Love

I seem to be having a philosophical week. forgive my ramblings  (And mis spellings, I usually write before nebs, not after, unlike tonight and so my hands are shaking more than the average woman in an xrated movie)

I wote yesterday about the urge I get, to be useful in some way. Well, the other thing I often crave is love. Yes, I have an abundance of love from family and such, but I am talking more the soppy, butterflies in stomach, just want to hug all the time type of love.

I do crave that so much and in a way, I crave it in the sense that when things do get tough, I want someone there who I can turn to, someone to be scared with me, who will hold me, curl up on my bed with me and tell me everything will be alright. Someone, who can rub my shoulders when I have had a rough night and make me feel good about myself whilst coughing my guts up.

But as I think more about this, I know that this is a dream. Sleeping Beauty had to be asleep for her prince to come. Cinderella had to go the dance and so on. You need to be able to put yourself out there. A knight isnt going to suddenly ride his white horse through the middle of your living room and find himself in a deep love at first sight.

But right now, I cant put myself out there. It would be easy in a way to hide behind the reasons why. To say, well I cant talk well and I cant hear well so there is no point. Or to say, I cant get breathe enough to do it. But that isnt the full reason. Its the easy reason.

I think, more to the truth, is that I cant put myself out there, for many reasons, but mainly, I think if I want to be loved so much, then I first have to love myself.

I think, through this whole ordeal, being held against my will, the stabbing, the transplant and all it entails and after that the whole breathing saga, the thing that is hardest to deal with and has the biggest inpact, is the hatred and guilt that I feel towards myself. I cant help but feel like such a big part of me was taken away from me. I lost who I was. I was the loud, confident, successful one. The one with a big heart, the one with friends and boy friends. The kinda person that would get up and dance on a table, without even a drop of alcohol. The kinda person who went on a 2 hour hike at 4am to Tesco to buy hot dogs as I had a craving. The person who was never home. The person with a big heart who laughed a lot.

Right now, and for a long time, I dont love myself. I dont like my life and I dont like where things are headed. I hate never having energy, I hate the looks I get in public.

I know I talk a lot about giving up about how the future is bleak. But I put myself through insane procedures, painful ones that give more hindrence than help, ones that leave me in hospital for months at a time. But, deep down, I do this because I want a chance. I want a chance to take my life back. To be me once again. I know that I can never get back to the person I was and I am ok with that, she was self centred 16 year old anyway. But, I want a chance to see what I can be. To pit myself against the world and see who I truly am. To see if I am capable of becoming a person that I can once again love.

And with love becomes happiness. I want to be happy. Happy and breathing and useful. So yes, I do pin a lot of surgry. But the way I see it, I have a lot to lose. Because there is so much that I want to do and see and witness. But I cant do it like this. And I cant do it alone. And right now, my bitterness and my lack of love, has left me alone. It is rare I talk to anyone outside this house. I am 26 and in an average week I talk to 2 people. But the longer this goes on, the more hollow I become, the deep and darker the hole the inside me grows. And I can barley even accept myself, nor look in the mirror whilst the whole is still there.

I hate that the hole was put there, but I also hate that over the years, I have allowed it to grow and consume me.

So for now, I shall cruise a long and hope that I am able to stay afloat. And that the next surgery is the one that works. The one that gives me my life back, instead of adding more problems.

It goes on

Do you ever do that thing, where you kinda compose letters of blogs in your head, I guess its kinda like talking to yourself. They always turn out so well worded in your head and never so once written out. I think this post is going to be one of those. I have been composing it for a few days and yet I cant recal what I wanted to write.

The other night, was kinda monumental for me. To be 25 and going on my first date. I am also very proud of myself for doing it. a first date is a scary prospect for anyone, let alone to do it with any medical crap still going on, I think was a big step. It kinda showed me that life can go on pretty normal, even when I dont feel normal.

Alas, it wasnt to be and no more will come of that date. I was a little sad about it at first, but I guess it would be silly to even think of things being perfect from the start.

I think, that in my head, I want the perfect romance. I want the fairytale knight in shinning armour, the prince the whip me off my feet and to fall head over heels for someone who feels the same for me. I want the disney ending. But Cinderella rushed home so her dress didnt disappear, she wasnt worried about her scarf slipping from her neck. Belle lived with the beast, with no worry of how to deal with coughing up blood during dinner, i guess if she did there might have been a little hoover person to come clean up. Sleeping beauty awaited a kiss from her prince, she wasnt thinking about not having breath flowing through her mouth when she kissed him back.

I guess what I am saying, is that right now, I dont feel much like a princess so how could I expect a prince to come find me. If i want a fairytale relationship, my mind can not be in turmoil with my body. And although i have come a long way to accepting my current circumstance, I still have a way to go.

But that is not to say I have any regrets. Life is still going pretty amazingly. Being able to breathe is so amazing. I dont fall asleep if I sit still for more than a few minutes. I can do simple things again, like blow drying my hair and changing my bed. And whilst I still dont want this to be all I have, It is a firm foundation to build on.

I am starting to be more independant. Doing more to help around the house, being more active and actully considering finding my own place. What is more, I have the support of my parents in this and that means a huge amount. I am doing things right, sensibly. Not my usual jump in with both feet and get stuck.

Things are going in the right direction and I couldnt be happier right now. Breathing is so underrated.

lies

I told a lie today. It was only a small lie, the same one I have told so many times before.
But once I finished telling, i didn't feel the same careless shrug I usually feel. I was smiling, reflecting.
It was upon this discovery that i stopped and thought. Perhaps it wasn't a lie. Maybe it's the truth. The thing i have wanted to be true for so long, now seems so natural.

I was talking about the past. About everything really. And i said I was so lucky. That sure things may not be ideal, but I was thankful to be where I am now.

It is true. For so long I resented being saved. I hated that things were hard. But right now, I am filled to the brim with love and gratitude. I could have lost much, yet here I am.

I will always want more but that doesn't mean I am not Damn grateful for what I have. I have so many opportunities and so many prospects that i can't wait to try out.

Hospital wise things are going so well. There are bound to be small hicups but i know i can beat them. I have a wonderful life ahead of me, filled with such amazing people, that I can't wait to get on with living it.

Oh and this was the first skin graft where there was no new or open scars to be discovered. Everything is on the up. And i can breathe a deep breath and admire the view from the top.

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Love, Loss and Repetition

My family is far from ideal, but watching history repeat itself can get painful.

I dont know remember really having much family around when I was younger. I know my mum had disagreements with her mum, but I am not sure on my dads family. We started seeing my nan on my dads side, when I was maybe 6. Both my parents come from huge families, each having 8 siblings, who of course have their own families too.

I loved going to my nans, she was the only nan I ever knew. I remember watching the film Granpa and just crying for hours as I wanted a Granpa. Subsequently, my dad banned be from ever watching it downstairs ha.

Going to my nans was exciting, suddenly I had tons of cousins and plenty of places and people to play with. This pic is from my nans 80th. (I am the one with the white hair band near the right.)

I grew up living with my mum and dad and my bother who was 3 years older than me. My older sister Tracy, also lived with me until I was about 4. We used to share a room and although I would fight with her if I couldnt get my own way, we loved each other. She had a boyfriend, who I would follow around like a shadow whenever he was around. She left on bad terms with my mum.

When I was about 9, I gained some more family. Turned out, I had an older sister named Michelle, who had also left home on bad terms with mum, but she got back in touch. Along with a sister, I also gained a brother in law and a niece and a nephew. There was some riverally at first, adjusting to sudden changes, but I loved it.

A couple of years after that, Tracy got back in touch. By this point she had 3 kids, but one was ill. When she had had her youngest there had been complications. She should have been a twin, but only one survived, when Tracy got in touch, the youngest was ill in hospital needing surgery and a long stay. She survived and did well. I now had 3 nephews and 2 nieces.

Christmas was wonderful. It was chaos. The room full of nice smells and coloured strips of paper flying through the air as everyone exchanged presents. The excited squeals as the kids unwrapped what they wanted or sat and played games with each other. Everyone making the effort and wearing their best clothes. And after tea, we would go visit my nans with more kids and chaos. It was wonderful, I loved it so much.

Not long after, my elder sister Michelle got pregnant. It was a complicated pregnancy and she had to spend a big chunk of time in hospital before the birth. I got the job of looking after the other two kids. I already loved spending time with them. I got to play the nice role, the reading bed time stories and making hot chocolate.

When the baby was born, I was instantly in love. Shell used to come visit one afternoon a week and I would race home to spend 30 mins with the baby before she had to leave to pick the other two up.

Life was good. I had my family around me and I loved it.

There were issues with my brother who for a while was in and out of my life a lot. I made a point of seeing my nieces and nephews all the time. Going once a week to Tracy's for tea and to see the kids. Watching them grow was wonderful and I felt very grown up.

When I got sick, family pulled together, but the stress of it all had an effect. Everyone began arguing with each other. Once the danger zone passed, the stress became too much and my Tracy stopped visiting. I lost contact to my niece and 2 nephews. This is still a very raw wound, that I blame myself for.

I loved them with all my heart and yet I lost them. Soon after, my nan got sick and after rushing back on a mad 18 hour drive from the middle of Italy, we spent a couple of weeks at the hospital with her, before losing her, in an ugly and painful battle. Again, I loved her so deeply and it hurt so much losing her that I cried non stop for weeks. She used to hold my family together and once she was gone, we all drifted. Its rare now that I see anyone from that side of my family. 

My eldest niece from Shell, turned 18 last winter and due to family arguments, now lives away from home with her dad. We are slowly losing contact with her and no matter how hard I cling, I am struggling to hold her into this family. It hurts like hell to picture losing her.

Maybe, I shouldnt love as strongly, because it hurts more when losing people. My family is drifting apart and I am powerless to stop it no matter how hard I try.

Just had some more bad news, which may further pull on my little family and lead to me losing even more contact. I cant write about that at the moment, but I can say that I am scared. I cant lose anymore. It feels like it maybe a battle of my health and their health and I am losing more people. 

I have taken every loss personally, yet held it all in. Now, more than ever I need to hold it in, I need to be strong, yet try to keep my family together. I need to be the rock at this point, not show my fear and stand up tall. 

But its hard and it hurts and it feels like I have a huge weight sitting on my chest.

First Love

I was luck enough to have contact with my first love from a very young age.  Regular contact helped to strength our bond together and with the support of my familiy our love soon expanded. We would spend hours alone together, always there telling me what I needed to hear. Be it comfort, understanding or humor. This love still stands today, though it has gone through some major changes and periods of neglect. There is a downside to this love, mainly a financial thing, but if kept unchecked it could turn into an addiction.

Books have always been a part of my life and feature in many of my early and most fond memories. Of course I will have begun with all the kids picture books and first word books, but those are from a time before my memory seems to kick in. The more memorable of my younger days would be those written by Enid Blyton. My sisters had had them when young and so they where still in the house and ready for reading. I spent hours sitting on mums knee in the rocking chair her dad made before he died whilst she read 'The magic wish chair' to me and my brother.

That is the cover of the book I had and a quick search tells me its from 1972. It was all about a magic chair that could fly and grant wishes. The other book I remember from the same era was called The Three Golliwogs. Which was about 3 naughty boys who used to play tricks on people as they all looked the same. Golliwogs actully used to advertise the English Marmalade, but they were later banned for being 'racist' But the stories from the Three Golliwogs, dad used to read me at bed time when I was small. Once I was a fluent reader I went back and reread them myself.

Aged 3 I began to pick up the letter sounds and could pick out basics words from text. By age 4, mum used to buy me a series of learn to read books, that I would practice with. Each time I mastered one book, I got the next book as a treat.

Once I started school aged 4 and a half, everybody in the glass were just learning their first letters, however, I already knew all mine and soon grew bored of the basic books, that I would race through quickly. Mum spoke to the school and they agreed that I could choose books from the next years shelf. Here I discovered Dr Suess. I soon fell in love with his funny words and characters favoring The cat in the Hat and loving thing one and thing two. I still greatly love Dr Seuess, with my favorite being the Lorax, closely followed by the Cat in the Hat.

It must have been around this time I discovered the tales of Peter Rabbit by Beatrix Potter and her other fun stories such as a tale of two bad mice. I got to visit the Beatrix potter Attraction in the Lake district where I saw all the characters come to life.

By the time I got into year one (Aged 5-6) I had free reign of the infants books. I quickly spotted Matillda on the shelf, by Roal Dahl. It had probably been put in the wrong section, but that did not stop me taking home to read. Dad perservered with my attempts to read the book, that was much to hard for me, but after a couple of chapters we agreed to give up on it for a while and come back, but I kept it in mind as a target to reach.

By the time I reached Junior school (aged 7-11) I was reading everything that I could get my hands on. I had already read through the entire set of Puddle Lane books.

A series of 54 books (plus two standalone volumes) was produced for Puddle Lane, published by Ladybird Books. The texts, based on the animated stories, were written by Sheila McCullagh. Illustrations for the books were provided by several different artists (Tony Morris, Gavin Rowe and others). There were five sets of books (different cover colour for each set), the first set (Stage 1) being the easiest to read and the last set (Stage 5) being the hardest. Since they were intended for children who are learning to read, the books with lower reading stages would present the text in two versions: the left page contained the full version, to be read aloud by the parent, while the right page contained a simplified version for the child. The books are currently out of print.

From there, I moved onto the american write Judy Bloom and from their, I was finally ready to take on Roald Dahl. Over a series of months I worked my way through most of his popular books from Matalida to the BFG onto Charlie and the Choclate factory and my all time favourite the twits.

My year 5 (aged 9-10) teacher picked up on my love for Roald Dahl and shared her love of him too. Subsequently, she leant me a couple of his more adult based books, such as Danny the Champion of the World, Henry Sugar and Boy, though I struggled at the time to read Boy.

By this stage of school, I was permitted to read any books I wanted as my 'homework' and I used to find many varied books in neighbors and families houses. I read a whole series of 'Liverpool' books by Helen Forrester, depicting life in Liverpool during the war and post war years.

I would also read any magazines that mum had finished with and I read my first real fantasy series, the Deptford Histories by Robin Jarvis before developing a love for 'horror' in the form of RL Stein and then the Goosebumps series of books. During Summer break between changing school (aged 11) I continued with the historical books and read The diary of Anne Frank, which shocked my beliefs in the safety of the world around, yet opened my eyes none the less.

Once I changed school, my tastes also changed from childhood books to more adult genre. After getting a copy of The Gift by Danielle Steel free, I quickly lapped this book up, to this day it still remains one of my favorites. A story about fate and happy endings from bad beginnings. I read a few others by the same author, but soon got bored of the similar themes that ran through the books, (broken homes and unwanted pregnancies) Choosing a book from the Library one day, I decided I wanted a challenge. I wanted to read a thick 'real' adult book. I chose to begin with Stephen King, but started on a shorter book of his so I had a chance to get through it. That night I began reading the Running Man. I couldnt put it down and finished the book in a week or so. Then came my obsession with Stephen King that lasted a couple of years. I read the majority of his popular work, staying up until the early hours of the morning to finish Fire starter and Cujo.

School reading also had to fit in here and books such as Lord of the Flies and Romeo and Juliet once again whisked me off to other worlds. But by the time I finished school at 16, I had grown bored of Stephen King. He had great stories and a wonderful way of telling them, but they began to make me mad. I would get so engrossed in the story only to find that they seemed to end suddenly with no real ending. I liked al the lose ends to be tied up neatly and explained, which he never did.

So after much thought, I moved onto James Herbet. Hoping that keeping to the same genre would keep me interested. I was so engrossed by his Rats series and the magic cottage. I read a fair few of his books. During this time, my nephew recommended and leant me the Harry Potter series to read. I demolished these books pretty quick and was always egar for the next one to come out.

It was around this time I got sick and reading was pretty much forgotten about for a while. Once I began reading, I went back to the comfort of my old favorites again. Then one year, before going on holiday, I decided to treat myself to a couple of new books from a whole new section. I had heard a lot about Terry Pratchet so I picked up one of his books and another one called Wi'itch War by James Clemens that sounded good. I couldnt take to the Terry Pratchet one, but I couldnt put the Wi'tch one down. Here came my love for fantasy books and introduced me to all their charcters such as Elvin, shape shifters and ogres.

And my taste now? Well it changes a heck of a lot. I literally have mountains of books to read. I tend to go through phases with my books. I can go weeks without touching a single one and then I can suddenly read a load in one go.

Lets have a look at my current books shelves. Now only my 'current' books are on the shelves in my room. I have a huge book shelf of read and waiting to be read books in the loft.

At the very left hand end are a couple of music books (I used to play flute) followed by some drawing books. Basic drawing, fantasy art drawing and Disney drawing and coloring ha, so mature. Then is my prized possession coffee table book of Frank Lloyd Wright. I fell in love with his architecture in year 10 and based a wood work project on his work, such as the Guighiem museum. Mum bought me the book. There is then a couple of Tarrot books. I used to do a lot of tarrot and got fairly good at it at one point. 

I have maybe 5 sets of cards, the last set I bought would have been in Simione in Lake Garda. There is a shop there that has over 100 different sets and I bought a pixie set, though the set I really want is the viencian set. Then we have some camera books and a complete works of Shakespeare. I do like his work, but it can be difficult to read. Next comes a Stephen King book that I was attempting to reread out of the dark tower series.

Next is a Robin Hobb book. This is a to be read book, but my favourite series of all time s by Robin Hobb. The Farseer series and The Tawny Man captured me by the second chapter. I literally couldnt put them down. I fell in love with Fitz and the Fool time and time again. I have read my copies of these books so many times that the pages have all come lose, in fact it might even be time to reread these. This book on my shelf is the second book in a newer series called The soilder Son series. I am yet to be pulled in by this book. Bring back Fitz and the fool!!

I am sure most people will recognize the next set of books. The twilight Saga, which I absloutly adore. I also have The Host by the same aurthor, but I have not yet been able to get into this book, I will try again at some point. And lastly on that shelf, Dreamsongs by George RR Martin. It has been recommend to me to read his series Ice and Fire, which is sitting waiting for me, but I bought dreamsongs by him as it is a series of his short stories that I have been reading off and on.

Yes, my book shelf s a mess and I am not going into detail of all the books here, but this is a double row. But of everything, from nursing fiction and non fiction books, Camera book (The bright green one) Some Non fiction books such as Cathy Glass and Out of The Dark. If anyone ever wants to know how on earth therapy can help a person, I would recomened Out of the Dark as you get a view from the patient and the therapists situation. And them my newer phase of vampires. There is the Charlene Harris set of True blood books and well as the Anne Rice set (Interview with the vampire, The vampire Lestat and Queen of the Damned) there are also a few other vampire ones there, that are not as well known. And a couple of lighter reading books such as Cecclia Ahern.

And the row behind continues along the same theme. Some Terry Brooks (to be read) some psych books, Robin Cook and Phillip Pullman, which need to be shifted to the loft or charity shop. They were a nice read, though I struggle to finish the 3rd book as it started to drag and get silly so I wont be rereading them ones.There is also Robert Jordan, which I have been promised is a wondeful series. I have started it maybe twice and didtched it both times. Either my mood is not wanting me to read it just yet, or I jsut cant get into it.

I think my taste is changing once again. Just as I drifted from horror to fantasy, I feel perhaps now I have drifted from fantasy to vampires, but that I am drifting again. Who knows where I shall end up this time.

Though I do have a love for Tim burton! Maybe its just the silly rhyme things I like. They seem to be present in Dr Seuss, Roald Dahl and Tim burton.

I can see this love being a long lasting one! Nothing will ever separate us, except maybe blindness, but that is not going to happen =]