Garfield and I have a lot in common!
I never used to dislike Mondays, but they are rapidly becoming my least favourite day of the week. I’m finding that the weekly treadmill of Monday to Friday work, school and home management is beginning to take its toll. It’s not that I hate any one element in particular, but put them all together and I find my stress levels soaring.
This week started with a slightly louder bang than usual. As well as dealing with getting the kids up, showered, dressed and breakfasted before school, I found myself having to make a doctor’s appointment unexpectedly. Not, as you might well expect, for M, but this time for G. She suffers with eczema on her right arm, which flares in typical eczema fashion, but rarely travels away from the crease of her elbow. I have previously noticed that just like me, her eczema flares when she is worried or stressed and had sought a natural remedy to treat the area.
At the Allergy and Freefrom show back in June, I had come across the company Earthbound Organics, who’s highly knowledgeable representative was able to suggest their Chickweed & Calendula cream as a treatment. It wasn’t a cheap investment – Mike gulped hard when I paid the price – but it sounded like a good, natural remedy for G’s skin irritation. We’ve been using it as needed since June and have found it brings relief. I’ve also used it when my own eczema has flared and even daubed it relatively liberally on M’s rash, which was the result of his newly discovered allergy to raspberries.
This weekend, however, G complained that the itching was spreading and when I took a look, I discovered that it had now spread up the length of her arm, under her armpit and was beginning to break out on her left arm too. I suspected that neither the E45 emollient cream nr the Chickweed & Calendula cream would work this time and so off we headed to our local Medical Centre to see one of the team of GPs after school. We were there barely 5 minutes, but he agreed with me and quickly prescribed a low dosage hydrocortisone cream to see if that would help.
45 minutes later, we were back home with prescription in tow and a sinking heart as I prepared to tackle that “homework vs. dinner v.s playtime vs. screen-time” argument that seems to break out almost every evening in our household. It was then that I received my lovely surprise.
M picked the post up from the doormat and passed it to me. It consisted of an Amazon parcel containing my next book for my Book Club and a large silver envelope bearing my name. I tossed the book to one side and eagerly ripped open the intriguing envelope. Inside, was a card emblazoned with the name of a local beauty salon and I opened it wondering what on earth I would find inside.
What I found was the lovely message you can see above. An unexpected gift from an old school-friend and her family, who happen to be M’s godparents too. A special something to treat me, realising that, as is the way of all mothers, I would come bottom of my list of priorities. A treat to say “Relax” and “Spoil yourself”, when it’s highly unlikely I’d have stopped to take that me-time of my own volition.
A little act of thoughtfulness that let me know that there are people out there thinking of me, supporting me and reminding me to take care of myself as well as the children. Thank you dear friends for taking the time and trouble to show that you care and I promise I’m going to book in that stress-relieving massage before Christmas, even if it kills me!
Today a parcel arrived for me. To say I was excited by its delivery is something of an understatement as the contents of this parcel meant that M had only one request for tea – pizza. At the Allergy show a couple of weeks ago we discovered the wonders of Mozzarisella cheese, a cheese made from germinated brown rice and which is therefore 100% safe for M. I recently perfected a M-friendly pizza base recipe too, so this proved to be the ideal opportunity to put these magical ingredients together and taste the final result.
7 years to diagnosis 