Well it’s been a while hey?

Since having covid, followed by long covid my mind has been such a fuzzy mess that putting coherent thoughts down on the blog has been pretty impossible. But..finally I feel like I am at a point where life is slowly returning to normal. I still have rough days, some more so than others but I am getting there I think. It has been ten months since I got my positive test result and I am nowhere near full health or fitness but I will get there. I know in many ways I got off lightly, many people who have long covid can barely get out of bed, then there are the thousands of people that were lost to covid and its frightening to know that it can happen to people of my age who have previously been fit and healthy.

Life in general is slowly getting back to normal for all of us. I doubt that any of us will really get over what happened to the world this last 18 months but it has taught me and I am guessing so many of you such valuable lessons. It has taught me to want to make the most of my life, because it is just the one we get. It has made me more empathetic, yet also stronger. I am no longer the soft and often naive person I once was. I am firmer with people, I say no more often and I will not allow people to walk all over me. I have learned a lot about what I want in my life and more importantly who I want in my life, it showed me who are real friends and who were simply lurkers in my life.

I am determined more than ever to do more of what I want and what makes me happy at the same time as creating the best possible home and life for my children. And I believe I can do it. Life won’t be easy, it rarely is but if you make your days as happy and positive as you can then it changes your mindset and you find the harder days are a little easier to handle. I started forcing positive vibes into my day back at the earlier part of this year, I know that sounds pretty cheesy but I did. At first it was far from natural, we all know how easy it is to mope and let yourself wallow but the more I did it the easier and more natural it became and I realised I was starting to catch myself on those low days and I had found ways to manage it now.

Here are a few things I do to start my day positively:

Blast some feel good music, me and the girls love a kitchen disco in the mornings and we often play music on the walk to school and have a bit of a sing. Don’t underestimate the power of music and how it can transform your mood.

Eat a little better, now I don’t mean go on a diet and I definitely don’t mean cutting out favourite foods. Just think more about what you are eating, maybe on the weekend you know you will be going out for a sumptuous BBQ feast or all the snacks at the cinema so perhaps for a couple of days during the week you eat a little less red meat or sugar. What we put in our bodies affects how we feel. None of it for me is about losing weight, purely about helping my mind.

Get fresh air every day. Before I became unwell I was walking between 15-20k steps a day as well as attending a gym. I was the fittest I’d been in years and then suddenly I was struggling to breather and for about 4 months the furthest I walked was to the end of my street. By late Spring I was managing the school run and actually started to enjoy it again and I will never take being able to go for a long walk for granted again. I am still not back to being as fit as I’d like but I don’t put pressure on myself and as long as I’ve done something that day, even if it’s a ten minute walk then I feel better for it. I don’t need a perfectly toned body but I know how important exercise is for me personally and is a big factor in me having good mental health.

Avoid too much time with mood hoovers. I imagine not everyone knows what I mean by this but in your life you will definitely have mood hoovers or drains. People who only ever see the bad side of life and sometimes even seem to enjoy wallowing or being negative. You cannot avoid them altogether, perhaps they are members of your family or lifelong friends who need your support. But if your mental health is fragile and let’s be honest after the last two years it is for a lot of us then you do sometimes need to put yourself first and that is not selfish. Read that again. Putting yourself first is not selfish. Sometimes it is absolutely necessary. Remember the stronger and happier you are then the more likely you’ll be able to positively impact those around you. Be the change. I know it is very cheesy and almost Tony Robbins esque but it is true.

Find something that truly makes you happy and do it often. For me this is cooking and creating. Maybe for you it will be a certain game, going to a special place or even your work.

Find five positives in every day. You may think this is an impossible thing to do especially when you are going through a rough patch but don’t think these five positives have to be monumental things. Here are a couple of examples of positives I have found in the last few months:

Really good coffee

A walk by the river

The bubble of laughter from my girls when I do something daft

Being able to walk and see my parents

My favourite songs

Mastering a new recipe

Reading a quote that resonates

Fresh bedding

The fairy lights in my garden

The comforting feeling of a tight hug from someone who loves you

A beautiful butterfly landing on my lavender

None of these things are huge things, to some they will seem almost mundane. But keep counting those little things and just breathe it in. List them in a book, on your bad days look back at them and see how many of them were in that day without you even noticing. Life is brief and we ignore so much of it. Soak it up. Love, live and laugh a lot.

I have a few new recipes planned for this month so keep your eyes peeled and I really hope you are all doing well. feel free to comment with any recipes you’d like me to post or any ideas you have for me. Take care.

Like most people I spent March and April of this year scared that my loved ones or myself would contract Coronavirus. We saw frightening scenes on the news. Heard stories of people dying on ventilators in hospital and it was generally a frightening time for all of us.

Photo by Adam Nieściorukon Unsplash

As time went on and we began to get used to living in this strange new world I began to become less worried for myself and really I only focused on protecting others from getting it. I focused on my general health, worked out more and walked 10-15k steps a day. I felt in pretty good health. 

Life seemed to become more normal, nights out with friends resumed and the kids returned to school. It seemed we all had all learned to live with this pandemic. Cases dropped, the death rate in my area dropped to 0. I returned to my day job. Then slowly at first and then all of a sudden things changed again. Cases began to rise. We had to wear masks in shops, which although was the norm in most of the UK was all new to us in Wales and once again we were asked to stay away from other households. Pubs introduced curfews and restrictions and I realised that the time to be more careful was here. Not just with protecting others but also myself. I stopped going on nights out. The only sense of normality that remained was the gym but even there each machine was wiped before and after use and I always showered at home. I felt like I was doing all the right things. I still worried that my parents would get the virus so contact with them was minimal, no physical contact and only sat outside their home. I didn’t really worry that the virus would affect me if I got it. I thought naively it would be like a really bad cold.

It was at the beginning of October that one day I just couldn’t warm up. Then the next day I was full of cold. My nose was blocked, I felt kind of achy and tired. I stopped visiting my parents even outside just to be cautious. A few days later I had a cough, not a bad one but enough for me to order a home test. At this point I genuinely thought I was being over cautious then I lost my sense of smell and taste. I did really think this was down to my cold because my nose was so blocked. When my test result came back positive I was surprised but not worried. If anything I thought I’d get it out of the way. After all I was in my 30’s, a three times a week gym goer and I walked 15k steps a day. I had no major underlying health conditions and I was a healthy weight. I was sure this would feel like a nasty cold and then I’d be done, immune for a while at least and able to just get on with life. Unfortunately I was wrong.

I’m now nearly 10 weeks since I first developed symptoms, 9 weeks after my positive Covid result and my recovery is slow. Most days I get breathless at least 4 to 5 times, sometimes more. Sometimes it’s from putting washing in the tumble dryer or walking up the stairs. Sometimes it’s when I am sat watching telly and I haven’t even moved. My chest pain is still there every single day, my temperature still fluctuates throughout the days and nights and the joint pain, in particular my legs can be agonising at times. The overall feeling each day is one of extreme fatigue. Every morning I wake feeling almost hungover, groggy and as if I have really overdone it at the gym. I’ve barely seen anyone other than my two children in all of that time. I am very lucky in that my family and friends have helped with doorstep deliveries and helping with school runs as I’m not sure how I’d have coped otherwise. I have seen my GP five times, had blood tests, ECG’s and a chest x ray. I’ve had two strong doses of antibiotics, an asthma inhaler and am now on neurological pain tablets for the joint pain. I’ve taken more painkillers than I’ve ever taken in my life.

Some days I feel really low because it feels never-ending but I am also extremely grateful that this is as bad as it has been. For so many others the outcome is far worse. My recovery may be slow but I am, I think and hope, recovering slowly day by day.

But the real reason I wrote this post is to tell you that covid is very real. It doesn’t only affect the elderly or already sick. It can affect you or your families in exactly the same way as it has hit me. Yes I didn’t end up in hospital and for that I am thankful but it has had a significant impact on my life and will likely continue to do that for quite some time.

Here are the symptoms that I have experienced due to Covid. Read it carefully, be aware and stay safe:

Initial symptoms, day 1-3

Feeling very cold

Cold like symptoms, blocked nose and sinus pain. Lost some sense of smell but not all.

Aches all over. Similar to flu. Even wearing the softest of clothes hurt my skin.

Days 4-7

The cough began, not continuous but it hurt a lot when I coughed

Sore throat

Skin became more sensitive to the touch

Headaches

Days 7-10

My sense of smell completely went and my taste became impacted too.

My chest had begun to hurt a lot, it felt like I’d been kicked directly in the centre of my chest.

I had a temperature. It varied between 37.8 – 38.9 at its worst, this was whilst taking painkillers regularly.

The aches remained but my leg pain became a lot worse. It affected my sleep and I just felt in pain all day long.

Day 11+

The breathlessness began. This was the scariest of all of the symptoms and is still ongoing. Being unable to breathe properly panics you, I’ll never take it for granted again.

All other symptoms remained and other than the sore throat and cough which thankfully has eased and the temperature which is mostly ok they don’t seem to be going anywhere.

If you are in doubt about any symptoms you may have try and get tested, if you cant get tested at least isolate yourself to protect others. Some people won’t be able to beat this. We all have a responsibility to protect each other.

2020. I can imagine in years to come people sat down talking about difficult times and crazy news and saying yeah this may be bad but hey remember 2020? WOW.

Who’d have thought this year would turn out like this? I don’t know about you but I know that on January 1st this year I had a lot of big plans for this year. I was taking control of lots of areas of my life and I had many things I wanted to do. It seems pretty silly to look back and sort of mourn the year that we have almost lost because in the grand scheme of things myself and my family have been very lucky, we haven’t been personally affected really by the pandemic in terms of anyone being seriously ill. But yeah silly as it may sound it does seem that way, we have lost a significant chunk of time, time where we haven’t been able to be close with loved ones and friends and it almost seems as if some areas of life will never be quite the same. Although life is very slowly getting back to some sort of normality, there are still many things we can’t do and I still cannot hug my parents or have dinner at a friends house. I can’t curl up and watch a tv programme with a cup of tea on my parents sofa. Can’t eat inside a restaurant ( at least here in Wales), haven’t been clothes shopping since February, haven’t had a haircut in even longer. In fact for someone who travels so much my life has been contained within 4 miles for 5 months. It’s crazy and still sometimes feels almost surreal, anyone else still wake up some mornings and think woah what an absolutely bonkers dream?

I have learned to appreciate the smaller pleasures a lot more. A daily coffee in the garden where I have got to know all of my regular birds and whilst I often begrudge ordering myself a takeaway I don’t think twice about ordering them 150 fat balls.

I have started growing lots more veggies and herbs at home. and it tastes so much better when you know you grew it!

As a huge indulgence at the beginning of the pandemic I ordered a hot tub for the garden, I say huge indulgence when I actually got a pretty decent deal for £199 and whilst that kind of impulsive purchase is very unlike me it has made the experience a whole lot sweeter. I do some form of daily exercise, because I have the time for it. Sometimes I walk 10-15k steps a day, other days its yoga or stretching but something each day and my body is stronger and healthier as a result. I haven’t taken up a new hobby as such or learned a new language or written a book but I have baked A LOT, I have made major life decisions and I’ve started writing just for pleasure again. Not even pieces I want anyone to read but just writing for me, for the pleasure of it and because sometimes my stupid brain just will not switch off at night. I have worked on my friendships more, making sure to maintain contact when we weren’t able to see each other. I speak to my family more and I have tried where I can to make life easier for those around me, in small ways where possible and thats helped me to keep going.

I will admit there have been times, especially when I have been entirely alone at home on rainy days where I have sat down and had a good cry because for someone who actually loves to be alone I have at times been incredibly lonely. For normally being alone is a choice you make, these last few months that has been forced on me occasionally and it is an eye opener. I realised that although I am not someone who needs company all the time that I should seek it out more often and be more social when the opportunity allows it.

I guess this is just a bit of a ramble but I haven’t posted much lately and thought you may enjoy a little of what is going on in my life. I’ve got some exciting stuff to share with you soon I promise.

I’ll end with this, whilst this year has been hard on most of us I am thankful that my friends and family are for the most part happy and healthy. We all have managed to keep our jobs and yes we have seen the effect of this awful virus through members of the family who work for the NHS and through the news but we are all ok. I am thankful for that in more ways than I can say. I hope this time hasn’t been too difficult for you and yours. Feel free to say hey on my social channels, I do like to catch up with you all!