Well you know that stress I talked about in my last post - well it finally overtook me on 20th February. I'm not going to go into all the gory details but its been a pretty awful and scary few weeks. I'm seeing my doctor weekly and just this week have started a series of counselling sessions with a psychologist. The first session definitely helped and I now feel I can see my options more clearly and we've also got the start of an action plan going forward. Meantime my doctor declared me unfit for work for at least a month. The response from my employer - or at least my immediate leader and manager has been disappointing to say the least - especially when you've invested over 17 years in the company and been recognised throughout that time as a high performer. Anyway I'm currently exploring (and testing) the company's fair treatment system. I guess it's a measure of the pressure everyone is under when the GM responds - to an email I sent him last night - at 4.57am this morning!
Not sure where it will all end but I feel I owe it to myself to fight back - I may not win or obtain a satisfactory outcome but at least I'll know I've tried.
Elsewhere - I have managed to avoid the poor me comfort eating syndrome and am now 2.1kgs down - had a bit of a blip a couple of weeks ago but managed to haul my ass back into line!
Bloss had surgery almost two weeks ago for cysts in his gums - one on the bottom and one on the opposite side on the top and the associated teeth removed. He's actually coped quite well and seems to be recovering well. However as part of the recovery process it really was essential that he stopped smoking to avoid the risk of a dry socket. I'm thrilled to say that today is Day 13 smoke free. But we're not allowed to talk about it and his moods and mood swings have been dreadful - in fact the anger is really quite scary but I'm learning (with the help of research on good old
Google) to stay calm and not respond other than to agree sometimes just for peace. It's quite tough but so worth persevering if we can get him through this stage.
Can't actually think of anything else to tell you and the nails I have on this week (a new type - which I do like) are making it bloody difficult to type on my laptop keyboard which is hard to type on at the best of times (aluminium keyboard).
So will sign off and try and update again soon.
Z xx
Wednesday, March 13, 2013
Sunday, February 17, 2013
Definitely not the Hare
Sorry - despite my commitment to check in weekly, some how time got away from me. However I am steadily going downwards but not quite as fast as I should be but at least it's going in the right direction. I went a bit haywire there for about a week - nothing too bad but just not being as careful as I should but I think I've got my right 'head' on again now. Now down 1.6kgs so will just remember Chris over at Diet Coke Rocks mantra - one day at a time! and keep plodding away.
Elsewhere in life - work continues to be horrendously busy and stressful. I love what I do but am really struggling with the volume. I'm a perfectionist and take pride in my professionalism and the amount of work is compromising that. However my health comes first and if I continue to feel overwhelmed, tired and not sleeping (all the things I feel a lot of the time at the moment) then a visit to my doctor will be in order.
But at home - Bloss was offered a redundancy when we had the restructure at work in August and took it very happily and retired. Was always his plan anyway but a retrenchment package made it much sweeter. So he's been getting lots of jobs done around the place. No major projects - just jobs which are a real rush to get done on the weekend but a few hours each day gets them sorted just the same without the hassle.
Much of his time has been spent getting our pool up to scratch after the flood but he's done a marvellous job.
He's also tackling his shed - this is a mammoth project - I've never seen the back wall in the 17 years we've been together - but he reached it the other day!
Elsewhere in life - work continues to be horrendously busy and stressful. I love what I do but am really struggling with the volume. I'm a perfectionist and take pride in my professionalism and the amount of work is compromising that. However my health comes first and if I continue to feel overwhelmed, tired and not sleeping (all the things I feel a lot of the time at the moment) then a visit to my doctor will be in order.
But at home - Bloss was offered a redundancy when we had the restructure at work in August and took it very happily and retired. Was always his plan anyway but a retrenchment package made it much sweeter. So he's been getting lots of jobs done around the place. No major projects - just jobs which are a real rush to get done on the weekend but a few hours each day gets them sorted just the same without the hassle.
Much of his time has been spent getting our pool up to scratch after the flood but he's done a marvellous job.
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| A before and after shot - 2 weeks after the flood |
The other piece of fantastic news we got last week is that the insurance company have said they will honour our claim. This came as a huge surprise as we were both of the opinion that they wouldn't pay out. But I think there has been pressure from very high places to pay on these flood claims - which certainly makes us very happy.
Merlin has turned the corner - he's been a challenge but was coming on well but still tending to be defiant - as Bloss said he always wanted to challenge you rather then please you. However I think he really missed us while we were away - the housesitters did a marvellous job but the week before we came back he was off his food and remained so even after we were back - I think he was starting to pine a bit. But we're now finding that he's much more obedient and definitely out to please us - which makes him a delight! And of course he's enjoying have Bloss home every day. They do things like go to the dump together!!
Other news which might interest is that we're going to be grandparents again - Clive and Jo are expecting a baby in May - another little boy - we have so many little boys in our family - but they're so cuddly!
I'll finish up with a couple of photos of Clive and Jo's wedding and some taken last weekend. I have a new camera - bought myself a digital SLR and while very much in learner mode, am having lots of fun playing and practising.
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| My two handsome lads |
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| The groom's family - including Clive's dad |
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| The bridal party |
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| The happy couple |
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| Merlin and Bella at the beach - love the expression on Merlin's face |
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| Josh doing a mid air twist |
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| Curtis having fun with dad |
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| Curtis after swimming a breadth unaided |
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| Happiness - love seeing kids with such joy on their faces |
And that's it for me - will make a better effort to report in again next week. Have a good one everybody xx
Thursday, January 31, 2013
Water, Water Everywhere
So after my last post, I was back to work after being off for 5 weeks on holiday. I was struggling to get back in the groove especially since there's now a ridiculous amount of work in my role - we had some organisational restructuring during the year and I'm now doing what was previously the work of 2 people - and add to that our turnover has gone through the roof and you can guess the impact on me.
Anyway around Thursday it started to rain.... and rain and Friday it was still raining. We live by the side of a river which takes the overflow from a nearby dam. On Thursday night it was 0.6m below the spillway. By Friday morning it was 0.3m above the spillway and just kept on rising. Meanwhile it continued to rain. And the river is tidal.
See where I'm going - it's coming out of the sky, down the river from the dam and up the river from the tide and our house is the lowest point in the street. We've never been flooded before but did know that we were listed on the 1:100 year flood plan.
Saturday morning at 6am we were wakened by police doorknocking, warning us the river was rising and that high tide was at 9am. We leapt into action. Fortunately we live in a high set house so downstairs is a bedroom/games room, laundry, and bathroom and they are all now tiled. We have a large pool table so we piled as much as we possibly could on that and brought everything else up the stairs.
We survived the 9am high tide but went ahead and prepared bags ready to evacuate as meanwhile the dam level continued to increase. Now about 4.5m over the spillway. Around lunchtime we had some really heavy rainfall which caused damp patches on our bedroom ceiling and had water seeping into the downstairs room as the downpipe couldn't cope.
In the afternoon we went to our next door neighbours annual Australia day BBQ and noted that after coming up for high tide the water didn't drop real much for low tide. Not a good sign. Nightfall came and with it another high tide of 3.5m around 9pm. We watched and waited anxiously ready to jump in the car and go if we had to - we'd already taken my car to higher ground. Once again we survived the high tide but not by much. Then just shortly after we were again visited by the local constabulary and told we had to compulsorily evacuate. They were expecting much more water over the dam wall during the night. By this time the dam was 8.3m over the spillway.
So bags and dog in the car and off to our friends Deb and Ian who also live locally but on much higher ground. We could have gone to Grant and Tiff's - but they're in town (19km) away and the bridge we have to cross to get there was almost certain to be closed and then we'd have been stuck with no way back onto the island and unable to keep an eye on what was happening to the house.
At 1.30am we got a text message warning everyone to be out of low lying areas as they were doing a controlled release from the dam - this was in addition to what was gushing over the spillway so a serious amount of water rushing down the river. Merlin slept in Bloss's car overnight - so at 6am I went down to take him to the toilet and decided we'd walk round to our place. Craig caught up with me in the car just as I got to our street. We couldn't actually see our house as the whole street was flooded and had been blocked off by the SES
Our neighbours who had retrieved their boat could tell us the water hadn't quite reached the house but it was still about 4 hours to a high tide of 4.3m. Nothing more we could do so we left and checked out the damage elsewhere. Many many boats were either lost or badly damaged - our river is a popular place to moor your boat and many owners weren't able to reach them in time to do anything to save them from the raging water - which of course had all sorts of debris - logs, barrels and even a shed!
About 3pm which was after high tide we went back and this time were able to walk along the street and actually see the front of the house. The SES didn't want us to cross the road to see at first hand the damage but then we were able to sneak along the other side of the road and slip in without them seeing. By this time of course the water levels had dropped considerably but we could see that the whole of our ground floor had been under 300mm (12 inches) of water by the tidemarks left. We left then as there was still the expectation that it would re-flood with the next high tide.
I'd planned to work on Monday and have a day in lieu - and I figured I might as well stick to that plan as we probably wouldn't be able to get to the house. However I thought I'd just have a quick zap by the house on my way to work and lo and behold the water had gone right down and the street had been re-opened. So back to get Craig out of bed and into operation clean up. Both Deb and Ian as well as Deb's son Brandon and his girlfriend Kaytie came round to help then later another couple of friends Lex and Nola. This is when you are so truly humbled by the power of friendship. By midday it had all been cleaned up.
It's doubtful if we'll get any insurance coverage - there's a distinction in coverage between flash flood damage and river overflow - we're covered for the first but not the second. The assessor came this morning so we'll just have to wait and see what eventuates - but it could all have been so much worse.
This all kind of messed a bit with my good eating habits - I was down 1.1kgs on Saturday but then it flipped up a bit by Tuesday when I finally got home and by today I'm down 0.7kg - which is OK and I'll just keep working on it.
Back next week xx
Anyway around Thursday it started to rain.... and rain and Friday it was still raining. We live by the side of a river which takes the overflow from a nearby dam. On Thursday night it was 0.6m below the spillway. By Friday morning it was 0.3m above the spillway and just kept on rising. Meanwhile it continued to rain. And the river is tidal.
See where I'm going - it's coming out of the sky, down the river from the dam and up the river from the tide and our house is the lowest point in the street. We've never been flooded before but did know that we were listed on the 1:100 year flood plan.
Saturday morning at 6am we were wakened by police doorknocking, warning us the river was rising and that high tide was at 9am. We leapt into action. Fortunately we live in a high set house so downstairs is a bedroom/games room, laundry, and bathroom and they are all now tiled. We have a large pool table so we piled as much as we possibly could on that and brought everything else up the stairs.
We survived the 9am high tide but went ahead and prepared bags ready to evacuate as meanwhile the dam level continued to increase. Now about 4.5m over the spillway. Around lunchtime we had some really heavy rainfall which caused damp patches on our bedroom ceiling and had water seeping into the downstairs room as the downpipe couldn't cope.
In the afternoon we went to our next door neighbours annual Australia day BBQ and noted that after coming up for high tide the water didn't drop real much for low tide. Not a good sign. Nightfall came and with it another high tide of 3.5m around 9pm. We watched and waited anxiously ready to jump in the car and go if we had to - we'd already taken my car to higher ground. Once again we survived the high tide but not by much. Then just shortly after we were again visited by the local constabulary and told we had to compulsorily evacuate. They were expecting much more water over the dam wall during the night. By this time the dam was 8.3m over the spillway.
So bags and dog in the car and off to our friends Deb and Ian who also live locally but on much higher ground. We could have gone to Grant and Tiff's - but they're in town (19km) away and the bridge we have to cross to get there was almost certain to be closed and then we'd have been stuck with no way back onto the island and unable to keep an eye on what was happening to the house.
At 1.30am we got a text message warning everyone to be out of low lying areas as they were doing a controlled release from the dam - this was in addition to what was gushing over the spillway so a serious amount of water rushing down the river. Merlin slept in Bloss's car overnight - so at 6am I went down to take him to the toilet and decided we'd walk round to our place. Craig caught up with me in the car just as I got to our street. We couldn't actually see our house as the whole street was flooded and had been blocked off by the SES
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| Our neighbours getting their boat at 6am Sunday morning |
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| Someone in a boat helping people get medication. Our house is just round from the palm trees you can see |
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| Our next door neighbour's house |
About 3pm which was after high tide we went back and this time were able to walk along the street and actually see the front of the house. The SES didn't want us to cross the road to see at first hand the damage but then we were able to sneak along the other side of the road and slip in without them seeing. By this time of course the water levels had dropped considerably but we could see that the whole of our ground floor had been under 300mm (12 inches) of water by the tidemarks left. We left then as there was still the expectation that it would re-flood with the next high tide.
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| Looking out from our carport at low tide Sunday afternoon |
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| Our house from over the road on Sunday afternoon |
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| The flood level |
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| Our poor pool |
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| The games room floor |
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| The laundry |
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| The slimy slippery silt left on the driveway and carport |
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| Our front door and the shed |
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| Looking down the driveway after I had hosed it all |
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| Fairies at work |
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| All clean |
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| Another fairy at work |
This all kind of messed a bit with my good eating habits - I was down 1.1kgs on Saturday but then it flipped up a bit by Tuesday when I finally got home and by today I'm down 0.7kg - which is OK and I'll just keep working on it.
Back next week xx
Monday, January 21, 2013
Return of the Prodigal
There's probably no-one out there who'll notice I'm back. I see my last post was almost exactly one year ago today so I'm probably off everyone's Christmas card list!
So what's made me get off my bum and do a blog entry. Well two things probably - first off as many of you will know if you know me on Facebook - I've been doing a blog for the last 6 weeks about our recent travels to Norway, Scotland and Hong Kong, so I'm kind of back in the habit of blogging. The other reason is the same one as got me started blogging in the first place - weight loss support.
Last year was a kind of ordinary year for me weight loss wise. I started the year a bit higher than I like and knuckled down and lost about 4 kilos before Clive's wedding to Jo in Melbourne in April. However as part of that event my Mum and sister Linda were out here from Scotland so lots of eating out and socialising. So by the time they left I'd probably gained back two of the four I'd lost. The next few months I just bumbled along - not being too bad but not particularly good either. Then in September I decided I'd get serious and lose a few kilos before our trip. I was off the grog for six weeks, eating pretty well too but I couldn't seem to shift very much. I then got a bit lackadaisical so by the time the holiday actually arrived I was almost back to where I'd been at the start of the year. I've only gained about 2 kilos on holiday but its like someone just stuck a big lump of fat on my belly and midriff - and I hate it. I've never felt my abdomen and spare tyre so pronounced. Normally in the past I just get bigger all over but I think it must be an age thing and the rest of my body hasn't altered that much - just this thick bit round the middle. We got back on Saturday and I enjoyed my last bit of badness last night and today was back to work and back on some sensible eating (and drinking - that means none!). I've set myself a challenge to lose 10kgs this year - I know that these days it's much harder for me to lose so rather than coming up with a pie in the sky number I'm aiming to slowly and steadily lose 10kgs between now and the end of the year - if I manage it sooner then that will be a bonus.
So wish me luck - no that's not necessary - just encourage me to remain sensible! and in return I'll commit to doing a weekly update on here. In preparation and to get me hyped up I've given my blog a bit of a makeover.
Happy new year to anyone who reads - may this year be full of wondrous things and special moments for you.
Zanna xx
So what's made me get off my bum and do a blog entry. Well two things probably - first off as many of you will know if you know me on Facebook - I've been doing a blog for the last 6 weeks about our recent travels to Norway, Scotland and Hong Kong, so I'm kind of back in the habit of blogging. The other reason is the same one as got me started blogging in the first place - weight loss support.
Last year was a kind of ordinary year for me weight loss wise. I started the year a bit higher than I like and knuckled down and lost about 4 kilos before Clive's wedding to Jo in Melbourne in April. However as part of that event my Mum and sister Linda were out here from Scotland so lots of eating out and socialising. So by the time they left I'd probably gained back two of the four I'd lost. The next few months I just bumbled along - not being too bad but not particularly good either. Then in September I decided I'd get serious and lose a few kilos before our trip. I was off the grog for six weeks, eating pretty well too but I couldn't seem to shift very much. I then got a bit lackadaisical so by the time the holiday actually arrived I was almost back to where I'd been at the start of the year. I've only gained about 2 kilos on holiday but its like someone just stuck a big lump of fat on my belly and midriff - and I hate it. I've never felt my abdomen and spare tyre so pronounced. Normally in the past I just get bigger all over but I think it must be an age thing and the rest of my body hasn't altered that much - just this thick bit round the middle. We got back on Saturday and I enjoyed my last bit of badness last night and today was back to work and back on some sensible eating (and drinking - that means none!). I've set myself a challenge to lose 10kgs this year - I know that these days it's much harder for me to lose so rather than coming up with a pie in the sky number I'm aiming to slowly and steadily lose 10kgs between now and the end of the year - if I manage it sooner then that will be a bonus.
So wish me luck - no that's not necessary - just encourage me to remain sensible! and in return I'll commit to doing a weekly update on here. In preparation and to get me hyped up I've given my blog a bit of a makeover.
Happy new year to anyone who reads - may this year be full of wondrous things and special moments for you.
Zanna xx
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