carolannwright

The Falling of Tears and the rolling of Emotions

In my work, I teach clients how to let go, how to be ‘in the moment’, how to allow themselves to cry. Tears are healing I will say. Just let them come and you will feel better, I will say. Well, do you know what. I lied. You don’t feel better, I don’t feel better and I have cried buckets of tears these past weeks. Do I feel better? Does letting go make you feel better? No it doesn’t and I apologise to everyone I have told that they do.

I thought that once we had made the choice, as to what treatment David will undergo, we, or rather I as I can only speak for myself, would feel better. I don’t. We don’t as yet know whether the surgeon will operate as my hubsnad is over 70. This in itself causes us obvious worry. It is all in the hands of the ‘team’ who will meet and decide whether to see us for an assessment. Horrible that others may know before we do, how our future will pan out. Helplessness is evident now.

I am currently not sleeping well. I wasn’t sleeping at all but have a kind of ‘bracelet’ that induces sleep and it works. So I get a few hours each night, enough to help me through the fog that is my today. As I awake, everything is okay. Normal. I look around my beautiful purply/Lavender bedroom and am okay. Then it comes, like a sledge-hammer hitting me in the very pit of my stomach. I remember. All is not okay.

I try to retreat back under the duvet but my wonderful husband is already coming up the stairs with my breakfast. Yes, David, with all that he is going through, believes in the ‘norm’. The norm in our house and has been for 30 years, is his bringing breakfast up to our room and we sit in bed and chat. With our curtains drawn back, we look out over beautiful countryside, hills and valleys and had always wondered at this amazing scenery.

But not any more. I don’t see the beauty anymore.

Anytime it can strike, anytime during my day when I have worked on ‘normal’ ,suddenly the rush of emotions from deep inside of me cause a huge rolling sea of apprehension and fear. A legacy from my childhood returns in all it’s glory. Panic. The feeling of something huge and horrible coming. I try to find the stop cock for these empty emotions, to try and turn it and twist it firmly shut. I have always been able to do this in the past, switch it off and carry on as though nothing happened, nothing is wrong. But not now. I can’t seem to reach it fast enough and suddenly salty unstoppable emotions stream down my face .

As I said before, in an earlier blog, life these past years has been fraught. Lots of losses, some forced upon us by death, my eldest sister and a close friend. My youngest daughter’s unborn baby. Some others because I have always needed to be honest. This need to keep my integrity cost me my eldest daughter Lisa. Yes I could have lied on a legal statement and said everything written about us was true but I couldn’t. I had tried to prevent a little foster girl being treated as I had been treated, by the woman they called ‘my mother’. I had tried talking to my daughter about how she was with this child. and she shut me out of her life but still expected me to lie for her. I couldn’t do this, it was far too much to ask as the lies were too huge. So life became full circle you could say. Trying to stop this cost me my daughter and my grandchildren. At that time I was helping her adopt a foster baby, my granddaughter Hannah, who was 4 years old this past week and that in itself brought the tears. This falling out,was followed by horrendous treatment from my youngest sister who had, sadly, barged into our lives after 40 years of no contact and taken over the family that was mine telling wicked lies to keep them onside. They should all be part of this. Supporting us in our hour of need. That’s what families do isn’t it. Not my family.

So I was already in a bad way when this new nasty hit us all. Yes I know that it is David who has this disease but I have been shocked and angry at how it has affected me. I should be the strong one as I always have been. I should be comforting and encouraging him, not the other way around. I had read that wives and partners are affected as well as the patient but was never prepared as to what extent. This disease changes people. It has changed us, changed me, changed the dynamics, the conversation, the way we are. It has stolen our ‘norm’ and replaced it with ‘canceritis’.

Looking out of my study window as I write, I can see the Welsh hills and valleys. It all looks the same but the beauty has gone. The leaves are beginning to fall, a time of year I usually love. Things obscured by the leaf laden trees have become visible again. Today I can see the top of a little cottage that is obscured all Summer, stolen from my sight. It looks the same and as it always has in Autumn. Like nothings changed.

But everything has changed. Yes, the seasons always do, but here ‘on the farm’, life is now different than ever before.

So how do I survive to help my husband? How do I get the ‘normal’ back? I don’t know. But what I do know is that the Carol Ann who is the Health Professional. The Carol Ann who everyone comes to in a crisis. The Carol Ann who is the survivor, needs to buck her ideas up and come back from wherever it is she thinks she is hiding. Because I need her, here, now!

Last week I said I would find humour. Still looking.

I said I would be strong. Still trying.

I said I wanted ‘it’ to stop, to turn the clock back. To un-know what we now know. Didn’t happen. So I need to look forward. Plan Christmas. Plan where we will move to after David is well. Yes we have decided to move, maybe back home, who knows but move we will. Life here has been spoilt. Spoilt by ‘family’, spoilt by illness, spoilt by loss,so a new venture is on the cards. If I can plan ahead, then all will be well. As a child, an emotion I had, never served me well. I ‘hoped’ that my life would change. That the abuse would stop. I ‘hoped’ that one day my ‘mother’ would show me love. None of that happened. So I believe I am now due some good. That ‘hope’ will prove justified.It’s time it began to do that. So Hope. If you are listening, I am now hoping life will get better. Please don’t let me down.

Thankyou for reading. x

Feeling the extremes of pain.

Well, I am hoping that the above does happen. Hasn’t as yet, but still hoping.

The early part of this week, we, David and I , talked of nothing else apart from what is happening, re the invader of our peace, the unwanted guest in our thoughts. The cancer that has hit our little family like a thunderbolt. We have read , I would think, everything ever written about this nasty disease, the treatments, the outcomes, the side effects. None of it very enticing or reassuring. Whatever David decides to do, he seems to be dicing with his future, our future. None of it can be done without some kind of repercussion and that makes decisions very hard.

All week we have tried to contact our specialist nurse to no avail. We then decided to talk to our GP and I must admit he was very good and very helpful. Eventually a lovely lady, one of the nurse specialists rang and went over the options. Although David was almost sure he had decided on surgery, Robotic, she asked him to take a few days to think, to make sure it was what he wanted. She is ringing tomorrow morning for his decision.

We also have had support from our local group, on Facebook and another lovely lady whose husband has been through it all. She has offered to talk to me or my husband on the phone when and if we feel the need. Very kind.

For those who know me, they will know that I don’t cry. Sad movies, music, weddings etc. I feel the emotions but don’t and sometimes, can’t cry. A legacy from keeping my emotions under control as a child. But now, I seem to be in floods at every upsetting thing I hear or see and every time I try to discuss what is happening to my wonderful man.

We are a very private family and very small. Yes we both have extended family, not local to us but we do. My own ‘family’ however, has been infiltrated by its own kind of cancer. Someone who has always wanted my life apparently: my ‘mother’ often said my sister was jealous of me, why I don’t know but several family members have said the same. With lies and deceit, she now feels she is living it, pretending my daughter is her daughter and my grandchildren, her grandchildren. Sad really but dangerous.. Friends and family on here know who this is and I am just thankful that the nasties that have been inflicted on me over the past 3 years, mostly instigated by her since she appeared in their lives, have stopped . They have done irreparable damage to me and David and had left me very low and poorly at a time in my life when I need all the strength and support I can summon. I hope she is very proud of herself.

Back to the purpose of my blog, journey. I have experienced heights of pain and emotion I didn’t know I had, these past weeks. I have been scared, no terrified, angry, sad, full of hatred and yes helplessness. I have been to the depths of despair that the thought of losing someone you love so much, takes you. One minute I want to scream that it’s not fair. The next I can’t summon the breath to do anything but survive. I read that things will be okay and feel better. Then on the same page I read that nothing will ever be the same again. That thought breaks my heart.

Life has been put on hold it seems’ here on the farm’. I can’t seem to look forward, can’t plan and can’t see my way through the fog of literature and research that anyone in our position must go through.

Help! I want to scream, but who to? Hold me! I want to ask but can’t ask. Make it stop! That’s the biggest. Make it stop, turn the clock back. Let’s un-hear what we heard. Let’s unknow what we know. Let’s go back to normal. To ordinary. Even to boring. Anywhere but here!

On the visit to my GP he asked me to go in the following day, on my own. He said he could see I was struggling and asked if I had family to support me. He knew I had 2 daughters as I had talked often of the baby my eldest daughter was trying to adopt a few years ago and how I was helping her. He knew how excited I was by that and how I loved my daughter. He didn’t know what had happened in the interim.He suggested I contact her and tell her what is going on. I felt ashamed to tell him why I couldn’t do that. I told him why and exactly what happened and he was in disbelief. But it made no difference, she has shut us out and being told what is happening will not affect her in any way. Sad but true.

So my world has fallen apart. I am on my knees and waiting for this help that my poster talks about. Tomorrow we will at least be on some kind of waiting list. Not sure how long but it will seem a lifetime. I know I will wane between wanting it over and not wanting it to happen. Love is keeping us afloat, love for each other. Whatever happens, nothing in that will change. He will always be the love of my life, my rock. I will always show my man that he is just that, my wonderful, sexy, loving, kind, intelligent funny man and eventually we will find the one thing that has kept me sane during trying difficult times. My sense of humour. But not today. No humour here.

Thankyou for reading x

A Very Hard Week…. and more to come.

A friend asked me to reblog, so here it is.x

carolannwright

159231-one-day-someone-is-going-to-hug-you-so-tight Well this past week was one of the hardest of my entire life. To say I felt broken is the biggest understatement ever. The feeling of falling apart, of all the pieces of ‘me’, just blown away in the fear and terror was there all the time. I have never been good doing ‘helpless’. If a family member or friend was in trouble, or came to me with a problem, I was always there, trying to make it better, put it right. When I did my counsellor training, we did schema work and I discovered that I was a ‘rescuer’. Couldn’t bear to see others afraid, in pain, in trouble without wading in, sometimes wrongly, sometimes unwanted,but trying my best to make it right. Don’t get me wrong, I am not a do-gooder, I am not everyone’s answer to a prayer, my need to help ,comes from way back in…

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A Very Hard Week…. and more to come.

Well this past week was one of the hardest of my entire life. To say I felt broken is the biggest understatement ever. The feeling of falling apart, of all the pieces of ‘me’, just blown away in the fear and terror was there all the time. I have never been good doing ‘helpless’. If a family member or friend was in trouble, or came to me with a problem, I was always there, trying to make it better, put it right. When I did my counsellor training, we did schema work and I discovered that I was a ‘rescuer’. Couldn’t bear to see others afraid, in pain, in trouble without wading in, sometimes wrongly, sometimes unwanted,but trying my best to make it right. Don’t get me wrong, I am not a do-gooder, I am not everyone’s answer to a prayer, my need to help ,comes from way back in childhood when no one was there for me when I so needed them. I have worked hard to be the person ‘I’ needed, at various times inmy life.So helpless is not something I do well if at all. And this past week I felt it in a huge way.

I had been convinced that the cancer I have talked about in the past 3 blogs, my husband having Prostate cancer, convinced that it had spread. These past 3 years, I have lost so much, we as a family have lost so much that another blow was, in my mind, expected. I would go over in my mind, how I would greet this devastating news. Would I be able to take it? Would I be strong enough to comfort my husband? Would I, as I have felt close to for the last few years, fall apart? I have been hanging on in here for a long time, pretending all was well when really, inside of me I was already broken, heartbroken, sad beyond measure and then this. So my fears around surviving the news on Friday,and being able to be strong for David was something I was beginning to doubt.

He has been with me, as I have said in earlier blogs, sat and held me when my world fell apart on numerous occasions. Held me in the night when the night terrors returned, sat with me in the day when I felt lost and lonely within myself. He never faltered, never complained and always always showed his love. When something nasty happened via ‘family’, he was the one who pointed out that none of it was down to me, reminded me of the ‘wicked’ that is within my birthright and made me feel a bit better. I have been psychologically bullied and bruised on social media and in ‘real life’ by those out to cause me pain, for more than 3 years, leaving me broken and very low. My only resolute, my only constant was my husband David. Now it is my turn, was my turn and I wasn’t sure I was able to be the strong person, he had fallen in love with, all those years ago.

All week I fluctuated between feeling nauseous, panic-stricken, terrified and yes, helpless. To okay, calm and ‘we can do this’, whatever ‘this’ was. On the first visit to see the consultant, after the biopsies, I watched the body language of the nurse and doctor. I hadn’t been aware of doing this at the time,but it has become a natural instinctive thing I do in my work, so it just kind of happens. That first visit, the nurse came and sat between my husband and I, on the bed behind us and then the consultant, leaned forward. That was when I knew. This is going to be bad news. It was. That was the first time we were told that it was real. My wonderful husband had cancer.

As I said last week, cancer is a dirty word. It can come into our lives in many ways. Sometimes in life something cancerous is evident. Not the disease, just something that is there, that contaminates everything it touches, like a bad apple in a fruit bowl. A criminal mind in authority. A trouble maker out to cause upset and pain, spreading their lies and hatred to other people. Sometimes a single person can do that, poison everyone within their circle and then spread their nasty into another person’s life, using lies and stories they know to be untrue, contaminating things others hold dear.I have met that kind of cancer, within my own family. Then there is the disease, the one everyone dreads. The cancer that I refuse to give a capital letter, the one my lovely man has . That is the cruelest.

So back to the results, we made our way to the hospital last Friday, last day of September,every single traffic light was red. The road works stopped us, then parking, well that is another issue all together. David was quiet but seemed calm, I was the duck on our pond, calm on the outside, paddling like mad to stay afloat under the water. Feeling sick, apprehensive and terrified, I held tightly onto my husband’s hand when they called us into the room. I tried to see any kind of clue on the consultant’s face but couldn’t. He asked us how we were. You have to be joking I thought. How do you think we are?? But I said nothing,still convinced that as the past 3 years showed, this was going to be bad.

‘Well’ said this man sat in the chair, looking at David and then at me, ‘Just tell us!’ I silently screamed, tell us and let us go home, back to the safety of our wonderful somewhat changed home. But I said nothing. ‘The good news is, it hasn’t spread outside of the capsule’. I remember thinking I had heard wrong. No relief at that point just shock of a good kind. ‘It hasn’t spread so our options are better’, he continued. I looked at David and saw nothing while I wanted to hug this medical man sat in front of us,and thank him. But did nothing. After explaining the options, he suddenly said that although he had just laid out the surgical approaches, because my husband is 71, they may not offer surgery. Talk about good news bad news all in one minute. I couldn’t quite take this in. I could feel David becoming angry, I was becoming angry but we both held it back. The consultant wasn’t sure about the age limit,so we were to go home and think through our options, then let him know and an appointment to see the surgeon would happen and he would make the decision. We left.

The journey home was okay, I felt elated that it hadn’t spread and felt calmer than before. The age thing to me, didn’t seem an issue, we just wouldn’t accept that because of his age, they wouldn’t operate. That can’t be right. Can it! I slept better after a cosy evening with my husband and my dogs, beginning to look and feel a better future.

Saturday morning it hit me. David has cancer. He needs to have surgery or treatment to cure him. Why did I feel better? How could I feel better? He has cancer. The dreaded c word. No if’s or but’s just facts. So yesterday was a confusing day emotionally. I wrote to a few people on Facebook, on a private site for survivors. They are supportive and the best people to talk to as they have been on this journey. All are so kind and so willing to share and to help.

I never considered being here, being in this position, I don’t suppose people do. Having to be the strong one in our partnership but here I am. Not willingly but determined not to let my husband down. I am already a survivor, not of an illness but of Childhood abuse and do a lot of work to help victims become survivors. I have to draw on this now with every ounce of strength, to be strong and be David’s rock as he has always been mine.

As wives and partners of men with Prostate Cancer, we are a necessary aid to survival and to recovery. We are the ones who need to be there for our man, to comfort him, to hold him and to love him. Reassure him that he is still the same person he was before the dreaded c word and to help him pull through. On a good day, I think I can do it, No, I know I can do it. Let’s hope, in the weeks and months ahead, the good days are more present that the bad.If other partners feel this way, I send my warmest love and thoughts, it ‘aint easy’ as they say.

Thank you for reading. Please comment if you feel you want to . x

One step forward..many steps back.

Today’s blog is the second step of this new and scary journey we are having to make. I have used this photo as it shows me, as a little girl, but doesn’t show the fear, hurt and unhappiness I felt back then. I was helpless to the abuse I was suffering, to the hurt inflicted, mostly verbal, by the woman they called my mother. It shows a little girl smiling. Unwittingly I had hidden my life from those around me and I find myself doing that once again. I felt alone as a child and feel alone now. Of course physically I wasn’t, alone I mean. I had 3 sisters, a brother and parents. I had a relative who ‘loved me’ so no, I wasn’t alone. Today I have a loving, funny, intelligent partner in my husband. a wonderful caring daughter in Marie, my brother Tony and nephews Paul and Robert. I also have many close friends and relatives, some I found late in life. But, in the quiet moments, in the ‘wee small hours of the morning’, as the song says, I feel alone. Once again helpless.

If you haven’t read previous blogs, I am writing this as a way of offloading my fears and worries during this next phase of my life, it is a journey no one wants to travel. The Cancer journey. David was diagnosed a few weeks ago I am struggling at times to deal with what might or what might not be. This week, the days have been full of panic, fear and impatience. It makes me cross that someone somewhere, who has read the MRI report, knows what we are up against but we don’t. I know that’s ‘just how it is’ but that makes no difference. One part of me needs to know NOW! The other part wants to run and never know. We have a long 5 days ahead of us until we are told how bad things are or not.

One of the strengths of our marriage is humour. David makes me laugh every single day. No matter what is happening in our lives, at some point he will bring my smile. Either by his silly boyish antics or quick-witted comments. I try to do the same. My sense of humour, albeit sometimes a bit ‘out there’ has seen me through some very dark days. As a young mum of 2 daughters, bringing them up on my own most of the time, friends around me always commented on how I could always turn a near disaster into a funny story. I would relay it to them, using humour and so it lessened the pain for me and brought a smile from them. As a child, making people laugh helped me cope with the lack of real love and smiles at home. To please others, family mostly, I would make them laugh or smile in one way or another. That, I felt, was good.

In the past few years, there has been little to smile about but I have found myself ending phone-calls with a light-hearted comment, ending conversations outside of home in a way to leave the other person or people smiling. I tried hard to remain positive even though my ‘family’ was disintegrating around me. David would hold me at these times, when the real emotion came, when I was safe and at home with him. He would comfort me and always manage to bring a smile to my face.

This past week it has been so hard to do this. September is always hard for me. Happy memories of my first child Lisa Jayne being born, happy memories of my first grandson Harrison and holding that tiny bundle in my arms. Then sad ones because they are no longer part of my life. My fault I suppose, I lost my daughter and her children by my honesty and trying to protect a child in her care. Our wedding anniversary is also in September and this year seemed more poignant than usual. There is nothing like the ‘C’ word to make you re -evaluate things and people. To put things in perspective. Yes I have lost many people I love but my time now must be given to David and to this fight we have ahead. The rest doesn’t matter. ‘They’, don’t matter. I,now, need all of my strength, to support him, and that will include humour, if it must. Years ago, Marty Caine a comedienne of the day, said, ‘always laugh at yourself, then it won’t hurt when others laugh at you’. I have never forgotten that and need it today.

When talking this week, my husband said, he didn’t understand why I was afraid, it wasn’t happening to me. How wrong is that! How wrong is he! I married him in sickness and in health and will be here no matter what. The things that hurt him, hurt me. The worry that is his, will be mine. We are a couple, a shared life, almost a shared being. Whatever he goes through, I will wish I could take his place. Just as I do with my children. But I can’t. All I can do is be here, be strong and yes, make him smile.

Monday I was okay. I came on here and did a great deal of research, that left me very low. Very scared.

Tuesday I was a mess, results from too many words, too many outcomes, procedures, relapses, etc. Too many stories.

Wednesday I decided not to research and have a day without ‘it’, felt slightly better, more optimistic.

Thursday we went out. Looking to the future, our future, Making decisions is a no go currently but we may need to move at some point, down size and so we explored a few areas to see where we liked. We decided that we might even return ‘home’.

Friday was quite optimistic. We don’t yet know the score, so yes, a bit better.

Saturday was okay. Marie spent the morning with me so that helped.

Today, I spent the morning baking, David’s favourites as I always do on a Sunday but feel very apprehensive.

I have read stories, on support groups on social media etc.some really good some, really sad and bad. I keep telling myself, ‘one day at a time’, as I would tell my clients. I have tried relaxation techniques and breathing relaxation strategies, all of which I taught clients over the years. But physician heal thyself is not working.

I have to remain positive. I hope next week’s blog will be just that. We will at least know the score. We will know if the ‘C’ has spread. We will be told our options and I pray with every ounce of my being that it hasn’t spread and that it can be removed. Those of you who believe, please prayer for us.

Thankyou for reading x

The First Stage

The 24th August is the day our world was turned on its head. We arrived at the hospital, for the biopsy results taken a few weeks earlier,my husband very calm, me believing all would be well because he has no symptoms and is not unwell. I should have known; when we were sat down, the nurse came and sat between us on the couch just behind. The consultant leaned forward. I study body language, part of my professional training and knew this wasn’t going to be the best of news. It wasn’t. They had found Cancer.

After leaving the hospital where 10minutes had changed our lives, we did the weekly shop, David wanted to keep the ‘normal’. Me? There was no ‘normal’ now. I came over a bit light headed and had to leave the store, to gather my thoughts and my composure. I felt quite ashamed. This wasn’t about me but him. I gathered myself together and joined him back in the store. Then we went home.

This blog is from my side, my husband doesn’t want me to talk about him very much on here, has a dislike of Social media because of all the nasty stuff I have endured these past 3 years, so this is from how all of this is for me. Not selfish, not selfpitying, just a way of offloading my fears, hurt, stress and yes, hope.

The photo today is one of our geese, they work the same as ducks and sometimes, this is how I feel. Like Gordon here, serene on the outside, above the water, floating along but paddling like mad to stay afloat. Fitting I thought.

I don’t have a huge group of friends here, some good ones back in Hampshire and some lovely family and friends scattered around, Somerset,Andover, Portsmouth, Fareham etc. But not here. I don’t think it would make a difference if I had. Somedays I can’t talk about it. Other days I do every bit of research I can fit into one day, about this evil enemy that has struck my beloved husband .Some days I want to shout from the rooftops how angry I am. How this is not fair. How this is so wrong. David is one of the good guys. He took me, my daughters, lots of animals and everything that came with me on, and under his wing. He is strong, funny, intelligent and kind and good. There are so many evil people walking this earth and nothing happens to them. As a child, the woman they called my ‘mother’ would not allow us to say ‘it’s not fair’. Well do you know what?? IT ISN’T DAMN FAIR. None of this.

Some of you know that my childhood was an abusive one, a life without the love of a real Mother. I was the different one, the one who didn’t seem to belong. I was the brunt of her anger and dislike one day, and on other days,used to hurt my dad, the man who brought us up. Her games at my expense continued after her death and are being continued now by her youngest spoilt daughter. I was sexually abused all of my childhood. Unloved and later in life suffered the legacies of that abuse and became dependent on prescribed medication. I had many failed relationships, because of the damage done in childhood.Life was a struggle but I had two beautiful daughters to love, who were mine. There was a time, I fought to keep my first child and other times I fought for her in other ways. I nursed my youngest through many illnesses as mums do and would do it all again in a heart beat. The withdrawal from the medication, was horrific; panic attacks. night terrors, fear and lack of self worth , along with physical pain so bad I still remember it. I fought a hard battle to come off everything and succeeded, all with the love and support of a dear friend and my two daughters. Life was my own for the first time.Then out of the blue, life changed again, for the better and the best. I met my husband. That was 31 years ago. Life has been good and I know I am a very lucky lady.

But these past 3 years , after wanting to keep my integrity, my life has been bombarded by nasty comments, posts and blogs, full of lies. In my very first blog on here, I have told about these horrid wicked lies so won’t repeat myself. I have lost so much, people who I love, people who love me but I am putting this right. A few weeks ago, because of lies, I was told to stop contact with my beloved brother. Since then he has rung me a couple of times, I was out both times. But then, needing to hear his voice, a day or so ago, I rang him. He was so happy to hear from me and I will now ring as I have always done and he is good with this. It’s times like this we need the people we care about, need those who have been in our lives forever and know us, in our lives. So one down, 2 to go.

I have also had a long phone call with my nephew Paul, my eldest sister’s son. We keep in contact once a month by phone. His mum sadly died of cancer so I didn’t want to mention it. But he knew. I don’t know how, but he did and so we did talk about it. He is still trying hard to ‘make things right’ in my family or rather keeps asking me to. That was the promise I made to his mum before she died. I tried after her funeral and failed. So that part of our conversation was hard.

So, like childhood, the past years have been awful and had left me low and unwell. I felt like a broken doll until the nasties seemed to have stopped and I really thought that things were getting better. Then the diagnosis. Maybe I would have taken it better, been more capable of withstanding this latest blow if I hadn’t been so battered over the past few years.So forgive me if you think it wrong that I am angry. Forgive me if you think it wrong that I don’t think this is fair. My journey, my blog, will be honest, raw and straight, it is the only way I know how to be.

It’s like you feel when your child is ill or suffering, you wish it were you. You wish you could take the pain etc. instead of them. That’s how I feel. Helpless to the extreme. If I could take this away from David, I would so it without question. I should have family supporting me but apart from my youngest daughter and now my brother, I don’t. But I will pull through, I have no choice.

I have joined a couple of support groups on social media, they are great. It is good to hear of all the success stories but you also hear of the unsuccessful and that is scary. We don’t yet know how bad it is. We don’t know if it has spread and will know that at the end of the month. The letter came yesterday with the date. I tell myself that if it were really bad, they would have made the appointment earlier. But I was so optimistic last time, I daren’t even go there.

So, my days are changeable, scary and full of terror for the future. Other days I am okay and think that as long as we have each other we will be fine. Others I think,maybe it is not as bad as we know it could be. Even, ‘maybe the have made a mistake’! I know. futile wishes but I don’t seem to have any control of my thinking some days.

I will keep on with my journal, good or bad and hope it helps someone, someone who has or is feeling like me. Please comment if you are or have.

Thankyou for reading

My Journey…whatever it brings.

The word Journey, has in my opinion, been a little over used these past few years. You hear celebrities use it when they are becoming famous, the same with sportsmen. It is used in reality shows and anywhere that a person feels they have changed because of a certain endeavor. Yes, over used and here I am using it myself but in a different context.

I suppose life is a journey, one we all have to travel and one where we never know where it might lead us or when it might end. It might be an exciting journey, or a difficult one. It might be a boring journey or it might be full of magical times. When we begin we are unaware of the where our private journey might take us. Yes we plan, everyone I think does that. Plan our lives, where we will be later in our life, where our children might be when they are grown. We can however hope and plan to the enth degree and it doesn’t happen. Life has a way of kicking you into touch, sometimes in a very painful manner as I know only too well.

As readers of earlier blogs know, childhood for me was a journey I wish had been very different. Then in my adult hood, I made many mistakes, mostly because of legacies of childhood. But I had two daughters and we had a happy life until a few years ago.

29 years ago I married , not my first time but I got it right in the end. My husband took on my children, the ponies, cats, dog and guinea pigs and rabbits, under his protective arms and I have never looked back. He was and is a great dad, not ‘step’ dad, but real dad. Marie welcomed him into our little family because she could see how happy he made me, after some very unhappy years. Lisa however did not make it easy, despite his many attempts to care for her. He loved our grandsons and was good with them on the rare occasions they came to stay.

My brother Tony and his wife Lin, found David quite hard to understand in the beginning but after a little while they became friends. We had many lovely times when they spent time with us on holiday in Monmouthshire, many happy memories.

All part of my journey with my husband, mostly good and always loyal, supportive and loving. Through the nasties of the past 3 years, courtesy of my eldest daughter and my youngest sister Trisha, David has been my rock. Without him I would never have coped with the pain and hurt inflicted on me, the losses they brought about and the friendships they ended with their lies.

As you will know, from earlier blogs on here, lies told to my brother Tony and my sister June, have left them without contact with me. But Tony rang me a week after my niece stopped him talking to me and again last week, I was out each time. But I have kept his message on my answer phone, just to listen to and hear his voice. It has broken my heart to know our estrangement was forced upon him and wish I could have rung him back. But these days phone-calls are not easy as I am almost always close to tears. But I will ring him, soon.

The photo above, I chose because it shows a journey of sorts, me on my beloved Star and my first grandson, Harrison who will be 26 on 13th of this month, on Charlie our Shetland. Lovely memories and wonderful times. Another loss to us, as grandparents, our grandsons and a grand-daughter whom we never met. But I have memories of the boys and hundreds of photos of the little girl who Lisa adopted.

So, my new journey. It is our journey really, mine and David’s. But being a man, he doesn’t talk much about himself and especially about illness. David has cancer.I have gone through the shock I was in last week. I have felt every emotion possible. Anger, pain, fear, loneliness, frustration and every emotion under the sun. But today it is the anger that I am feeling. Anger at why him? Anger at the timing, as if any timing would have made a difference. Anger at the injustice, unfairness of our current situation. But most of all anger at my daughter and my sister, my niece and my great- niece and everyone they involved in the vendetta of the past 3 years. They stole time from my husband. Time that I should have been giving to him and not wasting on people who have caused us such pain.It was David who sat with me when I cried over my daughter. David who held me and let me cry myself to sleep. David who spent time and money, getting my book back into circulation, my life-story that was out there, helping others and that the lies of these people took off the market. It was David who comforted me when talking about how my sister has usurped my ‘position’ in my daughter’s family! A wicked nasty person who doesn’t deserve her lot in life. Yes I am angry and wanting to hit out and hurt them in the same way, especially my youngest sister. Am I proud of feeling like this? Of course not. Will I act on it? Yes. Anger today is good. I have things to do that will take a lot of strength, before we go too far down this new path and anger will help me do that.

We have only just embarked on this journey together, we have no idea where it will lead. He has a 2nd MRI tomorrow and then shortly after I hope, we will know how far the cancer has spread, if at all.

It’s a dirty word, isn’t it, Cancer. I have lost so many people, relatives and friends to this nasty cruel disease that none of us are immune to. The first was my sister- in -law, all those years ago. She was 26 years old and left two sons with my brother. A lovely girl, someone I loved and admired.Then the list is endless, my best friend Mo, my friends husband Bob, my sister Georgina and the list goes on.

David, as I said, has been there for me at every hurdle life threw at us. He has been my lover, my friend, my companion, my rock. He has made me smile and laugh when I was at rock bottom and continues to do so. Now it is my turn. I will stand by him and together this journey will not be as bad as it would be without each other. Whatever we are told, whatever he chooses to have done, I will be there at his side.

So life, so Cancer, so Family, throw what you like our way, we are ready! This is a journey we would rather not have to make but we will reach the end and smile.

Thankyou for reading. x

What September means to me

As a little girl, because of my home-life, the Summer holidays were not always happy. September to me was a ‘happy’. It meant school again, the end of the long periods of time at ‘home’. It meant safety. When I was in my late teens, it would mean the beginning of a new term at college for 3 years at least. Something I loved and where I had good friends.

September became my favourite month. A golden month, late summer sunshine and the beginning of the leaves turning orange, gold and red. As I grew into woman hood properly, it was always a time I enjoyed and good memories would always come back to me along with the end of Summer.

I married quite young and became pregnant, more by luck than by anything else. My first child was to be born at the very end of August and I remember thinking, if only it could be September. Well someone heard me because my first daughter was born, 10 days late on the 9th September. Lisa Jayne, My Blessing. So once again, the month became special in a way I could never have hoped for.

Many years later, I was blessed with my first grandson, Harrison born a few days after his Mum’s birthday. Another day I will hold dear to my heart forever. These are the things that give us memories. The good memories that we take out and cherish when we feel low. I don’t have either of these family, born to me, in my life today, not my choice but no one can take my memories away and boy do I need them at the moment.

So September brought me safety, friendships and love at many times in my life. It wasn’t September that I met my husband but it was on September 8th 1987 that we married. Both of my daughters were there, Marie and Lisa and her then husband Paul. A wonderful day now, tucked away in photos and dried flowers in my memory box. We often smile about the choice of my hat, his choice and that of the pretty lady in the shop where I purchased it. Not mine and it is my only regret of that beautiful day. The beginning of a long happy marriage full of fun, loyalty, support and love for each other.

Since coming here to West Wales, September meant the ducks returning, the trees and fields from my window, changing into a beautiful array of warm colours and the most amazing sunsets.

We have had some bad times, more of late re family on my side but our love for each other has never faltered.

Last Wednesday the last day of August we had the devastating news that David has cancer. When I awoke this year, on the 1st of September, my favourite month, I could see none of the beauty I always saw here ‘on the farm’. The hills were the same, the fields and our lake and river were the same but so so different. The birds still sung, I think and life ‘out there’ went on. Farm machinery roaring, cows mooing and the ducks playing on our water. Nothing had changed.

But everything had changed.

I supposed we thought we were safe. My two sisters had breast cancer, Georgina died of liver cancer, after surviving cancer the first time round. I had a big C scare but thankfully it was cysts. My husband’s brothers both had brain tumours, the youngest died last year but I think we thought we were okay.

Then this.

People have said, especially on my other social media, under my author name, that I must be a strong woman to have ‘gotten through’ the things life has thrown at me. My abusive childhood, a nasty hoax and the ‘family’ nasties over the past 3 years made public by them. Perhaps I was but not now. I don’t feel strong today. This September day, when the leaves are turning orange, brown and red, where the temperature is quite autumnal, I don’t feel strong at all.

But…

I have to be. I have to stop this ‘poor me or poor us’ and get my strength from somewhere and fight this battle along with my husband. We don’t yet know how bad it is and I am told, waiting for those results is the hardest part. Let’s hope ‘they are right.

I will continue to use this platform, please don’t read it if you don’t want to . I need this outlet, I always have written things down to rid myself of the thoughts and will keep doing that, so please bear with me.

I will find the strength, we will fight together and hopefully win this fight. This week, this 8th September, we will spend quietly somewhere having lunch, just the two of us, reflecting.

Thankyou for reading x

Trying to clear my head.

Throughout my life, when I have been worried, happy, sad or confused, I always put pen to paper. In this case, a computer as my handwriting is illegible now. During my life as a psychotherapist/Counsellor, I encourage clients to write things down. To write their innermost thoughts if they can’t express them. To write letters to those they have lost, through death, separation or estrangement. We then, in session work with these literary aids and the client begins to see things more clearly. In the case of losing someone to death, this often helps with saying goodbye and gradually allows the bereaved to move on and accept.

As I said, I use this way of expression and find it helps clarify things for me. I keep a diary, make notes, I write books. During the writing of my autobiography I had to work through some horrific memories, the very worst of times. I was taken back to some sad times and eventually helped to remember some good ones. It was a cathartic experience and one I pass on to those I try and help.

So, today, here I am again, trying to make sense of the past few years and put those nasties into perspective with the fears of today. Those of you who follow my blog will know how I have been bullied and libeled on social media. How I have lost a great deal. You will have read my own side, the truth of what has been happening. I am very grateful to everyone who has commented, emailed or pm’d me re all nasty family stuff. Many times in the past 3 years I have felt as though I was in a nightmare and couldn’t wake up. Because of my childhood, when I am scared, the fear and terror of those times, not always the memories, but the emotions come flooding back and leave me very low. For the last few months, particularly since Mother’s day, I have only just been able to hold on.

It couldn’t get any worse, I thought. Nothing can feel worse than this and nothing can hurt the way I was hurting and so I made every attempt to stop it.

Well do you know what? There is something worse and that happened Wednesday. My wonderful husband, who has never been ill, had a blood test as a routine and was sent for a biopsy because of the results. Wednesday just gone we had the results and they are not good. He has cancer. It was like a huge blackness suddenly descending on us in the consulting room. The nurse was talking, then the consultant was talking but I didn’t and couldn’t hear them. I have been told by patients when they hear the ‘c’ word, they fall apart. Are terrified. That was me. David seemed not to be surprised. I was the one who had done all the reading and had come to the conclusion that he would be okay, he had no symptoms, wasn’t unwell and only had the blood test as a precaution. I was so sure the biopsy would be negative but here we were being given options of choice for treatment.

He has to go for an MRI, to see if the cancer has spread. This will determine the treatment if he chooses that route. The rest of the day is a bit of a blur.

We came out and went into town. He still wanted to go and do the week’s shopping, saying it was Bank Holiday weekend. I was in a daze. I didn’t know what to say or do and followed him like a little lost sheep.

Coming over a bit faint I made my way to the toilets and sat for a while. Trying to get a grip, make sense of what had just happened. Once home we went about our daily tasks and said nothing. We fell asleep in each other’s arms Wednesday night.

The following day we told our daughter and said how we needed her help over the next few months, going to appointments etc. with the animals. I know she will be there for us as we will be for each other.

Today, I went to my GP for my routine blood test and also down to the sea. Sitting at the water’s edge, the words of my best friend came into my mind. She had been diagnosed with lung cancer and I was the first person she came to. Sadly after a brave fight, the cancer won. ‘You can let it beat you and go down, or you fight like hell and beat it. If you then go down at least you have tried. Always smile, always kiss each other goodnight and don’t let anything or anyone steal a moment of your time together.’

So, that’s what I am going to do. She was a brave little lady, Mo, and I miss her wisdom and her love. I will be strong, I will fight whatever comes, with every ounce of my being and so will David.

The past few years, the ‘nasties’ have stolen my time, my peace of mind and my energy. No more. I have what is important, here ‘on the farm’, and will concentrate on that. We share a love of animals and live in an amazingly beautiful place. We have a lot to be thankful for.

Every day is a day nearer my David getting better, a day nearer to normality returning, ’here on the farm’. Bring it on.

Thank you for reading. x

Changing life’s patterns ….or not.

On clearing the clutter in my study, I came across my Learning Journal that I wrote whilst in my early training to become a Counsellor. It was quite revealing and somewhat alarming.

1998, I was on my 2^nd year of a 3 year Diploma and was combining this with being a Mum, a Grandmother and a wife. Not easy. I had also begun writing my life story but had placed this on hold to allow me to concentrate on the course. We had moved to Wales in the previous year, not a willing move as I was leaving family in Hampshire, but had no choice. My husband was relocating to Bristol and I didn’t want to be a weekend wife, so my youngest daughter Marie and I went with him. A new adventure although my health at that time was not good.I had been registered disabled and felt at the lowest I had felt when this happened. But then decided, it was sink or swim. I swam.

I took myself off to college to take up a hobby and found myself signing up for the 3 year Counselling course, which lead on to a Masters in CBT that I gained in 2003. Having had a tough childhood and a difficult early adult hood, I decided to try and be, the person I would like to have been there, for young Carol Ann.

Reading the Journal, took me back to happy times, scary and traumatic times, but all done with a lovely group of men and women who were interested in helping others. We learned a lot, we laughed a lot and sometimes, some cried a lot. Not me.

Part of the learning was to discover our ‘inner child’, the child who is still in us today, but to look back and see how she or he found herself reacting in the family set up. We learned about relationships mother to child being the most important. I hedged away from this many times but eventually after a grueling weekend residential, had to confront my demons. Throughout the training we were to take on Personal Therapy, to allow us to work through our own issues and worries, so being able to ‘hold’ clients during theirs. At this stage I had avoided doing this, having securely locked all of my demons away in boxes whose lids were well and truly locked. I always avoided childhood stuff until that residential.

We were almost at the end of time and I stood well back, hoping we would run out of time. We didn’t. I was placed in the centre of the circle of students and told I was 7 years old. With all the emotions of the previous students ‘acting out’ their memories still in play, I found myself a child again. The frightened, vulnerable, scared child who was me.

The idea was to place other members of the group, as our own family and name them as such. My 2 eldest sisters were easy, I had some lovely friends in the group and they played those parts. A special closer relationship I had formed, was with a lady who had been a nurse and had a quirky sense of fun, like me, I placed her as my best friend Carol. One of the male lecturers, John, I put right next to me, he was Tony, my beloved brother. Another gentle kind student was standing the other side of me as my dad, William. That’s when I became a bit scared. That left my abuser and the woman they called my mother.The emotion in the room was highly charged, the air seemed thick with something that resembled the fear I had during a lot of my childhood. What should I do? I was becoming emotional and couldn’t allow that to happen, I was prompted to continue. When I chose a man who I always felt was a bit aggressive, cold and who I didn’t like, to be the man who destroyed so much of me. I couldn’t speak I just pointed to him to stay way outside of the group and couldn’t look at him. On reaching this point, my chief lecturer and head of the course asked where my ‘mother’ was. I said she wasn’t there,that if she had been in the room, I would not have been able to say how it felt to have been the child I was. So I left her out.

It was hugely significant, how I placed family and told the groups and therapist so much about me. Later,during processing the things that happened, which I found very hard, I discovered that it was my fear as a child that kept me unwilling to process events. Having been cruelly singled out by the woman who was supposed to have loved me, I became reticent, scared, took on self-blame, became a rescuer, the scapegoat of the family. I could place all of the family in the Schema table and knew exactly where I stood. My pattern as a little girl had been to always help when I could, never to show I was hurt or upset, never to show anger and certainly never to cry. I would never question a decision, never answer back, never defend myself if wrongly accused and always explain or try and justify my actions. I also always felt responsible for another’s pain.

I noticed in group work when we began with silence and the topic was given, I would be the first to speak, helping others to open up. If we had presentations and students were reluctant to take tasks on, I would volunteer. If there were awkward silences I would be the first to break the silence.

If I wanted to become a good counsellor,I had to work through these feelings to be able to help clients. I knew this was going to be very difficult.

As I said before,I didn’t show anger, not as a little girl or even as a young woman. Did I feel it? I don’t know but never showed it. This was also a legacy from childhood. Gerry, my personal supervisor and lead lecturer, did some work with me and we identified, that the anger I had suppressed for many years, was because, having taken fear and anger to my ‘mother’ as a child, when I had been badly hurt and scared, and to have her show anger towards me, I stopped letting it show. Just took was dealt to me. The thing that I believe damaged me the most, was losing trust. From the time I went to her for help and was not listened to or believed, I stopped trusting.

Throughout my life,if I saw someone in difficulty, having a hard time etc. I rushed in to help. Whether this help was wanted, I didn’t always know but rushed in anyway. If someone was upset and crying, I would try and show my concern and comfort them, try and put things right if I could. Always wanting to be loved. But I never cried. Didn’t mean I didn’t feel but that I had lost the ability to cry. When anger, pain, fear and sadness, is not acknowledged and worked through, the person will internalise these emotions and thus become ill, depressed or repressed. I know that now and have seen it over and over in my work but hadn’t acknowledged it for myself.

Yes, I took on blame freely, always felt responsible for everything. If a family member were in trouble and I was told, I would make the effort to help. If someone didn’t ring me, or make time for me etc. I would always think I was to blame. Once when my daughter and husband were watching the news, showing a war torn country, Marie asked her Dad why there was a war. David very quickly replied, ‘I don’t know, but I expect it was your Mum’s fault, she seems to think everything else is’. Yes I took on the blame, it wasn’t always given to me, and I just took it on. A childhood of being told that all troubles in life were my fault, paid its price.

During training we looked at every feeling, emotion and one of the worst for me was shame. We were asked to talk of an occasion where we felt shame. I could think of so many. Childhood abuse, left me feeling shame. As an adult, finding out things about my parenting and parentage, left me with shame. It is easy now, to recognize these feelings as somewhat transferred from others to being my shame, when they weren’t.

There came a point during my training, that going into therapy, opening what Gerry called ‘Carol’s bloody boxes’ was essential and had to be done soon. How could I help others if my own issues around self-worth, self-esteem, shame, and fear had not been processed and dealt with. So off I went. I never actually worked with my own CSA in therapy but did work with my low self esteem and lack of self love; acknowledging that if I wasn’t loved, for whatever reason,that would prevent me from loving myself and having self respect. I was brought to accept, that not being shown love wasn’t my fault but that of my ‘mother’. It did help me, opening some of the boxes and I would always recommend personal therapy, counselling in all kinds of situations.

The purpose of this blog is to let those who know me, understand me a bit better and those who don’t, maybe to understand themselves. As children, we form patterns of behavior. We learn when and what we can say and to whom. If we are told we are worthless, if we are shown we are unloved and if we are given the responsibility for the feelings of others, we all grow up with these beliefs firmly in place. The patterns we form to cope with these beliefs, stay with us into adulthood. Sometimes our patterns keep us safe, sometimes they help but more than often, they hinder.I have seen clients who have presented with emotions carried over from the child they were and whose patterns of behavior have stopped them from moving forward, have often got in the way. The way we are as children, the way we are bought up, disciplined, cared for, taught and most of all loved, determine the person we become. Sometimes the patterns have to be changed.

With all of that in mind, I recognized, working through the journal, that yes my way of being changed a lot but when stressed or in times of doubt or fear, the old patterns that have been often lurking in the background, come in without us realising it and off we go with the behavior that was us. We become our inner child.

Over the past few weeks, last blog included, I have regressed to childhood habits of explaining myself, in defence. Not exactly as I would have as a child, but still feeling I need to justify what I had said and done. I shouldn’t always do that. But habits are hard to break and when they are our childhood patterns, formed when we are most vulnerable, they are never very far away. The past 6 months at least, little Carol Ann has been present where the adult Carol Ann should have been.

My training was valuable in many ways. I understood myself so much more but had forgotten whom I had become during this past stressful upsetting time. De cluttering my study was hard and painful but necessary and productive. I am back now and will use the new me on Social media at least.

Thank you for reading x