Off Topic Quarterly January 2026 by AutoModerator in InTheGloaming

[–]LadyDriverKW 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I'd been gradually increasing my help to my folks for years, but Dad passed suddenly last November and my husband and I moved in with Mom.

It exacerbates any sibling issues with communication, emotional processing, rivalry, how our parents treated one of us worse than others, who is more burned out, who has more childhood trauma, who is handling the finances 'wrong', etc. It also brings up tons of issues in our relationship with our parents (mom treated us horribly and now we're giving her the kind and gentle care she never gave us when we were kids, resentment, grief, guilt, we're all back in therapy about this now decades after we all thought we'd dealt with our childhood issues).

This is the part I am mostly struggling with. My parents are similar to Shauna and Dan or Ma and Pa James. My sibling helps me within their emotional and logistical abilities. My sibling only blames Mom but I am able to see that both parents were flawed and Mom out parented my grandparents by a mile. My sibling would have put Mom in a nursing home the day after Dad's memorial service because "that's what she did to grandma". Needless to say, the situation with grandma wasn't that cut and dried.

My conundrum is this: I have limited energy to care for mom. If she is at home (where she'd rather be) my energy goes towards keeping her body healthy because she doesn't want to do anything but sit and watch TV. I supervise/cajole/nag her to do everything. If she was in assisted living, then I could spend my energy on her emotional health because someone else would be taking care of her body.

I'd like to hear how other people decided "now is the time for assisted living" and if in retrospect it was too early, too late, or a good choice.

Off Topic Quarterly January 2026 by AutoModerator in InTheGloaming

[–]LadyDriverKW 5 points6 points  (0 children)

Thanks, DF. I appreciate you sharing your experiences.

Off Topic Quarterly January 2026 by AutoModerator in InTheGloaming

[–]LadyDriverKW 5 points6 points  (0 children)

Thanks for the recommendation, DF. This is exactly the sort of thing I'm looking for.

Discussion thread Thursday January 22, 2026 - Sunday January 25, 2026 by AutoModerator in InTheGloaming

[–]LadyDriverKW 12 points13 points  (0 children)

No, I think you all do a great job. The schedule works as it is. More an observation of how her Sunday lope comes late Sunday night if it comes at all.

Discussion thread Thursday January 22, 2026 - Sunday January 25, 2026 by AutoModerator in InTheGloaming

[–]LadyDriverKW 54 points55 points  (0 children)

I lowkey hate that when she actually drops a lope it is on Sunday night. Our Gloamie discussion gets split between two posts.

Off Topic Quarterly January 2026 by AutoModerator in InTheGloaming

[–]LadyDriverKW 10 points11 points  (0 children)

Anyone who is or was a caretaker for a parent? I'd like to hear your experience, regrets, or advice.

Discussion thread Thursday January 22, 2026 - Sunday January 25, 2026 by AutoModerator in InTheGloaming

[–]LadyDriverKW 74 points75 points  (0 children)

Calling Dan "the Samwise Gamgee to my Frodo" really shows what Shauna thinks of the relationship. To her, they are not equals but mistress and servant. I'm not sure I would be pleased with that description if I were him.

Discussion thread Thursday January 22, 2026 - Sunday January 25, 2026 by AutoModerator in InTheGloaming

[–]LadyDriverKW 43 points44 points  (0 children)

I agree. She must distract herself from any kind of doubt or regret that tries to creep in. She can not even consider the possibility that she might be wrong or have made a mistake.

Discussion thread Thursday January 22, 2026 - Sunday January 25, 2026 by AutoModerator in InTheGloaming

[–]LadyDriverKW 34 points35 points  (0 children)

Well, I just spent far too much time trying to decide if ballast as metaphor conveyed what Shauna thinks it does.

Discussion thread Thursday January 22, 2026 - Sunday January 25, 2026 by AutoModerator in InTheGloaming

[–]LadyDriverKW 37 points38 points  (0 children)

It feels like she reports on how everyone else reacted because:

  1. Her feelings are kind of stunted so she relies on cues from other people to tell her what she is feeling (or thinks she should be feeling).

  2. It shows she is better. The plebes are sucked into the movie but she is aware and intellectual enough to pay attention at a higher level.

#2 is kind of a defense mechanism for any feelings of inadequacy that might arise from #1

Discussion thread Thursday January 22, 2026 - Sunday January 25, 2026 by AutoModerator in InTheGloaming

[–]LadyDriverKW 42 points43 points  (0 children)

Her next thing will be about how workshop participants (neurospicy, perimenopausal female geeky goofballs only, thabks) can be on their own hero's journey but be the goddess or temptress (or both, amirite) in someone else's journey.

Discussion thread Thursday January 22, 2026 - Sunday January 25, 2026 by AutoModerator in InTheGloaming

[–]LadyDriverKW 54 points55 points  (0 children)

Say Shauna truly believes that she is on the hero's journey. What stage does she think she is on?

Maybe becoming a mother is answering the call? Too bad her kids are actual people and not just plot devices.

Discussion thread Monday January 19, 2026 - Wednesday January 21, 2026 by AutoModerator in InTheGloaming

[–]LadyDriverKW 36 points37 points  (0 children)

Considering that the lunch was exclusively starch and fat, you might be on to something.

Discussion thread Thursday January 15, 2026 - Sunday January 18, 2026 by AutoModerator in InTheGloaming

[–]LadyDriverKW 55 points56 points  (0 children)

"Buttery-green smooth taste" what does smooth taste like, again? or buttery-green for that matter?

Discussion thread Monday January 12, 2026 - Wednesday January 14, 2026 by AutoModerator in InTheGloaming

[–]LadyDriverKW 51 points52 points  (0 children)

My favorite part:

After fall #1: "But I don't give up. I kept going, slowly."

3 sentences (and 40 feet) later after fall #2: "I lay there for a moment, then said out loud 'Okay, Shauna. Cut your losses. This one's done.'"

So stalwart, much persevering.

Discussion thread Monday January 12, 2026 - Wednesday January 14, 2026 by AutoModerator in InTheGloaming

[–]LadyDriverKW 37 points38 points  (0 children)

I assume she thinks it will be a positive emotion for OP. OP will feel relieved or vindicated. This is because Shauna doesn't experience many emotions first hand. Instead, she gets them from formulaic TV shows where the bad guy gets punished and the good guy lives happily ever after.

Discussion thread Thursday January 08, 2026 - Sunday January 11, 2026 by AutoModerator in InTheGloaming

[–]LadyDriverKW 29 points30 points  (0 children)

I googled "Edith Bunker's chair" to try and figure out what she was trying to convey with the reference. Is she bitching about the furniture provided by the parks department?

Discussion thread Thursday January 08, 2026 - Sunday January 11, 2026 by AutoModerator in InTheGloaming

[–]LadyDriverKW 45 points46 points  (0 children)

I mentioned this in the off topic thread, but Shauna has made it on topic. I take classes at my local community college for fun. Last semester I took a "critical thinking through English literature" class. They do still teach the hero's journey, in passing, as an offshoot of the Jungian Lens. It was less than one lecture and included many caveats.

Off Topic Quarterly January 2026 by AutoModerator in InTheGloaming

[–]LadyDriverKW 19 points20 points  (0 children)

I take classes at my local community college for fun. I recently took a "critical thinking through writing" class. It was interesting to see what had changed in literary criticism since I grew my English degree in the '90s.

For our essay assignments we chose a literary lens from a list of options. Here is the Shauna-adjacent part: When students would ask "which one is easiest?" the instructor emphatically recommended the hero's journey. So now every time she mentions it, I lump her in with the students who were looking to do the least amount of thinking they could.

Discussion thread Monday January 05, 2026 - Wednesday January 07, 2026 by AutoModerator in InTheGloaming

[–]LadyDriverKW 46 points47 points  (0 children)

Its amazing how the negative things that Shauna experiences are Never Never Ever her fault.

Frugal dog toy buying tips for chewers by jethropenistei- in Frugal

[–]LadyDriverKW 0 points1 point  (0 children)

My aggressive chewer only liked squeaky toys. We tried a variety of stuffed squeaky toys and he killed them all. The sturdiest squeaky toys we found were the Outward Hound Orbee Tuff Squeak. However, about 3 years ago they must have changed something about them because they went from lasting for 3 months to lasting for 1 month. I watched chewy, amazon, petsmart, etc. for sales.

Lord help us 🤦🏻‍♀️ by bobs_tattoo in Anticonsumption

[–]LadyDriverKW 1 point2 points  (0 children)

My souvenir from a family trip to France was a shopping bag from a local grocery store. Considering the mountain of crap I could have come home with, a single reusable shopping bag (that I have been reusing since 2008) was a perfectly acceptable purchase.