Illness, Frustration, and Soup

So, the last while has been a bit of a pain for me. Quite literally, actually! I’ve been struggling with pretty severe kidney pain for the last few months. It started with an infection, but the pain persisted long after there was no infection left to treat. I’ve had multiple trips to doctor’s offices and hospitals, lost an armful or two of blood (I only cried a lot. And tried to hold the doctor’s hand, but that’s beside the point), and been otherwise poked and prodded to within an inch of my sanity. All of this has so far been for naught, nobody has a clue what’s going on. I have more scans ahead, and more hospital visits, and possibly a good long while before I find out why I have this pain, if I find out at all. 

But, I don’t want to moan about any of that, I want to moan about something different. What I want to moan about is the FRUSTRATION! Arg. 

As you may know, I have been dealing with various chronic illnesses for a long time, so I am actually quite used to it. But I don’t remember ever being quite this frustrated. That’s a lie, I do. But it was ages ago, so I’m ready to be overly dramatic about this instead. 

My frustration has been compounded by the fact that, before Kidney-gate, I was actually doing really well! I had made a lot of changes to my diet and lifestyle and I found myself with way more energy, both physical and mental, than before. I was feeling rather on top of things, my house was clean, my dishes were clean, my clothes were clean, even my hair was clean! I know! I was pretty much cured, tbh. Or at least my little goldfish brain thought I was, and that was good enough for me. Then the kidney nonsense started up and, not only was that going on, but everything else came crashing down on me as well. I was back to days spent in bed, unwashed hair, and general self-pity.

But! I have started to feel a little better, I’ve gained some ground and some mental energy. Things are being washed again, much to everyone’s relief. Which, is a long winded and ranty (shut up spellcheck, ranty is a word if I say it is!) way of saying that I didn't feel like doing any writing for a long time, but now I do. Yay! (Yay for me, you can feel how you like about it)

And what will I write about, you ask? And I will answer…soup! Oh yes, this is what it has come to, soup. 

A little while ago, in a frenzy of excitement due to a rare burst of energy, I decided to make my first ever pot of soup. What a revelation! Then, my lovely little pally suggested to me that I should try making soup with my slow cooker. Another revelation! So, I have gone a bit soup mad. But, it’s November and it’s miserable outside and it makes me feel like a domestic goddess even when I spent ten minutes chopping veg and then the rest of the day lying on the sofa, so I’m pretty happy about it. So what if my poor husband sloshes when he moves!? He is very well nourished, whether he likes it or not. So I count that as a win. 

My first attempt at soup making, as shared on my Instagram. 

I hope that I’ll have some answers soon but, if not, at least I’ll always have Soup. 

I’d like to do a bit more writing, and possibly even share some of my experimental soup recipes on here, so we’ll see how that goes. 

I know that a lot of people are in the same boat as myself, health wise, and I hope that you can find some comfort in knowing that you are not alone in feeling miserable and frustrated sometimes. I send you all telepathic comfort soup! 

Take care and stay cosy. X

Under the Weather

It has been a hectic few weeks, and I find myself coming out the other end completely loaded with the cold. Booo! 

I had planned to do so many wonderful things with all the free time suddenly opening up ahead of me, but instead I am sofa-bound and snotty. 

I suppose it is to be expected, after trying to do all the things at once and running myself down, but I'm still not pleased about it! Add in the miserable weather (why do I always forget that the coming of Spring just means more rain?) and I am feeling rather sorry for myself. 

So! I think I will just hibernate with multiple cups of tea and wait for the weather and my nose to clear. Hopefully embracing the cosy time snuggling up on the couch will make me resent it slightly less! 

Moan over, happy Tuesday everyone! X

Spring Cleaning

With one set of visitors departing yesterday, and the next set due to arrive on Monday, I have found myself thrown in to a cleaning frenzy! Well, kind of. 

I spent most of my day today doing laundry and trying to restore my house to a decent level of cleanness, in between tea breaks and looking at Instagram. 

I do feel motivated to tackle a proper, full-on Spring Clean before my next set of guests arrive, as daunting as that may be. 
I have already completed a "deep clean" (oh my!) of the bathroom, but other rooms are a bit more terrifying. For now, I will settle for throwing open every window in the house to let in the spring air (and fumes from the roadworks outside), and claim that I am "spring cleaning".  

So, after my day of tea-drinking and window-opening, I am off to enjoy a well earned glass of wine until Tim returns from playing football. 

Neverland

I have always felt a deep understanding for Peter Pan. Not in that I have any particular penchant for green tights, but in that I have never wanted to grow up. 

My childhood was an extremely cosy and happy one and, knowing that the adult world could be quite the opposite, I had absolutely no desire to leave it. 

Even after getting married and leaving home, buying sofas and signing car leases, purchasing alcohol without ID and being put in charge of other people's children (not at the same time), I've never properly felt like a grown up. I've always felt like a "grown up".  Like I have been faking it and could be discovered and sent back to the kids table at any moment. 

There is a lot to be said for being a child in an adult's body. If I want chocolate for breakfast and McDonald's for dinner, there's no one to stop me. If I want to suddenly drive off on a ridiculous adventure, then that is what will happen. Usually with my husband as instigator and partner-in-crime on both counts. 

But then, suddenly, things changed for me. I had to deal with a grown up situation in a grown up way. I had to make real, grown up decisions. I felt like, after spending years as a "grown up", the quotation marks fell away. And, to my astonishment, I actually really like it. I feel comfortable in myself. I feel happy and settled, confident and in control. I feel like a grown up. 

Now, this could just be an extremely short lived thing. You could find me tomorrow, throwing fairy dust over myself and thinking happy thoughts, or curled in a ball, sobbing. And I by no means rule out future random adventures or chocolate breakfasts/McDonald's dinners. For goodness sake, I'm not a Grown Up yet. 

But, for the moment, I feel like being a grown up isn't the worst thing in the world. Maybe Wendy was not as stupid as I thought  after all. Maybe when we refuse to grow up, we just tie ourselves to living in the past. Maybe I shouldn't write blog posts when I'm feeling quite so philosophical, who knows! Whatever the case, I will just quietly enjoy my budgets and to-do lists and proudly state "I...am an adult! And it's not that bad." 

P.s Although, I did buy drain un-blocker for the first time this week. How boring and unglamorous. I could happily do without the part of adulthood where you have to deal with plumbing. 

Well, so much for that.

For all my good intentions, I did not manage to become blogger extraordinaire after all. 

Sometimes things go wrong, and life becomes something you never thought it would be, and you need to take a little time to reevaluate. Some time to figure out who you are, who you want to be, and how you want to progress from here.  

I have taken that time, and I feel now that I have a much clearer idea of all of those things and so I am ready to start again. 

I won't promise any kind of regularity but I will write when I feel like it, and when it makes me happy. As I'm pretty certain that my rather protracted hiatus will have lost me the three followers I managed to attract, I'm guessing that there is no one out there to mind! 

This is what it is, and I hope you enjoy it.