Last day at school

The days arrived. It's the last day for the kids at their current school before our move to Nottingham. It was 6 weeks ago when we started letting people know that we were moving and that time has just flown by. I'm looking forward to going to Nottingham and being closer to my family but boy, oh boy am I going to miss all the brilliant friends I have down here.

Some of these friends have witnessed the journey that our family has taken over the last 6 years (some have even been around longer than that, they must be mad!) and the support we have received has been incredible. I went from being a bright, bubbly, vivacious 20-something to nearly losing my life more times than you can count on one hand. I've gone from being a stay at home Mum, to working and then a 'sicknote' and needing plenty of favours from friends to keep everything ticking over. The kids have grown up and gone from being little ickle kiddies to ones that answer me back and cause me stress and worry but at the same time they're also these wonderfully empathetic mini grown ups and will still lie with me on the bed stroking my hair when I'm not well. Hubby has climbed the career ladder (and been knocked off it recently!) and at the same time he was, and still is, the glue that's held this family together. Now he's not working he doesn't know what to do with himself. I only hope we look back in 2 years time and say that taking Voluntary Redundancy and moving back to Nottingham was the best thing we ever did.

For me it's going to be hard turning up to a new school playground filled with Mums that have known each other for years and have already formed their cliches. Everybody tells me that I will make friends easily but deep down I am actually shitting myself. Yes, I can do small talk and am happy talking with strangers but how do I explain the fact that I can't remember any of their names despite the fact that I've asked them every morning for a week? Hopefully I will get invited for coffee one morning but what if I'm not good and can't go at the last minute? Or what if I forget to go?! How many times will I cancel before they stop asking me again? And how do I explain the frequency, length of time and noises that come from the loo if I go to someone's house??? These are all the things that I'm scared about. And if I'm scared and I'm an adult then I'm sure the kids must be feeling it too.

I don't know how I'm going to cope with today. I'm not good at goodbyes and I'm very emotional at the moment. I will be needing me waterproof mascara tomorrow for sure (erm, who am I kidding? Make up on the school run? Some days I'm lucky to be out of my onesie! There's another thing that will be different- I'm going to have to get dressed every day for the school run, at least to begin with anyway😉)

Luckily, or unluckily (depends on how you look at it and whether you're a glass half full type of person) I've got a lot of medical appointments coming up over the next few months. Almost one a fortnight, if not weekly sometimes. So I'm going to use it as an opportunity to catch up with people (and once the house sale goes through I will be sofa surfing!). I wrote a list 6 weeks ago of everyone I wanted to see before we moved. And I haven't even ticked off half, though not for the want of trying.

I'm hoping the weather is good today so that the kids can all play in the park one last time after school. I think a few Our ladies of pragues have been printed off and stuck outside to keep the sunshine here a little bit longer. I keep saying that the kids will need to go to finish off the chapter, but in truth it's me. I will need to eek out every last minute at the school tomorrow because once it's gone, that's it. Finito. For ever. And then it means moving day is just around the corner. And I haven't even started packing!!

NB x

Light at the end of tunnel

I’m sat writing this blog post in St Marks, the specialist bowel hospital in London. So much has happened in the last few weeks; it’s all been a bit of a whirlwind. But I finally feel like there is some hope at the end of the tunnel. Let me tell you why. At the beginning of June I was admitted yet again to QMC in Nottingham with huge amounts of pain, my bowels not working properly and just feeling generally unwell. I had only been home a couple of weeks since the admission in May but I had been feeling so rubbish most of my time had been spent in bed. I had tried everything I could to stay at home but the pain had become so bad I was barely able to stand or take a few steps on my own. I had expected to maybe be in for a week or two to get stronger pain meds and get back on my feet but I ended up being in for almost a month. They put me on morphine injections and ketamine but then stopped them when my heart rate dropped to 30 beats per minute and my breathing to 7 breaths a minute. Th

The light at the end of the tunnel is a train

Last week was a busy and pretty crappy week for me health wise. I had to go and have blood tests done with the nutrition nurses and I had two hospital appointments; one with the gallbladder surgeon in Nottingham and the other with colorectal surgeon at St Marks. I was hoping to have at least one surgery date to write in the diary following these appointments but I came home empty handed on both occasions. Here’s what happened. I began noticing over the last few weeks that I’ve started feeling really crappy. I’m feel lucky to have been at home for the last 6 months and I have been the most well I have been for years but it felt like things had shifted slightly recently but I couldn’t quite put my finger on it. But years of being sick means I know my body and I can tell when something isn’t right. I have been feeling permanently exhausted and having way more bad days than good. I’ve gone back to spending 2, 3 or more consecutive days in bed, unable to do anything but watch tv and sleep.

The wrong size line

I’m on the M1 heading back to Nottingham after a road trip to St Marks to get my line repaired. But this is me, and as usual it wasn’t a smooth ride. More like a bloody shit show. So what happened? Let me tell you… After being admitted to QMC in Nottingham on Sunday with a broken Hickman line I was taken down to Interventional Radiology on Monday afternoon to get my line repaired. Firstly, I couldn’t believe it was happening so quickly and secondly I didn’t want to get too excited because, well it’s me, and usually things don’t go according to plan. And sadly I right to rein in the excitement. When the doctor came to consent me for the procedure it was for a replacement, not a repair. I assumed he had made a mistake so I told him I was there to get my line repaired and was definitely not there for a new one. He looked at me and said “I hate to be the bearer of bad news…” and that’s a sentence that never bodes well. He then went on to say that they didn’t have any repair kits and that

More than just a bag lady

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