New Year new hope

I had a lovely Christmas and New Year.

It was my sons 21st Birthday a few days before Christmas, 21st!

Wow it made me feel old and genuinely wonder how quickly the years have gone by. 

But I am extremely proud of the man my son has become, and unbiasedly know that he is a man who will do well in life, because he works his tail off now in order to achieve his dreams. 

He is, and always will be the best thing that has happened in my life. 

I was able to go to my parents and have Christmas lunch and on Boxing Day spend time with my brothers, neices and nephews and my brothers lovely wife 🙂 

Amidst the talking, joking around ( because all of us are jokers and cheeky remarkers) and eating I had a moment of feeling like the old me. I stopped and felt so much like me that it was scary but so exhilarating! 

I haven’t felt like that in a very long time, haven’t felt ‘normal’. But with my family, I felt so happy to be there, to see them all and able to join in that I forgot that I am actually sick. 

To be able to talk to my older neices and nephew and see how grown up the eldest neice is becoming, and how clever and cheeky my older nephew is and the spit of my brother! 

I felt like the old me, carefree, happy, jokey, and being silly with my young nephew as I played with his Star Wars figures and discussing how if a ghost tried to drink water it would go through its body, and that zombies eat brains, but not mine because it’s too small.. :,) 

It was good to feel that way, good to actually feel I am still me, that I am still me inside myself and to let that out.. Felt incredibly freeing 🙂 

I felt greatful for the amazing family I have, felt greatful that I could manage to see them, and feel grateful for the genuine love and support we all give to one another no matter what. 

Yes, I am still very ill. Yes, my mobility is so bad now that I lose the use of my legs in a weekly basis. Yes, I am still mostly bed and housebound.

But.

But, it’s the special moments like that which make me feel fortunate for what I do have, regardless of what I don’t. 

That despite how sick I am, I know that I have far more good things in my life than I don’t have. 

That many would love to swap places with me, and experience the love, support, and care of a family. To have a roof over their heads, a child and security. 

To know that despite how bad things can be, I am never truly alone and never will be. 

That, is worth far far more than what I don’t have health wise, and always will be no matter what the future brings. 

🙂 

All about… me :)

For another change I thought I would talk about and show pics of me from my past.

I haven’t really given much background on myself, snippets here and there but the older I get the more I look back, I think being unwell makes you look back more often too.

I am the fifth of six children, all from the same parents no step. I have four older brothers and a sister 17 months younger than me.

Along with my parents, and the several dogs we had over the years it was a very manic, no personal space, boisterous, noisy but happy home.
Luckily we had a three story house and 100ft garden, where my parents and sister still live, so we had room to play, fight, move about without it being too crowded.

Having four older brothers did create a lot of teasing, jokes, being dared to watch scary films etc.. which I think moulded my character a lot. The traits of standing my ground, not easily scared, my humour, the standing up for myself and others.
I didn’t grow up very girly, I played football, cricket, made dens, but I still had Barbie dolls and have a memory of washing my dollies clothes and hanging them on our washing line as my Mum hung our washing.

We were not rich, or well off. We never had spare money and were lucky to have enough money to pay the bills. We grew up with no central heating, we relied on three coal fires and in a three story house you can imagine how un practical that was. In the winter it was freezing, and I mean so cold you could see your breath when in bed.

I have so many happy memories though, toasting bread in front of the fire, laying against our much loved and still missed dog Kano as I read and wrote stories. Playing cards, star wars figure games with my brothers. Playing practical jokes on each other, being teased but always knowing my brothers would and did fiercely protect us.

The one thing we always had was food. My Mum is the kind of woman who will not let you leave her home without haven eaten something or taken food with you. God knows how she managed this with so many mouths to feed, I know she went hungry many times so there would be enough food for us children.

This resulting in me being tubby.. well overweight as a child.

I matured at a very young age, physically as well as mentally. I was not a pretty child, I had big front teeth, wore glasses, was tubby, clumsy and wore baggy clothes to try to hide my chubbiness and maturing body.
This is me at 7 years old…

It took having my son to lose weight, which is unusual. I was 12 stone before pregnancy, 14 half stone after pregnancy and within six months was 9 stone, which over two years became 7 stone which was way too thin.
This is me at 15 on my sons 1st Birthday

From having my son, I changed my life around. I was a little wild before hand, never in school, hanging around with older and wrong people. I have no doubt I would not be here today if it wasn’t for having my son, I was on a slippery slope that could of only ended badly for me.

At 15 I was a Mum, working as a cleaner, in school and college. They have a brilliant school for young mothers in Bristol, where you take your children with you as you study. I have recently looked it up and it now offers 6th form and university level courses. I haven’t visited for a few years and kept meaning too, but the last two years have made me unable to do so. I plan to get in contact with the headteacher soon though. She is an amazing woman who campaigns for young mums and help any of us she can.

Some of my best years were spent in that school, I still miss those days more than I ever thought I would so many years later.

As regular readers know I suffer from Endometriosis too, the last 8 years of my life have been blighted by illness. I was not as bad then as now, and still had the silly side I do now which has helped me through a lot.
Dressed as Miss Christmas 3 years ago

So that is a little bit of my early life I wanted to share with you. I hope it didn’t bore you too much 😉
All of us that are unwell, have long term illnesses, short term, any illness that impacts on us had a different life before we became unwell.

For the people who only see us as we are now, sick, stick walking, wheelchair using bed and home bound need to realise this. That we are people, just like them. We were children, teenagers, adults. With all the past, memories, feelings families, experiences that well people had and have.

We are people, not a diagnosis.