The deadliest shower....ever!

It's nearly the end of summer and oh boy has it been busy for me!

I have loved having Holly home for 3 months especially since she has provided me with lots of reasons to smile and laugh.

Two weeks ago, she out did herself when she called me from upstairs. She had just come out of the shower and was alarmed to hear a buzzing noise coming from it after she had switched it off. She seemed to think that the shower was going to blow up or electrocute her!

I came upstairs to investigate and sure enough there was a buzzing noise coming from inside the shower. I was confused because it wasn't an electric shower so how it could be buzzing was beyond me. It runs off the gas central heating so instantly has hot water all the time.

I turned the shower on and off a few times while Holly hovered at the bathroom door, looking anxious.. I stood outside the shower door and listened. The buzzing was coming from near the temperature control button. I leaned in to listen closely and that's when I realised that the buzzing wasn't coming from there at all but from the basket that hangs in the corner of the shower.

I put my hand in and brought out the battery powered razor she uses and said to her "were you using this in the shower?" She looked at it, like it was some sort of alien object and looked at me confused. "emm, yes I was, why are you asking?" I had switched it off as I brought it out of the shower, so I promptly switched it back on and it started buzzing gently. I then dropped it back into the basket where it started buzzing very loudly. Holly's face was a picture!

"That's your dangerous buzzing, you numpty!" I said, bursting into hysterical laughter. I laughed so hard that I was clutching my stomach, unable to breathe. Meanwhile Holly is standing indignantly, in just a towel, not sure whether to laugh or cry at her imaginary brush with death.

I was still laughing an hour later but she just kept telling me to shut up which just made me worse. Who'd have thought having kids could be this much fun?

It's only poop!

Well, Holly's new boyfriend was chuffed to bits with her homemade Valentine's Gift.  His gift was homemade too; he made her flowers and drew her a picture.

How cute is that?  and totally priceless.

She was smiling when I got her up early, I on the other hand resembled a rather grumpy version of 'early man'. I really don't do mornings, they come way too early in the day for my liking!  Holly and I don't even speak to each other first thing, just communicate via grunting noises and god forbid anyone asks us a question cos our brains just canna handle it!

Yesterday my brain really was not working.  Well the multi tasking bit anyway.  My friend, Kathy, called while I was in the middle of getting Jack up for the day.  It was about 11am cos he was still sleeping up til then.  So there I was, phone wedged between ear and shoulder, chatting away while I was in the process of changing Jack's pad.  It was a poopy one, so not easy at the best of times but when multitasking, makes it just that little bit more tricky but hey I normally manage.

Half way through the conversation, I leaned forward to see if I had managed to clean it all up and in doing so, I loosened the hold on my phone and it went 'plop' bottom first into the poop!  Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhh!
Meanwhile, Kathy is still chatting away and oblivious to the fact that she is talking to me whilst nestled in a pile of smelly poop but I think my screech kind of alerted her that something was amiss.

Well there was no way I was speaking into that phone while it was in that position so I had to put her on speaker phone so that I could fill her in on the gory details.  Her response was to absolutely wet herself laughing and ring off!  Grrrrrrrrrrrrr!  Jack is of course, completely oblivious to the drama unfolding around about him as he has slept through it all.

I plucked the phone outta his pad, attacked it with baby wipes and then got a piece of gauze, sprayed it with disinfectant and wiped the phone again.  Suffice to say, it is none the worse for it's ordeal and smells as good as new!  You should have seen Holly's face when I told her what I'd done........hysterically funny, even more so when she then said she would not use the phone ever again.  Since I have 3 phones in the house, she isn't to know which one it was so she most definitely will use it again, unwittingly!

After that little drama, Granny Mac came to babysit while I went for the induction meeting for my course on Health and Social Care.  There is only going to be 3 of us on this pilot course but only 2 of us were there yesterday and can you believe the other girl's name?  Take a wild guess people.  Yep, you've guessed it her name was none other than Lynn Mckenzie!!! I mean, apart from the fact that she has no 'e' on the end of her first name, we are the same.  What is the likelihood of that?  I thought that I was unique but it would seem not and I am truly taken aback cos that is sooooo messing with my groove!  On the plus side, she is a chatty, happy character like 'moi' so we should get on well.

After 2 hours of having my brain bombarded with all that is involved with the course, I wanted to run hell bent in the opposite direction am not scared, honest!  I am trying not to be overwhelmed by the enormity of the fact that the assessor is going to be watching and assessing me while I feed Jack, shower him, change his pad, communicate with him and the many other things that I do.  I am probably doing it all wrong as I have had no training whatsoever and probably am not up to the 'standard' that you have to be, in order to get a job caring but hey it will all be very interesting, a steep learning curve and in a bizarre way, I am really looking forward to it.

I already have my first written task to do and we meet up again in 3 weeks so I will keep you posted on my progress.

Laughing is a dangerous occupation

Holly has entered the relationship world....again.  His name is David and he seems kinda cool.  There has been lots of texts, msn and facebook chatting over the last few days and last night while we were in the kitchen, she started telling me about his friend who took over his facebook chat and asked her a lot of "awkward personal questions".

Now Holly was not in the least fazed by this as she isn't her mother's daughter for nothing and I think he got more than he bargained for.

I was rummaging in the kitchen for something to eat as I had an attack of the munchies and came across some very ripe plums so opted for this healthy option, much to my disgust really, as there wasn't anything remotely exciting apart from that.

So Holly is telling me the story as I begin biting into this very juicy plum. With the first nibble I realise that this is gonna be a messy business as the juice is squirting everywhere so I hang over the sink, taking bites and laughing at the funny parts of her story.  I am not making much headway with said plum so with still half of it to go, I shove the whole thing in my mouth and start to chew around the stone.

I am doing ok and have nearly gotten most of the plum away from the stone when Holly makes me laugh so hard that I bloody inhale the stone and it gets stuck in my throat.  Trying not to panic, I try to swallow and pour myself some water at the same time.  It goes down a little bit so I chuck the water down my throat and the whole lot goes down but my face is a picture as I explain to Holly what has just happened.

This sets off another bout of hysterical laughter followed by lots of burping and hiccuping from me and I suddenly start freaking out that I might of aspirated it into my lungs!  I thought Holly was gonna wet herself she was laughing so hard while I was most indignant that she wasn't taking me seriously!  I mean, hello, this is not some small pip we are talking about here, this is a humongous stone for f**k's sake!  Ok, slight exaggeration but you get the drift.

In the middle of my major flap around the kitchen, Holly manages to get a hold of herself and starts texting furiously on her iphone.  I'm now calming down about the aspirating, I think I am spending too much time around Jack but then the dawning realisation that what goes in, must come out, kicks in and my eyes get great and big again while I am muttering  "oh just my luck, no doubt it will come out sideways and my poor butt will never be the same!".

Holly is hysterical with laughter, as am I and then she drops the bombshell that she has just put my trauma as her status update for facebook.

I feel loved!

The Day Before Christmas and Chaos Reigns Supreme

Last night I was upstairs getting the kids presents out to wrap.  I shouted on Holly to bring me up the scissors but as I didn't want her to see the said prezzies, I came out onto the top of the stairs to meet her...........and slipped!

I pitched forward, just about to go headlong down the stairs, managed to throw myself to the side and careered side on into the thick stone wall that separates my house from next door.  As I had put my hand out to save myself, it bore the brunt of the fall and then I literally bounced back, hard onto my butt!

I let out this scream, followed by a major amount of expletives and Holly came running asking what the hell had I done.  It was so painful that I could barely speak and tears were silently rolling down my cheeks as I explained what I had done.  She was gave me hell for coming out onto the stairs when she was quite capable of bringing the scissors up but I explained that I didn't want her to see her prezzies.

Then she burst out laughing at me sprawled there in a crumpled heap and then I was laughing through my tears cos it was quite infectious especially when she said "ha ha, I blinking well hope this will be put on your blog.  It had better be cos all my traumas do!". She is so like me, other peoples mishaps are always hilarious.

So there we were, huddled at the top of the stairs, Holly falling about laughing, me crying and laughing, while we checked out whether I had broken my hand or not.  The thumb and first two fingers of my right hand (oh trust me!) were already quite swollen but I could move them with a bit of effort so they weren't broken, thank god.

Despite this I managed to wrap all Holz's prezzies and she helped me with Jack's.  She is such a star.

This morning my hand hurts and unscrewing the child proof caps from Jack's medication was so fucking painful that eventually I had to use my left hand.  Don't you just hate child proof caps cos they aren't just child proof, they are anybody proof!!!!

So it has been some week so far and Christmas isn't even here yet!  Ah but I so love Christmas.

So onwards and upwards, here's hoping for an uneventful day, lol.

Exercise and Holly = Carnage

As I am writing this post, my lovely daughter Holly is working out to a children's yoga DVD.

I did intend to write about something else but this has just been way too funny not to share.

On this particular DVD, an older lady, accompanied by small kids, show you the moves.  So as you can imagine, it is quite gentle exercise.  Easy for most kids but we are talking about a girl who can't even do a roly poly for fear that she might break her neck!  Did I fail to mention that not only is my girl a hypochondriac but she also is a total "paranoid Annie", so much so that I reckon it makes up at least 50% of her DNA.

She is also very tall, has been from an early age and so probably was quite justified really in worrying about doing anything gymnastic related, after all, most gymnasts are short, making it easier for them to flip their body around. But honestly, Holly is not in the least bit athletic.

At her first sports day, aged 5, she was in the sack race and I nearly fell off my seat, I was laughing so hard when she was jumping like a crazy frog and getting nowhere.  The reason?  She hadn't realised that she was supposed to jump forward so all she was doing was jumping up and down on the spot!  Her wee face was puce with the effort and you could tell by the confused look she had, that she couldn't understand why she was never getting any closer to the finish line. One of her little friends shouted "Come on Holly" and then all the parents started chanting her name to encourage her. The Headmaster, realising if he didn't intervene, we would be here all day, ran behind her, picked her up and sprinted to the finish line. The crowd went nuts and were all like "aww how cute" and I could barely see for the tears of laughter running down my face!  Bad bad mum.

Anyway  back in the present,  she is ten minutes into just the warm up and there are lots of mutterings and moans and groans. You would actually think she is being tortured! Little does she know, there is at least another 20 minutes of this before the end.

I am trying to concentrate on writing when I look up and she is in what looks like the "downward dog" position and she is talking to the lady on the screen while she is upside down saying "oh this is an easy one" but after a minute "oh my god, my arms!  This isn't natural you know and how are you managing it, you're an old lady!".  When it's time to get out of that position Holly slumps to the floor giving it "aaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhh, this is NOT normal, why would you want to get into that position anyway?"

I am trying really hard not to laugh but believe me it's not easy cos she looks so so funny.  Instead I try to encourage her and soon she is getting into it and it is getting easier so I go back to my writing cos she's not entertaining me any more............boring!

I am so engrossed in reading other peoples blogs that it takes a while for the moans of pain to penetrate my brain.  I look up to see Holly lying on her back with her legs up and thrown over her body, feet touching the floor just above her head.  There is a lot of "oh my gods" and "aaaaaaahhhhhhs" going on and finally she is forced to straighten out her body.  When she does, there is an almighty crack and she screeches " I think I have broken a vertebrae!".  Wtf?  Only a hypochondriac would even know where the hell that was I'm thinking, so I calmly said "nah it sounded more like one of your ribs!"

She was only joking, so when I said that, her head whipped round and out came Hypochondriac Girl and she's panic stricken saying "eh, you think, oh my god, I've broken a rib!!!!" I, being totally sympathetic, start laughing, especially when she tries to get up and fails dismally cos her back has now locked.  As she is lying there trying to roll onto her side I cannot help for I am bent double with mirth and then she shouts "stop laughing, at this rate, you will have two children in wheelchairs" which then tips me over the edge and I am now rolling about in hysterics on the sofa.

Finally she manages to get up, with the help of the leg of Jack's hoist and she slumps down into a chair.  Then her face crumples and she says in this very defeated voice "oh no, my water is over there and I just can't get up, this sucks" and she looks over at me for help but I am still wetting myself laughing!  So up she gets, with great difficulty and just after she is about to take her second swig of the water, I make her laugh and she snorts and a big glob of snot comes out of her nose at great speed into her glass! She is crushed and I am once again helpless with laughter.

Are your kids meant to be this entertaining?  Or is it just me?  I have a feeling you are gonna say it's just me!

So suffice to say, sporty is not really a word that should be associated with Holly.  Things never really got better after the sack race trauma and over the years she began to dread sports day and so did I cos I knew how much she hated it. I did eventually come up with a way to encourage her, I suggested that she get a small prize from me for every race that she didn't come LAST.  She took me at my word and every June for about  3 years running, she fleeced me for all I was worth and I think it was karma for laughing at her sack racing début.

Yeah, well they say that "revenge is a dish best served cold" don't they.

A Trip Down Memory Lane

Today, 20 years ago, I had my first dose of Chemotherapy.  This is a long post, so bear with me.

I had been in hospital a month and finally the treatment was starting.  I remember the date cos it was my ex husbands birthday.

I had  been ill for awhile, about a year in total, suffering from extreme tiredness and weight gain.  It started just before my wedding the September before.  I went to the doctors and they reassured me that it was just the stress of organising a wedding.  But it didn't ease up and by that Christmas I had put on 3 stone!  Major trauma! Mr Blobby didn't have a look in!


By May of 1990 I was literally putting one foot in front of the other and sleeping all the time.  I saw the doctors more often than I saw my friends! Then I found a pea sized lump in my neck.  I was told I had swollen glands, then glandular fever then tonsillitis!  I was trying for a baby and was reassured that this was nothing serious and it was ok to keep trying.

The lump kept getting bigger but was growing inwards rather than outwards.  I could feel it inside my mouth.  Then I fell pregnant.  I should have been over the moon, which, don't get me wrong I was but instinctively I knew something bad was gonna happen.  Pregnancy hormones played havoc on my body and the lump then grew at an alarming rate.

I could actually open my mouth and you could see this "thing" pulsing in my throat.  It reminded me of the blob that Kelly le Brock turns Wyatt's brother into in the movie Weird Science! 

Finally, in September a GP sent me to the hospital for a Fine Needle Aspiration.  At this point I was so sick, literally, I could keep nothing down and the lump was cutting off my breathing.  I was like the elephant man, if I lay down to sleep, I couldn't breathe so had to sleep sitting up! No mean feat I'll have you know and really I should add that to my list of useless talents!

One Fine N Aspiration and 10 questions later and I knew that we were dealing with something serious, which was no surprise to me cos I had been trying to tell the docs for months.

A week later I was in hospital for another F N Aspiration cos the first one was inconclusive and maybe a biopsy.  I was just supposed to be in for the day so I went alone.  They did the aspiration test again and within an hour they came back and the surgeon pulled up a chair. He told me that I definitely had a tumour, that they were going to now take a biopsy to determine how bad it was but that it was dangerous to have an anaesthetic because of the baby so they would do it under local!  I was terrified.  Ten minutes later they had me in a gown and I was being wheeled into surgery.

The weirdest thing about having a local anaesthetic is that you feel it but it's not painful.  They covered my face so that I couldn't see them cutting etc and someone held my hand.  There was lots of tugging and cutting and at one point I screamed cos they had cut into a bit that hadn't frozen but they quickly topped up my anaesthetic and it was alright after that.

Back on the ward, I think I was in a bit of shock cos everything had happened so quickly.  In the afternoon I called my mum and broke the news to her and she cried.  I called my boss to tell him that I wouldn't be at work the next day and he was extremely pissed off! Two totally different reactions, I had to laugh.

That night, the nurses questioned me closely cos they didn't think that I had taken in the fact that I had a tumour.  I had, but I had been ill for so long that I was just so chuffed that someone was finally listening and doing something about it!  I was ecstatic!

The next day, my mum came through and along with my husband, we went home to Elgin for the weekend.  It was a surreal weekend.  My sisters and brothers were all gutted at this turn of events but I just kept smiling and laughing, being my usual self.

I spent the next 3 weeks in hospital, had a further biopsy and then the day of reckoning arrived.

Kathy was up visiting and we were rolling about laughing on the bed cos she had nearly fainted at the doctors having a plaster removed from a cut when two very official, sombre looking guys appeared at my bedside with a nurse.  They asked could they talk to me in private and I knew that my world was now crashing.

I came back about 45 minutes later and basically they had pulled no punches.  I had Non Hodgkins Lymphoma, had about 6 months to a year to live, couldn't keep the baby as wouldn't live long enough to give birth and so therefore required an immediate termination, body scan, 12 doses of intense chemo and 4 weeks of radio therapy.  They wanted to start immediately.  Ok, ok, stop the bus here.  Right, I know I am ill and I have wanted you to believe me but hey I wasn't planning on being this bloody ill, WTF???  Did you have to take me this seriously???

The day before the termination, I had a major wobble and just couldn't do it, wouldn't do it even!  My poor mum was distraught, crying and hugging me, telling me that I was HER BABY and she would do anything to keep me whereas she hadn't met my baby yet so her priority was me.  It struck a chord and I calmed down a bit.

I refused to go to the Maternity ward to have the termination so they took me from the ENT ward.  On the morning of the op, I had to have an x ray of my neck and an ultrasound on my stomach.  The lady doing the ultrasound asked me did I want to see the baby and I said no but then changed my mind.  I lay there watching that screen with tears running down my cheeks, privately saying goodbye and begging forgiveness to this tiny baby.  A couple of hours later, it was all over but still I didn't cry.

I lay listening to the two girls across from me reading their horoscopes out to each other.  When they realised I was awake, they asked me what star sign I was and I told them to guess.  They went through them all, avoiding the C word and when they had no other option but to say it, the looks on their faces made me laugh so much it hurt!  Yes my star sign was bloody Cancer, how fucking ironic! and the horoscope for that day was totally bang on! An hour later I had to use the commode as they wouldn't let me walk to the loo, that's when I saw all the blood and totally fell apart!

Five days later, I was lying flat on my back, traumatised after having had a body scan and two bone marrow samples take, one from my spine and one from my chest.  I was so bloody sore, pissed of and feeling right sorry for myself when in walks the Chaplain's assistant.  Oh sweet Jesus, this was all I needed!  So she sat there prattling on about how you only get what you can cope with and this was God's will and that I had to suffer cos this was all part of his plan and I totally lost it.

I told her what I thought of her God at this precise moment and her too in the finest language I could muster.....fuck, fucking and bastard spring to mind and the air was blue.  I have never forgotten the shocked and horrified expression on her face when I told her to "get the fuck out of my room" and if she ever dared to come near me again "she would rue the day!"

Twenty minutes later a nurse peeked in the door, waving what looked like a white flag and asking was it safe to come in.  I was mortified but the nurses thought this was the funniest thing they had ever heard and couldn't stop laughing,  It was pretty funny and suffice to say I never did see her again but I did read in the paper years later that the Chaplain of the hospital had run off with the Chaplain's assistant so I definitely think I was a positive influence on her, not!

Two days later I started Chemo.  The first one wasn't that bad, piece of piss if I am honest despite the fact that I am terrified of needles!

There is so much more to this story, I could write all day but suffice to say as I am writing this 20 years later, I SURVIVED!  Aye your shocked aren't you, you weren't expecting that little twist to the story?  lol  In the words of my lovely mother, who will be laughing up there right now as I type, "only the good die young and you have far too much mischief to do yet and anyway if you were even thinking about dying, we would just hold onto your hands and pull you back up!"

I was like "awww mum" then said" but don't you mean you would be holding onto my feet and pulling me back down?"  At which point she cracked up laughing saying " you don't seriously think you are going up there do ya?  You are far to wicked for that!".  Such faith huh?

Oh to be loved, warts and all.

So if you can remember that far back, what were you doing 20 years ago today?  Hope you were having a fucking better day than me, for sure!

Jack's Little Gift

With Jack home from hospital and Kathy staying over, it was back to "training" for Kathy.

Jack had already had one change of clothes after flooding his nappy and within a short space of time had filled it again, this time with a no 2, much to Kathy's delight....NOT!

All was going well, she had more or less cleaned up his bottom when he decided that he might like to go again. Unfortunately for Kathy, she hadn't gotten as far as getting the new nappy on so it went all over the carpet! The first I knew that something was up was when Kathy let out a bit of a screech and I looked up to see her frantically trying to contain the onslaught! Jack meanwhile was lying there innocently looking at her as if to say "you have a problem with this?"

I of course, being the totally supportive friend that I am, fell about laughing and once I started, just couldn't stop. She on the other hand is giving it "AAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHH" and frantically looking about for wipes wondering how the hell she was gonna sort this one out.

Eventually I regained control of my hysteria, helped her mop up, fetched more wipes and nappies and we tried to clean up as best we could. Throughout this whole spectacle Jack lay there quite the thing and even had the cheek to laugh..........wee monkey. Mind you I was still laughing myself, mostly I have to say, at the look on Kathy's face when she realised she had major fallout going on and that if she moved a a mere inch she would also be covered in it.

Did I mention that Jack likes to share!!!

After we had gotten Jack sorted and the carpet cleaned, I was half expecting Kathy to say "I QUIT!" but no she is still willing to soldier on and for that, I will try and take a break from laughing and show how grateful I am! Tee hee hee.

Who knew that training someone to look after your child could be SO entertaining? All I can say is that I really can't wait til it is Emma's turn.

Welcome to my world, shit happens here :-) lol