Holidays, Hospitals and Hope

So over Christmas I went to New Zealand. I went with my parents which was interesting, but it was one of the best holiday's I've had. My sister lives in Auckland and has just had a baby, so we went out to see my nephew, baby Dylan. Here are a few of my snaps, with captions and stuff!

 This is Hot Water Beach, Whitianga. 

  This is Hot Water Beach, Whitianga.

  This is a palm tree in Whitianga.

  This is an exploding geyser near Rotorua.

  This is Hot Water Beach, Whitianga.

  This is Huka Falls.

  This is me sailing on Lake Taupo.

  This is a smoking volcano near Lake Taupo.

  This is our first stop on the awesome road trip.

 This is me and Twinkle, chilling in the campervan.

This is me and the lovely Rik, who I finally got to meet on my day trip to Wellington! Rik is one of my really good friends, despite us living so far away from one another, and so it was really amazing to see her in the flesh!

I am aware that this blog post gives little details of my holiday, and there are no pictures of my nephew. This is because I'm exhausted from my holiday and would like to sleep lots, and because I don't want to make Dylan's photo available to the public without asking. I loved the sunshine and I think that the vitamin D did me good whilst I was out there. However now I am on a bit of a crash.

I was recently admitted to hospital with severe stomach pain, vomiting and fever, they suspected appendicitis and I had an emergency operation to investigate. I did not have appendicitis, the surgeons found when they opened me up. Instead I had something much rarer, called Meckel's Diverticulum. It's a deformity one has from birth, and doesn't usually cause a problem, where the small intestine bulges a little to form a pouch like the appendix. When the pouch becomes inflamed, similarly to the appendix, there are all the typical symptoms. They have removed said pouch, and re-sectioned some of my bowel. I stayed in hospital 8 days, but now home, I'm recovering okay, though I've become entirely bed-bound now. Hospitals are hard places for people with M.E. ad they are noisy and mess up our routine, we're not allowed to take medication when we need it and not many people know about our condition and how ill we are.

Daily Encouragement

“Hope is the thing with feathers 

That perches in the soul 

And sings the tune without the words 

And never stops at all.” 

― Emily Dickinson

“Hope,

Smiles from the threshold of the year to come, 

Whispering 'it will be happier'...” 

― Alfred Tennyson

I've been feeling very hopeless of late, like every time I make an improvement, something comes along to kick me to the floor again. I have gotten increasingly emotional, stressed and generally not good. Stress is obviously not good for my illness, especially not for my non-epileptic attacks, which have gotten a lot worse. However, I've started making YouTube videos about M.E. and how it affects the lives of myself and many others. I've started a video blog series called the Pyjama vlogs which can be found on my channel here: http://www.youtube.com/user/ThoughtsFromAlice

However we cannot lose hope, because hope is all we have. Hope is a flickering candle in the darkness of turmoil. When all else fades away, people let us down, situations prove too much to handle. Cling to hope. Things will get better, inevitably. They might take turns for the worst, they might seem impossible, but eventually, things get to a point where they cannot get worse. Often, it's our own perspective on the situations we face that determines the outcome of said situations. Don't get me wrong, I'm not asking you to flit through the clouds on a beam of sunshine and fairy-dust, but don't while the hours away sinking ever lower into your own personal pit of despair. Trust me, I've been there and it's not pretty, and ultimately, it gets you no further up the happiness scale. Find someone close to help you see the lighter side of life, laugh often and love deeply.

Until then, take care
Alice xxxx

© Alice Daley 2013