Illness a death BUT a great holiday

I cannot believe that it has been 6 months since I wrote an entry – very bad. I make sure that I write in my private diary most days but sometimes when things are not great I don’t feel like putting it online how I’m feeling.

A LOT has been happening these past few months – my sister has been worrying us a lot because her condition has been getting very bad and she is on a lot of medication to control her chronic pain. She has a condition called Trigeminal Neuralgia ninds.nih.gov/disorders/trigeminal_neuralgia/detail_trigeminal_neuralgia.htm which is a horrid nerve pain condition that ruins your life if it isn’t treated. She has had it for nearly 2 years but it has never been this bad before and now she takes such high medications that she is disorientated, off balance and confused and has lost an awful lot of weight due to not being able to eat properly. When we go out for a meal we have to ask the waiter for warm water or ask them to put a J20 drink in the microwave because she can’t have anything cold. It isn’t like that all the time but for the past few months she has been living on warm drinks and easy to eat food as chewing can bring on an attack. She gets very depressed about it especially as there isn’t really a cure – there is an operation but it is the last resort as it is complicated surgery and if anything went wrong you could be left paralysed. It doesn’t help that she has been unemployed for over a year and a half now and there doesn’t seem to be any light at the end of the tunnel for her. She is always applying for jobs and she gets lots of interviews but always gets turned down which is devastating for her. She doesn’t have any friends in the area as well or a boyfriend and I know that she gets lonely and wishes her life was very different.

On a happier note Mike and I have had a fantastic holiday and have visited 3 states – Arizona, California and Nevada. We did so much on holiday and visited LA – including Hollywood and Beverly Hills, Santa Monica, Malibu, Santa Barbara, Carmel, Phoenix, Flagstaff Palm Springs, Las Vegas – we did a helicopter ride over the Grand Canyon on Mike’s birthday and we also took a raft along the Black Canyon where the famous Hoover Dam is. We went to San Francisco too and visited Alcatraz prison which was amazing. We were away for 18 days and the weather was very hot – around 40 most days!

Mike and I should be exchanging contracts on our house next week then we get the keys and can make plans to move in – yesterday I bought our first Christmas decoration for our tree 🙂

On another sad note though I want to send my thoughts to a man named Des who tragically killed himself while we were on holiday, I had only met him once but he was an ex colleague of Mike’s and Mike thought a lot of him and was very said to find out that he had done this. Sadly he left being a 7yr old son. The funeral was last week when we were flying home so Mike was not able to attend. I also felt sad as he seemed like a nice guy and it is such a terrible waste of a life.