Caring for your household

 

So as you know, I believe in being prepared for food shortages and other distribution problems. 

I have been buying extras of staples when they are on special and my pantry is shaping up really well.

Likewise, I have been refurbishing my first aid supplies and updating our medications. I also have bought home cleaning supplies when on special and extra cat food for Xena and Milo.

I checked up on what foods were rationed here in Australia during WW2 and I have used that as a base guide for buying foods... plus I am adding foods that I know we particularly enjoy.

Also, I have purchased some extra diabetic supplies and monitoring machines to ensure we have the means to keep our diabetes under control.

In case of power outages we have purchased a generator and we still have our camp stoves with gas cylinders for cooking. We have an aluminium kettle and saucepans in case we need to use our camping stuff. I have bought different strength batteries when they were half price too.

This may seem all time consuming and energy intensive, but with no spoons due to ongoing fibromyalgia, I can tell you that it isn't. It just takes some planning and then buying a few extra things on your list each week.

Not wanting to keep our storage foodstuffs in the pantry with our usual edibles, I cleared off some shelves in my linen press and these have made a wonderful storage larder. Likewise my fridge/freezer in the garage is just loaded with storage edibles.

I know that hard times will come. Jesus has warned us in the Word. So it really makes sense to gather and store food in these times of plenty for when the times are lean.

There is no fear, just a quiet confidence that you can laugh at the times to come because you and your household are well cared for.

Strength and honour are her clothing; and she shall rejoice in time to come. Proverbs 31:25

Putting insomnia to good use!

Fibromyalgia, angina, spinal problems, muscle pain and neuropathy often vie for first place in keeping me awake at night.

It often starts with a trip to the bathroom and ends with insomnia raising its ugly head. You know the noises of bird calls in the night, a train tooting in the distance or the barking of a dog, you hear them all and they are the loneliest sounds...

I have found a way of replacing that lonely feeling with making my mind bring to remembrance prayer requests and anxieties of the past and coming new day. 

Laying in bed, I meditate on the LORD and force my body to lay in a restful position as I often eventually fall asleep mid prayer.

Where once I would stress out because I thought it rude to zone out on God, but I now have come to see that He blesses us with sleep and is therefore pleased when I succumb to my tiredness.

What can be a lonely time can be redeemed by praying blanket prayers. It's comforting to know that we can put insomnia to good use! 

Better than running from bombs!

 

Well, my fibromyalgia flare has abated, and I have been doing a lot of knitting as watching TV bores me to tears.  

I have been a bit depressed lately and I think it's because I have been watching too much news on world events. So I decided to turn it off and bring my attention to something positive.

I often listen to the Bible on YouTube read by David Suchet. It tends to put my mind at rest and gives me pleasure.

Most mornings I do breakfast and medications and go on the computer to check emails, answer any comments in my blogs and check out groceries specials and organise our medications and get the scripts that are due, refilled.  Then I tidy my home.

I have a lot of joy in watching the birds that come into our back garden and one of my morning chores is to feed them after I have fed Xena our little white cat... and now Milo, separately of course lol

As I am often low on spoons, I need to pace myself in the afternoon and often take a nana nap in order to be able to cook dinner.

We don't leave the house much at all, and to be honest I prefer it that way. But with my motorised scooter coming soon, I may find I quite like shopping again....

Life is pretty simple- almost boring, but with all that's happening in parts of the world, I am glad for the boring life. I don't think I would cope very well running for my life away from bombs!

Acceptance brings peace and patience

 

Over the past 30 years that I have been chronically ill, I find my tolerance for drama and fighting is almost zero.

It's not that I don't like people, it's just that the more you are surrounded by them, the more involved you become in their problems and their dramas unfolding. These days, I prefer solitude and sharing my life with Chris and our cats.. as for people's dramas etc, I pray for them.

These days, I am so grateful for our home which is a haven to Chris and I.  On the days that I don't have to leave my home, you will find me enjoying the peace of homelife. Our cats, Milo and Xena give us  not only joy, but peace. I love their purring near me. It's particularly soothing.

Throughout the day you will find worship music playing low accompanied by the noise of the kettle as it boils the water for a cup of tea. It's going almost constantly.

Because of lympedema and peripheral neuropathy in my feet, coupled with severe fibromyalgia, Chris will often massage the fluid from my legs and rub my feet which feel like they are burning. He has done this for years and it is so soothing that I will usually be asleep within minutes.

Chronic fatigue coupled with aging has given me extreme sleepiness and I seem to be unable to function properly without a daily nana nap.  I no longer whip myself with false guilt, but have accepted that this is out of my control. It is what it is.

Part of living a peaceful life when chronically ill is to accept that some things will have to go to the wayside, but I try and do as much as spoons allow.

Along with quiet enjoyment of your home, and acceptance comes peace and patience with oneself.. 

I love being a sacrificial home keeper!

 

I am nearly 73 and I find that there is true contentment in staying home.

Keeping the home clean and attractive is time and energy well spent and I find that it gives me a great sense of peace.

Housework is spiritual and for me keeping my home in order is good for my sense of accomplishment and peace. A messy or dirty home depresses me no end.

I have been blessed to be able to stay home for twenty years as my many illnesses saw me needing rest. But for me it has been no hardship.

After my first marriage ended, I felt lost. I missed being a wife who could stay at home but life dictated that I provide for myself and so I went to work until I met and married Chris 29 years ago.

He was happy to look after me and as illness came to stay he encouraged me to stay home. He also was happy to come home to a nice meal after the work day ended.

I believe that chosing to be a stay at home wife is God ordained and is still a goal that can be achieved with careful planning and management.

This is one definition of what a housewife is:

Housewife:

A married woman who stays home.

This is a lifelong vocation.
It is an old-fashioned term,
and something to be proud of.

Not a "domestic engineer."
Not a "home manager."

An old fashioned housewife,
who keeps the home,
and abides there.

 

I don't know how I managed to work with all my illnesses and I daily praise God for making it possible for me to stay home.

May He do so for you too if that is what you seek... as for me, I love being a Sacrificial home keeper! 

When your bed is calling your name.

Over the decades that I have lived with chronic illness, especially heart problems and fibromyalgia, I have found that having a routine helps me keep focussed and feel in control of my home.

I am not saying that I don't ever have days where I cannot rise to the occasion and follow them, but on the days that I have a small amount of spoons and motivation, knowing my priorities helps me know where to start in the overwhelm...

My priorities on days when I have enough energy to make an effort in doing housework, are cooking, dishes and washing. Everything else can wait.

So instead of being a slave to my routines and house, I allow myself to let a lot slide on bad days. I refuse to feel guilty for something I have no control over.

Instead of hating my routines, I have come to welcome them for they give me peace and direction, especially during a fibromyalgia flare with brain fog.

I have learned a lot in the three decades I have been a fibromyalgia sufferer, and I can honestly say that sticking to the basic routines will help you cope with it all. 

If I (however loosely), can follow the basic routines on a bad day, at least we will have been fed and have clean sheets to slip into when fatigue kicks in and our bed is calling our name.

Are you a sacrificial home keeper?

     

                               

Anyone who manages a home whilst battling chronic pain, illness and disability will know that there is a sacrificial element: we are the most selfless and courageous of women. We Sacrificial Home Keepers sacrifice our comfort and exert ourselves beyond limit for those we love.

As a chronically ill woman, I can identify with women who are sacrificing themselves in trying to maintain normality in their home and family. I believe I am well qualified to write about chronic illness as I suffer from a myriad of health problems.

These posts are written as a diary of thoughts and articles through my days as a sufferer of chronic pain and illness. If you share that journey, please feel free to read this and perhaps comment, for illness can be a very lonely and isolating experience.  

Are you a Sacrificial Home Keeper? 

Housework is spiritual

 

As a Clean Freak and author of the e-book secret confessions of a clean freak - I can tell you - it's the results of housecleaning that are spiritual.  A clean home feels better.  Plus, you have the pride in a job well done. It's all positive - calming.

Housework left undone is very negative. A constant reminder of things you haven't done. I feel good when my bathroom walls or my stove is shiny. It makes me feel like I have control. And sometimes, that's all I have control over.

And, like all things spiritual, it takes discipline until it becomes habit. Housecleaning is a breeze once you have it under control and you have a routine. Really! I'm a single mom and I get picked on all the time for being too clean - like I have some disease! Guess I'm just a freak! author unknown.

Well, I wouldn't call this author a freak. I know from my own experience that a messy house makes me feel worse than usual and irritable. The trouble for me with never ending fibromyalgia, is getting the energy to do it. But the results of housework certainly are spiritual!

I have known a Christian woman who was part of our home bible group many years ago. Her place looked like a hurricane had struck it. Ants marched along the floor to dine and pillage her overflowing trash container in the kitchen. There wasn't a clean cup or spoon for after the study's fellowship cuppa.

We all cleaned it up so that the ladies who came would be more comfortable, but by the next week it was just the same. Instinctively, we knew that housework is spiritual and that we would not be able to focus on the Word sitting in filth. Filth is not conducive to worshiping God.

These days I am limited in how much I can clean and it often is a source of dismay to me that I can't do as much as I would like. When I do have the spoons (energy) to clean, the results lift my spirits so much that I have to conclude that housework is spiritual. Blessings as you sacrificially set the spiritual tone in cleaning your home.

 

Perhaps I am

 

So over the Christmas/New Year break, I have had a few disappointments. Once again fibromyalgia flares, lymphoedema and angina have plagued me when I particularly wanted to be well, and they've ruined my joy in life.

This year we weren't even invited anywhere for Christmas Day or New Year. When I asked about it, my children responded with "well you never come anyway!" It hurt because it's true, but I smiled and said "that's OK!" But it would have been nice to have been invited anyway.

Chris's children came to visit us a few days before Christmas and I was nearly demented with pain and fatigue, but I kept smiling and tried to be cheerful. I don't think they realised how much pain killers and determination went behind that smile.

I know some people think I am a malingerer because I don't look sick most of the time. And I think they believe that I am putting it on when I say how painful my life is- they have no idea the effort it takes to appear well. 

Not allowing illness to define me, I try very hard to overcome my pain, tiredness, depression and lethargy. Often it is overwhelming and I succumb to the feelings of loneliness and inferiority that drown me. 

But no one really knows that depth of suffering, and I do believe no one cares. So I will discipline myself and take control of what few spoons I have, for not many know how heavy the cloak of illness gets.

So when I occasionally do succumb to it, and mention it to others, I can see them looking doubtfully at me and judging me as a malingerer. They think I am acting and putting it on.

I do act a lot, really. Strong when I am weak. Energetic and able when I am clearly not. Smiling in spite of it all. Bearing my load stoically.

If they did know the depth of my pain they would know that I do act- I act out feeling normal. An actor who could win an Oscar to avoid being labelled as a fake. 

A good actor can bring to life a fictitious person and for me, that person is myself enjoying good health.

They say I am an actor- perhaps I am...

They weren't forthcoming!

 

So Christmas has come and gone and I am totally down and out with a severe fibromyalgia flare.

Our festivities weren't grand and we stayed home. We had family come on Sunday and then on Tuesday and it was fun but exhausting.

Come Christmas Day, we just stayed home by ourselves. I was so fatigued and in pain that we decided that leftover ham sandwiches were good enough for lunch and dinner.

By 9 o'clock Christmas Night I was in bed and stayed there all Boxing Day. I was so tired and stiff in the muscles that I could barely move. Painkillers didn't help at all...

Saturday saw me cook dinner and lay on the couch and that was all I could manage.

Lucky that I don't believe in Santa any more or else I would be sorely disappointed... all I wanted was some spoons for Christmas... and they weren't forthcoming.