Oct 15 2012
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Daily Life

About as Useless as a…

One of the best things about the weekend newspapers are those ‘innovation’ catalogues that fall out of them. You know, the ones with all those amazing items you can’t believe you’ve lived a whole lifetime without.

I must be getting older (can’t blame everything on the MS) as my ritual now is to make a nice cup of tea, choose a biscuit, settle on the sofa and jot down all the things that will make my life so much easier and more fulfilling. Here’s my latest list:

  1. Hands-free vegetable and fruit peeler – which, they say,will be the envy of my dinner party guests. That’ll make for an exciting party then, eh?
  2. A traditional barometer in classic brass and mahogany. Measures atmospheric pressure in millibars and hect-pascals. A grateful customer is quoted, ‘invaluable as it lets me know whether I need a cardigan or coat whilst gardening’. Lovely.
  3. A mop that spins itself dry! Comes with foot pump and centrifugal spinning system. They promise that once I use it, I will never want another mop!
  4. A foot stool with floral padded cushion that even stores my telly remotes. With four lockable castors, it’s not available in the shops!

If I order now, I can choose a free LED torch and if I spend over £30, I can claim a set of 2 ceramic potato bakers for just £2.99. Will I place my order? Um, no. I can peel my vegetables just fine, I check my weather app every day, the remote lives on the sofa arm and I don’t have space for a huge mop bucket. Even if it is centrifugal.

But I will still write up a new list, next weekend, just for the fun of it.

 

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Oct 14 2012
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Daily Life

Under Construction

I can think of a million and one lovely things to do on a beautiful, sunny Saturday. The Teenager is spending the day with his dad and I have the house, and time, to myself. There are museums to visit, shops to look round in and I need to pick up some books from the library. So why am I dressed in builders gear, thick gloves and Timberland boots, twirling a spirit level?

The good news is, I seem to be in remission at long last and a builder friend needs a bit of help with a last-minute job. It’s all quite technical, but it involves two steel lintels, lots of cement, nails and bits of wood. If the job isn’t done properly, the house will collapse in on itself. Or something.

My main roles are chief sweeper-upper and go-fetch-from-the-van person. After a long week of office work and study, it’s surprisingly good fun, this building malarky. I think I sometimes forget how satisfying it can be to do physical work, never more so than after months and months of mind-numbing exhaustion from a relapse. Suddenly, I feel refreshingly, alarmingly, gobsmackingly alive. My arms and legs seem to be behaving and I’m actually doing something useful.

Plus, I get coffee, breakfast, lunch and the odd Snickers bar thrown in – always a bonus. When I’m dropped home, I rush to the shower and it’s never been a nicer one. I’ve had an excellent day and I feel as if I’ve had a full-body workout – another bonus. So now, as I am about to lounge on my sofa for the rest of the evening, I kind of feel I deserve it.

Would I give up the day job though? Not a chance. My friend’s last job was fixing a roof. In torrential rain.

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Oct 13 2012
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The Teenager

The Kids are All Right

The Teenager is going out to a birthday party tonight. Not so very long ago, parties were held during daylight hours, the kids were exhausted from bouncing around giant soft play shapes and they had dinky party bags to take home.

Recently, parties meant a child inviting two or three close friends, taking them to a child-friendly restaurant for tea and staying with them the whole time, then embarrassing them by having the waiters bring out a birthday cake.

Now, heading for 14, the kids want to invite four or five close friends and be left, all on their own, in a restaurant for dinner. Can they even be trusted to behave? Should we follow them in disguise or wait outside in the car with binoculars? How will their waitress cope? I’ve seen these kids on the rugby pitch and they are LOUD. And still laugh at rude words.

The Teenager had already planned his outfit by Monday. It’s been washed, ironed and hung up in his wardrobe – Fred Perry top, Next chinos. With Vans shoes. He’s actually going to use deodorant and style his hair. I won’t be able to get into the bathroom for at least an hour.

What should I do then? Well, I guess what any parent starved of babysitting does – head for the nearest place that sells wine. A good friend is in town, there are three pubs within walking distance of my house, I’m in remission and it’s the weekend. The kids will be fine.

Luckily, I’m a cheap date now  – MS has somehow made alcohol much…stronger. A couple of drinks and I’m ready to flop. And I can always blame my unbalanced walking to the loo on the MS…

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Oct 12 2012
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Symptoms and Treatment

Oh, So I’m Ill Then?

An odd thing happened to me at my latest blood test (apart from being compelled to buy chocolate…). I have blood tests every month, so no news there. But this time, I had a new nurse.

She must have been reading my notes before she called me, as she came through to the waiting room, gently tapped me on the shoulder and gestured for me to follow.

Puzzled, I put away my book and went with her. In her room, she pulled out a chair and almost helped me to sit down. I was starting to get a bit worried. Did she know something I didn’t?

She sat down, clicked through her computer screen, then turned to me with big, sad eyes and said, ‘you poor, poor thing. You’re what (looking back to screen), only ten years younger than me, but you’re so, so brave, so strong’. Huh? ‘Oh, we don’t see many people with MS here’. She asked me how I was coping with the diagnosis, what my fears for the future were and whether I had to make any…adjustments. Wheelchairs, catheters and walking sticks flashed through my mind, none of which I need. Yet?

This got me thinking. I’ve been through a horrendous year and the diagnostic process isn’t easy. There’s no single test, there’s a set of criteria you have to tick before you move from a ‘single’ attack to ‘multiple’ sclerosis. It’s incredible what you can come to think of as your new normals and you just shift your life around them. I think I’m doing pretty well and I don’t live my life as an MS victim/sufferer, I just happen to have MS. But things like this pull you up short, and the fear rises again. I really am ill?

Finally, she took my blood pressure. ‘Mm, it’s awfully high. Are you anxious about anything?’ Not before I came in here, I wasn’t….

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Oct 11 2012
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My Ramblings

Chocolate, *sigh*

A friend has just told me it is National Chocolate Week this week. Regular readers will be familiar with my chocolate trials and tribulations, but who am I to turn down any  reason to celebrate the wonders of the humble cocoa bean? It is obviously my duty (and honour!) to take part.

To mark this sublime event, I hovered for far too long in front of the chocolate display at my local supermarket yesterday. I had just been for my monthly blood check and was in need of a little treat to cheer myself up. I trundled out the old MS excuse to myself, ‘hey, I deserve it, I’ve got MS’. This can work on pretty much anything – another glass of wine, extra helping of roast potatoes, another hour on the sofa.

So there I am, moving swiftly past the Christmas displays, the huge boxes of Thorntons (I’m not that greedy), on to the single chocolate bars. Furtively, I snatch a family-sized Dairy Milk, shoving it under my healthy yoghurts, fruit and low-fat cheese. At the check-out, I tut, saying ‘kids, eh?’ as the chocolate is swiped through, neatly blaming the chocolate on The Teenager. Result!

Gwyneth Paltrow once said in an interview that she stops herself having junk food by eating naked, in front of a mirror. Ha! The biggest mirror I have is in my hallway, I have a glass front door and I don’t think my postman would appreciate the view. I prefer the Fridge Plan. Put your chosen contraband in the coldest part of the fridge. This makes it much harder to scoff in one go. Clever. Plus, whenever I open the fridge door, The Teenager miraculously appears next to me, peering over my shoulder and I have to hastily hide it behind the ketchup again.

But I know it is there, and I know I will very, very quietly rescue it, silently open it, and sink into chocolate oblivion. Again. *Sigh*.

 

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