Car Crash Part 1

Ok I’m 10 days’ post car crash. I’ve really thought about whether I want to talk about this as really, it’s still quite traumatic. But talking to Ben and other people has helped so writing it down is going to act as my little therapy session. My injuries were grim so if you are easily squeamish this probably isn’t the post for you. The details of what happened I can’t talk about because the police are involved so I’m just going to talk about what happened immediately after.

It didn’t occur to me immediately that I would crash. I thought I could stop in time. I had my hand on my horn while my feet were flat down on the clutch and brakes. The sound of my horn and me screaming I don’t think will ever leave my ears. It wasn’t an out of body experience it is just the vision of the car still coming closer and my scream over the noise of the horn. The impact of the air bag deploying on my hand sent intense pain through my arm and numbness followed by the most intense pins and needles through my hand. I knew I had also hit my head but the pain in my arm masked anything else. I remember screaming in pain. I remember Amber crying out to me. And the intense panic and shock of what had just happened. Feeling so vulnerable. Unable to move and unable to comfort my baby who had seen the whole thing from the back-passenger seat.

I can’t talk about the other driver so ill skip to hospital. A couple had stopped when they had seen the crash. They had called for an ambulance but the ambulance was unsure of the location so they drove me and amber in their car. I kid you not that couple are my guardian angels. The road we had been travelling on is usually deserted and that day 2 cars stopped to help. I still dread to think what would have happened if they hadn’t been on that road 1 minute behind me. When we arrived at a&e I was put on a trolley and had blocks put around my head in case I had damaged my neck or spine. people were asking me questions about my date of birth, my address then they wanted to know about amber. I was still crying. I had my eyes closed. At this point people were trying to contact my parents. The woman who had stopped in the car with her husband was carrying Amber and kept reassuring me she was near she told me amber was still here with me and she was fine not to worry. Someone came over and started talking to me and I reached out for their hand with my left hand and just held it they stayed with me whoever it was until I was moved to a bay in resus. In resuss I went to open my eyes but could only open my left. I was crying and my ears felt wet. Doctors kept asking what had happened asking where the pain was. I was calming down but kept randomly coming back to tears. A doctor then put his hand under my neck and began asking if I had pain in my neck shoulders and back I told him no. they decided to take the blocks of my head and sat me up on the bed.

Someone takes photos of my face but I can’t remember who. I can hear doctors checking Amber over and asking her to mover her head and to open her mouth. I hear her telling a nurse about her bunny and a wave of relief comes over me that she’s ok. Its then I go to wipe tears of my face and I realise I’m crying blood out of my right eye. I had realised in the car that I had a cut on my outer eyelid but the blood was also coming from my tear ducts now. I don’t remember feeling freaked or alarmed by this. My arm was still so painful that I didn’t care about anything else. They managed to ease of my coat ii had been wearing while I screamed blue murder with pain. They then asked to take my hoodie off and I begged them to cut it. After they customized my hoodie cutting off one sleeve I got the full view of my arm. My hand was bleeding but my forearm was bent in the middle and fat. They had to x-ray it which meant manipulating the position of my arm for the best view of the break. Turns out there were two breaks in it. The two bones in my forearm had both snapped so when they lovely nurses on x-ray department were picking my arm up the reason I was screaming in agony was my hand wasn’t being held up by anything. just skin attached my hand to my arm.

As soon as the x-ray pictures came back the doctors wanted to do surgery right then. Unfortunately, I didn’t plan very well as I had had lunch right before going to pick amber up so instead they had to give me local anaesthetic and gas and air to pull the bones into place to reduce nerve damage. I was told I would have surgery the following morning to put metal plates in my arm. Great! My mum then arrived thank goodness and I’m very thankful to her that her face didn’t recoil at the sight of me. I have since seen the photos that were taken when I was admitted. I looked like id been in a fight with Mike Tyson I looked horrific. I had had to leave a voicemail for Ben telling I was in hospital and he needed to call me back. I was very relieved to see her anyway. She could occupy amber while I was seen to for my eye. What first looked like a job to just put steri strips over my cut eyelid turns out it needed stitches. After a trip to get a CT scan, it then turned into an optometrist looking at my eye ball and telling me I need emergency surgery within the hour because they think my eyeball has ruptured and stitches in the eyelid would be done during theatre. Forgot to mention I was on morphine by this point so the arm was no longer an issue being in plaster cast past my elbow. Now I was facing two lots of general anaesthetic in 12 hours and one of those surgeries is on my eyeball.

Ok that’s as far as I’m going today. My eye op went well in the end. 10 stitches in my eyelid but luckily no rupture to my eye. Il have to do these posts in sections because it is way too long to fit into one. I’ve tried to make this slightly light-hearted but bare in mind this the single most traumatic experience of my life. I’m still recovering I’m still processing what happened and how life has now changed. These posts will just come as and when I’m ready to type them. I set this blog up to document the year and what a hell of a year its turning out to be!

Abi x

Early Pancake Day!

With everything going on at the moment I’ve not been on the ball. So, on Monday evening when I was sitting with Amber all snuggled I thought to myself its pancake Tuesdays tomorrow “Hey Amber do you know what day it is tomorrow pancake day!” Got myself out of the house to buy fruit and chocolate spread got everything set up. Then after the carnage sat down with tummy full of pancakes and realised that its next week 28^th of Feb not 21^st.

Never mind! Small wins in that amber and I managed to make pancakes with hardly any help (except washing up sorry Ben!) Amber could crack eggs all by herself and had much more stirring time than usual. Mummy only being able to use her left hand has perks!

I cut up fruit and set up a little pancake decorating station for her to do whatever she liked. Which turned out she just wanted to pile everything on! I tried to be a little bit more creative but that was difficult using my left hand! 

Side note – the best and easiest pancake mix ever is Krusteaz buttermilk pancake mix – amazing! Super easy, 2 scoops with 3 cups of water makes 5 large pancakes we add an egg for every scoop of mix with 2 cups of water makes extra fluffy pancakes!

Anyway, it was nice to do something normal and fun again with Amber and yummy too! Also just note that my right arm/hand is completely unusable so typing takes twice as long and then editing all of my typos as well plus fun extra my right eye is unable to focus so its taking longer for me to get my head around things bare with me!

Abi x

We do believe in Fairies!

It’s been a bit quiet on here. If you don’t follow me on Facebook, you won’t know I was in a nasty car crash on 15^th Feb. I haven’t felt up to posting much and life has been consumed by hospital trips and pain killers. I will talk about it more another time but for now here is the post that I had been due to publish that evening before the crash. A very special post about the fairies who live in our house…

My 4 year old Amber is absolutely encased in the magic of fairies currently. When I was Ambers age I remember looking for fairies in the garden, pretending they lived in the tree at the bottom of my grandparents garden, reading books about fairies and my mum making up stories about them for me.

For Amber it started at my aunty’s house. Her garden is full of flowers including some with huge petals perfect for a fairy to sit in. My aunty called Amber out to the garden and showed Amber the fairy flower explaining that fairies liked to sleep in them. Amber loved hearing about the fairies and the next time she visited the fairies had left her a little present! A mini box of smarties! Ever since the fairies have been very generous to Amber leaving her little treats to show her they are there.

For Christmas me and my mum were given fairy doors so that the fairies could visit Amber at our houses too! Amber ever since has had a fairy door in her bedroom at our house and my mums house.

Now, the fairies at mums house are very dedicated to leaving gifts for Amber. Almost always they have left her a little treat and Amber is estactic! However the fairies at our house have been slacking a little ever since they ran out of Christmas chocolate! So when they visited today while she was at school it was a very big deal when Amber discovered the white chocolate bunny in front of the fairy door! So much so that she wanted to write a letter to the fairies to say thank you.

Feeling very proud of what a polite sweet little girl Amber is blossoming into. Her imiganation is endless and her willingness to help others still gives me a lump in my throat. It’s safe to say her little letter to the fairies will be greatly appreciated and I’m sure they will be sending her a reply!
Abi x

Valentines painting

I had planned to do lots of crafty things with Amber in the run up to valentines however it all has been a bit hectic and I didn’t get organised quick enough! Resulted in my very quickly rushing through pinterest searching easy valentine’s crafts for kids and I came upon a loo roll cardboard tube. Yep! Bend it a certain way and voila a love heart. Dip it in paint and you can print onto paper. Perfect!

 Easy to bend into place but not easy to dip into paint to cover all the edges. Somehow when you bend it in the point of the top “M” shape goes further up and doesn’t touch the paper when printing. So, you don't get a full heart that joins in the middle. Amber was not impressed by it really did it a couple times and moved on.

 I prefer her to make her own paintings and art stuff anyway. I’d rather her do something completely all her own work than me tell her what to do and end up doing it myself. If she wants to paint blobs then it will proudly be pinned to my fridge! Anyway Pinterest FAIL with my love heart shaped loo roll!

Hope everyone is having a good valentine’s day. Ben is away but we were lucky that we had Sunday together so cooked dinner and he bought flowers. One day we will be able to celebrate Valentines together on the actual day. A girl can dream!

Abi x

Wedding Nightmares!

Less than 8 weeks to go till the wedding and I had my first wedding nightmare. Our wedding planning has really been plain sailing and I think we have been quite lucky. However, this weekend brought some challenges and really put a strain on things. I think the stress and frustration of the what has been happening has taken a toll on my sleeping and now its invading my dreams!

So, last night dreaming about the wedding started off very nice. It was the night before my wedding for some reason. Me my bridal party and about 30 people I went to primary school were all in my old school assembly hall. Bit odd now to look back but it was perfectly normal in the dream. We all then decided we should get some sleep and simply laid down on the cold stone floor?! Next thing it’s the morning of the wedding and we are getting ready in the back room of a pub. No idea why. Everything seems to be going to plan until I go to put my dress on and somehow it is about 5 sizes too big for me. I’m told there’s no time to take it in so I just have to hold it up myself. Next I suddenly realise that ben is probably with his groomsman drinking in the pub and I need to leave in case he sees me. Panic now thinking this is not how I wanted to look. This is not what I want ben to see and as I am quickly coming out of a back door through a car park I hear Ben laughing joking with his friends and even with my back turned I know he has now seen me. He then starts calling after me and I just run away in embarrassment.

I woke up in tears. Safe to say it wasn’t a good wakeup call! Luckily, I know I have a brilliant seamstress who will make sure my dress fits perfectly and I know I’m getting ready 40 minutes away from me and our venue is not a pub or my school assembly hall. And I also know that there are a lot worse things that can go wrong at a wedding so I’m praying these dreams don’t get worse! Regardless it left me a bit shaky. Hoping for a more pleasant sleep tonight!

Abi

Hen Do #1!

Hen do 1 of 2 is now complete! I can believe it! I spent a lot of the time looking around thinking this is for me! I’m getting married! Still hasn’t quite sunk in but a Hen do will definitely make it feel real! The reason I am having two hen dos is because I’m incredibly popular and have lots of friends ;) Basically I go to an adult dance class once a week with the same teacher who has taught me since I was 12! And everyone in that group of women now are really close we have been on a lot of ups and downs together! So, when trying to figure out how I would manage to have a Hen do with 30 of my close friends and family it cut our options rather thinly! So, when another member of group had a separate hen do just for the ladies in the dance class I hopped on board with the idea! So, Hen do #1 was with dancing ladies and we went to Bistro Live in Milton Keynes.

I went there with the same group of ladies three years ago for my 21st! Was brilliant to go back again. For anyone that doesn't know Bistro Live is a venue that will serve you a 3 course meal, live band, DJ AND lets you dance on the tables!! Its really popular for hen parties and birthdays. When you arrive you are given a menu with 3 options for starter and main and dessert is a trio of mini classics. The waiters and hosts will come around to introduce themselves and you are given a flag to wave if you need anything. We also could order alcohol either pay cash or open a tab. The cocktails were lovely and you could choose how strong you wanted them in pitchers from weak, regular and strong. There is also a guy whose only job is to serve shots!

When we got there my maid of honour Louise handed out little slips of paper for all the ladies which had sections to fill out to give advice for married life to me. It was such a nice touch and I cant wait to go through them all properly with Ben whenever he is around next! Louise also had been busy making each of us a miniature ben on a peg to have with us at all times! If you lost him you had to finish your drink as a forfit!

For my meal I chose sticky chicken to start and fish pie as my main. The sticky chicken tasted like crispy shredded chicken from the Chinese and it was really tasty. the fish pie was served with a creamy dill sauce it was amazing! the trio of mini desserts were a fudgy chocolate brownie, meringue with berries and a lemon cheese cake all were delicious. If I wasn't full enough after all that they then presented me and my friend Lesley (it was also her birthday!) with a huge cupcake! I couldn't finish it so they gave me a little box to keep it in and I let Amber have it!

After the meal the live band starts playing and you are free to get up and dance on the dance floor while plates are being cleared. A photographer also comes around to take group shots if you want them for no charge. After the band play a few songs you are given a quiz sheet and the DJ plays a clip of a song and you have to name the artist. All a bit of fun but we got a bit competitive and might have cheated using an app for a few. We still didn't win! The band then plays their full set. The two times I've been before my uncle has been the lead singer of the band so it was odd to not have him there and dare I say him and his band are better than the band that was on Saturday! With that said I was still dancing on tables! The band finished at 11 and then the DJ played until 1am. The DJ mainly plays request songs which were brilliant! Definitely my favourite part of the night!

 Me and my mum dancing on tables!

 SHOTS

I want to say a big thank you to all the ladies who came out to celebrate with me Saturday. I had a brilliant time!

And a huge Thank you to my amazing best friend and maid of honour Louise the amount of time and energy you have spent of planning all this I cant thank you enough. Saturday was everything I wanted and more! Feel so lucky to have such an amazing best friend!  I cant wait for part 2! Love you lots!

Abi x

LVL Lashes!

I had been thinking for ages, that for the wedding I was going to get eyelash extensions. My natural lashes with mascara are never quite enough for me. But piling 30 coats of mascara on was never a good look on anyone. Strip lashes are so fiddly to put on and I always manage to get the ones that look more suitable for drag queens. So, when I went for my make-up trial a couple weeks back I asked my make-up artist/beautician if I could book in for eyelash extensions for the wedding. She suggested I try LVL lashes. She explained that I had naturally long lashes that were very straight. The LVL treatment would bend the lashes upwards to lift them and tint them to make them more defined. The results last for up to 5 weeks so I decided to give them a go. The treatment felt very similar to a lash perm and tint but instead of perming the lashes to give them a full curl. LVL lashes put a bend in the lashes like when you use an eyelash curler so you see maximum length! My Beautician Candice took before and after photos for me to see the difference and I’m kicking myself for forgetting to ask her to send them to me! I’ve managed to find an old photo of me without mascara so you will get the idea of how my natural lashes look (non-existent!)

A very zoomed in picture excuse the quality and untamed eyebrows! 

And here is the after pic!

After the treatment, your lashes continue to lift for 24 hours and you are given strict instruction to not get them wet in that time. As soon as the 24 hours I put mascara on to see the full effect and here it is!

There’s no doubt it’s made a big difference to my lashes appearance. I really love how long it makes them look! I think this would be perfect for anyone who doesn’t wear a lot of make-up but wants to add something subtle and still natural looking. And if you love long lashes then this treatment is for you! For me I would love this for a holiday, when I wouldn’t be wearing less makeup or for an everyday look to give my lashes a boost. For my wedding however, I still feel like I want a bit of oomph for my lashes. I want volume as well as length to get the full lash look. So, that is my verdict on LVL lashes I’m really looking forward to getting the most use out of them on my hen do part 1 this weekend!
Abi
xxx