A New Grandchild Arrived Feb. 10

Photos: My five grandsons: Caleb 5, David 4, Simon 18 mths, Jacob 11 and Daniel 2 1/2. Grandsons David 4, Daniel 2 1/2 and new baby Rachel.

My daughter, who has five boys, finally got her baby girl. Rachel Amanda was born February 10 at 3:25 p.m. weighing in at a whopping 12 lbs. She has dark hair and eyes (so far anyway) like her oldest brother, Jacob. I really hope that they decide it is time to stop but I'm afraid that my daughter wants to have more. The problem with that is the fact that when they need someone to look after the children, I am the only one they can call.

My family doctor read me the riot act this time because she told me when Pamela had Simon that I was not well enough to look after so many children for days at a time. A few hours maybe, but no more of this 24/7 babysitting. Pamela started making trips to the hospital three weeks before the baby was born so I was at her place, whichis very small, almost the whole three weeks. It's been a week since I came home and I still haven't really recovered. When I am there I cannot take extra pain medication for the pain because I need to be alert at all times. I cannot take my power chair to her place because I have no way to get it there so I use my manual chair but there isn't room to use it everywhere so I end up walking (if you could call it that) to get a lot of things done. I also have to lift the youngest ones in and out of their cribs.

At the end of a typical day with the children I am in such pain that it is hard to focus on anything. I drag myself to bed, dead tired, and fall alseep right away. The problem is that about 2 to 3 hours later I have to get up because the pain wakens me. My body gets increasingly stiff and painful with each passing day and yet I keep pushing. I think I get to a place where I become numb to the pain as a survival tactic. Of course, when I finally did get home my body and my mind flooded me with my true condition - terrible!

I can't write any more today, it is too painful to sit here and I need to get out of my chair and into my recliner with my swollen legs up. I am so grateful that I have a doctor who understands chronic pain and will prescribe pain medication for me. I know many people like me who have doctors who just refuse to accept chronic pain as real and won't prescribe anything and, in fact, they are sent for psychiatric help! Unfortunately, there are more of them than I care to think about. Thank you for reading this, please leave a comment.