Just... life things

I've been really enjoying my life lately. It's taken a while but I'm finally headed somewhere positive (I think) and things are on a good streak. 

Mainly. 

It's a hard one isn't it? Happiness. You might never know whether you're truly happy or not, sometimes you think you're happy and you're actually not you're just settled, but it takes something life-changing to happen to make you see any different. I thought like that last year, even this time last year. I'd split up wth my ex-boyfriend in October last year and I'd thought we were really happy, I had a good job and a house and a beautiful wee cat and then it all fell apart. Slowly. It was like when it snows - it started off small, with things gently falling out of place and then suddenly everything was out of my control. I lost my job, then my boyfriend and then my house. 

 A year down the line I'm happier than I think I have been for a long time. I'm (loosely) sticking to slimming world so I'm still healthier than I've ever been, I socialise more, I have a job I adore with wonderful people. But I'm itching. I'm itching for change, for something new. Something more of a challenge with new people! 

 My biggest issue awkwardly is people. Socially I struggle sometimes. New people I find hard to handle and groups of people. Often groups of people I know but don't know to talk to are the worst. Even sometimes single people I know but don't do are hard for me to talk to. I get all awkward and shy and embarrassed then I realise I'm acting like a clown and get more embarrassed and it's just a hard circle to escape from. 

 But I always think that it makes you feel more alive to be in those sort of situations, the ones that make you worry a bit and your heart beat faster. Because you're feeling something no matter how small or pathetic it actually is. A reminder that yes you're still here and yes you matter. So many people don't understand how much they mean to another person or even know their own self worth. 

 I'd like to live far away, in some small town or village somewhere. Smaller than Irvine but not completely off the map. I like the sound of Orkney or Skye or the Shetland Islands. But on an opposite thought I'd be happy in Inverness or Fife or Aberdeen. Somewhere northern and a tiny tad more rural than here. 

 Nothing in Irvine really entices me more or draws me in to stay. Except for my job I have, but who knows how long that's going to last.

Believe in You

People always very quick to tell you to 'never give up' on things in life, especially when it comes to your hopes and dreams. Anyone whose ever had any sort of dream or goal must know that this is nigh on impossible. The most important thing in my eyes is that you don't give up in the long term, so most importantly if you DO give up for whatever reason take time, give yourself a quick shake and jump up right back on it! Life is short and unfortunately during that time you will come across and spend copious amounts of time with the wrong people who will discourage you and belittle you. 

The most important thing ever is to believe in yourself!

I didn't for a long time due to negative experiences and even more negative people, but fortunately after a rather long period of time I've finally been able to pick myself up, dust myself off and get moving again in life 😊

Slimming World... Problem Solved?

 So this is my sixth week at slimming world. I've been attending the meetings every single week for my weigh in and staying for some classes, but it's been hard this past three or so weeks because I've been on and off plan on a daily basis. It showed in the scales as this week I gained 1lb. 

 I've been going with my best friend and so far she's lost a grand total of 17lbs whereas I've lost a measly 4. I keep making excuses - I'll get back on track tomorrow, I'll be back on it after my weigh in this week, and the worst one 'I don't really need to lose weight anyway'. 

 I don't necessarily need to lose weight, I'm not hugely overweight but it's more of a personal thing, more of a choice. I'm uncomfortable with how I look and how I feel and I want to be healthier for next year, preferably next summer. Slimming world is a godsend that way as its looking at changing eating habits as opposed to calorie counting. Calorie counting on very bad at as I'll have my calories on stupid things, tiny portions of chicken nuggets instead of being sensible. Plus I hate carb restrictive diets - feed me pasta and potatoes and I'll love you forever!

 One of my biggest problems is the relationship I have with food. I have a very odd relationship, I'm so fussy with what I eat, I'll not try new things so every so often I get so bored with my repetitive diet that I just don't eat because I can't decide what I want because it all sounds so bland and then I get so hungry I go for the nearest convenience - often kfc or McDonald's. Maybe I need to make a bit of a resolution to try more new foods - using quorn I can try so many new things as they're easy enough to swap. I often make 'chicken' curries and bolognese using this method. Maybe I should make an effort to try one or two new recipes per week.

 One thing I do love is my soups. They're packed with vegetable and can be nothing but good for me. I batch cook and freeze, making one or two soup per time and then freezing between 5 and 10 bags. Being free on slimming world I can put rice in my soups to bulk them out and this does me a meal! 

 I'm not even finding myself wanting to eat as much sugar as I did previously, my love for cakes and biscuits comes and goes but often these days I'd rather have melon or something savoury which I suppose has to be good. There's so much free savoury stuff, a lot of it quick to make! 

 On that note I better not forget that I need to buy more veggie sausages... I've eaten all the ones I had 😆

Just a wee daily post

Sometimes I find it hard to think of things that I want to blog about. I don't feel my life is particularly interesting enough (although it certainly has its days!). Sometimes I'm just at a total loss and don't have a clue. 

 I talk a lot about my job. I love my job, but I think it's more for the people than for the 'job satisfaction'. It's definitely more these two reasons than the pay level. I'm paid decently enough for what I do and it's more than the minimum wage but it's certainly not a pay I'd like to stay on for the rest of my life. 

 My biggest problem lies with the fact that I love my job, I know I'm good at my job, I'm quite well liked within my workplace and I'm fairly happy and settled. However I don't ever want to move up. I'm happiest working with the people, on the lowest level. I don't want to move up to eventually be a manager because I feel in my line of work that this is where all of the job leaves the job and the stress and paperwork just piles up. I don't think I'd cope too well with that. 

 My mum is forever on at me to try and work my way up or to perhaps retrain as a nurse, but again I feel nursing is becoming a paperwork oriented and highly stressful job. Where's the satisfaction there? Where's the utter joy from helping someone albeit with the most basic of tasks? 

 I know my mum and family are just wanting the best for me but sometimes I find it hard to try and talk to them to let them know I'm happy enough where I am for now. At the moment I like my job, I like the free time and freedom I get, I'm happy enough with my holidays and I'm pretty damn good at following my job role. 

 Maybe in the future ill want a more permanent or creative or easy going or harder working career, who knows. For now though I'm just grateful for the opportunity to be making a significant difference in the lives of both those I work with and those I support. 

 Makes all the bad days worthwhile!

What is 'the Norm'

I'm a Support Worker. 

This job has numerous titles - Care Assistant, Care Practitioner, Care at Home Assistant, Community Alarm Staff, Personal Assistant, but all these titles effectively mean the same thing. 

 People in this line of work, my line of work, are at the very forefront of other people's lives. We help people who may have any number or form of disabilities to have a 'normal life'. Because  quite often people with disabilities are still seen to be 'abnormal' in some way. 

 A disability can be caused by any number of factors - age, genes, gender, an accident or fall and issues during or at birth can all lead to a disability. Brain damage is a big cause and this can be caused by something as minor as a bump to the head. A car accident or assault can also leave you with enough brain damage to be left with a disability for the rest of your life. Sadly many members of the public can't wrap their heads around the fact that at any time, suddenly your life could just change. Families also struggle with a change in their relative if something happens, and this is mainly because people still see people who have a disability as being heavily reliant on others. This isn't always true and from my personal experiences I've worked with people who require 24 hour care and support, adults who need constant supervision, people who require sporadic visits and people who are so independent that they don't need support at all. These four very different groups of people have only one thing in common - they're all registered disabled. 

People with a disability are often viewed as 'different' or 'strange' or 'not normal' but to be honest I think people have lost sight of what the word 'normal' actually means. Normal is something that is different to every single person on this planet. For some people it's normal to go to work every day, but that's not everyone. For some people normal is driving a car to work, but that's not everyone. For some people normal is jumping onto a private jet and flying halfway around the world because you fancied some proper Colombian coffee beans, but that's definitely not a normality for most people. 

Normal is an image that is different to each person who seeks it, because at the end of the day it's what you as a person define it as and since everyone's an individual there's got to be over 7 billion different 'normals' spread all over the world.

 Someone who has a disability is much more easily incorporated and accepted into society than they were as little as 30 and 40 years ago, but discrimination is still there and still needs to be more widely challenged within society. People are people at the end of the day and we're all that little bit different, it's a part of what makes us human. You've got to see the person before you see the disability, after all we wouldn't define each other as 'blondie' or 'specs' or 'terrible fashion sense' (well my pals would, these are some of my personal nicknames!)

 A woman I work with at the moment has a disability that means she has limited upper body movement and she can't weight bear, so she's in a wheelchair to get about. But she's not long achieved a doctorate at University, she's set up her own business and has just landed a part time job. Her neighbour helps out teaching foreign languages in a local primary school where she is totally adored by the children. 

Personal ability is a perception and normality is an easily achievable illusion, if it were not for people holding themselves back with their lack of confidence, and holding others back with their outdated views and their lack of belief in others. 

Acceptance isn't something anybody should have to fight for so just be nice to each other, eh?

Slimming World

I love my job as a support worker - I work permanent nightshift in a residential unit for adults with disabilities. Some of the people I work with live here permanently but some only come in for respite.

 It's one of those wonderfully rewarding but stressful jobs that come along every so often giving you just the right amount of job satisfaction that the bad days don't make you tear your hair out and quit spontaneously. 

 The only issue I have with it is how hard it is to stick to a diet! Diets usually consist of calorie counting, and when you're awake 22 out of 24 hours for work how do you work that? Sticking to 1300 calories per day isn't easy because when you eat most of those calories during the day by the time break time comes on nightshift you're starving. And a salad just doesn't cut it!

 During my time on nightshift I've had a huge variation of meals... Macaroni or pizza alternate nights. Because that's my two favourite dinners! It's also why I'm slightly chunkier than I should be. 

 My pizzas are just pizza. I microwave them, eat them and then feel sad because I've got none left. 

 Macaroni has always been different. I've had macaroni on a plate, with ketchup, on toast, on a roll and at one point I had it on top of my pizza!

 Since joining slimming world 6 weeks ago I've made a huge effort to change my eating habits. I've not done very good but I'm trying and that's the main thing. I've swapped a lot of eating out for eating in - I used to be at McDonald's or kfc on an almost daily basis but that's all different now. Slimming world has been wonderful for me because I've got a new sense of importance because I've been cooking for myself more often that not, although I seem to burn a lot of my food and my grandparents keep joking I've missed a trick and should be working in a crematorium. 

I have such a horrible fear of food poisoning which leads me to have a terribly limited diet. I won't eat any meat other than chicken (and chicken has to be cut into tiny little pieces and even then it's rare), I like my food to be slightly burnt as I worry when it's soggy, and I like to be totally sure that it's cooked. I'm a nightmare for anyone other than me to feed which is why slimming world has been so wonderful for me. I've discovered dishes I didn't know I'd like and using quorn products has led me to experiment a bit more without the panic of becoming ill. Although judging by my cooking I'm pretty surprised that I haven't yet been ill!

 To date I've lost 5lbs, which I'm not overly happy with but its better a loss than a gain! I've been terrible this past fortnight due to my birthday and eating out so many nights but I've been back on track on plan the past couple of days. 

 Dinner last night on nightshift was homemade soup, pasta and a salad. Followed by a yoghurt and a Crunchie. My Crunchie didn't go to plan as the chocolate was all discoloured and horrible looking, and there was a funny smell. Someone's looking out for me and is determined I'll have a loss this week!

Shame it's not me, I'm going home for another Crunchie 😬

I Have Bad Dreams Regularly

I have a really strange phobia.

I'm scared of all the usual things - ghosts, scary movies, snakes, adulthood - I'm a little more nervous than most, and I do know that I scare a lot easier than some of my friends and family member do. Most of my phobias tend to boil down to one common fear - I'm afraid of getting hurt or seriously injured and potentially dying. 

 Watching films that scare me sends my already highly active imagination into overdrive. I've seen me working a nightshift and panicking during it that there's vampires or zombies kicking about outside of the residential unit I work in. I fear looking into the darkened windows of the individual homes of the residents and am even more afraid of looking out to the outside world in case I see one of the fictional vampires I am so afraid of. Random and unexplained noises get me, as do the silly sudden pains I experience as a part of my body continually working to replenish and grow and change itself. 

 In short, I'm a total shitebag. 

The oddest fear that I have is the fear of running out of something to do. I put off reading new magazines and books I've bought for the fear of what they'll bring - sadness when they finish, a waste of time if I don't enjoy them or find them helpful and boredom when I run out of things to do. It occurred to me that I need to find some way to deal with this when I recently picked up a magazine I'm sure I only bought a week or three ago to find that actually it was the very outdated August 2015 version of that particular publication. I know in my head that there's a very unlikely chance that I'll ever run out of books and magazines to read, not when they're being printed so regularly, but the irrational and partly idiotic part of my brain tells me that this is a possibility!

 I've currently got a 'December' copy of a magazine sitting in my room, alongside another 23 books that are in my 'yet to read' pile. Some of them I'm nervous for reading in case I don't enjoy them, but more of them are unread due to this stupid and totally ridiculous silly fear I have. I know that life is short and you should never take it for granted, maybe that's partly one of my reasonings for not reading all those books. If I didn't enjoy one the nosy person within me would force myself to continue reading in order to find out what happens to the characters. Studying people is one of the pleasures in my life that will never get old! 

People quite often are wonderful, irrational and pointless fears are not.