Author: Sonja

One woman’s journey as she comes to terms with living with Fibromyalgia. Living with her knight in tarnished armour, with a small flock of chickens, and pair of Tawny Frogmouths and a homicidal Butcher Bird in the backyard.

Food for health

A common theme in many of my support groups, is people asking about diet. Which diet is best for Fibromyalgia? Has anyone tried keto, vegan, gluten and/or dairy free, this diet, that diet, the only breathe air diet? Okay, maybe not the last one, but it feels like it sometimes!

And the answers people give to those sort of questions is always varied. Some people swear by vegetarian/vegan diets, LCHF (Low Carb, Healthy Fat), low fat diets, carnivore diets, low salicylate diets, low FODMAPs, GAPs, Wahls – there are as many answers as there are questions.

I’ve tried a lot of them. Some made me worse, (like vegan and low salicylate diets), some made no appreciable difference (like FODMAPs and the blood type diet) and some helped me – Like GAPs, the Wahls protocol and metabolic balance.

I often write about diet, and I do this because I honestly feel it is a super important part of managing the FibroTroll. But I want to make one very important point:

There is no one-size-fits-all diet for Fibromyalgia.

What works for me, might be okay for someone else. But in all likelihood, they will need to tweak some foods to suit them.

It has been a long experiment, and it’s not over yet. I did many elimination diets, blood tests and stool tests. The GAPs diet made a huge difference to my IBS issues and helped resolve a few (unfortunately not all) of my food intolerances. The Wahls protocol helped a little with pain, but I gained weight, when I was already carrying a few extra kilos and that didn’t help the fatigue. Metabolic balance got me back to my ideal weight and helped me isolate some more foods that were causing issues.

Right now, I find I do best on a low carb, but not quite ketogenic diet. I don’t eat cow dairy (except for ghee) or grains. I avoid added sugar – I do have a little 85% chocolate as a treat from time to time, but as a general rule I avoid sugar. I have recently worked out that nightshades are not my friend, and I avoid the random foods that don’t fit into a category but that cause me problems – like pork and almonds and most, but not all legumes. I continue to mostly follow my metabolic balance plan, using principles from both Wahls and GAPs.

Most of my food is organic, with a few foods from the Environmental Working Group’s clean fifteen list included if the organic version is super expensive. The EWG is based in the USA, but its Clean 15 and dirty dozen lists are a good guide if you can’t afford all organic food. I also try as much as I can to stick to foods that are in season. I get most of my fruit and vegetables from Food Connect in Brisbane. Luckily, I can usually find a box that only has a couple of things that I can’t eat – which my wonderful Knight then consumes!

Due to this, I mostly bring my own food to functions. While I love to have people at my home and to feed them, bringing my own food to everything gets a little tiresome. While it is significantly better than having an IBS attack or migraine from the wrong food, it wears you down after a while.

I recently caught up with a friend for lunch for her birthday. I made an almost compliant (a bit higher in sugar than I would normally eat) chocolate tart in lieu of cake and she insisted on feeding me lunch. It was such a wonderful feeling, to leave the house not having to bring my own food. We had roast chicken and vegetables and it was delicious!

I had significantly underestimated the mental benefits of someone offering to feed me and taking my dietary needs seriously and making a meal that included me.

So to that end I have given myself a new challenge. Let people feed me. If they ask, give them a simpler version of what I can’t eat, let things be non-organic, and so long as it’s gluten free, don’t worry too much about contamination. I’ll always let them know that it’s okay to back out and say it’s too hard.

It’s a bit outside my comfort zone, but I think (and hope) it will be good for me. It touches a little on the mental health care that is the other thing I write a lot about.

Wish me luck!

Infinite Possibility

I was completely without inspiration for this post today. So I flicked through my affirmation cards and came across this quote:

In this moment, there is infinite possibility.

Victoria Moran

It seemed appropriate for today as without inspiration, this post could have gone anywhere. I ended up writing quite a bit and finished with a recipe for meatballs and gravy and then accidentally deleted it!

I was super frustrated, as usually something written on the fly is almost impossible to replicate if you lose it. But then I realised that the quote still applied. There was infinite possibility – including the possibility that I would accidentally lose what I had written!

Which lead to a bit of an A-hah! moment. Right now, there is still infinite possibility. Sure I could have spent an hour or two trying to remember what I had written, or I could just start again and see what happens. And amazingly, I immediately felt better. Sometimes, letting go of something is the best option. My psychologist would be proud!

I’ve had enough stress lately, that obsessing over a blog post is really not going to be at all helpful. Most of the stress I talked about in my last post has resolved, and now I have a new one. This stress is not really my stress, it’s a thing I have taken on to try and reduce the stress on a loved one. And to be honest, I’m going to enjoy it – not the reason for it, but the activity of it.

My new challenge is cooking dairy free meals for a 3-4 year old. Now the dairy free bit is easy, it’s the feeding a child bit that is a new challenge for me. Normally when I feed this child, it’s a special occasion or just a morning afternoon tea where if they only chicken nuggets and watermelon it’s not a big deal because it’s a once off. But as a daily meal, that’s not terribly balanced!

Hence why I ended up with a meatballs and gravy recipe. Now I have a lot to do today, including making dairy free “cheese” sauce for pasta and a bunch of little pies that I can hide veggies in, so I’m not going to re-write the recipe now. I’ll save that for another day.

However, if anyone has suggestions for tasty, healthy meals for a 3-4 year old that are dairy free and easily frozen and re-heated by a stressed, time-poor, and/or convalescing parent then I would love to hear from you!

Another post on the importance of mental health and chronic illness.

I just realised that I completely missed March. I did a lot of writing, just not here.

I’ve been dealing with some personal issues and because it affects way more than just me, I’m not going to go into detail on a public page. I also had to do a witness statement to police (I’m fine, just saw a thing and my statement will hopefully help lock up a person who very much deserves it.) And again I have extra health issues on top of my usual ones – once again gynaecological on top of my usual dysmenorrhoea, so I’ll be off for more surgery in May.

So this last month, my cortisol (stress hormone) levels have probably been through the roof.

I tried all the things my psychologist recommends, I tried to meditate, which didn’t go so well. I tried to exercise, but because cortisol elevates pain levels, that also didn’t go well. I wrote – A LOT about the issues. Mostly just to myself, but also to the other people involved. And none of it was helping.

I am very much a person who needs to close boxes. Closing some of the boxes helped a bit. Getting the witness statement done and signed, closed that box. Seeing my gynaecologist and booking surgery closed that box. It might seem strange that I consider that box closed, but having someone willing to investigate and having a plan in place is enough for me to close that box. Surgery itself will be a box I open in May and I’m okay with that.

Open boxes cause me distress. The personal issue was most definitely an open box and it didn’t seem like there was going to be a way to close it. Lack of response to an issue causes me more distress. Even someone being angry at me is better than the feeling that I am not even worth the time to respond. Which may not be what they were thinking, but logic doesn’t always get a look in when you are on a downward spiral. So I spiralled faster and further downhill. I ruminated and stewed and argued with myself and stressed myself into a flare.

Thankfully, not a full on “can’t get out of bed because I’m too wobbly and weak and sore” level flare, but a milder version, where I can basically take care of myself for most of the day, but anything more than that and the FibroTroll starts playing with his clubs.

Elevated cortisol levels also weaken your immune system, so I’ve been fighting a cold as well, which has meant I couldn’t get into my HBO2 chamber because my sinuses were blocked.

So I made an appointment with my psychologist. As I’ve mentioned before, mental health concerns like anxiety and depression are common co-morbid conditions with Fibromyalgia. Any flare ups with those conditions, and/or increased stress levels will make the FibroTroll come running to the party.

Yesterday, I spent a very productive session with my psychologist and now I have a new set of tools in my toolbox for dealing with this. While the issue is not yet resolved, and may not get resolved in a way that makes me happy, I am now much more ready to deal with it. We worked out a way for me to close a smaller box regarding the issue, and she gave me tools to help me be okay with the bigger box not being closed and possibly not ever getting to close it. I’m sorry for being so vague, but I hope that vagueness will actually help others to apply the idea to their own issues.

I guess the point of today’s post is that it is okay to get professional help. It’s okay to not be coping even if it seems like it should be a minor issue. Psychologists are highly trained, caring people and they have the tools to help you cope. While psychology has not cured my Fibromyalgia, it has absolutely improved my quality of life.

So if you are struggling – with anything at all, no matter how “minor” you might think it is, reach out for help. You do not have to do this on your own.

When something has to go…

I’ve been very quiet this last month and a bit and I have a very good reason for this. I’ve been super busy doing written assignments and fixing up the garden (pacing myself in 15 minute blocks) so I could do video assessments outside, learning how to edit videos and also going back to Tai Chi. So something had to go, so I haven’t been writing much here. But I’m back now!

If you’ve been following me for a while, you know that in my pre-FibroTroll days I was a Veterinarian. I’m still registered, so I’m technically still a Vet, but I haven’t worked since September 2012. I struggled a lot with the loss of my career. It was a very big part of my identity and I loved it. Sure, it has its bad bits, but on the whole, I actually liked going to work and doing my job.

I still haven’t fully accepted that I may not ever be a vet again, but I am slowly getting better at saying the words “I used to be a vet” and being somewhat okay with this. I have a whole post on this, that I’ve been working on for a while on and off, and I will post it one day.

But the reason for all that assessment work, is because I have been working on a Certificate IV in Celebrancy. I was really running out of time to finish before my enrolment expired. I already had to get an extension because of the damn FibroTroll, and I can’t get another one, so it just had to happen. Today, I submitted my last assignment – with a day and a half to spare! So fingers crossed I don’t have any re-submissions to do!

I decided to do this about 15 months ago -around the time of that ridiculous marriage equality debate and postal survey that should never have happened. The politicians should just have done their damn job and passed the Bill without wasting so much time and money and inflicting hate speech on vulnerable people. Imagine how much that $166M would have helped our hospitals and schools! I am not ashamed of being a supporter of Marriage Equality and I really wanted to do more to show my support.

I also needed to find a vocation that I am passionate about, that I will enjoy, and one that I can work around the FibroTroll. After doing the course, I am confident that this is something I am going to enjoy, and not wanting to blow my own horn too much, I think I will be good at it too.

Having a career path again, one where I can offer a valuable service to society (and maybe bring in a little extra cash into the household) is such a wonderful feeling. Hopefully, in a month or two I will have had my registration approved and be a fully fledged Marriage Celebrant!

The other thing that doing this course has reminded me of, is that I really do have some amazing friends and family. People have come to my house to do mock interviews, to perform a complete wedding ceremony from start to finish and a rehearsal beforehand (and coming to re-film a bit I wasn’t happy with!) and to perform a full naming ceremony complete with their gorgeous little bub! Some of them even came to more than one assessment! To all of them, I am profoundly grateful.

My Knight in Tarnished Armour was there every step of the way, helping prepare, arguing with my printer and scanner for me, helping feed people, being videographer, and cleaning up and taking care of me afterwards when we knew I would be paying the FibroTroll’s toll. I honestly do not know what I would do without him.

My mother has also been wonderful, she has come and helped cook for people, printed things when the Knight didn’t win the argument with the printer, hemmed tablecloths and helped out in so many ways. Then she happily played mother-of-the-bride to a person she had never meet, then grandmother to a baby she had never met!

Thank-you simply isn’t a strong enough phrase to cover the gratitude I have to all of these people.

Delayed Onset Post Exertional Malaise

The FibroTroll, as I’ve mentioned before, is a bit of an arsehole. He likes to beat you with his club at short notice and for minimal reason. The other thing he does, is hold a grudge. Like really, really, hold a grudge.

I’ve noticed a theme the last couple of weeks in a few of my Fibromyalgia and other chronic illness support groups that people will comment that they did something on Saturday, didn’t feel too terrible on Sunday and then on Monday feel like they’ve been run over by truck. Or work a few days, then have to sleep the entire weekend.

This happens to me too. The technical term for it is Delayed Onset Post Exertional Malaise. Basically what it means is that you’ve used up all your energy, but your body doesn’t realise it until 24-72 hours later. It is mostly described in relation to Myalgic Encephalomyelitis/Chronic Fatigue Syndrome (ME/CFS), but it is common with FibroWarriors too.

It’s as if your car could run out of petrol but keep driving for another 10 km, but use up petrol that hasn’t been put in the tank yet. Then when the fuel light finally turns on, the car won’t run, and you have to replace that 10 km worth of fuel before the tank is even empty.

Possibly not the best analogy, but that’s the way I explain it best. (If it helps, pretend that car’s fuel tank is in some Dr Who’s parallel dimension!)

It makes it even more difficult to learn to pace yourself. For most people, (myself included before the FibroTroll came to stay) when you think about pacing, you think that all you need to do is stop when you get tired and rest. This doesn’t work. You have to work out how to stop BEFORE you are tired. Yep, you have to guess when that fuel warning light SHOULD go off, and ideally stop when there’s still fuel in the tank.

The other problem with Delayed Onset Post Exertional Malaise, is that if you do a thing (work, exercise, function, exam – basically anything that is physically, mentally or emotionally more draining than normal) and then might not feel too bad the next day. So you don’t rest as much as you should. Then the next day (or anywhere up to 72 hours post thing), that’s when it hits you. Except that because you didn’t rest the day after, it actually turns out that you went 20 kms into that negative fuel tank.

And this is where the FibroTroll’s grudge holding comes in. He’ll beat you with his pain club, his fatigue club and whatever other club he finds lying around, and often invite his friends over for a party.

My advise for this, is to ALWAYS schedule a rest day after a thing, if at all possible. I’ve done it for today, as I had a big physically challenging weekend. I gave myself permission to not get things done. No washing, no cleaning, absolutely nothing but the necessities. I kept my yoga routine down to the basics – pretty much just stretching. I have allowed myself to write this blog, as I am doing that in my HBO2 chamber and don’t have to move much to do it. But had the weekend been mentally challenging, then I would have curled up with a trashy novel or some simple crochet and tried not to even think. I’ve already given myself permission for tomorrow to be the same if I need it. Hopefully, that will be enough to avoid the crash.

If you want to read more on my thoughts about pacing, I’ve written quite a few posts about it. You can find them here, here, and here. I mention it a lot and I really do think it is one of the most important aspects of learning to manage the FibroTroll.

Do you get Delayed Onset Post Exertional Malaise? If so, I’d love to hear how you manage it – I can always use new tips!

Exercise and Fibromyalgia

Exercise is such an important aspect of health. Our bodies are designed to move, and to do it regularly. Aside from the obvious fitness aspect of exercise, it has many other benefits. Exercise helps keep our muscles and joints strong, it assists digestion, heart and lung function, blood flow, lymphatic drainage, liver and kidney function and even mental health! Basically every part of the body benefits from moving our bodies.

But what happens when we have a chronic illness? One that zaps energy and causes increased pain? I can tell you. It makes exercise exceedingly hard to do.

Before I was diagnosed, before I had any idea what was wrong with me – that the FibroTroll was coming to stay – and long before I had any idea how long that visit would be (spoiler alert – probably forever), I thought I was just unfit.

I decided to fix this by playing indoor beach volleyball. I enjoyed playing volleyball – I won’t pretend that I’m particularly good at it, but I enjoyed it. I also took up indoor rock climbing. Both of these activities are a lot of fun – and a lot of hard work. Even just walking through sand is harder than walking on a flat surface, so playing a sport on it, is significantly harder.

This turned out to be a bad idea. Fibromyalgia is not the sort of disease that you can force to get better. Until you learn some level of pacing, it is very common to have a push-and-crash cycle. This would happen to me. I would keep pushing until I ended up bedridden. Then as soon as I was able to get out of bed, I would try and do all the chores that I felt guilty for leaving to the knight in tarnished armour, and then relapse.

This sort of cycle continued until I basically became too afraid to push at all. Every activity or function became a source of stress. I would pretty much always flare afterwards. This was a contributing factor for my battle with depression and anxiety.

About 18 months ago, I started seeing both my psychologist and my physiotherapist. With their help I have made small but significant improvements. I have continued working with my naturopath – with her help, and metabolic balance I am back to my ideal weight! I just need to develop some more muscle and still stay the same weight and to do that, I need more exercise.

I joined up to Healthy Moving‘s Coaching and Challenge program – which if you can afford it, I strongly recommend it. If not, just sign up for her free emails and you’ll get some helpful tips anyway.

But the pinnacle for me in terms of improvement in pretty much every aspect of my life- fatigue, pain, confidence, independence, mental health – is that this morning, I went back to Tai Chi.

Tai Chi is one form of exercise that has been actually been studied in randomised control studies and has shown to be beneficial in the treatment of Fibromyalgia. Here’s the link to one such study. I used to go when I was first diagnosed, but haven’t been for a couple of years. It is gentle, can be altered for restricted movement, or even done in a chair! It also focuses on mindful movement, and is sometimes referred to as moving meditation.

This morning, the long suffering knight rode his bicycle to work and left me the car. I was quite determined that I wanted to drive myself. It’s not a long way and I feel I need to get some of my independence back.

I got myself ready – I chose not to do a full yoga session this morning, and made sure to give myself plenty of time. I fed the chickens, breakfasted, showered and meditated, then drove our little manual car to the lesson. I was pleased to recognise one of the instructors cars in the car park when I arrived. Not having to explain myself to a new person was very welcome. I got up the stairs and walked into the room, not realising how much I had missed it until that exact moment.

I managed the entire lesson. I sat down for a lot of it, but I very quickly started to remember the moves. My balance isn’t what it was, but that will come with time. I felt welcomed and valued. I met new people and caught up with old friends. And while I am definitely tired, I don’t have that bone weary exhaustion that comes when the FibroTroll has had enough.

So if you are at a place where you want to try some gentle exercise, or struggle with meditation and need a form of movement mindfulness, then I strongly recommend Tai Chi. If you are in Australia, then try the Taoist Tai Chi Society of Australia. The Brisbane branch has a health recovery class and I can vouch that it is well worth the trip up the stairs!

10 Tips for Surviving the Holiday Season

It’s that wonderful time of the year, when you try to fit in all the 50 things you were going to do all year into two weeks and suddenly find that you also have 16 more things to do. You had grand plans of having all your Christmas shopping done by the start of December so you could avoid the Christmas rush, but somehow it’s less than a week away and you have a grand total of two presents sorted, and one of them has been delayed in shipping.

Add a chronic illness like Fibromyalgia, with all its friends and what used to be your favourite time of year, starts becoming quite the drag.

So I decided to come up with a list of things to make life a little less stressful.

  1. Make time to meditate. I know it feels like there isn’t enough hours in the day to spend some of it being still, but settling your mind – even for just 10 minutes a day will calm your brain waves, making it easier to focus and get things done.
  2. Make time for exercise. Again, it feels like there aren’t enough hours, but a short yoga routine or just 5 minutes stretching will help reduce the tension that build up due to stress and will decrease your overall pain.
  3. Pre-prepare food. This is especially important with dietary restrictions or specific meal plans. Good nutrition goes a long way in reducing stress on your body.
  4. Bring food to functions. If you have dietary restrictions and you aren’t sure if the venue/household you are going to will be able to feed you, then bring your own. Yes, it’s a hassle, but frankly so is spending the day on the toilet because someone fed you the wrong thing. And while you are bringing your own meal…
  5. Remember to make/provide some treats for yourself. I recently made a plethora of Christmas cookies, mostly because I enjoy doing it, but also to give as gifts. I made the mistake of eating some cookie dough. It was gluten free, so not a large amount of damage done, but my goodness, the sugar cravings I had! and my pain went up significantly too. I had to leave the dough in the fridge for a day before baking them as I didn’t trust myself to bake them without eating more dough! So I made myself some almost compliant cookies that will satisfy the cookie monster without derailing all the hard work I’ve done on metabolic balance.
  6. Write a list of gifts. If you head to the shops without some idea of what to buy each person, you’ll end up overwhelmed, buying “it’ll do”  gifts, and probably spending more than you budgeted. 
  7. Pace yourself. I’ve written about this before, and I know how frustrating it is to receive that bit of advice, but it is even more important to do it when you are flat out. Doing too much then crashing in  a heap is not productive or enjoyable for anyone. And the most important part of pacing is….
  8. REST! I know this feels like a drag, but take the time to lie down flat even if it’s just for 10 minutes. No phones or tablets or other electronic devices, no books, no distractions. If you can, elevate your feet. You could even meditate at the same time!
  9. Ask for help. I suck at this. It’s a skill I’m slowly learning, but it’s super hard to do. If you are hosting Christmas, or a pre or post Christmas get together, then ask people to bring things. Be specific. Don’t just ask people to “bring a plate”or you’ll end up with loads of nibbles and no dessert or whatever.
    Assign the essentials to people with the time and inclination to make and bring them. And the things that you will live without to those who are time poor or don’t cook. Tell Aunt Mary that you love her pasta salad and no-one makes it quite like her and could she please bring some. Ask your cousin Bob to bring his famous chocolate cake. Ask your flaky little sibling to bring soft drinks and crackers. You get the idea. If you know exactly what people are bringing, you can plan the rest of your meal around that. 
  10. Relax your standards. Your entire house doesn’t have to be magazine worthy. If the bathroom, kitchen and living areas are clean, just close the door to the other parts. People who truly care about you won’t give a rats arse if your laundry is piled high next to your bed, or that you’ve just moved all the mess from the dining table to the spare room. Relax and enjoy the silly season, chores will (unfortunately) still be there next year!

Now if someone could point me to this list in about November next year, that would be grand!

Merry Christmas!

(or whatever appropriate holiday greeting suits your beliefs)

Self-Care Challenge

I mentioned in my last post (which I just noticed was over 3 weeks ago – gulp!) that I was about to start a “no-time self-care challenge”.

I am pleased to say that I have started it. I’ve mentioned Healthy Moving a few times and I’m pretty sure today won’t be the last time either. I should say – I don’t have an affiliation with Jen or Healthy Moving, I just really love her approach.

So the week didn’t start so well for me. On Monday morning, I watched the first video which starts with a mindset practice for the week. I found that this particular one both resonated and confronted me at the same time. This probably means that it is particularly relevant to me!

Then on Monday night I had an episode of extremely intense pelvic pain. The Knight in Tarnished Armour was threatening to carry me downstairs and take me to hospital, but thankfully the pain relief kicked in and I managed to avoid another sleepless night at the ER. Now I should point out, that our nearest Emergency Hospital is about 3km from our house, so in most cases, it would not only be quicker just to drive to the hospital, it would be a waste of the very valuable time of an ambulance service to come to us.

After a visit to my GP on Wednesday and an ultrasound on Thursday I now know my pain episode was likely an endometrioma on my ovary rupturing. Yay! Another co-morbid condition to add to my list. I really wish the FibroTroll would stop inviting friends over to my body. There really isn’t room for more! I’m on the upswing now, but I was pretty flat for a few days after this.

Which leads me back to the self-care challenge. Given that most of my week has involved me being horizontal, except for appointments, I didn’t think I would get much of the challenge done. But, I am super proud of myself. I watched the first exercise video and initially thought “Ha! I can barely stand up today and you want me to put one foot on a chair?! No chance!” But then I thought about the mindset for the week. Then I had a scroll through the Health Moving Website, and found an exercise that focused on the same muscle group, but was lying down. So I did it instead. I found the next day’s exercise easy, but the day after that was a difficult one again. So I gave myself permission to just do the really simplified version of it.

I am proud to say that I have done a variation of all 5 of this week’s exercises/stretches. This has been incredibly good for my mental health. Depression is another of the FibroTroll’s friends, and it is very much a double-edged sword. It makes it super difficult to do, well, basically everything. But conversely if you do nothing, the depression gets worse. Exercise has been proven to help, but when you have depression in combination with physical pain it is even harder to actually do any.  I have my depression mostly under control, but it does rear its ugly head from time to time, particularly when I have extra pain.

These little 2-5 min exercise/stretch videos are just the right amount for me to get the ball rolling. Some of the actual exercises take hardly anytime at all and are easy to weave in to your day – provided you can remember to do them! But the result is that I move my body more than I would have, and it gives me a sense that I have achieved something.

I am about to go and tackle the 15 min class for the week. I have to be mindful of the week I have had, and be extra careful with pacing. To that end, I have given myself permission, in advance, to just do 5 mins if it is too much. Wish me luck!

 

My future self

I was completely without inspiration this week.

I’ve been struggling with an almost constant headache, which only resolved after 2 visits to the chiropractor. After that I was just exhausted.

Now I am always fatigued, but this is the level of fatigue where you struggle to even lift a glass of water to your mouth. So I haven’t been writing. I’ve been hiding in online game world and fantasy novel world. And while that helps distract from the pain and fatigue, it doesn’t actually help much in the long run.

I’ve been following Jen from Healthy Moving for a while. I found her once after I signed up for one of those internet bundles and she had a class in it. Now I only get those bundles because of her contributions!

I recently signed up to her “No-time self-care 6 week challenge” which starts soon. I figure I have plenty of time, but not much energy, so small short exercises I can weave into my day are probably exactly what I need. Signing up also gave me temporary access to a lot of other stuff. One of which is the current “ritual challenge”. One of the things I love about Jen is that she isn’t just about exercise, she is all about your mindset too. The first mindset in her ritual challenge is to think about my future self.

This is the thing that managed to pull me out of my funk today. I found myself flicking from online game, to social media, to different game and then wondering what book to pull off my bookshelf when I decided to think about my future self.

That future self is probably not going to thank me for spending 6 hours on the couch mindlessly playing games. While I did spend 20 mins outside meditating this morning, that is not going to undo the damage I am doing to myself.

So I went and found my laptop and got into my whale (HBO2 chamber) and started to write. I didn’t actually know what I was going to write, just that Julie (my psychologist) encourages me to do so. It doesn’t use a lot of physical energy and it usually has a positive effect on my mood and general well-being.

And you know what?! It has done it again. While I’m still exhausted and not looking forward to working out how exactly I’m getting back out of my whale in about 15 minutes, I’m much happier. And I also feel like I’ve actually achieved something today. My future self will thank me for it I’m sure.

Blogger Recognition Award

 

This is my Blogger Recognition Award. I was nominated by Bethan Jones from Hello Fibro Blog. I had never heard of this award before I was nominated, so it came as a pleasant surprise.

So a big THANK-YOU to Bethan for the nomination. Bethan writes some inspiring posts and lovely poetry, so if you haven’t already, then click on the link above and head over and check her out.

How it all began

After I was diagnosed with Fibromyalgia in 2012 and soon had to stop working. I tried lots of different things to  keep myself occupied. I spent many, many, hours researching my condition and trying new things and (for the first two years) fighting with my income protection insurance company. I learned to crochet, I tried my hand at making soap, designed and oversaw my bathroom and kitchen renovations. I started writing a book. I watched a lot of TV and played a lot of games. I tried a lot of medications, diets and treatments. And I steadily declined. My symptoms got worse and I ended up developing depression and anxiety. 

I finally started seeing a psychologist in 2017. She recommended using writing as therapy and that quickly developed into this blog.

2 pieces of advice to other bloggers
  1. Be yourself. Don’t get caught up in writing what you think you should write or in a way that isn’t you.
  2. If you miss a post (or 10!) don’t stress about it. Just pick up where you left off.
The Rules:
  • Thank the blogger who nominated you and provide a link to their blog
  • Write a post explaining how your blog got started
  • Give 2 pieces of advice to new bloggers
  • Nominate 15 other bloggers you feel deserve some recognition
  • Comment on each blog nominating them, providing the link to the post you created
My nominations for the Blogger Recognition award

Many of the blogs I follow are well established, some of them are newer or smaller like my own. I find value in all of them for different reasons. Some of them are not primarily blogs, but if I didn’t include them, then I wouldn’t have gotten to 15!

I thought about categorising them, but many of them overlap, so here they are in no particular order.

  1. Repeat Crafter Me. I mostly follow Sarah for her amazing crochet patterns, but she also has some great craft ideas and recipes.
  2. Shannon’s Kitchen. If you love good, healthy food and you aren’t offended by swearing then this is the perfect blog for you. (Language warning!!)
  3. Planet June. Simply stunning, realistic, and extremely well written patterns for amigurami creatures.
  4. My New Roots. Plant based, healthy, delicious food.
  5. Health, Home and Happiness. More healthy food, great advice for special diets like GAPS and Keto.
  6. Rebuilding Wellness. Practical advice for helping symptoms of fibromyalgia.
  7. Healthy Moving. I don’t follow a lot of exercise blogs, but the thing I like about Jen is that not only are her exercise programs accessible for people like me, she also focuses on mindset.
  8. Phoenixhelix. Food and lifestyle advice for autoimmune and chronic illnesses.
  9. Finding Yoga. Finding yoga has an online yoga for pain course, which I have found helpful.
  10. Reclaiming Hope. Practical advice for living with Fibromyalgia.
  11. The Zero Waste Chef. Great recipes and practical advice on reducing plastic use and rubbish.
  12. I am Jessica. A fantastic blog on minimising waste that I’ve only found recently.
  13. Just Another Autoimmune Blog. Another blog I’ve only recently discovered, but I’ve really been enjoying her writing style.
  14. Crafts, Chronic Illness and Adulting. The title says it all really!
  15. And lastly, My healthy Green Family. I love the idea of homesteading, and one day hope to have the energy and space to grow most of my own food. This blog is an inspiration!