Re: My absence, Helping, Stenosis

June 11, 1998

Hi,

I really have to apologize to all our list members for my extended lapse.

Part of the problem was a build-up of physical issues quite terrifying to

me, and along with that there were some very painful issues with my

ex-wife, who is on anti-cancer meds & not thinking rationally due to that

(in my opinion). The marriage fell apart when each of us evidently still

cared for each other a lot, and I have tried to reconcile since. A few

weeks ago she made it plain that she doesn't want to talk to me at all (but

with a lot of mixed signals) & this has made me feel pretty helpless. We've

been apart for nearly 5 years.

So with a spike in physical problems, a cataract severely affecting my

vision (I just learned its ready for removal) and being generally depressed

over my ex wife, I was somewhat overwhelmed, & couldn't deal with work or

our list.

I had asked for volunteer helpers, and a number kindly volunteered. In the

next several days I'm going to put together some guidelines I think will be

helpful for the people who offered to be co-moderators, and share the

account codes, and then see haw we can work together on this. Since we all

will have some unpredictable ups & downs, I think this is the only way to

be fair to everyone and work to maintain a useful, quality resource.

I believe that continuity on the list is vital, and I sadly found myself

interrupting it. Also, people have to be recognized & responded to,

regardless of how a leader or any one person feels or may be

functioning.And it would be good if the leader's absence or absences could

be addressed with timely responses to find out what's up in the same way

this would be done for any member of a support group. We might even want to

get to a point (maybe) where some of us exchange phone numbers so we can't

hide in depression or distress by switching the computer off. This is

probably somewhat down the road, though.

This leads me to pose a question to everyone that could help us all build

our support group in directions that would be more helpful: What do we each

want to get from this group, and how would we like it to function?

Ken

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