Imagine you are writing a textbook for doctors on how to sensitively break bad new to patients. Is this how you would write the section on 'how to tell someone they've got severe osteoporosis of the spine'?

'Right, so you're here about your bone scan result. Well the scan on your spine showed that your bone density is minus 3 standard deviations below the average for a 21 year old woman. You don't understand what that means? Well, do you know what standard deviation is? Good. Well if you were to look at a Gaussian curve for bone density for women of your age, you know what a Gaussian curve is? Good. Well anyway where your bone density would be is way outside the average, in the bottom 2%, which means you have a severely osteoporitic spine. So anytime you fall you could easily break a bone and if for instance, you stepped off a stool you could crush a vertebra which would be very painful but at least you wouldn't be paralysed like someone who breaks their back in a motorbike crash.
Oh, dear, do you need a tissue? You look like you weren't expecting to hear this, the good news is that your hip isn't as bad as your back, it's only half way to osteoporosis. So you need to start on treatment, take these tablets twice a day and these once a week, you have to take them with a large glass of water and remain upright without eating for 30 minutes otherwise you could get a stricture of your oesophagus which could require surgery.
Look, there are a lot of medical conditions which are a lot worse, at least you're not confined to bed and lead a normal life. You don't lead a normal life? Never mind, do the best you can. Just accept this has happened and make the best of it.
Are you ok? You seem a bit down today. You weren't feeling down until you came in here?
Ok then, come back in a couple of weeks.'

My doctor is barmy!!!

I'm a bit concerned I might be making J out to be a little horror. He isn't really. Most of the time he's a cheerful, good natured, easy going, helpful little boy.
It's just sometimes...

I've felt some of my posts lately have been a bit gloomy so here's a bit of good news about our runner beans: this year the slugs are not going to eat them!

This is because they've already been killed by the frost.

Never mind.

We're going to plant some more.

My son seems to be seriously considering a career as a couch potato. In an effort to overcome this P is trying to get him to help with some jobs outside. So yesterday when Adam was over he had the idea they could both help with filling in our potholes. Adam was fine with this & was cheerfully helping & I thought J was as well (well, forget the 'cheerfully' bit) then I heard a rustling noise from the loft & realised he was hiding up there. Cue one outburst of temper from Mum.
Today J is outside with Dad again & actually seems to be happily chatting away as he works, this could be because he's realising it's a way to be not doing his homework.
After a rather stressful morning at church I'm thinking of composing a list of rules for J :

Do not whack other members of the congregation over the head.
Do not rugby tackle the minister's son when he is in the middle of singing a hymn.
Even if the blocks are loose do not take up the parquet flooring during the collection.
If it should happen that you've removed some of the flooring blocks do not loudly bang them together.

No doubt I will soon be able to think of additions to this list.

I don't know if you remember I mentioned the children's home that our church supports & there was a little boy who was badly burned. I just got the sad news that he's died. He had seemed to be doing so well up to now & he was so brave, I don't know what happened, perhaps he got an infection. It's all really sad anyway.
This has been a week when I haven't really had much of a grip, have been doing a lot of moping, some sleeping, a fair amount of struggling to make sense of things & a little bit of still managing to hold on & trust in God. Well, ok deep down I do trust in God, all the time. It's just sometimes I feel like I'm in a long dark tunnel & it's not a tunnel I want to be in & I know I'll come to the end of it but I don't know when & it's really hard not knowing when that'll be but when I try & tell people what the tunnel's like they don't understand & sometimes they get cross with me as if being in the tunnel is where I've chosen to be.
Part of the reason this week has been difficult is that I phoned the surgery for my bone scan result & the receptionist looked at it & said 'You really need to see the doctor.' This simply isn't encouraging. I suspected my bones might not be very strong after 15 years of no exercise but it's still a shock. I've got an appointment for Monday so I'll find out how bad it is then.

P & J returned yesterday morning having had a good time. I knew P would enjoy it. They hadn't had that much sleep though as there was one boy who couldn't sleep so at regular intervals kept deliberately waking everyone else up. The little darling!
J was talking about how he'd done crate staking up to 9 crates high & climbed this & climbed that. You'd never manage to have a 'mother & son camp', it would be 'You can't go up there it's too high! Have you tightened your safety harness? Why haven't you got your coat on? Don't sit that close to the campfire! Have you changed your socks?'
J gave me the plant he'd got me for Mother's Day then we headed off to church where they gave out more plants. When J gave one to the woman behind me she said 'I don't deserve this, I'm not a mum.' I know she wanted to have children but couldn't have them & the woman next to her lost a child. It's a difficult day for some people. I slid Mum's photo behind J's a few days ago, there are some times when I just can't look at it.
I am so thankful for J though, even if he thinks I'm not interesting he's been such a blessing. Anyway as Becky was saying yesterday there comes a time in life, a lot, lot later on, when you do appreciate what your mum did for you.

Well the music festival was seriously brilliant! There were 400 children & they were just so good it almost made me cry. Because I was in the wheelchair we got a really good seat right at the front with an excellent view of J who was at the back cos he's tall. Anyway it was just good.
On the way out we bumped into Louise & Steve & when we mentioned the 'father & son cub camp' the next morning both Steve & P had the look of two men awaiting a particularly nasty form of execution. Honestly, spending a day & night with a group of 8, 9 & 10 year old boys what could be better?
We had to get up early Saturday morning to pack, quite why I had to do most of the packing when I wasn't actually going is a mystery, but anyway there was the usual bit of a rush & last minute panic but nowhere near as bad as last year when P wasn't well & ended up not going in the end. Anyway it wasn't too bad & then they were off & I just has to quickly get ready for the ladies' breakfast. Becky had agreed to pick me up at 8.30. Becky is a wonderful person but punctuality just isn't one of her strengths so at 8.25 I thought 'She'll never be here at 8.30, I've got at least a quarter of an hour.' At that moment the doorbell rang. It was Becky's friend Simone: 'Becky asked me to pick you up because she's running so late.' Yikes!
She waited 10 minutes until I was ready, as we were driving past the caravans she asked: 'Did someone actually live in those things?' Well, er, yes actually, they did.
The breakfast was really, really good - there was orange juice or bucks fizz, tea & coffee, scrambled egg, smoked salmon, croissants, bread, muffins & fruit. Seriously yummy. And the speaker was excellent as well. She was very quiet but had a powerful message & gave her story of how she used to feel so inadequate & miserable as 'just a housewife' & one day she just cried out to God 'if he was there' to help her. Straight away someone she knew only slightly who was a Christian phoned up & said 'I don't know why I'm phoning you, I just feel I have to' & she went round to see her & poured out her problems & the other woman told her about Jesus & she gave her life to him & her life was transformed. It was a very good talk anyway.
I really love P & J but I did enjoy the peace on Saturday afternoon. Between them they can make a lot of noise with their TVs, computers, radios, X-boxes, hammers, saws, drills etc etc Becky came round for a chat in the afternoon, she asked if I wanted to go round & watch the DVD of Mamma Mia later & I did want to but I was just too tired. It's really good having a hamster when I'm sleeping alone in the house, if there's a noise I can think 'It's just Digger.'

Last night P was so buoyed up after his day at school I realised how much he still misses teaching really. He was training as a teacher but fell ill in his final year & by the time he recovered, several years later, the course had changed so he'd have had to do the whole thing again so he got a different job. I said to him if he takes early retirement, which he's thinking of, he could perhaps do one of those train on the job things & go back to teaching a couple of days a week. He said he has thought about it sometimes. We'll see.
H was in such a cheerful mood that I managed to say casually 'I wonder if J's cough will be a problem at the music festival.'
'Er, what music festival?'
Anyway he was quite happy about going. I just wonder if J's cough, which is of a peculiarly irritating variety will be a problem. I must phone up & enquire about wheelchair access as well.

I have spent the last two evenings going through MAJOR trauma trying to get J to do his writing homework. This involved a lot of holding my hands to my head & groaning 'Just get on with it ...please...' When the whole story is meant to take 20 minutes & after 20 minutes he's managed to write just the title & after another 20 minutes he's drawn a picture which he wasn't meant to do anyway & after another 20 minutes I find he's been secretly playing a game instead & after another 20 minutes he's saying 'I don't know what to write' & hasn't written another word... This is like stress hormones going through the roof time. The crazy thing is that what he had to do was write an advert for a new video game. You'd think that would be one thing he'd want to do.
Anyway when he'd finally finished it, having typed just 10 lines he started on the 'long writing task'. For this he was meant to interview someone & he suggested he could do one of his parents. Then he said: 'It's meant to be someone interesting so it'd better be Dad.' Crushing or what! (At that point P could have said 'Well actually Mum's really interesting underneath it all.)
So there they were sitting on the sofa doing this interview thing & it was all very calm & peaceful. How was P doing it I wondered, creating such a scene of domestic bliss in the midst of J's writing homework. Easy - he was typing it for him.
This morning I realised J hadn't written his name on any of his homework so I gave it to him to do so. Was it really unreasonable of me to expect him to then take the logical next step & actually put it in his school bag? He's just going to have to go back in to school tonight to take it in.

There is a father & son cub camp coming up soon. There have been some tantrums, pouting & generally bad behaviour all along the general lines of 'I don't want to go to cub camp!' J, on the other hand, is really looking forward to it.
What I'm trying to pluck up courage to tell P, as I'm sure he's forgotten, is that the night before we're going to a music festival in which J is singing (he's going because his whole class is going, like both his parents J is not greatly gifted where singing is concerned, P's singing tends to be all on one note & my music teacher likened mine to Norman Wisdom's). Anyway I'm concerned that P's reaction is going to be 'I'm not going to that & cub camp the next day!' He finds late nights really hard to cope with, he really does, he just can't handle them. I've been praying for a minor miracle in this area.
I went to coffee morning today, there were a couple there who used to go to church but moved away. They had photos of their newborn twin grandaughters & they were so cute. There was this lovely picture of them both asleep nose to nose.
P was at school today helping with Maths week & he really enjoyed it. He was in charge of measuring how loud the pupils could scream, doesn't sound that much fun to me. Afterwards he went in to see the old man who we saw when he was in hospital, he was sent home even though he's very confused & his memory is very poor. We were all shocked they sent him home like that & it's a really difficult situation.
Lovely warm day again today which was good as I got J's sleeping bag washed & almost dry (it was still smelling a bit musty from summer camp).

Lovely sunny day! J got another cold. Yesterday morning he said he felt too ill to go in & I said 'I know you are but the school's got a 96% attendance target to meet' & he replied 'I'd better go in then'!! They're having a special Maths week at school so that's a help. P's going in to help with it tomorrow.
Went to house group. Sophie had sent me message asking me to lead discussion but I hadn't got it so had to do it at last minute, I think I was quite tactful in saying that there are different ways of interpreting Gethsemane & I tend to go with the view that it was the moment Jesus began to take on himself the sin of the world, which was indescribable anguish, rather than just plain terror which is what the preacher had said. In the end they all agreed with me.
Must rush to hang out washing before I get J.

I am feeling bad and I just wish I'd kept my mouth shut.
Today got off to a good start, we all got up in (fairly) good time. J had his hair washed without too many complaints. I found I've lost 6 lb in total so far despite a week in which I ate a lot of cakes, half a packet of jelly babies and a bowl of trifle (at a cookware party). We picked Adam up ok, the boys played fairly quietly, the service was ok except I disagreed with the sermon (it wasn't our usual minister) but then it was about Gethsemane which is quite a complex subject. Then afterwards there was a prayer session about the ladies' breakfast coming up. Only one other person and me turned up and the other three all prayed great long prayers & I prayed just a little short one but I think that's ok because God doesn't mind short prayers. But as we were coming out I was talking to someone and all this stuff about how unhappy I am at the housegroup just started coming out of my mouth. I ended up bursting into tears & our minister came over & joined in the conversation & I started saying all sorts of stuff like no-one ever says they're praying for me & he said he knows some people are praying for me & I said how am I meant to know that if they don't say so & hardly anyone ever asks me how I am so how do they know what to pray for & he said they know I'm ill & God knows what I need which is true but when you have a long term illness it matters so much that you know people are praying for you. I kept talking to our minister for a while & kept crying & I made such a fool of myself & I don't know why on earth I started all this and I came home & just cried a whole load more. There's just all this sort of pain to do with church inside me at the moment & when I try & explain it to people it just all goes wrong.



On a more trivial level P has just planted some runner beans in a container, hope they do better than last year when the slugs ate every one.

On Friday night we had the Year 6 Fun Night which is to raise funds for the school residential trip. Each child is expected to run a stall with the help of their parents. There were a few problems as there was a bit of a falling out between some of the parents whcih resulted in the person who had been organising it resigning. Despite this it went very well & raised over a thousand pounds. We had a treasure hunt map but we felt like tying J to his chair as he found it almost impossible to sit still & kept jumping up. Half way through the evening someone spilt a glass of wine over our map & soaked it. Trying hard (through clenched teeth) to reassure that it really didn't matter & it was no problem that the stickers were lifting off. We ended up buying loads of cakes from Louise's cake stall which ruined my diet for the weekend & a whole lot of plants which are probably going to sit on our windowsills giving me accusing looks for not getting round to repotting them & leaving them to a long slow withering death.'
Talking of diets I've lost 5 lb over the last 2 weeks which is pretty good. I was glad I'd lost weight because I went for my bone scan yesterday & they weighed me. The scan was very straightforward & the nurse was ever so nice. She said if my bones are getting thinner they can't make it better but they can stop it getting any worse because you can take drugs to slow down bone loss now. I didn't know that you start losing bone from the age of 30 but it means I might have reached my peak bone mass before I got ill when I was still quite active. Apparently 1 in 2 women & 1 in 5 men over 50 have osteoporosis. Scary!

I still can't quite believe that J got into the school we wanted, I've gone back onto the website to check several times even though we've also had an email & a letter from the council & a letter from the school. The school sent me a wodge of forms to fill in, like medical forms, agreeing to use the internet correctly & does he want school dinners forms. I don't feel ready for all this yet. They also asked if he wanted to apply for a place on their Maths & Science gifted & talented summer school. This child who's been complaining that Maths & Science are too easy & he's bored at school immediately responded by saying no, he wasn't going to school in the summer holidays. I've persuaded him to apply though because it would do him good & it's also a good idea to appear willing to learn & interested in Maths & Science. Also he would get to meet some of the teachers & other children. He's got to get his teacher to fill in an approval form though, including saying how good his attendance is! Little does he know but his new school does some lessons on a Saturday morning - booster classes if you're struggling & master classes if you're good.
There were some real surprises among the children in his class re school places, 3 girls who were right up at the top of the class & seemed certain to get into grammar school didn't get through, no-one knows what went wrong. They're really upset, poor things.The system doesn't really seem fair, especially now there's so much tutoring going on which is pushing the standard higher & higher. Children whose parents can afford an expensive tutor seem to have a big advantage. We'd really been feeling that J wouldn't cope with the pressure of grammar school anyway so we're glad he's going where he's going.

J came out of school very cheerful yesterday because his teacher had been off sick so they'd hardly done any work. I'm not sure it's very nice of him to rejoice in the fact his teacher has food poisoning. This morning he got up ok & I thought 'Phew!' then half way through his breakfast he went pale & said he felt ill. He said it was because I hadn't toasted his crumpets enough but I think 'sudden onset underdone crumpet poisoning' is quite rare. So I dosed him up with Calpol again, he went back to bed twice & I dragged him out of bed twice & got him to school. This is all a bit of a strain. I think he still has got his virus a bit & is coughing but he probably is well enough to go in.
This made me a bit late for the housegroup but Emily arrived just after me so I wasn't last. I don't think I'd been since January. Last week at church Emily was talking to me & I hadn't said anything to her about being a bit unhappy with the group but she said she felt most of the same frustrations that I'm feeling. Anyway this morning was ok, we only chatted for a short time at the beginning & someone read out Psalm 29 which is a very beautiful & powerful psalm. It's just that one particular person tends to change the subject & go off at a tangent during the discussion & it's quite difficult. We were just starting to get into it a bit deeper & she just suddenly started chatting about something else & effectively brought it all to a close. I don't know the answer really.

Seriously difficult morning with J! Started yesterday evening really. He'd had Adam round & they'd had a great time tormenting the hamster & trashing the house. After Adam left I merely suggested a bit of piano playing & homework & he flew into a tantrum & stormed off to his room. He put himself to bed & said we were the worse parents ever & we weren't ever to set foot in his room again. A short while later a little voice said 'Mu..u..u..m, can you read to me.' His main grievances seem to be we make him go to school, make him go to bed & Dad expected him to help with the cupboard he's making for his room. It must be hard having such dreadful parents, I said I'd give him the number for Childline.
Anyway this morning he said he felt ill but I gave him some Calpol & made him go to school. The trouble is he's saying all the revision for SATs he's doing is stupid, boring & a waste of time & I think he's probably right. I phoned the school & they said they'd make him stay because he's had so much time off. He hasn't had that much time off, it's not nearly as bad as last year.
Can anyone with older children reassure me that all this bad mood stuff is going to get easier?

There seem to be two rules which operate in our house. The first is that if J has a dressing up day at school some vital item which he absolutely needs for his costume instantly disappears off the face of the earth. This explains why I spent most of Tuesday evening & Wednesday afternoon looking for a sword. What I would rather have been doing was resting after Monday night. The sword turned up under J's bed which is ok except I had asked him if he'd looked there & he said 'Yes'. When it turned up he said 'I didn't say I looked properly.'
The second rule is that whenever the house is such a tip that I'm thinking 'Wouldn't it be awful if someone came round' someone phones up & says they're coming round.' This explains why I spent yesterday morning exhausting myself cleaning the sink & cooker. They do look nice & clean though.
But I am tired & my legs ache. Tomorrow I go for my bone scan at 10.30 so I won't get much rest.
On Thursday I went back to the cardiac clinic. It was one of those amazing hospital appointments where everything runs smoothly. We got there early, a parking attendant found us a place, when we got to the clinic the person before me hadn't turned up so straight away I got my blood pressure done (a bit low) & had an ECG (ok). Then I saw the doctor who was really nice. He said there is a slight abnormality with my heart rhythm in that it's range is a bit greater than normal ie it's slow beats are slower than most people's & it's fast beats faster. It's not dangerous but if I get a virus or something my heart could start beating too fast but in that case they can give me drugs to slow it down. He said it's better not to take drugs at the moment, only if it becomes a serious problem which it might not. So, although I was a bit surprised that they found anything wrong it really doesn't seem to be serious which is a relief. It's probably not helped by me being so unfit.
Have to stop now for dinner.

Went to bed at 10.00 as I thought I'd have a bit of a sleep & then get up but couldn't sleep & just lying there not much fun. Got up at 12.00 but couldn't get into website, obviously lots of other people trying same thing. Went back to bed but still couldn't sleep, got up at 2.30, got straight into website & struggled to focus eyes on what it said... J had got into technology college which is school we all liked the best! Huge sigh of relief! It just so much 'felt' the right school for him, I really feel the hand of God is in this & I'm so thankful.

At one minute past midnight tonight we can log on & find out which school J has got into. I'm planning to stay up but super-cool P who hates losing out on sleep isn't, neither is J because we're not going to tell him about it. I don't want him not getting enough sleep straight after being ill. So anyway, the wait is nearly over & tonight I shall find out, unless the system crashes that is. Actually, really he'll probably be alright whichever of the 4 schools he's got into, as long as he has got into one of them. We shall see.

Yesterday J woke up feeling a lot better so he & P went off to the 'cholesterolfest' aka 'church mens' breakfast'. At this function they consume bacon, eggs, sausages, toast, baked beans etc etc & then they go home with a Yorkie bar. Why a Yorkie bar? Because it says on it 'not for girls'. Pathetic or what? (If you detect any hint of jealousy on my part you're imagining it, anyway I don't like Yorkies).
After all that masculine overeating yesterday, today we had the monthly church lunch which today had a 'fair trade theme' ie we were meant to use fair trade ingredients. I must say my banana bread turned out really nice & it was so easy to make. Here's how I did it:
Sat at table & said 'I want to make my banana bread but I'm feeling a bit tired would you mind weighing out ingredients for me?'
'Ok,' said P.
'Oh dear I don't think I feel up to mixing it.'
'No prob, I'll do it.'
And there it was - made!
Anyway if you're interested in the recipe (it really is very nice), here it is:

225g (8oz) self-raising flour
100g (4oz) butter
150g (5oz) fairtrade caster sugar
450g (1 lb) fairtrade bananas (the gooier the better)
1/2 tsp salt (actually we left this out)
2 eggs
175g (6 oz) mixed dried fruit

Pre-heat oven to 180 C/350 F/Gas Mark 4. Peel & mash bananas, then mix all ingredients except dried fruit together, by hand or in food processor. Add dried fruit. Spoon mixture into 1 kg (2 lb) non-stick loaf tin (we used silicone one, worked a treat), spread out evenly then bake for 1 1/2 hours. Done when skewer pushed in middle comes out clean. Cool on wire rack before slicing.

There you have it.

Church lunch was preceded by parade service, church was seriously packed. J didn't want to wear his cub uniform but he just had to. Now he's gone round Adam's to play & I'm sitting here typing while P whizzes his model helicopter round my head.