Family, Friends, Food

WOWZERS!! So its been a wee while since I last posted, I keep saying I will try update more often and breaking my promises..Sorry!! But as the saying goes "no news is good news" I guess I haven't been updating lately because I have been doing so well and have nothing to tell!! I have been very lucky to have had my mum and my mother-in-law come to stay with me over the past two weeks-all the way from New Zealand so I have been enjoying my time with them instead of writing on here.

I absolutely loved having them stay, but oh my gosh do I now miss home (NZ) something chronic.
It's all made harder with the likelihood that I cannot conceive or carry children myself , and that's why I keep getting homesick. At the same time, I totally don't want to leave Brisbane. I love my life here, I am passionate about my job and the industry I work in…oh and the weather is fab! The plans before all this was to go on our honey moon then settle down, buy a house, have children…You know how it goes. Now I feel like what's the point of buying a family home if there are never going to be children in there? We cant afford to buy a house now either, because we might need to use all the money that we have saved to try and have a baby. It's looking like one day we might have to move back to New Zealand because thats where it's more likely we can afford to try and have a baby whether it be through adoption, IVF or surrogacy. After all the struggle that we may have to go through, we would want to be by our family and friends, who are in NZ.

I watched this programme on multiple births the other week. It was basically people who had gotten pregnant through IVF and then next minute…triplets and quads. I'm secretly hoping that's me. Maybe not the quads but it would be nice after so much heart ache and struggle to get one more than you bargained for. But God if you're reading this, I'm not being greedy, just one would make our lives complete.*cough* twins *cough*

But anyways back to other things, I have enjoyed having my mum and Kay (mummy in law) here. I have eaten many a delicious treats gone for many walks and little adventures-it's been great. This past week I have been getting a bit annoyed because I havent been sleeping properly. It doesn't matter if I go to bed early or late. I will wake up to go to the bathroom during the night, and usually I can go straight back to sleep after this, but lately I am awake for around 2 hours after until I eventually fall back to sleep again. I'm not sleeping for anywhere near as much as I used to either. I usually will need 12 hours a night (at least), and now I'm not getting that and it's freaking me out a bit. I think it's because I am getting better and I don't need as much sleep though, which is a good thing.

The other night however, I haven't been feeling quite myself. I won't go into details as yet as its probably a little too much info, but I think I have cracked the case as to why my Crohn's symptoms are playing up. I will keep you posted!

I have had a few mishaps as well. I say everything is OK, but I did experience I leakage over a week ago. That was not fun. I really hope that doesn't happen again, or if it does I hope I am home!! My skin around the stoma has been getting a bit irritated having a plaster stuck to it every day of its life. I think its been acting up in the warmer weather we have been having. It has been around 32 degrees here lately, so I'm getting more sweaty, and have sensitive skin to begin with, this causing me to get a few really sore spots around my stoma underneath the plaster. When Mum was here, she gave me some tea tree oil to put on my skin when I clean it. Just a few drops in some water, then I clean it, and that seems to be helping. The spots are going/ have gone away. I try not to look at the bad side though, the positive things since having this surgery have so far outweighed the bad.

My workmates have been so amazing, they put together the most beautiful get well gifts for me. So much thought had gone into it I feel really special. They hand made a card for me which was so lovely!! I am really looking forward to going back to work again. I start back at work really soon, on October 5th, unless they have any jobs come up for me sooner and I will go in to help them out :) I am a bit apprehensive about some things, but I think I will be fine.

How great are my workmates?

I have been getting back into cooking slowly. Last week I made leek and potato soup and stuffed capsicums for dinner. I was quite proud of myself. Not only have I never made them before, they tasted delicious and I spent my evening just pottering around the kitchen without feeling tired at all.

The top left is a picture of the overnight oats that I have been making. They are freaking delicious but I have had to stop eating them because they were no good for me :( I highly recommend anyone with a normal stomach making them though. It's the easiest and most delicious breakfast for summer. It takes slight preparation as you have to make it the night before, but you have breakfast ready to go in the morning without any prep, which if you are like me and not a morning person or time poor, is awesome.

nom nom!

I have had a couple of people ask me how I did the capsicums. I did an adaptation of this recipe here. I forgot about the red onion and basil even though I had them ready to go..duh!! We had some left over savoury mince from dinner the night before, so I put a little bit of that in the bottom and then followed this recipe. So good, I tried it with mince and without, and I preferred it with. We aren't very good vegetarians in this house hold! I didn't have ricotta on hand either, so used the feta that we had instead and it was delicious. Put the lemon in as well. I initially thought hmmm I dunno about that, but it's yum.

I hope you are all doing well. I will update soon how my first week of work goes!

Holly X