My Week Away, Family Adventures & MS Fatigue

Hey Everyone, how are you all doing? For those living in the UK are you finding the weather a little easier to cope with? ( I certainly am!) Leave me a comment and let me know how your weekend has been.

Last week I went and stayed with my Aunt, Uncle and Grandmother for the week 🙂 I love spending time with them we always have lovely adventures and… nothing beats my Grandmother formerly known and Nana’s cooking!

So its been a lovely week, however my MS symptoms have been playing up quite a bit and I found myself resting quite a bit in the afternoons. My main symptom being… fatigue! I’m fine with dealing with fatigue my body tells me what it needs and its usually rest.

My Aunt and I would usually do something nice in the mornings and then in the afternoon whilst she taught the piano I would rest in my bedroom or sit in the lounge and have lovely chats with my nana — I love talking to her I always ask about things she used to do when she was my age, we are very close 🙂

So let me fill you in on my adventures that I got up to…

Monday

Monday morning my Aunt and I popped into the town centre to pay the final fee to the Registry Office where we are getting married next year! How exciting!! George and I have an appointment with Peterborough registry office this week to give notice of marriage and then… we are all good to go and can get the marriage package delivered! Its all happening now!

I had to rest in the afternoon as the fatigue hit, so I spent a few hours in my bedroom resting whilst my Aunt worked so it was a win win all around — fatigue was a little better after a rest — its been horrendous in this heat that we’ve had!

It was also my Uncles birthday today so we all made a little picnic, brought a cake and went down to my Aunt’s field where she keeps her horses and had a wonderful picnic ☺️ — I also taught my Nana how to Snapchat! That was hilarious!

Tuesday

Today was a little more restful because of what’s to come tomorrow!

We had a little trip out in the morning to a little garden shop where even in the heat we’ve been having, the flowers all looked beautiful ☺️ there was also a lovely little cafe attached so of course we had a cup of coffee and a little something to eat! Delicious!

I did however paint my Nana’s (grandmother formerly known as nana) nails! She loved them and k just spent time with her, which was really great! I love spending time with her ☺️

Wednesday

Today was a big day! We all had really early nights (I slept really well) and then today we were off to see some of my Aunt’s friends who kept and trained race horses!

As you all know I’ve been to Royal Ascot and a couple of other race days, so it was really exciting to see what goes on behind the scenes.

These horses were just magnificent! All in such amazing condition, real athletes! And they were all super friendly! Considering they had never met me before!

They were well looked after and had lots of things to keep them occupied, we even got to watch a couple go on the gallops, which was so exciting! I was able to sit down a lot because my Aunt took the car around and her friends knew about my MS and that my fatigue was playing up and they were wonderful to me.

After having a look around the yard we popped into the local town centre for something to eat and a look around, it was a beautiful little town and we stopped at this vegan/gluten free cafe and honestly I had THE best pea and mint soup I’ve ever tried! And the recipe was so simple!!

We then had a little look around some shops whilst on our way back to the car, which is when I found my bargain of the week!! In the British Heart Foundation charity shop I found a gorgeous dress.. my size for £4.99!!!!! Amazing!! I’m going to wear this to my friend’s birthday this coming Saturday!

Once we arrived home I had to go to bed for a while as i was exhausted, however WHAT an amazing day!

Thursday

Well after our exciting day yesterday, today was spent doing very little. We did pop into town because my Aunt needed to pop to the bank.. of course we had to go for coffee and we went to the cafe where the own will be catering for the wedding — we always go there as it’s so gorgeous!

Then we came home had a lovely home cooked meal by nana and the rest of the afternoon was spent resting and looking through my Aunt’s scrap book that I made for her 60th birthday ☺️

We also had our final picnic at the field because tomorrow I went home to be reunited with my boys 🙂🐈 — I also made the “Jus-Rol” chocolate croissants and introduced them to nana.. it was so funny! She absolutely loved them! Bless her!

Friday

Homeward bound! Today is the day I was reunited with my boys! Firstly we stopped off at a local retail store called “Boundary Mills/Downtown near Grantham for some retail therapy. I got some amazing sandals for £10 — bargain! Then I got home to my amazing boys and we generally relaxed the rest of the weekend ☺️

I hope you enjoyed reading this week’s blog post ☺️ sorry it’s been a bit late — technical difficulties!

Sending you lots of love always,

Hannah xx

A Little Family Boat Ride & Coping With The Heat W/ MS

Hey everyone, how are you doing?! I hope you all had a good week last week?

Some of you may know that here in the UK we are having some beautiful and rather hot weather this summer (to be honest we’ve actually had a couple of good summers in actual summer season)

If you’re not from the UK, you’ll find that English people moan about the weather… A lot!! Whether its hot, cold, raining, windy.. us English people always have something to say about it!

As much as I’ve been loving that beautiful mornings and sunny days, the heat has definitely been making my symptoms flare up — especially fatigue! Fatigue has been the worst for me, sometimes having to resort to an aid like a walking stick or sometimes needing to find somewhere to sit down & rest.

Yesterday we had a lovely family day out, for my dad’s Father’s Day present we arranged to take him out on a lovely boat for the afternoon ☺️ My Aunt and Uncle helped my sister and I organise it as they know someone who has access to some gorgeous boats and they are my dad’s favourite things ☺️

I made a little picnic (some vegan bits and some non vegan bits, but I didn’t eat those) and off we set!

It was such a beautiful day and thankfully majority of the time it wasn’t too hot, with the wind from the water blowing it was nice and refreshing. There were a couple of times when I sat below deck for a little rest but it was a really lovely day!

When we got home the heat was starting to affect me, so I sat in my grandmother’s cool living room with a glass of cool water and had a lovely cool bath… Also I LIVE with the fan at the moment so luckily I was able to sleep very well ☺️

This week I am spending time with my Aunt and Grandmother so next week’s post is going to be all about the adventures I have got up to (nothing too wild lol.. all about balance) ☺️

I hope you all enjoyed reading this blog post and let me know any tips on how you deal with the heat to manage your symptoms or if the heat makes your symptoms better? I love hearing from you!

Lots of Love Always

Hannah xx

Weekly Update:- Life with MS

Hey Everyone! How have you all been this week? Let me know in the comments how you’ve all been ☺️

So.. I’ve been fighting off a summer cold this week, in fact I had to take a few days off work because as us spoonies all know, it’s not just the virus we’re fight but also our other issues too!

My MS symptoms have been heightened anyway in the heat, but having a cold too just made them worse.. especially fatigue!!

But with plenty of rest, lot sofa fluids and good food, I’m finally out of the tunnel and went back to work yesterday and did 6 hours, which I’m really proud of! I was exhausted when I got home and in fact fell asleep at 9pm! (Yeah I was a little annoyed about that because it was a Saturday night — but when you have any other chronic illness you learn to become a lot more relaxed and chilled about life)

Copaxone is still going well, apart from the odd rash I get after injecting.. but I’ve come to realise that if I inject and I haven’t had enough fluids, then the rash is a lot worse.. so I now make sure I drink about 3 glasses of water before I inject and that seems to be work #copaxonetip lol!

Ive also been discovering some new vegan food from my local Sainsbury’s that’s delicious! Vivera have come into the shelves in some Sainsbury’s and Waitrose stores… Some of the things are quite pricy.. but worth it! I had 100% Vegan BBQ Pulled Veggie and it was delicious (made from soy) and I’m looking forward to trying more from them!

Other than that this week has been a little bit boring because I’ve been poorly.. but now that I’m back to almost full recovery (and my MS symptoms are slowly calming down) I’ll be able to get back to my adventures ☺️

I hope you all have a great week! And I’ll see you next Sunday! ☺️

Lots of love Always

Hannah xx

Wedding Planning & MS

Hey Everyone, how are you all doing? I hope you’re having s good week! For those of you loving in the UK how are you finding the heat?

I like it for about ten minutes and then fatigue sets in and I become an extra out if Sean of the Dead (zombie movie lol) but I love sitting in the garden early morning — you can hear the birds and it’s cool enough even though the sun is shining ☺️

I’m full of cold at the moment (yes, how can you get a cold in summer!?! And no it’s not hayfever) so I’ve mainly been resting in bed because doing much else takes it out of me but I’ve had the pleasure of finally watching The Greatest Showman — have you seen it? If you you must, it’s amazing!!

Anyway, this blog post is all about Wedding Planning with MS. It’s just under a year until George and I get married (it’s still weird but very exciting when I say that! I think it’s because I’ve been a Miss all my life and soon I’ll be a Mrs! Haha I’m smiling now as I write that!)

For us we wanted our wedding to be simple, we didn’t want a big show or celebration because firstly my energy levels start to drop from about 4pm onwards lol and secondly we want it to be intimate so everyone can enjoy the day 🙂

We are getting married in my home town, which is just up the A1 near Grantham, UK.. this is the one thing I’ve always wanted, we are having the reception in my Grandmother and Aunts back garden, their house means a lot to me because it’s been there throughout my whole life and walking down her stairs in my wedding dress is something I’ve always wanted to do ☺️

George is probably the most easy going person I know ever! We both decided on having afternoon tea (who doesn’t love finger sandwiches and scones!? Lol) and his request is that we have no speeches. We will say a few words of thanks and then enjoy the afternoon before heading to London for a couple of days as husband and wife! (We will be going to Benito’s Hat in Kings Cross because we go there all the time usually, so going on our wedding day is a given!)

Now.. the planning.. you’re going to laugh.. most of the planning is virtually done!

We are very grateful and thankful that family have helped out a lot and the key word for this planning is “stress-free” well as stress free as we can make it and so far it has been. The registry office is booked, the catering is booked, the marquee is booked, wedding cars booked and all the inbetweens are coming together and my little sister has offered to make our wedding cake as her gift to us, which will be amazing!

We’ve got the table decorations, most of the bouquets (we are having fake flowers because George suffers badly with hayfever) I’ve even got my wedding dress, Vail and shoes!

When it came to the dress, I literally tried it on and that was it.. you know when you just “know” it is so comfortable, beautiful but also simple.. like I mentioned we want our day to be like us.. simple 😂🙂 we found it in a shopping outlet store called Downtown.. we didn’t intentionally go to buy it there and then.. my Aunt came with me, my mum and my sister because they were selling Monsoon wedding dresses for under £100!!!!!!! We had loads! I mean probably about 5-10 dresses.. all storming into the changing room.. the last one I tried and that was it! Sorted! (I even did the sit down test to make sure I could sit in it!)

We are having a simple afternoon tea for the reception with a glass of prosecco but no other alcohol — George and I don’t drink so we decided that we weren’t going to have alcohol and we’re also bit having an evening reception — like I’ve mentioned my fatigue gets worse in the evening, which means I can’t party until 1am in the morning 😂 but to be quite honest.. I’m completely fine with that 🙂 I want to remember every nano second of our amazing day with all the people we love the most so not having alcohol or an evening do is fine 🙂 plus people will be driving.

It’s funny when people ask me “how’s the wedding planning going” I always reply “oh it’s fine, I haven’t done much recently because most of its sorted” their face is always a picture “what it’s all planned?” Lol.. as you all know I LOVE organising and planning so I was like a kid in a candy shop doing the planning.. don’t worry George had input too it’s what we both want ☺️

Planning a wedding with MS for me is all about managing stress levels.. thats another reason why we have planned so much in advance — also places get booked so quickly! My family have been amazing with helping me to plan and doing what George and I want which makes me feel so overwhelmed with gratitude.

People laugh at me when I say that I want my wedding to be as stress free as possible — but I ask them why? Why does it have to be stressful? Only you can make a situation stressful, if you go in thinking “this is going to be stressful, then 9/10 it will be” I went into this thinking “this is going to be amazing and exciting” and guess what… It is!

The next part of the planning is just getting the little things organised like “the stationary bits” I like to call them, mainly decorations but that can wait until the new year after we’ve sent out the invitations!

So that’s it… Wedding planning pretty much sorted just the final touches really.. I think because we are having a small and simple wedding it’s been easier.. I’ve also been determined to keep it low budget, why do you need to spend £10,000 on your wedding day (sometimes more) when it’s just about two people declaring their love to family and friends and who want to be together forever.. in this life and the next. (My opinion only btw!)

I hope you’ve enjoyed the read and when the big day arrives I will try and take as many pics as I can (maybe I’ll have to pinch pics of other people lol) and will write a post about it 🙂

Lots of love Always,

Hannah xx

July Link Up Party

Hey everyone! Wow can you believe that it’s July already! This time next year me and my truly amazing George will be husband and wife (that’s mental!)

I may write a post about wedding planning with MS if any of you are interested — there might not be many pictures lol as I want to keep a lot of things a surprise hehe.

Anyway, how are you all? This post I’ve teamed up with the lovely Sheryl from www.achronicvoice.com to take part in her Monthly Link Up Party for people with chronic illnesses. It’s a way to make new friends and connect with other spoonies and I love it! Alas I haven’t written one for a while so I’m determined to get back on the horse and start doing them again!

If you click on the link about, it will take you to Sheryl’s page where she explains how the link up party works.

This month’s prompts are:

* Adding

* Spreading

* Ranting

* Dividing

Adding

This month and every month for that matter I’ve been trying to add positivity into my life every day. I’m a very positive person but let’s face it, it can be hard and we have to work on it every day!

I like the phrase Charlotte from Sex and zthe City says in the first movie when she’s asked if she’s happy in her relationship.. she says.. “I feel happy and blessed every day” the others say “you feel happy every day?!!?” Her reply “not all day, but yes everyday I feel happy and blessed” — this is exactly me.. I generally feel happy and content every single day, like Charlotte it’s not all day.. but it is every day! And that’s what I focus on to remain that way.

I’ve also added a new MS treatment to my life Copaxone and so far it’s going well.. apart from some minor injection site issues but I deal with those.. I could write a dedicated post about that?

Spreading

I thought was a very interesting prompt and have to say it’s taken a while to think of something.

For me I love spreading my positivity and help to other people, I love writing, being on Instagram and filming you tube videos for you all (something exciting is coming in September stay tuned) my main passion in life is to create, share and spread content to people either newly diagnosed with MS or maybe it will help anyone with a chronic illness to hopefully make life just that little bit easier!

I’ve been researching cleaning hacks, cooking tips and general tips on how to keep life easy and relatively stress free and I can wait to share and spread that with you ☺️

Ranting

Okay.. I’m not too keen on this prompt and I don’t think I have much to rant about.. I don’t want to “rant” about the weather here in the UK, but I shall just chat about it.

Everyone with MS is different when it comes to the weather, here in the UK when it gets to 30° we don’t really deal with it too well.. we don’t have AC or an outside swimming pool in our back garden (believe me I’ve really contemplated digging a hole in the garden and filling it with water 😂)

For me the heat actually makes my symptoms worse. Fatigue is a lot stronger and makes me feel like an extra from a zombie movie, my whole body feels like I’ve got sandbags attached to it dragging it along, nerve pain in the evenings gets to a point where I’m in bed (with the fan on) at 8:30pm — so this kind of heat is a real struggling for me.

What about you? Does the heat help your symptoms? Or make then worse?

With all my symptoms heightened I just try and remain calm, relaxed, hydrated (that is so important!) And more importantly j make sure we have the fan on, always and our freezer is well stocked with ice lollies! Then I just keep smiling like I usually do cause let’s face it… Noone can see how I’m feeling inside so it’s sometimes easier to whack on a smile 😂 — but I’m fine and I deal with my symptoms, I just make sure I listen to my body.

Dividing

I think this is the only prompt this month that I’m actually struggling to decide what to write about. There’s nothing really that I’m “dividing” as such.

I suppose I divide my time at the moment between doing an activity and resting while the weather is hot.

I struggle to get everything done at once at the moment and if I do then I’m usually suffering for it afterwards, so I divide my time.. do one thing, then rest and so on.

That’s probably the only thing I’m dividing at the moment to enable me to save my energy and to be able to do more things 🙂

And that my lovely people is the end of this post and this month’s Link Up Party.

Thank you so much to Sheryl for always coming up with thesez they’re amazing! I’m so glad to be back doing them!

On Sunday I’m doing to be posting a blog post about all the things I loved in June.. maybe I’ll just upload them as pictures for you to see instead of writing about them? Let me know in the comments what you’d prefer 😊

Lots of love to you always,

Hannah xx