THREE THINGS TO BE THANKFUL FOR

I have been feeling a bit very sorry for myself lately.  Not without cause as I have had glandular fever followed by some terrible pain (read worse than childbirth) in my right arm (I am right handed) which nobody can figure out the root of.  (I should really add here that, aside from an awful out of hours doctor who couldn't care less, the doctors have been fab and arranged for me to have a chest x-ray and shoulder MRI super quick).  We tried Amitriptyline for nerve pain, but that didn't touch it and so I am having to take Co-codamol just to take the edge off which doesn't seem to have bothered Teeny at all, but as I am breastfeeding and not one to take much medicine it makes me nervous.    It also makes me feel terribly drowsy which is not good with three children and the drowsiness combined with the pain makes driving near on impossible; ironically though the drowsiness doesn't mask the pain to the extent that I can actually sleep at night!  Subsequently I haven't been able to do all of the things I had planned to do with the children or in the house/garden over the summer break hence the big pile of self pity.

So anyway inspired by this post by Georgia of Gregarious Peach (go check out her blog if you haven't already: she is such an inspiration!) I have decided that for the next month I am going to try to list three things from each day that I am thankful for or that make me happy.  Seeing Georgia's post reminded me that when I was going through a bout of depression a few years ago and using some NLP techniques and hypnotherapy I briefly tried a "happiness journal" and it worked well, but like a lot of things I didn't persevere with it.  I hope that having a blog already set up might make it easier to do because, at least if I don't have much time but have thought about it throughout the day, I can just log in and quickly jot down the list or attach a photograph.  I occasionally toy with trying to post a photograph per day;  the problem is that I am very self critical and a bit of a depressive (although that seems to have been pretty much under control over the last 4-5 years), but if I missed a day or the photographs weren't up to scratch it would be something else to add to my list of "fails" so I think I need to feel stronger before I try that and  stick to the "Three Things to be Thankful For" post for now and see how I feel at the end of the month.

So here is today's list. 

1.  My wonderful husband who, despite having to go to work each day, has spent countless nights awake over the last few weeks reassuring me, rubbing my arm and just generally being lovely to me while I have been feeling so rubbish.

2.  Christy P is a lovely, selfless "mommy friend" of mine who, despite having her own two, took A&D for me on Tuesday so that I could catch up on some sleep.  I really struggle to loose the reins when it comes to my children, but I was desperate for two things; one being sleep and the other being for A&D to have a really fun day without a grumpy mommy.  My children love to play with Christy's children and I trust her completely so I handed those reins over and of course they had an absolute ball.  I feel so incredibly touched by her kindness.

3.  A&D laughing together.  They came out into the garden with me today whilst I was putting out the washing and to be honest I can't even remember what lets pretend game their imaginations had inspired them to play because I was so busy revelling in the fact that they were laughing so hard together.

So those are my three for today and you know what?  I feel better already.