posted on October 1, 2003 10:59:07 PM new
How awfully tough for you and yours. Words fail me.
___________________________________
"Practically speaking, a life that is vowed to simplicity, appropriate boldness, good humour, gratitude, unstinting work and play, and lots of walking, brings us close to the actually existing world and its wholeness." --Gary Snyder
posted on October 1, 2003 11:26:52 PM new
Hi McJane,
Wow I missed the first thread. Thanks for bringing it up Kiara. It is good that you and your pets all came through intact. I am sorry for the loss of your home though. I hope you get everything sorted out soon. I hope your winning bidders are all very reasonable about this as well.
Regards,
Adrian
posted on October 1, 2003 11:36:38 PM new
McJane.. Hang in there. Things will get better, even though you may not believe it at this point in time. Just keep a positive attitude and let us know if we can help in any way.
The light at the end of the tunnel will turn out to be an oncoming train.
posted on October 1, 2003 11:36:56 PM new
Kiara,
That is nice of you to remember and ask. Especially since you are that cigarette smoking woman! (...lol...sorry, that was the most funniest posts going back and forth to read! Reminded me of 'cigarette-smoking man' on the X-files...WHO!-is cigarette-smoking man....)
Anyway, I'd imagine McJane let her auctions run out and she is concentrating on 'real life'. But maybe she'll see your post and that will be nice. If so, wishing you, McJane, "Patience, Perseverance and Help from Heaven!
posted on October 2, 2003 02:52:18 AM new
McJane, We are still praying for you and miss you here....hopefully things are pulling together for your family so they can get back to normal quickly.
Hey Kiara, I missed that thread about your "dark side" LOL! bring it back up for us slow people, please!
posted on October 26, 2003 09:13:46 PM new
Hi Kiara everyone. I'm touched by your thoughts & concern, I mean that sincerely.
What going on, not much. We moved out of the hotel two weeks ago & are living on the lower level of our property in a trailer, aka a fifth wheel, rented by the insurance company for the outrageous price of 1600.00 a month. Probably a bargain for them since the hotel & eating out was close to 4000.00 a month. We had our choice of this or a mobile home & chose this because it was bigger & a lot nicer. I used to think it would be great living in a suite of rooms in a hotel, but you soon tire of it. I prefer the trailer.
As for our house the tree was removed on 9/20 & it was covered by a tarp the next day & there it stands with the roof & attic still inside.The ins co engineer was here & said the house is 80% gone but, he was going to recommend repairing it as the kitchen, new room we added, basement, joices & foundation are sound. The ins co builder said he would recommend the entire house come down & we build on the same foundation.
Our builder said the same thing & both builders said they would not even attempt to repair the house & would refuse the job if offered. The Concord township manager visited & has offered to help us with anything we need, permits, etc & even offered the services of their engineer who agrees with the builders, take the house down & start over.
They also suggested we get an independant appraiser. So far we haven't because the ins co appraiser said if it would cost about 15,000 extra to rebuild he would recommend it. So we will wait & see.
Almost everything we have is still in the house & not much can be removed until all the debris is out & still no one has shown up to remove it. The builders say it's not safe to go in, but we have gone in many times to remove some clothes & the few valuables we have. All my cats come down to the trailer & also hang out in the house. We put a ramp & a cat window in the trailer they come & go as they please. This freedom is new to them & they are loving it.
I have been doing a lot of shopping to replace necessities because the dampness in the house has caused everything to smell moldy. We plan to replace furniture that wasn't damaged but is now damaged because of dampness, when the roof came down it rained in the house all night & it was really pouring. We have 95,000 in our policy for replacement of personal property so there is more than enough to cover what we lost.
If we rebuild we will have to submit plans for our new house & it will have to be what it was in size. We have a fairly large kitchen & the room we added is right beside it & connected with a dutch door, we plan to open the two rooms to one very large room with a counter separation instead of a wall so it will be more usable. After we had it added on we never used it, I just junked it up with eBay stuff so maybe this will make it more inviting.
So that's about where we are right now & really nothing is happening with our house.
We are waiting for answers.
It would be fun shopping & even exciting to know we will eventually have a new house except we are at an age where it is just a big headache & even a bigger inconvenience,not to mention how horrible it was the night the tree hit the house. I am so traumatized over it that when we had a wind storm last week I left the trailer & stayed at a friends house for the night, my husband stayed here. We still have a lot of trees on our property, twenty are close enough to hit the house should they fall & five of them are big enough to do the same damage.
A big thank you to Reenie for offering to email my bidders & micmic, I was really kidding with you in my post about Hurricane Isabel.
I also thank everyone for thinking of me & our wonderful & thoughtful Kiara for starting this thread & all who offered their help. I love this place & all you guys that make it so great.
I have been here everyday as usual & it brightens my stressful day to read your posts.
I hope to get back to selling on eBay very soon too.
posted on October 26, 2003 09:24:19 PM new
Jane - I'll come shop you. Don't you worry yourself. you just sit back and let me shop. I am quite adept at that particular activity.
In all seriousness though, good to hear that things are moving along and going well for you.
~~~ • ~~~ • ~~~ • ~~~ • ~~~
If it's really "common" sense, why do so few people actually have it?
posted on October 27, 2003 02:43:18 AM new
McJane, I was just wondering the other day too, why we hadn't heard anything else from you.
You might be ok without the independent appraiser if you have so many people in agreement about the house coming down and rebuilding. Please don't settle for less than though....remember what I said about the mold. By the time it developed, it was months after the all the repairs had been done. You can't live in a house with mold!
Was there any kind of help offered with therapy? See, this is just what happens! It's not just dealing with a tree, it's dealing with everything! You have PST = post traumatic stress syndrome. And you can't deal with this on your own, you need professional help to deal with it and probably meds also. Don't be ashamed of it! They can do wonders with it these days and there should be no stigma attached to it. There are usually "trauma teams" that go to devastated areas and offer help, but if the damage was not widespread in your area you may not have been offered that.
That's <u>another</u> thing insurance should cover that often doesn't, professional help dealing with the aftermath. You should not have to pay out of pocket for this! And it IS usually more than a lot of people can handle...trust me....been there done that personally. And my girlfriend ended up just losing everything like that after Opal, her house, her business and her health.
I don't want you to think I'm doing armchair therapy here, but from just your one letter, it certainly sounds like you need outside help. When you say most of everything just feels overwhelming and when the storm came through you couldn't stay there. It’s just usually that all the signs are so subtle that it may be hard to recognize, they just creep up on you. I would say with a 99.9% certainty that you would do better with professional help, no matter if it feels that way to you right now or not. People who have not been in that kind of a situation have no idea what it’s like. I’ll bet there’s some people here who think, gee, I’d LOVE to have a new house – but you wouldn’t. Not like this.
Christmas is just around the corner also and statistically that is the lowest emotional time of the year for a lot of people, and it may be hard without "the home" in place for you this year. You may be thinking that you can just struggle through it but you shouldn't have to struggle, because sometimes this can start feeling more like you're in quicksand. You won't believe how much better things can start looking with the correct meds sometime, like zoloft, prozac or paxil & wellbutrin even. You shouldn’t even try making any major decisions until you start feeling better. There’s always (too much pressure) a lot of pressure to make decisions and get things back to normal.
I feel for you, I really do. Please please consider this carefully. It’s not just pop psychology.
posted on October 27, 2003 06:27:06 AM new
Hi, I said it before and I will say it again Kiara rocks!Hi Jane I have been thinking of you. However I never thought of starting a thread to inquire, thank you Kiara.Jane, Your knowlegable input and wit is surely missed.
The holidays were mentioned on here, but first comes Thanksgiving, and we are all Thankful that you and your husband and pets survived.
Reenie
I don't get even....I get even better Jimmy Hoffa
posted on October 27, 2003 03:39:03 PM new
McJane?
I've thought about this all day since writing the above at 3:00 am this morning..I don't do time changes well...but anyway, I've felt out of body all day. I realized I got too close to being back in that space with you, and I mean that in a good way.
I spoke with my girlfriend this afternoon and ran it past her also, your statements and my thoughts and she was in complete agreement. When I said it was like quicksand, that is so much what it's like. You don't realize how quickly it creeps up on you until you're up to your neck. My gf fought against any kind of drugs or outside help until she went off the deep end about 2 years later, and it wasn't until she was in therapy and on medication that she realized what a "fog" she'd been living in.
I want to stress that you may feel "normal" and that you may feel like you are handling it all well, and you may be!! But if there are times that you feel overwhelmed, unable to make decisions, or just don't feel like you "used to", then know that it's not unusual to feel that way. It's almost like rape being perpertrated on you or a death of a spouse, what you're going through, the loss of everything you knew.
It just makes me furious that mental health is so often overlooked after something like this. Actually, there's a very good therapy called EMDR that my husband and my girlfriend used that involves no drugs and works almost instantenously. They do volunteer their time and effort and also help a lot of people after these kinds of traumatic events. It helped my husband with events that happened when he was 3 years old and too young to process correctly, and he'd been in therapy a few times and also gone through AA with.
Anyway, I just wanted you to know that I sincerly apologize if I upset you in any way! I just want to make sure you're operating at 100% and that you have all available knowledge at your fingertips.
Big hugs.
LB I LOVE Endicia! You will too – Click here!
posted on October 28, 2003 08:00:19 PM newglassgrl
Upset me, absolutely not.
I thank you very much & appreciate your advice & it makes sense, a lot of sense.
I'm at a standstill, can't seem to get going.
It's like if I ignore everything I will wake up one day & my house will be whole again.
It's raining right now & the sound of the rain on the trailer roof sounds like hail, driving me crazy too. I'm thinking of all the improvements we have done over the years & how we had the house exactly the way we wanted & now it's gone. I just can't sit back & do nothing. I have to start getting the things out that I do not want to go in storage & I can't bring myself to go up there & do it. It's dark, cold, musty & unbelievably dirty. I don't feel like doing eBay, my 5000 or so rubber stamps are still in the house & are undamaged so there is no reason I should not get back to selling. I almost started listing a few days ago knowing that, that would force me to get back to doing things I used to do, but didn't
I read your post & others & couldn't even answer right away. I think your right, in fact I know your right. This isn't the end of the world & it isn't like I lost everything like I would in a fire, so I will call my doctor & tell him how I feel & I need help before I hit rock bottom because thats probablywhere I'll end up. It doesn't get better each day, it just gets more depressing.
So, thanks glassgrl, from the bottom of my heart.
fenix03....OK, deal. You shop, I'll push the cart.
posted on October 28, 2003 08:13:08 PM new
I want to ad that before the hurricane I used to be on line 12 to 14 hours a day, now it's about an hour & the only place I go is here. It's comfortable seeing all the familiar people & nice to be posting again.
posted on October 28, 2003 08:34:44 PM new
McJane...Good to see you back on again. Why don't you try posting just 2 or 3 of your stamps? You never know, it just might change your outlook and get you back in the groove again. It can't hurt and you just might make a few bucks. It always brightens my day to open the mailbox and see a money order with my name on it.
The light at the end of the tunnel will turn out to be an oncoming train.
posted on October 28, 2003 11:21:48 PM new
McJane, I'm so glad to hear from you here! And I'm glad you'll see your doctor and get some help. Sparkz gave you some really good advice, I think, but perhaps you won't be able to do it until you've seen your doctor. However this all works out, I know you're going to pull out of this with help from everybody. I don't know how close you are to your family, whether you have children, etc., but it's wonderful the way the human spirit can get the courage it needs to go forward, and then you can be a role model for others who follow after you. We are ALL role models for each other.
Some of us have shown our children that we can conquer alcohol; some of us have shown folks that we can be good sports about major surgery and take care of ourselves well, afterwards. Some of us have pulled up stakes and moved to a strange city - and survived. And some have lost a child and lived to help others. We ALL role model, all the time.
You are going to be fine, I just know it. And you have my prayers now.
___________________________________
Junk: Stuff we throw away.
Stuff: Junk we keep.
posted on October 28, 2003 11:50:05 PM new
McJane
Do try to sell again, it helps keep connected.
Plus I just had a bidding war for a stamp I could not give away in the spring.
I am trying to sell a house and relocate to equine property. 1/2 my house is in storage and I thought I would be moved by winter. ha.
Can't imagine a tree through the roof I would be freaked!
Best
J
~~~~~~~~~~~**~~~~~~~~~~~
All the monkeys aren't in the zoo,
Every day you meet quite a few,
So you see it's all up to you.
You can be better than you are,
You could be swingin' on a star
posted on October 29, 2003 02:58:26 AM new
Godspeed to you, Jane. ... I wholeheartedly agree with these posters that suggest some moral/mental health aid for you and for your hubby ... [maybe even for the kittycats! ] .... Best to you, --- Marcia
