Positives

Yesterday we started packing up our caravan for a trip away. The plan was to head off tomorrow to the Cotswolds for 5 days and finally get away from the house. My husband had picked up the van during the week, cleaned it and paid for it’s storage. I didn’t achieve very much in the packing department as I was having one of ‘those’ days. Lacked motivation, felt exhausted and generally a bit grumpy. Last night we sat down after dinner and I checked emails and texts about the arrival time and general holiday details. I discovered I had missed a rather essential piece of information. England is opening up a little more from the 12th April. Non-essential shops, pubs and restaurants with outdoor facilities, gyms, hairdressers … this is all good news. Not, however, toilet and shower facilities on caravan and camping sites! Well, not strictly true: some sites will open toilets and cleaning facilities but no showers. Our site was a no facilities open at all kind of site. Oops. I missed the fine print there. Although, it wasn’t really fine print. It was quite clearly expressed on every piece of communication I had received in the past two weeks. Epic fail on my behalf. We can’t function without an on site toilet and shower facilities. Our caravan is not a fancy, sizeable outfit with mod cons such as a working shower or a toilet space you can actually fit into.

I felt a bit gutted. I broke the news to the family. I noticed a small smirk on each of the boys’ faces as they desperately tried to look disappointed that they didn’t have to go and live in a tin can with no WiFi for 4 nights. Even my husband failed to hide the relief at the thought of not freezing his backside off and having to wear a hat at night to keep his head warm (we don’t have heating in our caravan). The joy as he realised he could watch his football team play on Monday night … well, that was blatantly clear to see! Had it only been me looking forward to this trip? Was I the only one who felt disappointed about not going? Or are my family just far better as seeing the positives in whatever the plans are, no matter if they change? (I don’t actually believe that’s true …. my son’s reaction when he couldn’t go to football training last Sunday was something to behold).

I decided to apply some gratitude and reframing practice to the situation. I listed the positives about not going away and having some time (off work) at home. This is my list:

• Warmth (the weather this week looks pretty chilly in the evenings and at night)
• Not having to psych myself up for a day of packing, shopping, transferring guinea pigs to my parents, cleaning ….
• A free day to do whatever I want today
• Time this week to work on my application for re-banding my job. I have continually put this off but it’s so important I get it done.
• Day trips to more local areas with the ability to come home, shower and get warm and cosy
• We can still cycle and walk and explore each day. We just do it from home as our base. More facilities are open from tomorrow so we have more choice than we have had for 4 months
• I can take baths
• I can still practice my yoga (I’m not confident enough to practice outside the caravan in full view of fellow campers)
• Being able to sit watching TV in the evenings without wearing a coat or 20 layers of clothing
• Our beds are ready for us to get into at night and don’t need to be packed away in the morning
• Space

Writing the list almost put me off ever going away in the caravan again 🤣.

I do love going away in our van. It’s hard work to get everything ready and set up and we don’t have the luxuries we have at home but it’s a refreshing way to live. We don’t rely on technology and spend more time together as a family. There will be other caravan trips though and it just takes a little effort to ensure we still spend some quality time together whilst having a staycation. I’m quite excited to make some plans for the week ahead.

One last thing I am very grateful for. Thank goodness I realised about the toilet and shower situation before we spent all today packing up, all tomorrow morning hooking up and driving 2 hours to the location. I’m not sure any of us would have found many positives had that happened, no matter how hard we tried.

Happy Sunday to you all

Claire x

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Where to start?

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**Warning** Minor meltdown occurring alongside insomnia. Slightly dramatic post coming up.

Why can’t I find the courage to make the changes I need to? I’m really stuck and feeling trapped and I tell you, it’s not a great feeling. Not. One. Bit.

I’m not even sure what changes I need to make. I just know work has to change. My marriage has to change. My mental health and approach to life has to change. My attitude stinks and seriously must change. But how do you do it? How do you stand your ground. Set your boundaries. Overcome fear, guilt, anxiety? And here is the big question. What if the change you make is not the right one? Am I going to end up with years of regret and “oh shit, why did I do that?” mental torture?

See how tangled I am? I can’t even blame alcohol. I am now unsuccessfully self medicating this period of angst with sugar so I guess the old Claire lives on! I feel weighed down by so many emotions that I can’t move or breathe freely. Maybe I am just incredibly selfish and expect and want too much from life. The world is in the middle of a devastating pandemic and here I am, Miss Self Pity, wondering why my life is the way it is. First world problems.

I have so many lovely things in my life and I know I am incredibly lucky. I need to revisit practising gratitude and kindness as it really helps me feel grounded and focus on what is important. Hopefully, in time, I will find the courage to make the changes that are needed. Frustrated is no doubt how many of us feel right now. My frustration is off the scale. I’m getting sucked into ‘stinking thinking’ mode (thanks for the term Collette!) and stinking thinking never leads to good things.

Well, now I’ve offloaded all the swirling thoughts in my head into this post I feel a little better. No answers or solutions but that’s ok. To anyone who stuck with this one until the end, big thanks (and it begs the question, ‘why?’). I’ll give sleep another go. It’s evaded me so far tonight but maybe now it will come. A problem shared and all that …

Claire x

Sunny thoughts

Today is fairly cold but the sky is clear blue and I have been able to sit out in the sun. It’s been another quiet day with yoga, a family walk and then reading my Brené Brown, ‘The gifts of imperfection’, book in the garden. I have to admit I’m really enjoying it and learning loads. I keep re-reading chapters, highlighting sections and making notes on certain aspects of it. Much of what she says makes sense to me but there is a lot of info in there so I am taking my time.

I have almost completed the online CBT course I was registered for when I self referred to the local mental health service. I’m not particularly impressed and I knew much of what it has told me anyway. I’m currently waiting for 6 sessions of more specific one to one counselling, focusing on my relationships. Most specifically, focusing on my relationship with my husband. I have absolutely no idea what will happen there and I am slightly daunted by the prospect but I’m willing to try anything. I suspect he and I should really be attending the sessions together but that would mean an acceptance that I want to resolve things. In reality I think I would like to find a way that we can continue to live as a family for the next couple of years, without destroying each other and then decide what is best for us in the longer term. Maybe that’s terribly naive of me but at the moment I am not ready to face up to the devastation and trauma of splitting up. I guess the counselling might help me work some of this stuff out. This is all part of growing and changing I guess.

A year ago I was planning my trip to Vietnam. I went out there for just over 10 days with colleagues to work for a charity to deliver cleft care. God I was nervous but really excited. I’d never done anything like that before. I’d never been away from the boys for longer than a few days. It was an amazing experience and I learnt so much. Sadly we weren’t able to return this year due to Covid. I do hope all our colleagues and the families are doing ok. I wish I could have returned as my sober self. I worked really hard out there but I also drank a lot. Looking back, I know I was on edge and living on my nerves (if you know what I mean). I can only recognise that now because I have experienced calm and peace this last year. I did not have calm and peace back then. I returned totally knackered because I had burnt the candle at both ends. I don’t feel I gave my all to those families and I wanted to go again, to have one more shot and be the best I could be. Maybe one day …

It was after my return from Vietnam that I began to read about sobriety and started looking into alcohol and the effects of long term alcohol addiction. I’m approaching a year sober in November and I honestly can’t believe it. Claire of September 2019 would absolutely never have believed it. Just goes to show, we never know what is around the corner. The whole world has turned upside down and inside out since I headed off for that trip of a lifetime on October 3rd last year. My little world has also done the same. But I’m still here. I’m surviving, I’m sober and I’m sitting in the sun.

Claire x

Hitting the wall again.

It will come as no surprise to those of you who follow my blog and are in my little community that I have made the decision to restart taking antidepressants. I started them yesterday. This will be the third time in over 2 years and I am equally as sad and disappointed that I need them today as I was when I first took one in 2018. I honestly believed that I had this licked. I’d battled the demon and won. It has become apparent over recent weeks that really is not the case.

I will keep on going, using all the strategies and tools I have at my disposal. I will discover new ones on the way and rebuild my resilience and strength. I will remain sober and continue to focus on helping and supporting myself. Finally, I will accept that I have a diagnosis of anxiety and depression, that it is real and needs attention and that it is not a life sentence.

Claire x

What do I want to know today?

My mindfulness journal had this question as the prompt for writing. I wasn’t really sure how to respond or answer. What does any of us want to know at a particular moment or time? It might be something very specific or factual. It could be existential or philosophical. It might be nothing at all. Maybe you feel you know enough. It’s an odd question really.

I decided I would quite like to know what direction I should take. I want to know if I’m following the right path, heading on the correct journey. I feel like I’ve taken a turn somewhere, not necessarily a wrong one, but one that’s leading me somewhere different and away from my original route. I look back and I can’t really see the road I was on. It’s overgrown with trees and bushes. Should I spend time cutting them back and start searching for what was there, maybe to find it isn’t really the way I want to go? Or do I continue, down what looks like a footpath but I can’t be sure. I want to know where the signpost has gone. Where is the stile to help me over the tricky patch? There is just no clear map.

I really don’t mind how long the journey takes. I’m not in any rush to reach a destination. But what I’d really like to know today is, am I’m heading in the right direction?

Claire x