Category Archives: Daily Life

Dec 27 2012
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Daily Life

Excess All Areas

I have had an excellent Christmas. It may be getting harder to squeeze into my jeans, but you can’t go to a family get together and suck on celery sticks, can you? I have eaten thousands and thousands of calories over the last few days and have enjoyed every single one of them.

The Teenager rolled up his sleeves and helped serve Christmas lunch to forty-odd pensioners on Christmas Day, bless him. He was a bit shy to start with, but got into his stride and was soon happily scooting round, doling out roast potatoes, slices of turkey and carrots. Everyone agreed that he was ‘a very nice young man, very nice, and ooh, so tall, what was I feeding him, Baby Bio?’

There was only one awkward moment. We all had to gather in the hall and sing along to carols. A woman went round with a box full of musical instruments and feeling very Christmassy, I grabbed a couple of plastic maracas and enthusiastically shook them along to ‘Jingle Bells’. Unfortunately, I was still shaking them in tune to the next carol, the sombre  ‘In The Bleak Midwinter’  and The Teenager was mortified.

On Boxing Day, I went out for the newspapers early and had to pick up some wine for a party later on. Believe me, it’s very embarrassing paying for two bottles of wine at 8am when everyone behind me in the queue is buying satsumas and milk. Especially when my hands are playing up again and the wine bottles rattled in my bag as if I was having tremors from alcohol withdrawal.

Anyway, MS-wise, I’ve been more tired than usual and have spent endless  hours lolling around on the sofa, wrapped in a duvet. My feet have been buzzing more and the foot drop is driving me mad. I also had a spectacular argument with my bookcase. The bookcase won and my upper arm is covered in a violent purple bruise and throbs incessantly.

Apart from that, I am looking forward to more days of too much of everything. I have two very large boxes of chocolates that I feel compelled to eat and a bag of Twiglets in the cupboard, just in case. What more could I possibly need?

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Dec 24 2012
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Daily Life

What I Want For Christmas

Well, here we are…..Christmas Eve already. How did that happen? Seems I’ve been snoozing the time away, but at least the presents are wrapped, the fridge is stocked with wine and there’s enough chocolate in the house to graze (gorge myself) on over the festive period. The advent calendar has been disemboweled and is on its way to the recycling bin.

I have finished my massive house clean. The house is aired and the dead mouse which has been lying outside my back door for weeks has finally been laid to rest in the compost. I have three days of fun and frolics lined up before The Teenager visits his dad the day after Boxing Day. Where though, can I find some extra energy? I am so, so tired. Exhausted. All I want for Christmas is energy.

MS and Christmas is a double-edged sword. It’s great that it becomes socially acceptable, almost mandatory, to have a little kip in the afternoon, wine glass in hand, paper hat askew,  but the run of get togethers, one after the other can be hard. I’m turning into a tired and crabby old Grinch.

Anyway, enough whingeing. I’m just about to programme the Sky planner, filling it up with Gone With The Wind, Miranda, Downton and all the other usual suspects. My sparkly top for Christmas Day is hanging in my wardrobe, I’m resigned to wearing flat shoes and I think we’re pretty much ready for Christmas. I don’t plan on doing anything more strenuous than choosing what to eat next, which Quality Street to snaffle and reading out bad jokes from crackers.

I wish you all a fantastic Christmas. Thank you so much for your comments over the last few months – I love receiving them. On Christmas Day and Boxing Day I will be choosing some of my favourite posts, kind of like a top ten countdown, in true Christmas fashion. Cheers and have a good one! x

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Dec 19 2012
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Daily Life

Eat, Don’t Eat

Do you know what really, really annoys me about Christmas time?  We’re encouraged to fill our faces, over-indulge, drink too much, inhale whole tins of Roses and slump on the sofa all day long. Which is lovely. I don’t need an excuse at all. But isn’t it so annoying to pick up the newspaper on Boxing Day only be told off for our over-excess and shouldn’t we think about dieting? Make your mind up.

I am loving this week before the Big Day. My social diary is full, I’m catching up with my long-neglected friends and the usual timetable is suspended. There’s expectation in the air. We’ve reached the fag-end of the year and it’s time to reflect and move forward, fueled by chocolate and mince pies. Come the weekend, it will be totally acceptable to have a glass or two of mulled wine in the afternoon, and if I feel like dropping off in front of the telly, I can. Then I’ll pour myself a Bailey’s  – only at Christmas – and decide what else to stuff my face with.

Boxing Day will bring me back to earth with a thud. Magazines and newspapers flood into the newsagents, full of diets, rebukes and remorse. My local gym will hang banners up chiding me for my gluttony, offering me a free towel if I’m one of the first 50 to sign up for membership. Can’t we just enjoy a week or two of sheer indulgence without the shame afterwards?

It’s exactly the same every year. It’s just like the holiday adverts that pop up on telly. We’re deep in the middle of Christmas, we don’t want to be thinking about booking our next holiday. We’re praying for a little bit of snow. Can’t you wait until mid-January? Christmas isn’t over yet. I just want a chance to relax and enjoy myself.

I still haven’t lost the weight I put on with the steroids I took for three different MS relapses, so give me a break. If I want to buy a Family Circle box of biscuits and eat them all by myself while watching The Sound of Music for the 27th time, I will. I can blame MS. It’s a great excuse.

 

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Dec 14 2012
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Daily Life

Retail Therapy

Another day on the MS rollercoaster. To add to the long list of weird and wonderful symptoms MS has given me, I have just experienced vertigo for the first time. It started two days ago and I still have it, but I had to go Christmas shopping with my mum yesterday.

I finally decided against wearing black to the Christmas Day lunch (see December 13th post!), so I thought a cheery, berry red sparkly top would be perfect and we went to town to find one. First mistake was getting a bus. When you can’t move your head without it spinning, it’s hard to sit still on a packed bus as it bounced over every pothole, swung sharply round corners and took a roundabout at top speed. Second mistake was assuming that as it was Christmas, the shops would be filled with cheery, berry red sparkly tops.

There were lots and lots of black tops, black sparkly tops and black lacy tops. Lots of hideous prints. No velvet tops, which was odd. The only red tops I could find were either prim, buttoned-up cardigans or sheer, floaty ones. Nothing cheery and sparkling. We went in and out most of the shops on the high street and eventually I found a cream sparkly top. Result! I also treated myself to a necklace with a single silver star on it. Now I’m all ready for the big day, but the jury’s still out on whether I should accessorise with reindeer antlers or flashing Christmas tree earrings.

My mum bought me a Sarah Lund-ish  jumper for Christmas (yay!) and I cheered myself up with some goodies from Waitrose, then a stroke of luck as we were headed back to the bus stop, laden down with bags. My builder friend was working nearby and offered us a lift home. We must have looked a right pair, cramming my mum’s shopping trolley and four large carrier bags into the back of his van but we managed it.

Anyway, the vertigo is still here and it’s the oddest thing. Everything spins and I feel constantly dizzy and ill. The only way I can get any relief is to lie down, but that’s not really practical when I’ve still got work to do, but I’ve been bravely battling on. If I can just put in another few hours, I have a huge bag of chocolate toffees to chomp on later. And I can definitely eat them lying  down, with my eyes closed…

 

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Dec 13 2012
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Daily Life

Guess What We’re Doing Christmas Day?

Every Christmas Day, me and The Teenager head up to my mum’s house and spend the day there and it’s wonderful, but this year we’re shaking things up a little.

As he’s getting older, I worry The Teenager perhaps isn’t understanding the whole meaning of Christmas, so we are going to help serve Christmas Lunch to forty-five pensioners. You can imagine how that little conversation went. After I managed to lure him from behind his slammed bedroom door with the promise of pizza, we sat down and had a chat.

I told him that over half a million pensioners spend the whole of Christmas day alone in this country, with only the television for company. Would it really be so hard to give up three or four hours to make some people smile? I found out about the event as an MS support group I sometimes go to is held in the same church hall. I’m not a do-gooder by any stretch of the imagination, but when I heard they were looking for volunteers, especially younger ones, I jumped at the chance. A lot of foreign students at the University who can’t get home for Christmas help out too. It’s a two-way process – me and The Teenager will benefit just as  much as neither of us has any elderly relatives nearby.

Fair play to The Teenager, he came round to the idea pretty quickly. The plan is to spend the morning in our own house, then head up to the hall just before noon, maybe picking up some people on the way if they need a lift. We’ll have some carol singing (gulp) and lunch will be served at 1pm. It’s all wrapped up after the Queen’s speech, then it’s back home for an hour or so before going to my mum’s for a lovely long evening of food, wine and chilling.

As the time draws closer, I’m a little nervous though. Will The Teenager behave? Will he be too shy? I really want to show him that life is about more than just looking out for Number One. Anyway, the big dilemma we have now is what to wear. My Christmas Day outfit, planned before we signed up for this is all black. Too….funereal? Too sombre? It’s got lots of sparkly bits on it – too nightclub-ish?  And should I wear flashing Christmas earrings or is that too tacky? A Santa hat? Any advice gratefully received….

 

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