Another catch up!

Hello great people of the world! We have been out for our first family walk in ages tonight. Around the local area so nothing too exotic. We might expand tomorrow though ...! Meant kids went down to bed around 10pm relatively easy though so good there! We got home and had hot chocolate with a spoonful of icecream in it! Hey don't diss til you've tried it ;-) Must be vanilla mind! :-D  Right we are still playing blog catch up so I shall reverse back to ...

Monday 29th March:

Weee it's the last week of school before Easter! Today is positively glorious weather too so nice and warm. I topped around 23c on one day this week! Today though it was 17c and look at that blue sky! Lush! Friday we are going up to mother in laws house so I start packing by getting Sophie's case down and pack her clothing.

Tuesday 30th March:

Today I put on my big girl pants and called the school nursing team. Last night Jessica was very upset over her hands. I took some photos of them but she made me promise not to show anyone. So if you want any ideas of how they look just google OCD red hands. She said her hands were like ugly red potatoes and she hates herself. It was kinda like a kick in the teeth. I had been wondering before if I was over dramatising and making all this up? Is it really that bad? Will she grow out of it again? She went through a period of about 6 months of hand washing when she was 6 and was really stressed out with a teaching assistant she didn't get on with who picked on her. There is apparently a genetic link to OCD as well and then there is my parenting which was rubbish around that age. My mental health was really bad with rages and bad PMDD. I blame myself but I guess we are at the point where any blaming anyone isn't going to help. It could be all 3. So any way I rang the school nurse who pretty much confirmed my fears that we most likely won't be taken on by CAHMS. They are the child mental health team under the NHS and are notorious for being seriously rubbish! Whilst I don't envy you guys in the USA for having to pay for stuff at least you won't have to wait at least 2 years for your child to be seen! They won't take any child on unless they are very severe or suicidal here. Which puts the rest of us in no mans land! So she said that they won't even look at a referral unless there is evidence that something had been tried first. So after Easter she is going to send out a nurse to the school to do an Anxiety workbook with Jess. She will have homework. And once this has been done then we could put in a referral. So they will ring me after she has gone back to school to arrange that. In the meantime we are looking into getting Natasha Daniels course from the USA. She is a private child therapist who works there and has set a course together to teach parents about it and how to work with children at home on OCD. We have no other options really so will look into this. We could do a private therapist but we'll cross that bridge later down the line. 

Having a child with OCD is one of the most stressful experiences of my life. I spend all my time trying not to listen to the constant tap running in the bathroom. I just want to scream get out of there. Your damaging yourself. You have only picked something up off the floor. Or only touched your sister. Or only moved a plate to the kitchen side. ARGH just argh! I feel so helpless, triggered, frustrated and angry over it. I sometimes take my anger out on her telling her to stop but she says she can't. I know she can't. But man! Phew! I need to learn some coping techniques because sometimes I think it's affecting me more than her! Any way moving on ...

In the evening Sophie decided to give Jess a foot massage and play doctors or something! I pack again this time getting Jessica's case out and do her clothes. I go back to Sophie's case and do her smellies, bedding, and toys for there.

Wednesday 31st March:

Sophie wanted to go to the park. So we went over just me and her before tea. It was nice and quiet mostly just us 2 so I joined her on the swings, slide and other bouncy things! Here she is giving me an ice cream from her ice cream van. Guess the flavour ... It was ... poo! How polite!! What is it with 5 year olds and poo?! Yet more packing ... I go back to Jessica's case and do her smellies, books and toys for there. I do Sophie's toy bag for the car and prepare a sick bag in case someone be's sick in the car.1 Yes we have been there and done that an hour into the journey with Jess when she was 3 and we had nothing to change her into or clean up the mess!! So we take 2 towels, a change of clothes for both, a few carrier bags and wet wipes, gloves, thermometer and Calpol for both!

Thursday 1st April:

We ran out of potatoes so I picked some from a bag. Here is the result. Annoyingly though when I came down in the morning  after washing they were all covered in some weird hairy mould type thing so I just binned them. They weren't great any way as they are scaley. Due to a lack of watering no doubt!

Today I get my suitcase out and pack all my clothes, smellies and entertainment needed. Go back to kids cases and put in shoes, scarves, hats and gloves. Then write a last minute list of what food to pack tomorrow before we go both from the fridge and stuff to eat in the car.

Friday 2nd April:

Today we travel up north to mother in laws house for Easter. She is in our "bubble". The journey took 5 hours and 3 loo stops ...! We left home about 415pm and we arrived about 915pm. Thankfully the kids pass out in bed ok around 11pm tired from travelling. Happy days! We took an air bed with us as hubby snores like mad so I like to relocate to the sofa. Mil has got a new sofa which is too small to sleep on so we took our own bed. I slept on it this night but found it coooooooold!! Here's some piccies of the trip!

We stopped at Stafford services which is one of our favourites. It has a nice pond around the pack to walk around. The kids found 2 HUGE branches they wanted to take in the car with them. One was taller than Jess and me so easily 5-6 foot LOL! We fitted them in here ... from the front seat right through to the back lol.

When we got out the car there were 2 ducks just wandering by. They came right up to the car ... Until the kids gave chase! 

Here's an attempt at some sunset pics from the car from later on in the evening

Here's Sophie reaching round trying to trade toys from her car bag with toys from Jessica's! Didn't go too well ...

Saturday 3rd April:

Well today was a gorgeous day. 14c and not a cloud in the sky. Later in the afternoon we went out to help mil put up her patio set for summer. Didn't realise it was so nice out otherwise would have gone out before! So sat out and had snacks and food. Sophie used this time to try and play. First taking her dolls pram up the driveway for a walk.

Next it was time to try some spirography on the pavement. It ended up being cheap rubbish! So ditched and just used the chalks.

After this Sophie decided to draw numbers in mil's slabs. Mil wasn't happy at all about this until we explained over and over that it was made of chalk so it would wash off in the rain. Not like there is a lack of that in the north ;-)

Here's the big sticks/branches! 

Sophie was outside in her socks and mil wasn't happy about them getting dirty to be taken into the house so Sophie took them off and washed them in a bucket of water. Then headed off to put her socks on her line she made with her stick on the garage door.

Sunday 4th April:

Well Easter day is here and what a change in the weather! Today it is snowing! Not heavy, not lying, and I don't think you can even tell from the picture I took either!! But believe me when say there are are small flakes falling lol! We have our roast lamb dinner then the kids do their egg hunts. Didn't take any pictures as tbh it was far too cold to be outside!! Here's a dodgey picture of me and Sophie not long after I got up though!! lol. Yes I look rough as hell and am sporting some serious bags under my eyes!

The rest of the day was spent just lazying around. Reading, puzzles and doing some diamond bead picture art. We watched Shrek 3 I think it was too before bed in the evening. 

Right that's it for this update! Hope your all well. It's a late 1:30am here. So better be donning my jim jams and doing 10 mins headspace before going to sleepies! Lots of love to all - Love The Mad House Xx