u/hyrulecastIe

i never used to be much of a crier. in fact people used to tell me how good I was at handling stressful situations and i’ve always been the type to be calm under pressure and good at compartmentalizing. there were even times in my life where I wanted to cry about something and couldn’t, but ever since i was diagnosed with leukemia for the first time a couple years ago, it’s like something’s completely shifted emotionally for me. it’s gotten even worse after my relapse last year and now I cry at EVERYTHING.

like when I try to explain my life or treatment to people, i end up getting so emotional about it i forgot what i wanted to say and stutter through it and end up trying to swallow back tears, which makes sense but the crying at other things is new for me. i never used to cry at tv shows but now I do constantly because I feel the emotions so intensely. if someone speaks to me even a little more harshly than usual, i cry. I remember crying during my annual evaluation for my degree while my professors were just giving normal, kind feedback about areas I could improve on. if I get into an argument, I cry. i cry at games. i cry over other people’s stories. i cry thinking about my own life. sometimes I think about my cat and how cute she is and how much I love her and i start uncontrollably sobbing LOL

it’s strange because this feels so unlike how I used to be. i have no idea what it is, maybe it’s stress finally catching up to me, the treatment itself, hormones/body changes, exhaustion, or just the reality of living with cancer changing me emotionally, either way it’s definitely an unexpected side effect of all this. I feel like the experience of cancer cracked me open somehow, almost like my emotions sit much closer to the surface now and it’s become harder to hold them back

My house is on a corner lot where a school bus is, and every year we end up dealing with the same issue: groups of kids (especially middle schoolers) treating our yard like a hangout spot.

I wouldn’t mind if they were just waiting on the sidewalk for the bus and i don’t wanna be the stereotype of the old man screaming at some kids for being kids but they can be seriously disruptive! not only do they run all over our lawn but they’ve also done things like crush the flowers in my garden, steal the stones/bricks/pinwheels we have decorating our yard, hang backpacks from our tree, run around playing football, scream at the top of their lungs, and get into fights. the other day they hit the side of our house with a football. we’ve also caught them repeatedly running very close to our front door on camera, they’ve also hit/kicked our front door and often knock each other into our doorbell. and they’re SO loud in the mornings and afternoons that we can hear every word inside the house. it personally annoys me but the bigger issue is my dad is elderly and they wake him up almost every morning yelling and roughhousing outside the window.

At one point we suspect one of the kids broke my driver-side mirror, but we didn’t have a camera pointed in that direction at the time (we do now). when that happened I contacted the school but they basically said there was nothing they could do without footage clearly showing who did it. apparently the school can just wash their hands of it unless we catch the kids causing “serious property damage” (their words) which is so insane I don’t even know where to start with that lol. I also asked about moving the bus stop and was told the school doesn’t handle that.

This has been the bus stop for over 10 years but it’s never been this bad, and the kids just keep getting worse every year. often it’s a new batch of kids every school year, so even if one group improves, the problem just starts over again the next year. the kids used to be good and when never had an issue when they wait on the corner for their bus but the behavior has been getting more and more out of hand. this year’s bath, we’ve tried asking them to stop hanging out on our property or to stay on the sidewalk, but they don’t really care or listen. i literally go out there every day to tell them to keep it down or quit playing in our yard but they completely ignore me. i guess i’m just not intimidating enough and neither is my dad.

I’m wondering if there’s anyone has any ideas for what we realistically can do about this? especially with the end of the school year approaching? ideally, I want the bus stop moved for next year. there are several other houses on our street with school-aged kids, and it would probably make more sense for the stop to be near one of those homes instead. i remember when I was growing up, having the stop near my house was actually convenient because my own family was involved with it, but I just can’t deal with these kids anymore! it’s so frustrating to get completely ignored by them everyday and I’ve lost all motivation to work on our garden because they just steal my decorations and destroy all my hard work. i’m worried about my dad getting woken up every morning by these kids screaming and fighting and i’m concerned about any future/continued property damage

My closest store is a bit out of the way so i thought i’d check here first before i make the trip! I know lulu won’t hem if it changes the design too much and the define pants have a cinchable hem. i don’t mind losing the cinch because otherwise they’re just a bit too long! wondering if anyone has been able to get these hemmed?