the phone for me. As Quinn has never passed out before my first thought was to call 9-1-1 and ask for an ambulance. By the time the paramedics arrived Quinn had better colour and was more upset by the commotion than anything else.

They took his vitals and did a glucose test (yeah, Quinn *really* doesn't like the glucometre) and said he was okay. I chose not to have him taken to the hospital as the more I thought about it the more I realised that it was likely anxiety that caused him to pass out. The blood on his face and knowing I don't like them eating icicles was probably enough stress to cause him to become overly anxious and lose consciousness. I am to keep a watchful eye over him today and take him right to the hospital should he pass out again. (Like they really needed to tell me that . . .)

What really happened outside??? Well, he pulled an icicle off the furnace vent on the side of the house. It is SO cold outside that the icicle stuck to his damp lip. When he pulled it off he took skin off too. This caused the bleeding. (Remember putting your tongue on the cold metal pole when you were a kid?? This is pretty similar to that, except that the metal pole isn't as easy to carry around with you as the icicle.) No fall, no concussion, no major catastrophe.

So, that was my day so far. Actually, that was the first three hours of my day. How was your day? I know my BIL was hit by a car this morning. (Not hard enough to be hospitalized but hard enough to know he didn't like it. And when asked if he got the plate number or make and model of the car that hit him, my source tells me that he simply answered, "No, but I gave him one of my patented evil glares.") Anyone else find today not to be the day of their dreams?????

In like a LION

As you can see, there is snow and ice as far as the eye can see (of course, we live on a quiet, residential street so the eye can't really see very far). I know the boys were anxiously waiting for snow as we watched December and early January pass without more than a few flakes. This is ridiculous though. We got about 6 inches of snow in less than 3 hours yesterday afternoon. We couldn't choose to ignore it either because we knew the freezing rain and then warmer rain were coming and unless we wanted to move heavy snow we had to act quickly. I took this picture this morning and Quinn less posing for having his picture taken and more winding up to be ready to launch his snowball at me. I had to act fast and get in the house again before he nailed me.

Yesterday, while the snow continued to fall I sound myself stuck (literally) at the home of some friends (they have a laneway that is about 1 kilometre long). I was driving the Rabbit and the poor car just couldn't get out until they had plowed the lane. The boys didn't mind. We were stuck at the home of Fergus' best friend, Adam. They took advantage of the extra time to play more video games. It was nice for me though in that Stephanie (Adam's mom) and I rarely take the time to hang out and visit with one another. We are usually dropping off or picking up from play dates while we rush about to get tasks accomplished without children in tow.

Henry is doing fairly well right now. His memory continues to fade rapidly but his physical strength is coming back dramatically. He is eating full meals (toddler-sized portions but full meals none-the-less) and manages to get himself up and down the stairs that connect our homes. He has made a habit of coming up a couple of times a day to see Doug and to visit with the boys. Last night, once we were home and while I was outside doing my share of the shoveling, Henry sat at the table to make and fly paper airplanes with Fergus and Quinn while Doug tidied up the dinner dishes. It was great to hear of him interacting with our boys like that. It happens so much less frequently these days. I know the boys miss it too.

I must finish up here by telling you that while it was sunny 20 minutes ago when I took the pictures of the boys, now it is snowing again. One thing I can't keep track of is the weather patterns of Southern Ontario!

Take care and stay warm!

I'm not going to Ryerson in the fall

I wanted to let you know that I received a call from the university to let me know that I don't have the science requirements needed to get into school for next year. They are no longer accepting applicants on the condition that they achieve the science requirements prior to the beginning of the school year so . . . I am hoping to take some courses in the fall -- perhaps even through the upcoming summer so I can reapply next year.

I am heartbroken. I tried to tell myself that it wasn't a big deal and that I wouldn't be upset if I didn't get a call for an interview but I lied. It royally sucks.

I wanted to say thanks for having been on my side and having supported me through this process.

Take care