I'm a little messed up

It's kind of weird being back here. I only created this place as a way to vent about things in my life that I couldn't seem to deal with, and I guess that 's why I'm back. I was just reading the last post (seriously, 17 months ago?) and decided that I needed to catch up with myself. Here goes:

Things were going so well after the last post. I was engaged to a beautiful woman who I was truly in love with and working at the job of my dreams. The family seemed to be a little less crazy (sanity is too much to hope for, so I'll settle for less insane) and everyone was doing alright. Then, the walls started crashing in.

First (at least chronologically, if not by order of importance) the fiancee and I are no longer. She decided that I wasn't what she was looking for after all last November. That put me in a really bad place, and I'd like to give a special shout out to the only person who might even read this fr helping me to get through that.
I was really hoping that it could work out for the longest time, but recently have come to the realization that it's never going to happen. I guess that's life, but I don't have to like it. Right now I'm trying to get back on the horse, but that beast sits up high.

As a result of this, I start shopping around for new employment. That begins a whole other dilemma of finding a place to work and then deciding against it and then, finally, deciding that it would be a good fit after all. Just as I've made my mind up to take it, it goes to someone else. A little distressing, sure, but overall, this is not a big deal. I just wish I had been considered for the position.

Then the mack daddy of it all comes down. On May 17th my parents are in Plano for a wedding when my dad starts getting chest pains. He had a heart attack about 10 years ago, so we don't take chest pains lightly. He goes to the hospital in Plano and they discover that he is anemic. After a couple of days, we discover that it is due to an ulcerated mass in his stomach near his pancreas. I hope that no one ever has to go through the waiting to find out if a loved one has inoperable cancer or not, because those 24 hours or so were about all I thought I could take.

I remember when the nurse looked up the report and told my mom that the pancreas was clear of any development. I remember thinking that it was a real relief.

So we go to OKC r a procedure called a Whipple to remove this cancer that is isolated to the duodenum, and the surgical team there seems to do their jobs really well. The surgery goes off just fine, and when I call my brother to tell him that our father is alive and in recovery, I absolutely lose it. On a therapy note, I tend to bottle up feelings that I don't like and let them rush out all at once (probably why I'm an angry SOB right now, but that's getting ahead of myself).

Then the fun part starts. Dad has a bad reaction to some medication. Dad develops an incredibly rare blood disorder (actually, 2). Dad starts developing blood clots. Dad gets pneumonia. Dad had respiratory failure. Dad has renal failure. Dad starts going crazy. Dad goes into atrial fibrillation. Dad gets infections. Dad has abscessed fluid building up all over his abdomen. Dad loses virtually all of his muscle mass.

While all of this stuff isn't at the same time, it gets pretty bad. We all think we're going to lose him on no less than 3 separate occasions. He's in physical therapy rehab now, and we think he's finally getting better. I can say without reservation that the day he is able to go home will be the happiest day of my life.

But in the meantime, I am really upset. There are a lot of reasons, and I'm not that into putting them here, but I'm going to be posting a lot more often to try to deal with all of this. So sorry if you wasted your time reading this, I just needed to vent a little. I'll try to post things that are easier to read in the future.

Adios