Working & fostering

Here’s another thing that happened yesterday. For background, shortly after my mom passed in 2019, a “foster friend” went under investigation and the kids were moved. She asked me to take 2 of the 4. The foster friend was erratic and later I’d find out she’d had other investigations over the years alleging the same, oddly specific things. She got the kids back, but I started to put distance between us because she was doing weird things, eventually I notified the fostering agency and went no contact.

Weird things:

We were invited to her house for a Christmas party and she had the bios of some of the kids (who I later learned were court-ordered no contact) and she gave very lavish gifts. I got her a baking set and she got me a new iPhone (I refused it, of course). I got her kids legos and Barbie sets, she got my girls a Barbie dream house.

One time, I didn’t answer her text within a few hours and she showed up at my work, looking for me.

We were invited to a fancy dinner birthday party for a milestone birthday party for one of the children she had adopted. She invited the bios after they had not been in contact with the kid for years as a surprise to the kid. A very dramatic scene unfolded in the restaurant that ended with a bio parent locking herself in the bathroom and the chef and I trying to talk her out of self-harming in the stall.

As time went on, things got weirder and I was already putting space between us. She asked me to watch two of the kids she had as foster placements as she and her adult children were going to an art event as a birthday present. Then she didn’t pick the kids up for two days. I went to her house after the first day and her car was there as were a bunch of other cars, but no one would answer the door. It was over the weekend, so couldn’t get a hold of anyone in foster care. When she picked the kids up, she told me about having an affair with her stepfather and gave no explanation of where she had been that “time had gotten away.”

Anyways, I went no-contact after that. Told her it was best we went our separate ways. Blocked her on phone and social media. Wrote an email with my concern to the foster agency. That’s when my licensing worker called me and told me about issues that had been previously reported. After I went no contact, she would drive down my street multiple times a day, sent me a certified letter, have her kids come to the house. Eventually, things stopped.

So, a year ago out of the blue, her teenage daughter sent me an old photo of Liam she found on Facebook. I ignored it.

I price my lessons and events lower than anyone else in the area. Not crazy low, but $5-10 less. Intentionally as I’m just starting out and I’m in neighborhoods that don’t have anyone providing mahjong. My events usually sell out within a day. Never a complaint.

I added a last minute open play for this weekend. I rent the event space from a Black, Woman Owned Business. They get increased foot traffic into their business and I barely break even charging $15 for 3 hours of mahjong. I rent the space, provide all the sets, snacks, raffles and prizes.

I didn’t understand why this weekend event wasn’t selling.

The first post I found about me was that I was “money-hungry” for charging for people to come play mahjong. I don’t even know this person.

The second post was that I was a terrible host and the events are awful. The person who wrote that has never been to any lesson or event I have hosted. I have never met this person unless they’ve been to some of the huge mahjong events I’ve attended as a player.

Going down the rabbit hole, I found that both of the posters are friends with the self-appointed regional mahjong queen who has a mahjong parlor AND is starting a business manufacturing mahjong tiles. I think it’s somehow related.

Meal prepped a little bit.

Made progress on the mahjong room:

Hung new drapes

Put together this little rack for all my tiles and mats and hung my mats

Still to Do

Debating on a new light fixture

I have bamboo chairs I’m going to repaint white and reupholster

Art

Rug

Current progress:

I grew up in the Midwest and oatmeal is a staple breakfast food. Y’all, kids in the south gag on oatmeal. I add dried fruit and nuts, honey, when they were little I even got the little dinosaur egg instant oatmeal to entice them. I have not met a kid born in the south who willingly eats oatmeal.

👉 Get shingles vaccine (I think I can get it, there’s one questionable heart med I’m on that may make it a no go)

🀄️Turn my dining room into a mahjong room

📚 Finish getting the kids ready for back to school

💨 Change the air filters (I haven’t been able to get on a ladder for months because of syncope, but they really need to be changed).

Re: Mahjong Room

The walls are chartreuse with white wainscoting. Floors are warm oak/saddle. The current drapes are these heavy plum drapes. I’m thinking dusty pink or ink blue or cream drapes. Chinoiserie? Dramatic but not too heavy.

We did mahjong last night as family game night and ended up with Bee crying and Dino intentionally antagonizing everyone. But the set we put together made a really pretty tablescape:

I think I have a pretty moderate pain tolerance level. Thanks PTSD and the ability to disassociate, tbh. The nerve pain flairs in my br.east five months post the open hearts and wound vac are still very uncomfortable. It’s fire that spreads through the tissue at random times. They have been burning since 2am and nothing stops it. Gabapentin, compression, ice, heat- nothing works.

I mentioned it and the pitted edema I still have in my donor leg to my endocrinologist. He said that in his experience, this nerve pain is way more common for people with diabetes and long-lasting, likely to stay with me my entire life.

And I just take it in stride. But it’s 5 in the am and I’m so fucking tired and the burning won’t stop and i just want to cry.

I do buy some tile sets off Ali.baba and the te.mu. I have some big open plays coming up, so just placed an order on the Ali.baba. Now they are saying US cus.toms needs my social.

I was exhausted and went to bed at 9:30pm. Bee and Metoo stayed up most of the night bedazzling things.

Two weeks until school, last two weekends of summer break, so lots of stuff to do before school starts.

All of my August mahjong sold out. I released my September schedule and that sold out within a few hours, so I opened up one more class and that sold out this morning.

I’m sitting with a lot of disappointment. I had hoped that the expert in the field would say “Oh! Yes! We have treatments and interventions that are going to make everything better and you’ll live a long, easy life unburdened by constant medical crises.”

Reality: Your team has done everything possible and is aggressive as possible and there’s nothing different we can do.

He did say he thought the implant I have was shit and they don’t work. Evidence supports this. I do get pain from the Abbot lead and he said it could be taken out but does not recommend it as long as I can endure the pain. I can endure.

Also, is it insane to turn my formal dining room into a mahjong parlor for the sole purpose of teaching small classes (8 people max)?