The Garden Fence - proper Old Style support and chat!

MrsCD

Monnagran, we had a few days in Portsmouth a few years ago, and one day we took the hovercraft over to the IOW. We didn't have long to look around though, but we did have a good cuppa because it was freezing cold and windy. I would like to go on a bus trip for a good look around. I've read a bit about some of the places to visit, and it seems like an interesting island. You never know, one day....😁

LameWolf

Just popping by to tell you I Aiten't Dead - just spoonless.

Here's the reason. His name's Trigger; he stayed with us from 28th to31st October.

He's a rescue dog with all manner of insecurities, including crippling separation anxiety, so he was quite hard work, but a lovely boy nonetheless, and I've told his Forever Mama that I'll have him back to stay if she needs me to again.

This photo is him chowing down on a cow's ear in my back garden.

Hard_Up_Hester

Morning fencers

Lovely pic of Trigger, Beano loves pigs ears and cows ears but I have to  cut them in to quarters for him as they are too big.

We seem to have resolved our Wi-Fi problems, fingers crossed.

MingVase

Hope all survived bonfire night. One neighbour had some fireworks here but Beeglie didn't even wake up.

mothernerd

I saw the doctor on Monday afternoon. I'd written 3 pages of notes/ symptoms - one each on depression/ cold flu bugs, feeling like it's February already/ mobility (including dizziness/ disorientation). I normally have a list when I go in but there were so many things - the 3 pages were culled from loads of scribbled notes. I included things I'd done to help the situation and suggestions on how to proceed (dos and don'ts). He actually made me feel much better, he said I was doing all the right things and had done a lot to help myself and that many people just don't bother. He said that I was doing excellently, considering all the things I'm dealing with.

He checked my chest (no need for antibiotics and no resultant thrush or D and v). I asked to be referred back to CBT, he gave me a phone number and I have a phone assessment next Tuesday. After a few ups and down I came to a stop in mid-September. I've been concentrating on resting, relaxing and reading, pondering my challenges (don't have problems, they are challenges - the last few months have been very challenging). Pondering means thinking things through and trying to come up with improvements and part-solutions but not overthinking or going round in circles. I try to do at least one thing a day (selecting tasks by urgency and available energy). 

Last Saturday I did tidying from the bed - I had a tray with a number of 'takeaway boxes on it, sorted embroidery threads, pills and medical bits, garden stuff (mainly plant labels). I added a small cutlery drainer for glasses, purse, diary, pens and pencils, bags for rubbish, cans and paper recycling. When I went to the bathroom, I scooped up handfuls of stuff. Just lots of things that get separated from their containers, disappear into the bedclothes or fall off the bed. At home I have more places to hang things within easy reach, so it's easier to keep tidy and sort stuff. On Friday we'd had a waste collection (very helpful young man who collects all the stuff and puts it into a caged truck - he even helped me dig out the potato soil so the two small filing cabinets they were growing in could go). It was much less work than having a skip and me lugging everything about. I wasn't feeling up to much on Saturday but I found something I could do - all the baby steps will add up.

I'm hoping CBT will help with decision making and organisation - I keep writing lists (morning routine, daily/ weekly/ monthly tasks - lots of jottings and having a clear up day to go round finishing/ tidying tasks where I ran out of steam). I'm feeling a bit wooly on some things and it's sometimes helpful to lay it all out in front of someone else (it helps me to get things clear in my own mind as well). There is no solution for some of my issues but there may be part solutions, different ways of looking at things or different ways of doing them (and some where I just need a massive increase in energy levels to tackle them and to accept that you can't please everyone).

I have started taking a multi-vitamin (asked the doctor about cod liver oil capsules too) which has been helping - I have got tiny bubbles of happiness (when you've been feeling completely flat tiny moments of joy are welcome0 and my (very very dark) sense of humour is returning. I'm staying in my room today. I did a load of online orders last weekend (it was 3 weeks since I'd managed to go to town and only been as far as the post box twice since then). So it was buying all the things that I'd have picked up if I was managing my twice weekly visits (key target) including winter remedies, new bandages, some cleaning supplies (there are only 2 places which stock mum's preferred washing blobs).

This week has been hectic. On Monday I saw the doctor and had my flu jab. Mum saw the practice nurse for her flu jab and then went for blood tests (mine was a fasting blood test so switched it to Friday am). On Wednesday I took mum for her COVID booster (can book mine now, I was a couple of weeks short and they didn't have the appointments up on the system) and yesterday was (mostly) my day. Blood test at 9.18 am, boob squash at 2.22 pm so I'd decided to use the little bus and do as many errands as possible (took mum's urine sample with me to drop off at the blood place, bacon barms at the infirmary cafe after my blood test, bought stamps and posted two overseas cards for mum, bought my puzzle book and a large print one - very naughty, bought 2 books for £5 a choc bar and crisps - paid money into the bank, returned 7 library books and took out 3 more, picked up basic sandwiches and bulk drinks [2 l costs slightly more than the 500ml in the sandwich section] then spent over an hour in a comfy chair in a quiet corner of the infirmary reading to the end of my book [with sandwich and drinks - took my own 2l of water but weight of library books precluded taking sandwiches with me].

Mum is playing the martyr (no one ever had such a bad marriage as her and no-one is more ill than her - I'm not ill at all), she is the only one doing anything. I'm not going to play, answer back, lose my temper. I'm going to stay in here (she has a visitor), rest (I need it) and work on my immediate environment. DS1 has asked us for Christmas. I said could we go on Christmas Eve and come back Boxing Day and he said yes but hasn't spoken to me since. Think a taxi will be £70 each way (unless DS2 and his gf are going and will pick us up) but I do need a break from mum. Maybe we can go Christmas Day and I can stay on for a couple of days and come back by bus. I've even considered booking into the hotel on the Sport's Village for an overnight stay.

I'm also considering applying for PIP. I am not fit to work, can't guarantee being able to stand up for more than 5 minutes, I'm still 2 years, 2 months and 15 days from retirement, have a number of new MH health issues. Not sure I'd be successful but i can't continue being stuck in the depressed/ obese/ and broke triangle (currently my only income is my £67 a week Carer's Allowance). Just getting through until retirement isn't enough any longer and I'm too near the edge to feel safe (it's not just falling through the cracks - there are chasms out there).

So not great but improving - getting mad about the political situation helps (anger can be used and channelled into something positive). Hope everyone else is well (keep sitting by the fire if that's what feels right Ming)   

 

monnagran

mothernerd, getting things out on paper is a very good thing to do.  It removes all the things that are churning around in your head and and helps to sort things out.  It is also educational to revisit that written record some time later and realise how much of it has faded in importance over the years.

I've had a hectic week and I don't do hectic very well.  I was designed for a life of curling up on sofas and knitting or reading.
Yes.  I loved lockdown.
Nevertheless, life is not like that.

What I have found useful is to set the kitchen timer for 5 or 10 minutes and seeing how much tidying I can do in the room in that time.  It concentrates the mind and it's amazing how much can be achieved in a short time.

Anyway.  Time for another coffee.

weenancyinAmerica

Mothernerd- most of your early posts were so uplifting for me. I have gone back and read them several times. Maybe it would help it you go back and read some of them too. But your posts have really kept me going. I feel what you are going through - in my case it is 4 totally hopeless roommates who don't carry there own weight around here (won't do any housework, very little help with expenses, no help at all even with their own pets), being ill, in my seventies, living on Social Security and not much else, and being overweight. Good luck to you.

mothernerd

In good news, I told DS3 I was putting his contribution to household expenses up from January and he accepted it without a quibble. One of his games has done well and he had paid me a chunk in advance (paid up to March). He has just worked out the extra and sent that to my account and has told me to remind him at the end of the month as he is expecting another lump of money from this game and will pay me his contribution in advance again (he can't tell me how much as it's paid two months in arrears and the platform decide which date they will base the exchange rate on). This at least means I have a bit more in the bank than the basic emergency fund (house repairs would halve that if I could find someone to do it now). 

pollyanna_26

monna I always planned to visit the Channel Islands but never managed it. I'd visit Devon -  Loved Totnes and also went to Cornwall.

Something that came as a surprise a few years ago was reading a book based on fact but sold in fiction about the struggle for locals to get their children and other loved ones to safety when the Germans invaded Guernsey and took over there and other islands for the duration of WW2.

I was surprised how the islanders had been abandoned to their fate. In sixth form we had a wonderful teacher who was mainly Geography but would discuss the History of places but she never mentioned it.

My family seemed oblivious so considering it showed the UK in a very poor light I wondered if the news was supressed.

I have read the Ruth Ozanne diaries 1940-45, she's a bit like Nella Last with daily accounts of the new everyday life.

I'm not sure if you always lived on the IOW but wonder if locals and those on the mainland were aware what was happening when refugees were arriving in need of homes.

I haven't found any clarity on that.

A friend of mine visited Sark many times and said it was my kind of place. Real life got in the way and I never went there but I've had virtual wanders and it is my kind of place.

How are the Christmas Stockings coming along? One of Mar's sensible ideas is recline and knit. Rest up when you can.

pollyx

Nargleblast

Pollyanna, my late grandma's family ran the Dixcart Hotel on Sark, must've been in the 1920's. My great grandma Dorcas Newton is buried in the churchyard.

In the late 1980's I took my grandma back to Guernsey for old times sake. We visited Sark one day and coming off the boat a couple of blokes recognised her from years ago. One of them was an old beau of hers, Johnny de Carteret. He took us on a tour of Sark on his cart, pulled by his horse Briar Rose. 

I would love to go back to the Channel Islands, they are truly lovely.