New Year

I always tell people I don't like New Years Eve

Between you , me and potentially the whole of the internet what I actually mean is that I don't like feeling like you have to be somewhere on New Years Eve in party mode , forced to stay up until midnight and the pressure of feeling like you MUST have fun at midnight while in reality you're just a bit drunk and talking to someone with halitosis yearning for 12 midnight so you can drop the facade and bugger off to bed. Just me ?

As a child at school then one of my favourite things was when you got a new exercise book to write in and that new pristine , fully of potential empty white page feeling is what I like about New Year

Its a mental clean sheet

2010 ( bear with me ... I will get to 2011 , I not that mential that I think its a whole other year) was a really crap year for me as in it was when all the anxiety kicked in and I didn't know what the hell was going on and honestly felt that there was no way forward. I don't mean that in a suicidal way as luckily I've never felt like ending life but if I'm honest life felt like something to get through rather than something to enjoy

2011 in the oddest way has truely been a gift as even though I've been through some really horrible emotions due to the anxiety and panic , then it was the year when I realised that I will be fine and I am a strong woman defined by more than a dress size or material things.

The last few months of 2011 have been a work in progress of me growing stronger and finding myself as a person and finding pleasure in the little things in life which is something I've wanted for a long time but never been quite able to manage before

What I would love to be blessed with with 2012 without sounding too mung bean hippy about it is to continue growing spiritually and to be content with what I have and what I am and use that as a building block to build spiritually rather than always yearning for something unobtainable .

I'll be spending 2012 at a friends house with Mr Kay and my friends daughter who is going travelling this year for two years so it will be a special one ( no pressure lol)

Mr Kay came home after his three days away and told me he loved me in a sleepy type way as he fell asleep. He doesn't say that often as he's not a "sayer" . It made me feel slightly less murderous when his snoring kept me awake until 4am .... ** slightly***

Bring on 2012. For the first time in many years I'm really looking forward to it

I hope 2012 brings all my blogger friends contentment with what they have or a move towards something which brings them contentment

MK xxx

All by myself

Its all quiet at the moment in my little corner of the world
Very quiet

For the first time in six and a half years I have three days to myself , just little old me in the house
6 year old is visiting her nana for some spoiling and Mr Kay is working away until Friday night

I was looking forward to it with relish but now it has arrived I feel a little odd and slightly discombobulated

I've always thought that part of my personality is that I'm happy in my own company. Before my daughter was born I happily lived on my own for long periods of time and if I'm around other people for too long then I crave being able to lock a bathroom door with a big bubbly bath poured or get into bed and have some alone time to press the reset button.
I think I'm out of practice !

I've saved up a few recorded TV programmes as Mr Kay is a TV hogger , got some books , got lashings of xmas chocolates in and I've got enough work to do to make me feel like I'm doing something but not enough to overload me so I'm sure I'll get into the swing of things

I've just been out for a long and windy walk and stopped and watched the wind making crazy waves on the reservoir . It was really nice and now I'm back the house just seems quiet quiet quiet.

I was really nervous incase the anxiety kicked back in but it seems to be staying low so let the solitude begin

Sober January and Sober Wednesdays

I’m going to do sober January in 2012 .  I did this in 2009 and 2010 but that was in conjunction with a milkshake diet ( Cambridge diet ) and lost 1.5 stone in the process both times . For posterity I should add that all that weight is back on my ass now … sob)

However – I’m quite excited about doing Sober January next month as a personal development project rather than a weight loss thing ( don’t get me wrong – if I lose a few pounds then I won’t sniff at it but I’m very happy it’s a no alcohol thing for no other reason than developing my life without chemical influence skills !)

I’ve been a little reticent about mentioning too much about alcohol in this blog so far as I follow quite a few recovery blogs and it seems churlish to say that I’ve been in a place where I was definitely drinking too much and it was adversely affecting my life and it felt unmanageable but then to say I’ve now found I can drink within limits I am personally happy with.

Everything you read online seems to result in the opinion that if you think you have a problem with alcohol then you most likely have and it’s a progressive thing and that’s the end of that. I personally think there is a middle ground where you can self-medicate with alcohol at a point in your life but not have whatever genetic build up it is that means you can’t ever drink within “normal” limits. I am very conscious of keeping an eye on myself now as if I went back to my binge cycle of 2008 or my quarter bottle of spirits 5 times a week  habit of 2007 then I like to think I’d just abstain and give it up as a bad job . All that said – it never pays to get cocky does it ?

I digress however

In additional to sober January then since the start of December then I’ve also thrown Sober Wednesday into the pot as a hopefully permanent fixture

Sober Wednesday sounds like I drink like billy-o every other day of the week which isn’t the case. I usually don’t drink over the weekend at all and keep to 4-6 alcohol units the other days but having Wednesday as a no argument no alcohol day (no matter what social event might be on or however much I think "oooh hard day – lets have a drink") is proving to be something I enjoy and I think its here to stay. Its good practice to learn to say no to a drink in the pub etc.  I don’t want to be the person who no-one ever hears say ,  “I’ll have an orange juice please”

Bring on January I say !

All is calm , all is bright

I have had the strangest two weeks of serenity and calm since posting last . I have in all honesty been putting off posting about this incase I jinxed things but .. my anxiety and panic has basically gone away

I feel a little discombobulated  ( always wanted to use that word!) as I don't quite know why its gone , there has been no change to general circumstances in my life but I have a little fizzy feeling of contentment in my stomach and its marvellous.

I found an old packet of arctic root tablets in my vitamin box and started taking those a couple of weeks ago but I'm hesitant to hail a miracle cure by pill as

a) I don't want it to be "cure by pill" if I'm honest as I've also been working very hard on other postive thinking and lifestyle changes and I would prefer that it was a combination of all but I couldn't honestly say either way

B) T
he arctic root pack was only half full so I've obviously tried it before without noticing an effect and given it up ( I think I vaguely remember ordering it in 2010) so perhaps its not just that

In the interest of fairness and incase it helps someone else I should say that the arctic root tabs are a trademarked version of rhodiola rosea plus some other ingredients and are manufactured by the Swedish Herbal Institute whoever they are

I did some googling around and there was a clinical trial for Arctic Root but it seems to have been funded by the manufacturer ( Swedish herbal etc ) so that doesn't prove anything either way I guess

Apart from the arctic root then I have also been making a conscious effort to let the little things go and I've been eating better and also putting in 5 twenty minute sessions on the exercise bike a week since the start of December

I'm also keeping 2 or 3 alcohol free days a week and sticking to less than 20 uk standard alcohol units a week (which translates to 11 us standard drinks for any readers over the pond)

I've pushed myself the last two weeks to carry out every activity which I've previously had to grit my teeth and push through anxiously in the past.

Shopping in crowded places – fine

 Meal out seated under bright lights without alcohol - fine.

Watching my daughters Christmas Play at the school – fine.

Driving by myself – fine

Not one but three last minute high pressure time sensitive work bookings – fine

Floated through them all with absolute minimum anxiety

I can’t describe my ( tentative ) joy !!

The oddest temporary mini panic attack cure ever

Ladies and Gentlemen
I introduce to you ..... ( drum rolls ) Wasabi Peas

I've been feeling low level panic all day . Its annoyed me . I know I'm supposed to be all calm and float through the panic but its peed me off because I just want to go Christmas shopping and enjoy it rather than feel panicy about passing out for no bloody reason at all. I could stay at home. I don't , I go anyway but I want to enjoy things instead of getting through them feeling all rubbish and anxious

Word of the day : frustration ( accompanied by wanting to throw myself on the floor shouting "It's Not Fair"

The low level panicky feeling carried on at home .  I cracked open a bag of Wasabi Peas from M&S and they were so spicy that my nose ran , my face tingled and my panicky feelings got beaten into submission as my body had to deal with super spicy peas

The strangest things turn up when you need it !

I feel quite chipper now - how odd

Edit : I just googled " anxiety and wasabi peas " because I'm crazy like that. To my surprise then I'm not the only person to have found this super nose running spicy distraction cure. Seriously LMAO.
Small plastic bag of peas is a new handbag essential

The Goose is Getting Fat

There is an old rhyme lodged in my brain which begins

"Christmas is coming and the goose is getting fat "

I am that goose ( thats not part of the rhyme - thats me trying an analogy about ..never mind ..) What I'm saying is that my last pair of trousers which fitted me properly have become exceedingly tight over the last couple of weeks

What makes this so drama filled for me is that the trousers which are tight are a UK size fourteen ( and when I say tight I don't mean pinching a bit , I mean the full on bursting out of the seems extravaganza )

That technically means I need to diet right now before Christmas or go out and buy some size sixteen trousers for the first time.

I really really don't want to buy a size sixteen .

Buying the next size up is like admitting defeat and then you get all cosy having trousers that fit and expand into them and NO NO NO it's not happening. It'll be the whole " I'll just buy these size fourteens for now until I diet back into my size 12's " saga of 2009 all over again

Come to think of it I haven't been a size 12 in two years . Thats what happens when you buy the next size up.

I should mention here that even though the UK average size is 14 then the key difference between some people and me is I'm short. I'm 5 ft 1 . A size 14 on a normal height person is maybe in the carrying a few extra pounds category. A size 14 on someone short is fairly much dumpy barrel shaped. Bad news indeed.

So I'm darn well going to sit trouser less in my house until I can shoehorn the size fourteens back on. Thats a lie - I have some vile elasticated jogging bottoms which I shall wear like a hair shirt to do my daily 30 minute walk. And yes - I'm still doing my half hour walk all day so how the dickens have I managed to increase in size - HOW !!!!!! ( late night snacking and a trip to the chocolate factory with my daughter last week - thats how darnit )

Think of me sitting in my elasticated pantaloons chewing celery and sipping water while you all get into the festive swing of things won't you ?