Now where was I?? Oh way back in April ...... bugger.
A quick update with headings might be an idea then.
The Job
I packed it in at the end of June last year. Basically because it - and the people I was working for - were driving me completely bananas which, I have to say, is exactly the way I thought it would go but which I’d hoped I was wrong about! It was supposed to be very similar to what I had been doing at the NAS but because they were so desperate for money to keep them going it turned into mainly PR and fundraising both of which are not my forte. That sounds very pedantic but there were a million and one other very irritating and annoying things and a lot of them were not things I could particularly change unfortunately. And they were just so stressed all the time it really did my head in - I was miserable enough of my own volition without them adding to it and by May I was finding it harder and harder to motivate myself to get out there so just thought this is sooooo not worth it and handed my notice in.
I didn’t look for a job straight away - took a break for a few months because I knew I needed one - but in November I was back jobhunting and I’ve applied for a couple in the last month or two.
I’ve been amazed at how much my self-worth has been affected by not working though. I’ve just felt completely useless as though my whole identity had been wrapped up in work which I had never really felt it was before - it’s been quite bizarre I have to say.
Nikki
Nikki is expecting her second baby in March this year. It’s another girl so she’s really looking forward to it. Joel is the dad but there’s no prospect of them getting together although it looked like it for a while around October/November of last year. I think Joel was just ‘trying to do the right thing’ but not actually wanting to which is a complete recipe for disaster so I’m glad they didn’t go ahead. He does however now give her £700 a month which has meant, along with housing benefit, she can afford a higher rent and has found what seems like a nice 2-bedroom bungalow around half an hour’s drive away.
She gets the keys on Monday but it’s unfurnished so I’ve just spent an arm an a leg buying all the big things she needs to move in and paying her first month’s deposit and rent. That was money I had set aside to pay university fees for a postgraduate counselling course which I had applied to do last year but didn’t get accepted - good bloody job otherwise she’d be screwed!
We’re pretty organised for the move I think but have been let down by the removal guy I’d booked before Christmas who now appears to have vanished from the face of the earth which is strange because he’d done a couple of jobs for me before and seemed a really nice guy. However Nikki had bought an entertainment unit on Gumtree and the guy selling it very kindly said he could deliver it so we decided it would be less hassle to take it round to my house than humph it upstairs to her flat. Which he did at teatime tonight and I noticed he had a white van ...... so I asked if he did removals by any chance and he did! He gave me his card and said just to e-mail him all the details and he’d give me a quote.
I like it when that happens.
I’m not sure how she’ll cope with me not being quite so much available to be at her beck and call (she’s only 5 minutes away here and it’s very easy to drop in past) or just instantly available for babysitting but I think it’ll be a good move in more ways than one. She might make more friends in a small community (the place she’s moving to is like a little village) and it might be a good step to getting used to me not being JUST THERE which of course I won’t be anyway when I go back to work.
So we’ll see how that one pans out.
Lily
Continues to make us laugh.
She’s 3 months past 2 now so at a delightful age - as long as you have her in short bursts lol! It’s really fascinating watching how she makes sense of the world which she must think is a completely barmy confusing place I would imagine with adults who do the daftest of things and are never consistent.
The Furry Things
Also keep making me smile.
Bailey continues to have somewhat of a bag fetish.
Snarf couldn’t wait for Christmas morning.
Willow is a headcase.
But basically they’re pals. Sometimes.
Except there’s one missing now ......
As some of you will know from Facebook, poor Trooper had to go to the Rainbow Bridge in September after he snapped at a couple of older kids (with no provocation) between June and August. It was a horrible horrible time and I still feel like I’ve murdered my best friend but we couldn’t find anything physically wrong and I just couldn’t have kept him safely away from Lily, an impending baby and the cats and rightly or wrongly, I didn’t want to go down the road of muzzling, caging or shutting away in case he thought he was being punished.
He had a very peaceful passing though - I found a really lovely vet just before the whole dilemma and he talked things through with me a couple of times then when he came to the house to put Trooper to sleep he just couldn’t have been nicer or more patient. I’m so glad I found him.
And Trooper was nearly 12 so very likely wouldn’t have had too much time left in the natural scheme of things but that still doesn’t stop you feeling like a complete traitor. I just hope he was happy when he was with me.
Mum
She’s still going strong - well not that strong I suppose but she’s still in the world and still in her own flat. She’s almost 94 and gave us a scare last year in the summer when she fell and had to go into hospital. She became terribly confused and was convinced there was some sort of dreadful conspiracy going on in the ward - it was awful to see her so frightened and not be able to reassure her everything was okay. I very much doubt if we’ll get her into hospital again after that experience which is worrying given that it’s quite likely she may need to go in for something or other at some point.
My sister bears the brunt of most of her care and my brother and niece help out but I think the time may not be far off when we’ll need to think of more regular care. She’s had carers in at various times but always busts a gut to try and show them she can take care of herself thereby eventually ousting herself out of the package! And it’s terribly difficult to get them at any short notice - they’re always really stretched - same old story - not enough staff to go round. Anyway I suppose it’s a bridge we’ll have to cross when we come to it.
This is turning out much longer than I’d planned. Quelle surprise.
A good start back into the fray though although how I’m ever going to catch up with all of you now I have no idea!
I miss Open Diary so much.
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