Cancer-Stricken Woman Leaves Husband After He Refuses to Help Her

donderdag 26 september 2013

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AppId is over the quota
by Kiri Blakeley 2 hours ago

Marriage is supposed to be for better or worse. But, unfortunately, some spouses take that to mean their worse -- not yours! Yeah, they’re all, "Hey, marriage is all about in sickness and in health -- can you go to the drugstore for me?” but when the sniffles are turned, they run for the nearest exit. Or they don’t move at all. Or they say, "While you’re at the drugstore getting Sudafed, could you pick me up some ginger ale?" One woman’s husband brought this to the most callous extreme when his wife of 15 years was diagnosed with breast cancer -- and he refused to help at all.

Beth Gainer says:

I went through chemo and radiation alone and I did everything. I took care of myself alone and I had to work one full-time job and one part-time job.

Never mind that Beth had been supporting her husband emotionally and financially for years because of his mental health issues, when it came to her physical ones, he just completely checked out.

It’s definitely not the first time I’ve heard of this kind of thing -- and I’ve experienced a little bit of it myself too. Guys who are all about you bringing the chicken soup, giving them the backrub, and running to the pharmacy for them will tell you you’re "overreacting" or a "drama queen" when you’re sick or just refuse to help at all.

I had one friend who was married to a man for several years who just flat-out refused to set foot in a hospital or doctor's office, which meant she had to undergo every single medical procedure by herself. Oh, and then he didn’t want to even talk about anything either. Never mind that he had his own medical problems and she would faithfully accompany him when he needed it.

I think "in sickness" is one of the most important part of a couple’s marital vows. Sure, there are people who decided to leave a relationship after a catastrophic accident that leaves one person paralyzed or completely helpless -- and that is something I’m not going to judge.

But with any relationship -- whether it's short- or long-term -- there’s a pretty good chance one party will have, at least, a few colds. Maybe the flu. Possibly an iffy pap smear. Or a lump in the breast. Or something. A guy (or a woman) who refuses to help or acknowledge when you're sick is definitely going to be a difficult person to be with as you grow older. Either learn to accept it or get out.

As for Beth, she divorced her husband, saying: "I realized that I only had myself and so I decided since I'm alone through cancer ... I might as well be alone and I might as well enjoy life."

Right on, sister.

Have you ever had a spouse not help when you were sick?

Image via Richard Bowen/Flickr

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Disney Changes Rules for Disabled Kids After Families Abuse Special Accommodations

maandag 23 september 2013

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AppId is over the quota
by Jeanne Sager 1 hour ago

It's supposed to be the happiest place on earth, but Disney World and Disneyland are anything but for members of the special needs community at the moment thanks to rumors spreading round the Internet. The theme parks are changing the "guest assistance cards" that parents of children with special needs have come to count on to make vacations with their kids possible. The GAC or GAP program (as its known) has long provided accommodations for children and teens with physical as well as cognitive, developmental, or behavioral challenges.

But rumors that the GAC had been stopped entirely, coupled with a huge petition to get the program back, has parents scared ... and their kids upset.

How would you explain to a child that their favorite vacation spot doesn't want them?

If you've got a neuro-typical kid, you probably haven't thought about it. I'll admit I didn't, even with a future Disney trip on my schedule. It wasn't until I stumbled on a post from one of my favorite bloggers, Shannon Rosa of Squidalicious, that I even knew parents worried that Disney was penalizing kids with special needs because of folks who have been abusing this privilege.

Maybe you heard about the rich jerks who were hiring disabled "family members" to come on vacation so they could get special perks at the parks? There was an expose on the practice a few months back, and then, suddenly, came the rumor that Disney had ended it all.

And parents freaked. For them this isn't a minor inconvenience. It's a full-blown problem. As Rosa, whose son Leo is on the autism spectrum, said on her blog:

You have to understand: our love of the GAC is not because we get to skip lines and blow raspberries at all the chumps who don't. Skipping lines is not a convenience but a necessary accommodation for our boy. Because he is autistic. Because of his specific disability.

Leo can wait in lines, but not always. Not lines of Disneyland length. Not without melting down due to the crowds, the noise, the expectation based on previous experience that he will not have to wait in lines longer than 20 or so minutes. Without the GAC, Disneyland is effectively barred to my son.

And it's not just kids with autism who are affected, here folks. Moriah Bettencourt's son, Alex (the cutie pictured above), has CHARGE Syndrome and he's considered to be deaf/blind as he has serious deficiencies in both areas. Alex, his mom says, "lives for Disneyland."

The family, which hails from the northwest, goes to the California amusement park two to three times a year, and they've found GAC isn't just helpful for them -- it helps the other folks in the park have a pleasurable experience BECAUSE Alex's needs are being met. As Moriah told The Stir:

When Alex was about 7 he was finally tall enough to ride some of the larger rides. At that point my husband was uncomfortable with the special needs pass and thought that we should try to stand in line to see if Alex could do it. About 10 minutes into our waiting in the Splash Mountain line Geoff was horrified when Alex suddenly grabbed two handfuls of the hair of the little girl in front of us. He didn't want to hurt her he just was fascinated by her hair that she kept swinging around but as you can imagine when a stranger suddenly grabs the hair of another stranger things get tense really quickly. 

We made our profuse apologies & promptly stepped out of line, since then the GAP has been a necessity for us. Alex is unable to be that close to strangers without wanting to touch them, it's a serious issue.

Needless to say, the Bettencourts, like the Rosas, were swearing off Disney for awhile. As are hundreds of thousands of families who have been cut off. They're among the nearly 20,000 that have signed a MoveOn petition to get Disney to roll back the changes.

But they may not have to.

The good news? The Stir reached out to Disney, and they say the rumors aren't true. They ARE changing the GAC process ... but it's still in place for now, and they're working with disability groups, including Autism Speaks, to make sure the new program will truly meet families' needs.

According to Michele Himmelber, a PR director for Disneyland Resort:

We have an unwavering commitment to making our parks accessible to all Guests. Given the increasing volume of requests we receive for special access to our attractions, we are changing our process to create a more consistent experience for all our guests while providing accommodations for guests with disabilities. We engaged disability groups, such as Autism Speaks, to develop this new process, which is in line with the rest of our industry.

The new program starts on October 9, and you can be sure parents will be watching, hoping that they make the right choice for their kids. As Shannon Rosa said:

In a fair and just society, you don't take away (or complicate) accommodations for people with disabilities just because non-disabled people are taking advantage of them and making other non-disabled people mad.

Do you use the special accommodations at theme parks? Are you concerned about the changes?

Image via Moriah Bettencourt

Click "Like" for more about parenting kids on the spectrum. ABOUT THE AUTHOR Jeanne Sager

writes articles for The Stir by day, slays closet monsters and bounds through bedtime stories with her elementary schooler by night. The Phineas and Ferb soundtrack reverberates through her brain.

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Stranger Who Helped Woman Deliver Twins After Car Accident Gets Touching Reward

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AppId is over the quota
by Michele Zipp 3 hours ago

There are so many things that can go wrong when in labor and Jessica Stanley, a Florida mom pregnant with twins, experienced one of the most terrifying incidents when it was go-time. The car she was driving in crashed into another car while she was in labor. Jessica's fiance, Antavian Milton, was driving her and their three other children to the hospital because Jessica's water broke. Another car pulled out in front of them and Jessica remembers hitting her head on the windshield and then she blacked out.

Within seconds Betty Horne, a gastroenterology tech at Baptist Hospital, who was in the car behind them, ran to help. Horne had no idea what would happen next would change her life forever.

The panicked dad Milton jumped out the car when Horne approached yelling, "I'm gonna have a baby, she's gonna have twins." Horne reportedly looked in the car and she saw one baby already crowning. She grabbed a towel from her car and caught the baby as he was being born. He wasn't breathing. She swiped the back of the baby's mouth with her fingers to clear the airway and baby started crying. And what a beautiful sound that must have been amidst all the chaos.

New mom Jessica was alert and Horne passed her the baby boy. They named him Antavian II and he weighed 7 pounds and 13 ounces, which is very impressive for a twin. The paramedics arrived and took Jessica to the hospital to deliver baby number 2 by cesarean. That little bundle weighed 7 pounds and 7 ounces and was given the name Antavian III! How very, very sweet -- both named after proud papa. I wonder what their nicknames are going to be!

Horne calls the experience "amazing" and was welcomed just like family there in the recovery room cradling the baby she helped deliver. "I don't even know what a hero is," she said when someone told her that she was one. "I tell you, I don't feel like a hero. I feel that that's something that we all got to do for each other. We all got to help each other."

The family honored Horne for being an amazing human being by asking her to be Antavian II's Godmother. What a beautiful gesture for a beautiful woman who sprang into action to help strangers, and whose actions helped bring a baby's life into this world -- a baby who is healthy and doing fantastic along with twin brother and mom.

Congrats to all!

Do you think you would know what to do if you witnessed a woman in labor? Have you feared being in a bad situation when ready to give birth?

Image via Aaron McIntyre/Flickr

ABOUT THE AUTHOR Michele Zipp

loves vintage and will defend skinny jeans to the death though she is highly superstitious and "death" is probably a bad word choice. She has a touch of the hoarding disease and enjoys sleuthing, the worst reality shows, and wearing high heels, even at the playground. She's an AP mom of twins, slightly crunchy but with a pedicure.

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'DWTS' Premiere Recap: Season 17 Kicks Off With One Shock After Another

dinsdag 17 september 2013

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por Mary Fischer hace 10 horas

Ahhhhh! Sé que no soy el único que literalmente se levantó del sofá y aplaudieron durante el estreno de Dancing With the Stars temporada 17 esta noche. OMG. ¿Dónde diablos han sido esconden estos concursantes? Por primera vez en no sé cuánto tiempo, que no podía dejar sonriendo de oreja a oreja como cada pareja tomó la pista de baile.

La primera noche de DWTS suele ser incómodo, incómodo, un poco aburrido y también algo vergonzoso... pero este elenco está seriamente en llamas.

Y podrían que se echaron las cosas esta noche con alguien más caliente que Brandt Daugherty. ¿Por qué nunca oí de este tipo antes? Es todo tipo de sexy como el infierno y mucho más. (Mamá me gusta). Y él y Peta Murgatroyd tenemos química loco, así que deben ser muy interesantes ver esta temporada.

Después de actuación Brandt y de Peta, que la mitad espera el show al comienzo va cuesta abajo bastante rápido, pero luego solo guardé mejorando y sorprendió a los diablos de todo el mundo.

¿ Corbin Bleu? Sí, sí, sé que es un poco en el lado experimentado, pero todavía-- Karina Smirnoff y él eran impresionantes.

Y OMG-- Jack Osbourne. ¿No era nada corta de adorable, pero también probó ser muy suave en sus pies--quién sabían? (Y totalmente empecé a romper después de ver a su madre Sharon llorando en la audiencia.)

Elizabeth Berkley también me llamó la atención y es mirar hacia fuera para esta temporada. Ok, así que tal vez fue Val Chmerkovskiy que me había pegado a la TV, pero como sea.

Y no me hagas hablar sobre Amber Riley. ¿Puede esa chica moverlo y agitar, o qué? Es de noche sólo uno, pero si ella y Derek Hough seguir este ritmo, les sería fácil tomar el trofeo de bola de espejo.

Por supuesto, tuvieron que salvar a Nicole "Snooki" Polizzi para el final, y debo decir que ella entregó totalmente. Definitivamente lleva esta competencia (y su vida) en serio, que es tan refrescante. La quiero. (Y Len la llamó un poco "pocket rocket". El pobre no tenía ni idea lo que dijo, y fue increíble).

Hmm. Si tuviera que elegir un favorito esta noche pero voy a tener que dar mi voto a Jack Osbourne. Es demasiado lindo para resistir.

OMG. No puedo esperar para la próxima semana.

¿Quién es tu concursante favorito hasta ahora?

Imagen a través de ABC

Si eres un fan de Dancing With The Stars, haga clic en el botón "Me gusta" a continuación. Acerca de la autora Mary Fischer

es el escritor detrás de la Mommyologist y la madre de un futuro comediante famoso. Sus amores actuales incluyen Pinot Grigio sobre hielo y Harry Styles--en ese orden.

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Kids Sang 'Ding-Dong the Witch Is Dead' After 'Evil Obituary' Mother Died

zaterdag 14 september 2013

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AppId is over the quota
by Nicole Fabian-Weber Yesterday at 5:20 PM

By now you've probably heard about the kids who wrote the scathing -- and I do mean scathing -- obituary about their "evil" mother, Marianne Theresa Johnson-Reddick. "She is survived by her 6 of 8 children whom she spent her lifetime torturing in every way possible. While she neglected and abused her small children, she refused to allow anyone else to care or show compassion towards them" is a sweet, little excerpt from the shocking write-up. The kids -- all six of them -- agreed as a group that this was the lasting impression they wanted to leave of their mother on the world. And, needless to say, it's caused some controversy.

Some feel this was just ... too much. They're saying that, no matter how cruel a person is, you should try to find some positive after they're gone. But the kids don't want to hear it. In fact, they just admitted to singing "ding dong the witch is dead" upon hearing their mother died.

And when you hear about their story, it's kind of hard to argue with them.

In the 1960s, six of the eight Johnson-Reddick kids were admitted to an orphanage in Nevada. They lived there until they were 18, but would visit their mother on the weekends, where they were lined up and beaten with a steel-tipped belt. Apparently, the reason the kids were forced to spend time with their mother despite her abuse was because, at the time, Nevada law stated that parents' rights were more important than those of their children. When they got out of the orphanage, the kids contacted a state senator and lobbied for a change in the law, which went through in 1987.

The horror stories go on and on. In addition to the physical and verbal abuse they endured, they suffered from emotional abuse -- they were forced to sleep on the floor while their mother ran a prostitution business out of her home, right in front of their eyes. It's just heartbreaking, the things these kids went through. Their mother truly sounds like a terrible, terrible person, who seriously screwed her children up. It's terribly sad that this happened, and if this is Johnson-Reddick's kids' means of catharsis, who are we judge? They can't get their childhoods back. Let's at least give them this.

What do you think of this?

Image via Reno Gazette Journal

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