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Usually at this time of year I waffle on about resolutions and how life is going to be much better as a result of them but this year I’m not doing that, partly because resolutions never last the distance and more importantly because I have realised that life just doesn’t let you do as you plan as much as you might think! Planning to eat less, exercise more and so on are all well and go until something happens…

Towards the end of 2013 Pixie had a nasty accident that resulted in a broken collar bone which meant six weeks of pain, frustration and learning how to tie slings, at about the same time my seven year old Imp started to limp. We had two dr visits which yielded a diagnosis of strained muscles, not too unrealistic as he is active and may well have pulled something. After the suggested rest and pain relief he was still limping and a MRI scan revealed he had something called Perthes disease!

To say I was all at sea would be an understatement,  myself and Mr T were both hoping that it would be something called Irritable hip which is self limiting and lasts only a few weeks, Perthes is self limiting but much longer lasting and getting the right treatment is paramount to avoid problems in later life. Perhaps this is the most difficult part. He is in the group of 6-8 year old boys which show the most variability. We meet with an orthopaedic doctor tomorrow and I have everything crossed that he is in the group that require watchful management, maybe some physio, regular scans but no ‘active’ treatment. Depending on the severity however he could require crutches or even corrective surgery, some of it may be further down the line.

Perthes is a new disease to me, so lots of research has been done but until we know exactly what is happening with Imp we have no idea how high the mountain we have to climb is! Basically at some point the blood flow to the femoral bone was interrupted causing it to die, it basically rots is reabsorbed and then regrows so recovery is possible. The whole process can take from a year to three of four. Depending on how the bone regrows is how aggressive the treatment needs to be, as well as how much of the hip is involved in the initial phases.

Cruelly for young children the best treatment seems to be rest, particularly from sports such as football and rugby. In all probability he will need to avoid football, rugby, go-karting and so on for at least a year, swimming is in and  hopefully some of the other things he enjoys. Telling him he can no longer go and do things he enjoys has been difficult and in some ways we are looking forward to the next appointment and getting a better idea of what we need to be doing.  Perhaps the hardest things however is watching him limp and being in pain and knowing there is absolutely nothing I can do about it! I can’t take it away or make it go faster and we have noticed that instead of telling him no to run about we’re asking him how bad the pain is today?

Currently the weather is helping, running about and going to the park is out but at the moment the X-box and games are providing the entertainment and we are keeping it together. One of the saddest things so far happened when we were on the  way to an appointment and we passed the local park and he said, ‘sorry I can’t come to the park at the moment because it hurts!’ Questions start to pop into your head as well, what about the holiday in October, if he can’t currently walk to the local shop and back without being in pain, how will he manage the theme parks? Will he be able to go on any of the rides? What about other trips we have booked, will they be affected and school, what about games and all the stairs in the building?

I know there are far worse conditions out there but at the moment this does seem dreadful for him, we also know there is a genetic factor so we are watching the girls for signs of the same problem, luckily Hpops with all the activity she does and being 9 already should be OK, Pixie however is coming into the age group where things start to develop!

So there are things I want to achieve in 2014. I want to finish the kids books I have been writing for ages, the sequel to Tumbling and to finish the book I began for NaNoWriMo, but mostly I want to take advantage of good opportunities that come my way, enjoy my family and try to make  success of my job. Wish us luck as this is an adventure we weren’t really counting on!

NaNoWriMo is over and I have ended up with about half to three quarters of a first draft of a novel which I intend to finish and at some point publish, hopefully in the New Year quickly followed by More tumbles, coming to a Kindle near you by Easter life allowing.

When I decided to take part in the novelly writing month I had no idea how stressful life was about to become. Pixie had an accident at school resulting in a broken collar bone and humerus. This meant watching her in pain and having to try and dress her and manoeuvre her without adding to her pain burden, this did quickly ease and we fell into a routine. We had several scares when she was knocked or fell over and I am sure I was guilty of over parenting! I think one of the hardest things was watching her in her school Christmas performance, her class were being stars and were dancing to one of her favourite songs Shine. She was able to take part and they covered her chair in silver foil and we decorated her sling with silver stars as well as making her a silver wand to wave about. As she joined in I did feel a lump rise, partly pride that she had coped so well with an injury I am sure would have made me moan a lot more than she did, partly just being upset as she couldn’t join in, in the way she would have liked. However the big smile on her face as she took part convinced me that she was enjoying herself. A few deep breaths later and her song was finished and she was off and part of the choir again. The thing that really undid me was the end when she was given a special bow, was happily waving her wand in the air and beaming at me. Tears flowed and for the first time in a long time I cried at school. This was not made any easier by the fact that I was surrounded by friends, colleagues and other children, so a few sobs in a corner and rubbing of the eye and a much appreciated hugs from a couple of friends and  I was OK again.

Whilst all this has been going on our much loved chocolate labrador was diagnosed with cancer, I feared the worst as she is 11 and had another problem which required surgery but she came through the first one with no problems and during this tests were carried out revealing no spread of the cancer. Last week she had the second op and is due to visit the vet this Friday  to hopefully be officially discharged from their care. Pixie should go back to the fracture clinic on the same day and also be discharged.

As the saying goes it comes in threes and on the same day Imp will be having an MRI scan! At around the same time as Lucy was having her accident he was observed to be limping, his teacher was concerned and so after this had persisted for a while we took him to a local minor injuries unit, they thought it was muscular so we took him home, convinced him as much as we could to rest for a week and then allowed him to resume normal activities.  Within a couple of days we were back to the dragging of the leg and limping so we returned to the gp and were again advised he probably has some inflamed muscles and to use ibuprofen and to rest for a week, he did and the problem returned as soon as he began exercising, which when you are a seven year old boy is very frustrating. We returned to the gp, were referred to a consultant and saw him at the weekend. He believe the problem is in the hip and therefore the scan is to determine exactly what is going on. I am hoping that the scan come back clean which means that he has an irritable hip which will heal by itself but have to admit I am terrified it is something more sinister, either something called perthes disease, a growth or a dislocation, the dislocation is more easily fixed than the others but I am trying to tell myself not to panic before I know there is something to panic about! My first problem is to get him to lie still for long enough for them to take all the pictures during the scan!

Still hopefully we will at least have some answers soon and once we know what we’re dealing with we can work towards a goal, in the meantime Imp is fairly pleased to be told that when school is finished he doesn’t have to go and do too many chores but can watch TV, play in the x-box and do quiet activities! He isn’t so keen on my suggestion to read books and practice his handwriting but I guess I’ll have to try and convince him!

I have at least started my new job and it seems to be working out OK, I am enjoying the interacting with the children in a more relaxed setting as being a librarian gives me the opportunity to talk to them in a way that I wouldn’t be able to in class. The administrative side has been a steeper learning curve but I am getting there with that and have managed to track down most of the books that were deemed lost or missing or hiding in the library somewhere! I sometimes wonder why I keep the blog, a catalogue of times of things that have gone wrong or a basic moan, but I think to some extent it keeps me sane. I’m not looking for sympathy or pity but it is a way for me to get it all out, and in part to process in my own mind what is happening, a written way of thinking it all through if you like.  Hopefully the lead up to Christmas will be more fun than fear, presents are wrapped, tree is up and the kids are eagerly counting down the day to the visit of Father Christmas, hopefully by then they’ll be ready to have a lovely time. Merry Christmas to you all and keep smiling!

Half term has come and gone and despite the weather’s best attempts we did manage to carry out some activities. We visited Southend in fairly windy conditions but this did not deter the children from the rides! The highlight for them was carving pumpkins. Thanks to the supermarkets selling them fairly cheaply we were able to purchase one each for the children. Designs were made on paper first and then drawn on to the pumpkin. The messy and smelly job of removing the innards was everyones least favourite part of the job. The carving on the smaller pumpkins wasn’t too bad and Hpops produced a brilliant witch. Imp and myself did traditional jack o lantern designs and Pixie carved out shapes. On the night of Halloween we lit them using Halloween scented candles which smelt of candy and were quite enticing. We didn’t have many trick or treaters, although the kids were happy as that meant there was more Haribo left over for them!

We tried apple bobbing which proved to be amusing and difficult, none of us managed to get an apple out despite numerous attempts. The dogs on the other hand were able to get them out as quickly as anything as they simply got on with it! The kids went back to school happy after a great fireworks party. They got to eat pizza, watch fireworks, play with sparklers (gloves on both hands of course) and Hpops was engrossed in a Harry Potter quiz which demonstrated that she had read the books.

Now we are nearly a week into the new half term and I am sure the road to Christmas will be a busy one and I get to start a new job on Monday as a librarian, 15 hours a week that on the whole fit around the kids which leave me plenty of time for writing. Talking of which I have discovered that setting myself challenging writing targets works as I have been taking part in NaNoWriMo, (National Novel Writing Month), so far since the 1st November I have written at least 2000 words a day and having the target imposed means I have ensured that I have been hitting the targets as a result I think I will do this most of the time and I might even get the book I have been planning for years finished! Wish me luck.

For those of you who don’t know NaNoWirMo is national novel writing month and you sign up online. The idea is that you write 50,000 words during the month of November, and this year I have decided to take part. There are on-line local networks so you can meet up virtually with fellow writers and some areas organise writing events so you can get down to writing with people of a similar frame of mind. It is a challenge to write approximately 1500-2000 words a day, especially, as at the moment I am failing to write even 1000, and perhaps this was the impetus. The first draft on the children’s novel is nearly ready but even this has been slow going, too much prevaricating, time wasting and general distractions. NaNoWriMo then could be just the stimulation needed to kickstart the novel. There are two novels i have had planned for far too long, the sequel to Tumbling Through Life and a new novel with a theme that explores friendship and yet I haven’t managed to sit down and write them yet.

I have explained it away to myself, trying to find a job with a regular income, dealing with the children and various appointments that just have to take priority, but the truth is in reality fear. What if no-one reads it? What is people read it and hate it? Should  I use a non de plume just in case? Whilst all these thoughts are going around the writing is stilted and messy and although novels are planned no real work other than research has happened as yet, a few false starts and then the impetus runs out. SO I have decided that one of the novels is going to get written in as much of its entirety as it can this November, strangely for me straight onto the computer and hopefully at the end of the month I will be uploading it to the NaNoWriMo site to get an official word count, editing and publishing for Christmas.

The days of waiting for an editor to pick up the manuscript are over, I am going to take my chances with Amazon Kindle and let the work speak for itself. Fear will no doubt mount up but in the end my ambition has never been to be a bestselling author, just to maybe touch a few people or allow people to lose themselves in my story and characters for a few hours I still haven’t decided whether to add my own name but it’s time to be more confident and allow let others to decide if they want to read it or not! I am hoping that NaNoWriMo will re-establish my daily habit of writing every day for better fluidity and getting rid of those lazy and bad habits that develop, as most teachers of creative writing will say it is best to write every day wherever possible. As I have made this promise to myself, to just write for me without worrying ideas have been flowing, notebooks being scribbled in before the idea that arrives flees just as quickly.

Perhaps I want to take on the challenge as well to show the children how practice makes perfect, or at least a bit better than you were when you started, starting a task and finishing it. They are all working hard at school and this term has had a few surprises. Imp ran in a cross country team and has been going to running club, something I never thought I’d say about any of my children, and Pixie took a little time to adjust as it is the first time she has been alone in a school now her big brother has moved onto Year 3! Now she seems settled but we’ll see what happens after the half term holiday! Hpops meanwhile seems to be as forgetful as ever, we have already had to scour the house and school for glasses, violin and various books that she has managed to forget or lose! Pixie seems to have found something that interests her out of school as she has started to attend a stage school where she is enjoying learning to sing, dance and act, not that she needs much help with the latter as she has always been a drama queen, I just hope we’re not creating a monster!