Sleepless Nights

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  • Review for The Ginger People

    No payment was received for this post, but products were provided in the interests of honest reviewing.

     

    Back in February I was approached by a PR company for The Ginger People, and let me tell you, no one is more surprised by this than me. I stopped doing a lot of PR work many many years ago, before Evelyn was born and my last little bit of brain power trickled out of my ears.

    Nowadays everything is soap, packaging, kittens, and chaos. Reviews are low on my to-do list.

    However, ginger is one of my favourite things, seeing as how I eat antiemetics for breakfast, and still spend a lot of time nauseous. I was keen to try some of their travel sickness pills, and ginger syrup sounded like something I could use in soap, so here we are.

    Ginger Rescue.

    Chewable ginger tablets, meant to help with nausea. We received the original flavour, and the mango flavour, because Amy (now 11) has a lot of EDS related nausea and I was interested to have her try them.

    Look, I liked them. They won’t replace a medically prescribed antiemetic if you’re chronically ill, but they were good to take the edge off before the nausea could really take hold.

    Amy took mango flavoured tablets to her school camp to help with the hours on a bus, and she says they helped.

    There are two tablets in each individually wrapped pouch, and they’re technically chewable, but I found them a bit hard on my teeth, so sucked them instead.

    Be warned, the original flavour packs some serious bite, so if you don’t enjoy the ginger burn, or you have chronic reflux, or similar gastric issues, opt for the mango flavour instead. It still tastes good, and it’s much gentler on your mouth.

    Gin Gins Super Strength

    Tasty chewable ginger lollies, these have the consistency of chewy caramels, and are more like a sweet than a “rescue” tablet.

    Again, quite a hit of ginger burn – none of my children enjoyed these – but I found them quite nice. Individually wrapped, they’re perfect for dropping at the bottom of my handbag along with all my other medications.

    No, they will not stop an EDS-y/POTSy/Dysautonomia vomiting style crash, but for “normal people” nausea, I imagine they’d be quite useful. I like them of a morning before I’ve had time to register exactly how terrible I’m feeling. Also good when I’m out in public and not dying, but not feeling great either.

    Ginger Syrup

    Now we get to the good stuff.

    I had been using this to add light ginger flavour to marinades, roasts, anything that could tolerate the “syrup” portion of the product. Because yes, this is syrup and it’s very sweet (mostly cane sugar). I had vague visions of adding some to soap, but then I worried about ginger on mucus membranes, and I figured … maybe not.

    Then I got The Cold From Hell (which might have actually been flu) and in the last week, I have drunk half a bottle of this syrup added to Lemon and Honey drinks, and it is the absolute bomb. It is so so good.

    My throat felt better and it had enough bite to add a lovely element to lemon honey drinks..

    Downsides: the lid of the bottle dripped whenever I used it, no matter what I did, which made the bottle sticky.

    Really that’s my only complaint.

    –

    I also received pickled ginger for use with sushi, but I haven’t had the spoons/energy to make sushi in the last month, so the jar remains unopened. Based on the quality of the other products, I doubt I’ll have any complaints about it.

    So there it is.

    The ginger syrup I will continue to buy with my own money, because it is an excellent product to have in your arsenal of cold fighting products, but I imagine it would also be delicious with pancakes, or scones and cream.

    Products were provided in order to write this review. No money changed hands.

     

  • Eternal Optimism doesn’t work on Mother Nature

    I am eternally optimistic. Stupidly so, sometimes. Things will get better, it will be okay, we’ll get through it.

    This is of course why I was busy packing the car with all of the market set up last night, despite knowing that rain was forecast for today. A lot of rain. Because maybe it would be okay. It might not happen. It might be gorgeous weather. This is Tasmania, you can’t count on anything.

    Of course, I was wrong, and when it was pouring at 5am I lay in bed wondering what the best course of action was, right up until Evelyn woke up having an asthma attack and I had to get out of bed to make sure she could breathe.

    After fixing her, and spending a lot of time looking at every single weather report I could get my hands on, while talking to Mum, I decided to stay home.

    That wasn’t the end of it though. Because the angst. So much angst. I hate cancelling, and I hate letting markets down. Especially Autumn Fest which is one of my very favourite events to attend ever.

    However the idea of setting up a marquee in a thunderstorm and then standing alone in the pouring rain all day, in a marquee filled with soap, unable to leave – well. That was the kicker for me.

    So no market today.

    Of course this means you benefit, darling readers, because I am having a 20% off wet weather sale. If you use the coupon code WETWEATHER at checkout, you’ll get 20% off, and you won’t even have to come and stand in the rain with me.

    Shop Now.

     

    It’s absolutely bucketing down outside now, and I know I made the right decision, snuggled up writing this in a warm hoodie and yoga pants, with a cup of hot tea, rather than scarves and boots with a thermos of rapidly cooling hot chocolate.

    Tasmania in Autumn. Fun times.

     

  • Almost the end of the busy season.

    Almost the end of the busy season.

    We’re at the tail end of the crazy busy season, and while I’m not dying, I’m feeling a bit under the weather. I’ve managed a few weekends off over the Summer season, but my body is telling me it wasn’t enough time, wasn’t enough resting.

    It doesn’t help that Evelyn’s (very successful) entry into Kindergarten has seen her bring home a whole new slew of viruses, with sore throats and coughing, and something which seems to involve a headache which panadol can’t shake and oh my god, how many more painkillers can one woman take? (Answer: A lot. A LOT MORE.)

    Which is to say, things are good, and successful, and crazy busy.

    If you’re on Facebook you’ll know that we applied for some extra money on our mortgage and were successful, so hopefully we can start building an extension as soon as the busy season eases off. An extension which will involve, amongst other things, a studio and small shop front. I cannot wait to have my own space, and to be able to offer retail sales at least a few days a week, from home. Markets are lovely, but they are a lot of work and there aren’t many of them through the winter, so the year feels uneven, with craziness, followed by a period of sloth-like lack of routine. Neither of these are situations in which I thrive, if I’m being honest.

    Sadly, it means my small garden I have been babying along for the last five years (through toddlers and puppies and dogs and chaos) will have to be torn out, but if it means I get a studio and a sun room and a bedroom which has a real door and isn’t directly across the hallway from my tween daughter, I’m okay with that. We’re holding out a little longer until the blueberries and the small elder tree hibernate for winter so I can attempt a transplant, but we’ll see. At least that’s what I am telling myself.

    So that’s a thing which will be happening.

    Kids are good, everything is good really. The business trucks along nicely, and I’m hoping I have enough stock to see me through two more major markets before I have to start making soap again. Don’t get me wrong, I love making soap, but my joints do not love me at all right now, and heavy lifting is a bit beyond my reach. I’m relying on previously made stock and hoping to cut down on some of the increasingly large range, to make it easier for myself. Well, mostly to make it easier to find room for something. 100 different soaps in stock is a bit ridiculous, really.

    I’m desperately waiting on hand cream tins to arrive – tracking says they’ve been handed off to a courier, but I needed them three days ago. I have enough tins to fill a wholesale order due out, and then I might have to use plastic for Autumn Fest stock. (Autumn Fest is on in New Norfolk this weekend, 9th April, if you’re local, it’s a lot of fun. I will be there.)

    I’ve missed writing, and found myself awake at 3am last night, waiting for panadol to kick in and writing blog posts in my head, so no promises, but this space is mine and I paid for the damn hosting, so I may as well use it. At least a little. Sleepless Nights is never going to be about children again, but there’s space for my writing to be about work and markets and soap and EDS and why that damn giraffe hasn’t had her baby yet.

    We’ll see how it goes.

  • Mummyblogging is dead. (The things I would tell you)

    Mummyblogging is dead.

    We all know it.

    It died in the face of perfectly filtered instagram photos, posed and cropped for maximum rose-coloured-glasses blur. It died in the face of recipes full of hidden vegetables and sickly coconut oil truffle imposters. It died in the face of all our kids grew up and we realised we couldn’t talk about them on the Internet anymore. It died in the face of sponsored post after sponsored post, hey guys, look at my brand new glasses/holiday/chocolate brownies with no real chocolate in. It died, and we mourn its passing in the same way we kind of mourn leggings as pants (long live the yoga pants, you can pry them off my dead body) and real cake with real sugar and actual gluten (holy fuck I miss gluten).

    But.

    But.

    If I was mummyblogging still, I would tell you about Evelyn laying so still, and so calm, as she was measured for a full body orthotic suit to help keep her joints together at kindergarten next year. I would tell you about dislocating joints, and muscle fatigue and pain, about how she tries so hard, but her muscles can’t do the job of her ligaments all of the time and she’s so very tired. I would tell you how she wants to play and dance and run, and can’t, but maybe she can soon again. With a little help.

    I would tell you how Evelyn spoke to another child at prekinder today – a first for her. She asked someone to play and they did, and then they ran around together, two small children, riding bikes and playing in the water together. I would tell you how she excitedly told her teacher in front of the entire class that we put up our Christmas tree early and I was so proud of her for using her words that I nearly burst, because this child. This child of mine, she struggles sometimes to find the words in new situations or with new people or even with people she sees regularly, like her prekinder classmates.

    I would tell you about the whining whining whining until your teeth are as on edge as mine, but maybe it’s pain, maybe it’s exhaustion, maybe being four and the littlest just is the Worst Thing Ever and so there’s that tone in her voice until you just want to scream.

    I would tell you all about how seven sucks so badly you can taste it, but ten is pretty awesome, and there’s a sense of humour brewing in there, even if it is borderline inappropriate sometimes. Hilarious though.

    I would tell you about trying to juggle what is best academically with what is best physically for a child who needs help in both of these areas. I would tell you about the exhaustion of shouting GO TO BED a hundred times in a row until finally they crash and you crash and there’s not enough hours in the day.

    I would tell you all about juggling school commitments and work, and parenting bendy kids with bendy joints and bendy quirky brains. I would tell you about packing soap with a child screaming under the worktable until your eyes spin around and everything is ruined forever.

    I would tell you all of these things, but mummyblogging is dead.

    So sad.

  • It’s not a lifestyle choice you bastards.

    Shutting the fuck up is gluten free. Why don't you add that to your diet you cunt.

    Back at the beginning of the year, I had some new health problems pop up.

    I have Ehlers Danlos Syndrome, so feeling dreadful a lot of the time isn’t abnormal, but this was New and Different, and actually pretty shit.

    Between March and May, I had a whole round of blood tests done to check my health out. Why was I more than exhausted all of the time? Why was my hair falling out in handfuls? Why were my joints hurting beyond what was normal? Why did I feel so generally fucking awful without a new and good reason?

    We couldn’t tell. I was anaemic, and iron supplements weren’t fixing it. My thyroid levels were elevated, and then they weren’t. My hair continued to fall out, and I was barely making it through my days.

    As a last ditch effort, my doctor told me to give up gluten. “It probably isn’t coeliacs, but quit gluten for 6 weeks and see how you feel. If you get better, don’t eat any more gluten.”

    It was our last option, but there it was. Quit gluten and see how you feel. He didn’t want to do any more tests because what else could we test for? (Coeliac markers maybe, but he didn’t want to.)

    So I quit gluten.

    That was back in May. I’ve eaten gluten properly once since then, and I spent the night head down in the toilet afterwards.

    Gluten doesn’t agree with me. It makes me dreadfully sick. I get really spacey and my brain stops working well. I develop a rotten headache and reflux. I get nausea, and then all of my joints hurt and I get really angry. It lasts three days before I start feeling better after I get glutened.

    It’s miserable is what I’m saying.

    And yet here I am, justifying why I don’t eat gluten.

    This is not a choice I made, but it is what it is. Other people don’t see it like that though. Go into a cafe and ask to not be made sick, and you’re some sort of evil orthorexic clean eating demanding bitch who wants to make their life hard. “Gluten Free Foodie Wankers” are the butt of all the jokes, as the tellers sit there in their bodies which work well, digesting whatever they feed themselves.

    Of course they’re all very quick to point out that “We don’t mean people who actually have coeliacs, you know. Just everyone else? Right? Because they’re just being arseholes about it.”

    Recent studies have shown Non-Coeliac Gluten Intolerance is a real thing, suffered by real people, with real symptoms, and I’m fucking pissed off, because everyone still acts like I’m making their life hard when I ask them to not put fucking breadcrumbs on my plate accidentally.

    Being gluten free is not fun, or easy. Unless you live in the mecca of upmarket cafes, finding something to eat when you’re ou,t which isn’t another lettuce salad with no dressing, is a pain in the arse. You miss out on cake at parties. Actually, you miss out on everything at parties, because you can’t trust that your gluten free salad hasn’t had a contaminated spoon in it.

    It’s HARD and it’s frustrating, and I fucking hate it. It’s not a choice I got to make. I can’t eat mostly gluten free but then have a cupcake on the weekend as a naughty treat. It takes work and planning to be gluten free.

    I mostly don’t mind this, because I really like not feeling any shittier than I already do with the EDS. But I am so so so fucking sick of being asked to produce my credentials every time I mention I can’t eat gluten, or having people roll their eyes at me when I ask if their hot chocolate is gluten free (it usually isn’t) when I just want a hot drink at a coffee shop.

    I know it makes more work, and I know it’s a hassle – trust me, I KNOW.

    But for fuck’s sake, don’t make it harder for me.

    People behave like they’re the food police, like they get to have a say what other people put in their mouths. And you know what? It’s bullshit.

    Stop it. Stop questioning people over their dietary choices, or needs.

    Stop making us feel like shit for needing to avoid certain foods.

    And for fuck’s sake, can companies please stop cross contaminating all of the chocolate with wheat. It’s making it REALLY hard to not be a grumpy git when I can’t even eat plain chocolate.

    Sigh.

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