Ouch.

Ouch. Ouch. Ouch.

I had two grandmothers. One of them had a debilitating and very painful disease for the last 20 years of her life. She got all of her nutrition through a tube directly into her stomach (or large intenstine maybe) for 5 + years. She was mostly bed ridden, except she refused to stay in bed because she didn't want her muscles to atrophy. She made dinner for Grandpa nearly every night no matter how many times she had to sit down to rest during the preparation. Clearly she had ample reason to complain. But she didn't. In fact, she only started complaining about how she felt very shortly before she died.

My other grandmother complains regularly. Her hip hurts; her feet hurt; she's bored; there's nothing to do. Granted complaints of the last couple of years can be blamed on the Altzheimer's. And it truly does change people's personalities. I get that. But even before then, 10 - 15 - -20 years ago, this grandmother complained. I still love her, of course, but when it came right down to it? I want to be Grandma K when I grow up.

Except I find myself complaining. A lot. This hurts and that hurts and I screwed up my knee doing such and such and now I can't do thing A or thing B. So when I got a weird feeling in my neck after sleeping at my parents' house for Thanksgiving, I shut up about it. Now we're on day 4 post-back-in-my-own-bed, and it hurts. It really, really hurts. The only position that is remotely comfortable is when I raise my arm. Every other position is painful. It's sort of a muscle ache-but more burning than just a knot feeling.

So, now I have complained. And I'm sorry that I am turning into Grandma N but I just don't think I have what it takes to be Grandma K in me.