Sunday 19 July 2015

It's not all doom and gloom y'know.

I think I've given you all the impression that being sick is 90% doom, gloom and staying in one room so I thought that now was the time to set the record straight.
I'm naturally a glass half empty kind of gal, but I really do try to see the glass as at least trying to be half full. With chronic illness it really is all about how you look at it, I'm sure you've all had a few of those moments where you can either laugh or cry, well being chronically sick and fairly young it's basically like that all the time. Trust me there are plenty of times when your options are really cry or really really cry, but isn't that just life, wether you're sick or not?
To get back to the laughing part then I'd like to introduce to what I think is one of the funny symptoms of my crazy body...hiccups. I don't mean regular, garden variety, have a glass of water hiccups. I mean diaphragm spasms of a colossal scale for days on end. Seriously, days. I work with kids who find this hilarious and with adults who find it infuriating, when exactly do hiccups stop being funny? (apparently it's not 22) When these ickilycups, as my grandad calls them, first begin I do the grown up thing and keep my mouth closed to avoid sounding like a bull frog at the back of the room however, these are sneaky hiccups. They'll stop for a little while, just long enough for you to think that they've gone and its safe to open your mouth then, BAM. Bullfrog. Another funny thing about them is that they make my whole torso move, forget trying to eat or drink, the real challenge is in not looking like I need an exorcism every 5 seconds or so.
Next up is a word I'm slowly coming to turns with in regards to myself...clumsy. The thing with clumsy is that I could have been diagnosed and therefore helped a lot earlier if I haven't been written off as clumsy since birth. Buy, wether I like it or not, I am hilariously clumsy. I literally can't walk past a door handle without smacking into it, I even use plastic dinnerware and my cups have lids and straws though I still manage to spill them. I could cry that I use a sippy cup (not literally, that's just what I call them...although they would be useful) at 22 and try to disguise them in an adult way or I could use them with pride and only purchase children's versions featuring various film and cartoon characters. Which would you do?
 Meals out ate just a disaster zone, my first date with my husband started with me spilling pop down my top on the bus there and then pasta sauce on my jeans, only to finish when chocolate sauce drips down my top (I hated that top anyway) thank god he found it funny too!
At the minute I'm trying to teach my beautiful puppy DPT or deep pressure therapy. If you've ever seen an assistance dog lay on their owner this is probably what they're doing, it's a way of providing pain relief through warmth and pressure, think about when your muscles ache after five a side and you rub heat gel into it. She does it of her own free will and has done since I got her but she doesn't always do it when asked, resulting in some pretty funny situations. Her favourite at the minute is to sit on my face...not helpful, especially in public. Another favourite is to become a parrot and sit on my shoulders, which in most dogs is an act of dominance but is an act of randomness for my pooch. I could get annoyed and frustrated that she doesn't do what she's told all the time and embarrasses me in public, or I could just laugh and give her a cuddle anyway. It's not a hard choice.
I know all this positive thinking malarkey sounds a bit daft but honestly, give it a go. Just make a list of everything in life that's pretty good right now, even little things! I'll do a few to start you off:
- icklycups
-random clumsiness
-bizarre dpt training
-bath bomb glitter getting everywhere
-jazzed up living aids
- sick kid perks of free lip gloss etc.
-nothing shuts down a-holes like the disabled card
-ableism bingo
-the cost of living aids is hilarious
-getting to sit pretty much wherever you want
-sick kid community
-colouring books
......