Sleepless Nights

Author: Veronica

  • Online shopping, Ozsale and win one of two $50 vouchers!

    We all know that because of my EDS, I find in-store shopping absolutely exhausting. Therefore, I try and do as much shopping online as possible, as exhibited by the fact I’ve not needed to walk into a book shop for months.

    So when Ozsale emailed me and asked me if I’d like to try out their online shop, and included $50 credit to get me started, I agreed readily. You see, Ozsale do designer wear at cheap (amazingly so) prices – cheap enough to make me spend money in any case!

    Plus, with the 2 kids at home, I barely get into the cheap department stores to pick up clothes for the kids, so being able to shop from home makes things amazingly simple.

    I had a look around the site and found it really easy to navigate (huge plus in my book) with the current sales running. Also, once I signed up as a member – which I had to do to get access to the shops – I was getting emails letting me know about new sales.

    I had a ball, buying some pretty notebooks for me – we all know I have a major book and stationery fetish, some pretty pyjamas for the kids and a tracksuit set and some t-shirts also for the kids. Minus the shipping, I spent barely over $50 and got lots.

    Of course, I’ve spent a lot of time lusting over the gorgeous designer boots, but sadly, I can’t afford them, even if they are reduced drastically. My budget can’t quite stretch to $200 for $1000 boots – even if they are lucious.

    On top of giving me $50 credit and letting me run wild on their website, Ozsale has offered me TWO $50 vouchers to give away to my Australian readers.

    So, to win a $50 voucher tell me:

    What do you find hardest/easiest about shopping for kids?

    One comment per person, comment to enter.

    Tweet about this giveaway (and include @sleeplessnights so I can track the tweets) to gain an extra entry, but this is not necessary to win.

    Winners will be chosen using random.org and the competition will close on the 24th of July at midnight AEST.  Competition is sadly, only open to Australian residents.

    I would LOVE to give away these vouchers, simply because I had so much fun spending mine.

    AND THE WINNERS ARE!!

    Congratulations Kristy and TwitchyFingers! I’ll be emailing you shortly.

  • Cymbalta, Ehlers Danlos and Teething.

    This morning when I woke up and discovered that my skin was still looking godawful and I looked terrible, I thought that maybe I’d just hide in a bed somewhere warm for the day. Of course, life with kids never works out quite that way and while I did manage 30 minutes in bed before lunch with a book, I had Isaac snuggled under my chin and Amy curled up in the small of my back, eating an orange and dripping juice everywhere.

    I think part of my roller coaster of manic energy/total exhaustion has been due to my new tablets. The cymbalta have been fantastic for my anxiety since I got over the hurdle of the first week – in which I spent the days feeling stoned out of my mind, not sleeping and hurting all over – however, they do have some drawbacks.

    My appetite has been killed dead. Now that wouldn’t be so bad, if I didn’t get sick so fast. Without eating, my body forgets all the things it’s meant to be doing, like healing and not producing giant bruises and spectacular pimples. Cups of tea, sadly, while I could keep them down, weren’t doing anything for my health, because it’s all I was ingesting. I’m making a giant effort to at least drink milk and eat lots of fruit and while I’m still taking anti-nausea pills like they’re going out of fashion, I’ve not retched today and I have managed to eat. Not a lot, but I ate.

    The cymbalta also make me incredibly restless. I was hoping they’d make me a little drowsy, so I could take them before bed, but a few nights of not sleeping convinced me that that’s not how they were going to work. I’m having trouble sitting still to do anything, finding myself wandering away mid sentence in a book, or drifting towards the fire a few lines into a blog post. The children think this is great and follow me around the house, hoping that I’ll dole out chocolate instead of setting out to make a proper lunch. I’ve not done it yet, but they’re forever hopeful.

    On the upside, like I mentioned above, they’ve been fantastic for my panic attacks and so so good for the neuropathic pain episodes and despite the first week of insomnia, I am sleeping well enough at night, once I can finally switch off. Surely 6 good heavy hours of sleep is better than 8 broken hours. Right?

    In other news, Isaac is teething, with 3 molars making their way through at the moment. While he’s not waking at night – he’s a better sleeper than Amy, still! (who is waking at night, regularly) – he is completely miserable during the day, clinging and whining a lot. It’s draining on me, as I’m falling apart a little and he wants to to snuggle on my chest, while I stand up and rock him. Sitting down = unacceptable. He will allow me to sit on the fit ball, but my proprioception is so terrible that I am certain it’s only sheer luck we haven’t fallen off it yet. At this point, with him clingy and completely napless, I would KILL for a rocking chair. It’s on my wish list of things I’ll never have. Like a dishwasher, a maid and spare time.

    He was happy today to see my mother and even happier to wander around outside with us for a while, although he had a tantrum of epic proportions when we came back inside because I couldn’t stand any longer. He can do a brilliant tantrum, with the face down screaming and kicking. I’m sure it will be amusing until the first time he does it in public.

    Amy was also thrilled to be wandering around outside with her grandmother and her mother, even happier when Mum found two duck eggs, laid early this morning. (They definitely weren’t there yesterday evening when I did the rounds) At this point, we’ve got 5 ducks and a drake, 6 chooks and a rooster and we’re getting two hens eggs a day. I’m going to steal some of the ducks eggs, just long enough to get us into spring, so that I won’t be worrying about the ducks (and hens) raising babies in the bitter cold. When they start to sit, I’ll keep you updated.

    I’m hanging on Spring and the warmer weather, dying to get things growing properly in my garden and to be eating something (other than eggs) that I’ve had a hand in producing. Not to mention how much better my EDS feels when I’m not frozen solid and I’m able to sit in the sunshine, without the wind stripping the flesh from my bones. Come on warmth.

  • Boobs!

    So, it’s that time of the year again. The time where we all snap photos of our (mostly) clothed boobs and let Lotus put them on the Internet in aid of breast cancer research and winning stuff for ourselves.

    This is the 3rd time I’ve participated, the first time I was in the middle of weaning Amy and the second time I was deep in the breastfeeding woods with Isaac. It was nice to be able to wear a pretty bra for this one!

    So, if you’d like to head over and vote, my boobs are #5 and you can vote as many times as you like. Yay me!

    For the record, before anyone gets whingy and starts complaining that it’s a huge traffic grab (which hey, I’ve been on the ‘net for a while, I know what gets complained about), all the ad revenue raised this month during the Bewb Fest will be donated in aid if breast cancer research. And that’s always a good thing!

    Honarable mention to whoever owns photo #1, awesome photo (I don’t know who you are) and I’m voting for you too!

    (I’ll write something substantial soon, I’m finding myself in a small haze of exhaustion and crying children lately. I will resurface, eventually.)

  • Drugs and Addictions.

    Drugs:

    I’m beginning to feel a bit like a Pharmacy, as I juggle drugs and fill prescriptions and dole out medication to myself. It’s an interesting place to find yourself at 21, unlike my peers, I don’t have a recreational drug habit, just a I’m-slightly-broken type drug habit.

    Nathan wonders what damage I’m doing to my body by taking them. I wonder what damage I’d be likely to do to my body was I not taking them. We end in a stalemate.

    I saw the doctor again today, and left with a new anti-depressant, something that has the benefit of being even better for neuropathic pain and anxiety. I’m grateful for this, the Endep is fantastic, but if the new drug, Cymbalta, is even more fantastic than the Endep, well then, I’ll take that thankyouverymuch.

    I shall report back with how I’m feeling in a week or so.

    Addictions:

    Books. My standard addictions. Plus chocolate, but I can’t link you up with the chocolate I love. Hehe.

    (all links are affiliate links, but I’ve searched for the cheapest copy of the book, plus it’s free shipping. I earn a few pence if you buy something through these links)

    I just finished reading The Time Travellers Wife, which is a brilliant book. Absolutely fantastic. If you haven’t read it, you should, I recommend it entirely.

    Other books I recommend entirely are the books from Alice Sebold – The Lovely Bones, Lucky, and The Almost Moon, all of which will take your breath away with their brilliant writing.

    I’ve just started The Invisible Road, by Elizabeth Knox (which is 2 books in one, Dreamhunter and Dreamquake), the book that the lovely Stephen Estcourt mailed to me.

    On my current to read list are

    Riders and Rivals by Jilly Cooper – total junk food for the brain. I’m looking forward to it.

    One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia Marquez – I’ve heard good things.

    Amy and I are reading Alice in Wonderland, it’s a little old for her, but she’s enjoying snuggling while we try and get through a chapter a day (a chapter is around 5 pages, so not too bad.)

    Schindlers List by Thomas Keneally

    My Invented Country by Isabel Allende

    And for cooking and food books, I’ve just read Heston Blumenthals Total Perfection and enjoyed it immensely as well as Margaret Fultons Encyclopaedia of Food and Cookery.

    So that’s me.

    What are you reading at the moment?

    And if you’re not reading books, what blogs are making you laugh/cry/wonder? Leave a link, I’m always after new blogs to follow.

  • Hadrians Walk

    When I heard that Martin was planning on walking 84 miles in 6 days, across England, I might have laughed at him a bit. Just a little. Okay, I choked eventually.

    But you know what? He’s 3 days into it and so far whilst he is suffering a bit (okay, a lot) he’s not dead yet.

    Frankly, I think all the walkers are mad, absolutely bloody mad, but it’s such a good cause, how can I begrudge them their madness. So, even as I laughed about Martin walking his feet off, I threw some money his way, so that it was at least worth his blood, sweat and tears.

    If you’re interested, you can watch the tweets come in by searching #hadrianswalk on twitter (and there, I’ve even linked it for you!) and Dad Who Writes is keeping us all updated at the end of each day.

    The money raised goes to the Joseph Salmon Trust.

    Joseph Salmon was a little boy who died of pneumonia when he was three. A year after his death his parents set up the Joseph Salmon trust to give financial support to parents in the Huddersfield and Mirfield areas, whose child has died.

    So, you know, it’s a good cause and everything.

    Basically, I’m asking you to dig deep and donate a few pence to the Joseph Salmon Trust, so that they can help out bereaved parents.

    OR, if you don’t have the money (which hey, I know that feeling well, without my ad revenue I wouldn’t have been able to donate a cent) you can go and comment on THIS POST, where $1 will be donated for every comment left. (fine print: One comment per person and a valid email address MUST be left).

    And if you’re so inclined, cheer the walkers along on twitter by using the #hadrianswalk hashtag. They’ll (probably) be grateful for all the support they can get (from us lazy internet friends sitting at home in our warm living rooms….).

    Hehe.

    Photo credit: Dad Who Writes