Hello there! It's been a while - again! Another birthday has passed since my last posting. Thanks for the good wishes. I'd like to say I had a really good day but days are not great at the moment. Apparently I have an inflamed cervical vertebrae which is causing a great deal of pain across my shoulder and down my arm. Have had to wait weeks to get a diagnosis and will start physio in 2 weeks time. In the meantime I'm now on stronger painkillers but they are still not taking the pain away completely. I'm trying to avoid taking any opiate based drugs but I still feel a bit of a junkie at the moment - watching the clock to see when I can take the next dose.
It's frustrating and depressing because when I wake in the morning it is at its worst and it takes me a while to get up and going. The earliest I made it to work this week was 9.30 and one day I didn't get in until 11.30. Why am I still going to work? Well the alternative is sitting at home in pain feeling even more sorry for myself and stressing about all the work that needs to be done. Once I get to work the distraction seems to help and my job isn't particularly physical so I feel like I'm getting some stuff done. Although the politics at work at the moment are not great.
But things could be worse. Maybe if I tell myself that enough it will start to sink in.
My eldest son seems to be settling into his new life in Nottingham. His girlfriend moved into the flat properly last weekend having finished her teacher training. She will start work as a fully fledged teacher in September. They are off to India soon for a holiday. Michael's girlfriend arrives here around the same time from America. Their long distance relationship seems to be lasting - SKPE is a wonderful thing!
Nick keeps nagging me about sorting out a holiday but I'm finding it hard to focus on that with all this pain. And he is wary of driving at the moment until they determine if he does have sleep apnoea or not as apparently that is something you have to report to the driving agency and he might not be allowed to drive for a while pending the outcome of any treatment. Maybe we'll look at somewhere via trains. Or maybe I will just vegetate once we break up for the summer.
We have a couple of weekends away planned - a 40 year university reunion at Loughborough. Hopefully I won't feel too much the odd one out amongst Nick's old uni friends - I think the other attendees are all coming alone or as a couple who met at the uni - I will definitely be the outsider. But I'm sure it will be fine. The other weekend away is a family gathering at his sister's house in France at the end of July.
Then we have another family gathering at a holiday propery in Kent at the end of August. That's around the bank holiday weekend but the property is booked for a week so I won't be heading back home in a hurry.
Nick also has some leave booked at the beginning of August so that's what we need to sort out. It might help if we could believe it was finally summer! The weather has been atrocious so far this year. But it was nice on my birthday so I'll count my blessings.