Happy New Year!

Happy New Year! 2016 has arrived (admittedly some time ago but hey! I'm doing my best!) As the hours in 2015 were coming to an end I sat down and thought about what I wanted to get out of the coming 366 days (it's a leap year!) Here's what came to mind...

✏️✏️ 2016 AIMS ✏️✏️

▪️ To lose 2 stone by eating a better diet and starting to do some exercise

▪️ No more eating things that I know will upset my belly  

▪️ No eating after 8pm to begin with, moving to 7pm to rest my bowels and hopefully improve my sleep. 

▪️ To see my Bestie and her family in person once a month and to work hard at maintaining other friendships, especially with my Southern friends 

▪️To visit our friend in Germany 

▪️ To join rock choir or another type of social group with a view to meet new people and enjoy myself 

▪️ To write a blog post at least once a week

▪️ To have a date night with Hubby once a month

▪️ To have the annual Meadowhall trip in November 2016 with C, L and J and at least one other get together earlier in the year

▪️ To give myself permission to be unwell and to rest with a daily nap so that I have enough energy to not just look after the kids but to engage with them

▪️ To arrange and enjoy a holiday in the summer 

▪️ To seriously declutter when unpacking and either sell or donate what we no longer need or use 

I wanted each aim to be SMART so that I could definitively say whether I had or hadn't done them this time next year. 

But most importantly I want this year to be FUN. The last 6 years have been so difficult it has felt at times as though we have been surviving rather than actually living and having fun was a luxury that we could ill afford. But this year it will be different. I want to make the weekend family time- no chores, no boring stuff (unless we really, really have to) just lots of quality time with the kids, our friends and our families. I'm determined to plan otherwise the weeks go by and without you realising it you've lost 2 months. In the past I've not felt able to plan as I was always yo-yoing in and out of hospital and then the stuff I had planned would either happen without me or not happen at all. I'm thinking of weekends away discovering places up north that we wouldn't have gone to as they were too far from home like Whitby and other parts of Yorkshire, or visiting friends that we have scattered up and down the country (and in Germany). The train from Nottingham to London is fast and regular so a show and some shopping is something I'd like to do and passing through St Pancras has got me thinking about attempting a trip over the water to France for the day or weekend. We might even have a trip down memory lane and visit Skegness and Mablethorpe where Hubby and I holidayed as children although the snob in me now wonders whether I could manage a whole weekend there!

And most important of all is to go on holiday. With family, with friends, just us 4, I don't care. All of the above please if possible! Hubby needs that time to forget about work and destress and we need that time as a family to have fun away from the shit of daily life. But I'm still not brave enough to go abroad and I wish I was. I know that Hubby and the kids would love to go to Turkey or Spain- somewhere where the weather is guaranteed and they can play in the pool or a water park for hours on end. But despite reading online forums where other TPN patients have managed it I just cannot do it. I stress out so much about going on holiday anyway, about forgetting something or being unwell and ending up in a strange hospital that I couldn't throw a foreign language and hot temperatures into the mix too. I feel like I'm holding them back and I start thinking 'maybe I could do it...' But then I start panicking and realise that it's a step too far for me. You never know- maybe in a few years time. 

I know I've said that I want to go to see my friend in Germany but that's different. I've done it before so it's familiar, my friend lives 5 minutes away from a hospital and she could translate for me should I end up needing to go in. Plus the weather is pretty much the same as we get here in the UK so I'm not going to overheat or dehyrate. 

And on top of all these plans and ideas and hopes and dreams we will hopefully by the end of the month (or early Feb at the very latest) be moving into our new house. That will mean we will have our own space and room for all of our friends to come and visit us. So 2016 will be a good year. I've decided.

NB xx