Teetering on the brink

ellenvan

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Sun_Addict

Sorry to hear you're so unwell at the moment. The budget can wait, take a step back to look after yourself, your health is more important right now. I hope you turn a corner soon. 

EatingBeans

Thanks all.

I managed to get in to see my own GP today and through all the tears I recounted the very long list of current random symptoms I have, along with catching her up on the A&E trip. After handing me a tissue (she is lovely), she checked my pulse and chest, poked my back and tried to explain in more detail what the A&E doctor was probably trying to explain but just sucked at it. Basically, the current theory is that the constant tensing from the TN pain has pulled some muscles in my neck and back and the end result is all the added pain plus tingly arm feeling. We’ve agreed to add a new medication to my growing pile for my Trigeminal Neuralgia and if that helps then we may be able to decrease the tablets I currently take which I know give me side effects. But, some of my symptoms do not fit with just TN or side effects and since I have now not been properly well since I had covid last year, she did raise the suggestion that it could in fact be long covid too. She is sending me away for the biggest blood test sampling I have ever seen and we will go from there. 

In the meantime, I also went back to work today and basically spent the day trying to hand off as much of my work to other people as I could. I decided to try and destress as much as possible and frankly hand back work that was never really mind to begin with. I am sure it will get frowned upon but at this point I don’t care. I am focusing on getting well first. They are lucky I didn’t just ask to be signed off work!

Knowing that my neck/back pain is likely muscle related I felt better about my spontaneous Amazon purchase last week. I bought myself a funky new pillow. I’ll be honest, I wasn’t convinced that I wouldn’t just bin it after 2 minutes as I am very particular about my pillows but I thought I would test it out after finishing work and amazingly, I actually managed to find a comfy position on BOTH sides! If this holds true then this will be a revelation! You see, since the car accident I have only been able to sleep on my right hand side because the TN complains if I sleep on the left. The problem with that is I also have a hiatal hernia and that can cause problems if I lay on my right too long (basically there is too much of a hole in my diaphragm and my stomach sometimes pushes through it into my chest cavity). I sleep with my whole mattress wedged at a 10 degree angle to stop the insane heartburn I get from the hernia, but all in all, getting a good night’s sleep is hard work. If the new pillow can provide support so that I can actually change positions in the night without waking up all the time it will be worth so much more than the £40 🫣 I paid for it!

I still haven’t reconciled all the accounts at the moment but I have stopped the random spending and I have just been paid so I know there is enough in the account to not bounce anything accidentally. Now the Nationwide account is official open I have transferred £1000 to it to tick off another of the criteria for the welcome bonus. I will give it a couple of days and transfer it back to where it needs to be ahead of the end of month reconciliation. It will be nice to finally have everything settled into its new accounts. Oddly though, I didn’t realise how much happier I would feel about my finances just from switching banks. Saying goodbye to the accounts that have long being a source of stress (I am looking at you, TSB overdraft), and seeing a whole different bank interface in its place, has actually made me feel so much more in control of my finances. I walked past Nationwide today on my way to the doctors and it genuinely made me smile. It had “a good way to bank” written on the side, and whilst I am 1000% sure that I have always just looked a these logos and thought them cheesy and meaningless, today it made me feel like a new era of Beans finances was beginning. I may be physically falling apart but I am still determined as hell to get rid of this debt once and for all!

SuzeQStan

Wonderful glimpses of sunlight in that message EB 🌅 - I’ve got everything crossed that pillow continues to be the long sought answer to this pain!  Glad you have a lovely GP - that is worth its weight in gold. 

You know, you are an inspiration - your determination in adversity is an important example to all on here cheering you on xx

EatingBeans

Thank you 😊

EatingBeans

Well, I managed a total of 5 and a half hours sleep last night and that was split into two by a 1am dash to the loo. 😅 I am not giving up on the new pillow just yet though as despite waking up a lot to reposition myself, I did notice that it definitely aligns my spine more than a usual pillow. Most importantly, I woke up feeling like I had actually had some sleep and boinged out of bed pain free! I had a shower before work - first time in months that I have been awake enough to do this - and I started the day with a spring in my step. 😃

It’s 2:30pm now and I am beginning to flag, but omg, to get this far into the day and not be desperate for sleep is a downright miracle! My back is sore but my face is only just twinging so all in all a good day. 

I even started my apprenticeship today. 🤣

EatingBeans

TRIGGER WARNING: Domestic abuse/“Adolescence”

Woke up to £150 from NatWest for the switch I did for an old TSB account I never use, to a NatWest account I have had for more than 20yrs. Talk about free money! I would love to say that it got paid off debt but really it is just going to pay for some of the overspending I have done this month. 😞

I have bought two pairs of sandals for the summer, (exactly the same as my two pairs that I used to own but the puppy destroyed - I paid less than £20 each when they are £45 new👍), and there has been far too many takeaways. We have decided the ban on takeaways is resuming from 1st April and basically written off March as a blip. 

The reasons for the takeaways definitely varies. Very occasionally it is because we don’t have food in, more often it’s that I don’t have the energy to cook, and at other times it is for emotional reasons. Very rarely is it because I actually want that particular food.

Take yesterday. It was one of those very rare moments when dd1, dd2 and I were all in the same room at the same time, having a discussion together. Sadly, the topic of conversation was the new drama on Netflix called Adolescence. dd1’s first question was “who did that remind you of, mum?”. To which dd2 jumped in to relay me sobbing all the way through watching it. You see, the teen boy in the story was 100% my dear son in every way (minus the actual stabbing as far as I am aware). The scene where he is given a sandwich (you will know what I mean if you have watched it), is basically what my day to day life was like for years when he was that age. And all that time I was fighting for custody against their alcoholic father. It reached a point where I found myself physically defending my two dd’s from their brother(standing in a doorway getting punched so he couldn’t reach them), and even calling the police to intervene didn’t phase him. So eventually, (after he threatened me with a knife and told me he was going to kill me in my sleep), for the safety of myself and my two daughters, I agreed for him to live with his dad (It was that or potentially lose all custody of all three of them, or worse, as ds was threatening to kill himself/others if the court battle didn’t stop). What I didn’t know until YESTERDAY (bare in mind it’s been over 5years since the final agreement was made) was that during that time, regular visits (several times a week!) were being made to my ex’s house, as the court appointed assessor was very concerned for the children’s welfare and they were very often asking the children what their dad was doing and what their concerns were, and then TELLING their dad what they said! Apparently these conversations lasted hours in some cases, particularly for my ds. I knew none of this! My ds begged me to make the court process stop and turned from a loving boy to exactly that boy from Adolescence, when I told him he must keep seeing his dad or I would be held in contempt of court. Since he went to live with his dad full time, he hasn’t spoken to me in years, apart from the odd time to tell me how much he hates me. Whilst the dd’s flourished, my ds failed all his GCSE’s, rarely gets/keeps a job, and is pretty much a recluse with serious mental health problems. I keep trying (he did at least start going to the gym upon my suggesting), but it’s difficult to help when he doesn’t want it, even more so now he is an adult. And NOW I feel I understand why. Because I never stopped what was happening to him, even though I didn’t even know it was happening. After suffering at the hands of their father myself, I can totally imagine what would happen if they told someone what was going on and then they told him! What an insane thing to do! I was a grown adult and too afraid for years to speak up or leave, those kids only had me to help them and despite doing everything I could based on my knowledge at the time, I feel if I had known that then, it would have absolutely changed the outcome as I would never have signed the court order that I did. The scary thing is, at the time I was told it was a 50:50 case if it went all the way through to final hearing because he had apparently stopped drinking and his girlfriend was a nursery teacher. How can that possibly be the case if they had such concerns about him?! 

So yes, after that revelation, I bought us all a Domino’s. Frankly, a large bottle of wine is what I really wanted, but given the situation that seemed wholly inappropriate. I’d like to say I have some pearls of wisdom to share about living through that kind of situation, but what I do know is every situation is different and sometimes well meaning advice can be dangerous, so I am not going to offer any. What I will say though is my heart goes out to anyone going through anything like it. Sending (((Hugs))) and virtual 🍕to you. X

Sun_Addict

Oh my goodness what a terrible time you all went through. If you didn't know what was happening you shouldn't have to bear the blame. I hope your DS can find it in him to seek professional help and see that it wasn't your fault. 

Sending hugs x

EatingBeans

Two surveys completed to end the day. Some of the questions were fairly random, like, “what is your favourite swear word?”. Er. 🤣
But, either way, it is a couple more steps towards debt freedom. 👍

satchmo1

Not quite the same, but my first husband had a complete personality change after a near fatal frontal lobe injury. He became more and more erratic, destroying a home office, throwing things... I kicked him out after he punched ds (then 17) in the stomach.