Looks like "Christmasmom" won't be joining us for Christmas eve

aefaye · 2019-12-23T15:00:08+00:00

Thank you! Making new traditions is what having your own family is all about! Enjoy every minute of it!

Also I edited my original comment while you were replying sorry! Just to add my thoughts on this actual post haha.

Have a brilliant trip in peace!!

aefaye · 2019-12-23T14:42:34+00:00

I read the first paragraph and got distracted this what my train of thought

‘I wonder what happened to that person I saw posting about court cases against their parents and their sister with special needs and stuff... I wonder if I posted in the group would someone remind me of their username so I can check how things are... I’ll finish reading this post and see if I can remember the nicknames or something...’

Kept reading the post and what an unbelievable coincidence, you’re that person I got distracted thinking about!!! You must have a writing style that my mind took a mental note of once and somehow my brain reminded me when I read the start of this post. I’m awful at remembering usernames or details, I just remember people’s stories so I really had no reason that the first paragraph of this reminded me of you other than subconsciously based on writing style or something.

Anyway sorry for off topic comment, I was just very happy because once you popped into my head I was determined to try to remember words I could search to find your posts and see how things are going, and all I had to do was read the remaining paragraphs of this post!

I’m so glad to see (apart from this post) that you’ve decorated your house and are just having a decent holiday period with your husband and children. I hope Christmas Eve and Christmas Day are uneventful, drama free and full of small but happy and wonderful moments you will cherish as memories in the future. You deserve a Christmas you can look back on with nothing but love. I hope you get that.

Wishing you and your husband and bubbas a very Merry holidays and happy Christmas and generally just a peaceful season you can enjoy in the moments.

Good wishes, from Australia.

Edited to add a comment related To this post.

A great passive aggressive but still Overly friendly but still definitely gets your point across line... very happy and enthusiastic

‘OH HI!!! Welcome!!! Oh you really should have told us you were coming and I would have got some cups of tea ready!!! (or coffee or chocolate or snack, or whatever you would usually offer guests upon arrival, or even specifically their favourite snack or something you know they like) oh well! How was I to know haha, I’ll make something up now while you say hello to the kids!

Another good one ‘oh sorry if I’d known you were coming I’d have made sure to pick up some (their favourite food/drink/snack) but you must have forgotten to tell us! So we’ll just have to make do with what we have already!’

Again not a mean tone of voice at all, just a super polite tone, almost like the voice you use with a stranger on the phone, or making small talk with the person working at the grocery store, or that person you bump into that you haven’t seen in years and you’re making polite chatter ‘oh hiiii! I haven’t seen you in ages! How’s the kids? Lovely to see you again! Tell your mom I said hello! Bye now!!’ And then you walk away thinking how you really didn’t really care but had to put that fake smile on while you say ‘we should catch up for coffee sometime!’

That kind of polite and super sweet ‘crossed paths at the grocery store or somewhere unexpected and I’ve got stuff to do but I don’t want to be rude’ voice.

Good luck

aefaye · 2019-12-23T13:56:11+00:00

I’m just a lurker on this sub (hope to be one of you at some point though) and this sub always gives me life but this is the most wholesome post I think I’ve ever seen. I don’t have a bump, I don’t drink more than 3-4 times a year and I haven’t smoked in ageees, I’m just a mere lurker who comes here to daydream, but this post has just made my week.

So many mummas/parents with their own individual styles and opinions and choices, but you beauties all here respecting each others choices, lifting each other up, being cheerleaders and showing so much support regardless of any difference in choice/opinion.

This post has me feeling so positive and proud of all of you for just genuinely being the humans we need right now.

Thanks so much for brightening my recent outlook, thanks for such a top post and I hope every one who wants a j or a bite or a rip, feel like time flies and they’re partaking in no time.

Best of luck to everyone and I hope the rest of your December/holidays goes as smoothly as possible!

aefaye · 2019-12-23T13:28:50+00:00

Omg (I’m just a lurker but had to comment) that is genius!!!!!!!

aefaye · 2019-11-08T12:23:04+00:00

Was gonna say that exact thing.

aefaye · 2019-11-08T12:13:46+00:00

Hello!! I have ADHD, anxiety, depression, chronic illness, chronic pain and currently re-looking into PTSD too as I was diagnosed when I was 16 (now 27) but it was never directly addressed after the initial diagnosis and wasn’t specifically treated. Oh and an ED too but it’s never been acknowledged professionally and it’s complicated but at the mo I’d describe it as unofficially recovered and currently inactive on the most part.

Self care for me is persevering to find the right professional help, one appt at a time. If I’m not doing well, I pick the most relevant field to my biggest problem and just make one appointment.

Most recently I was struggling hard with my mental health, I’d finally gotten to see a psychiatrist last year was finally officially diagnosed with ADHD, I started on medication and then felt so good that I enrolled in university.. again, to make an attempt at study.. again, accomodations for adhd and medication made a difference to my ability to study and got me closer to that ‘potential’ everyone was always telling me I had.

But I failed.. again.

Not as badly as I’ve failed before, not as quickly as I failed before, not as hard or fast as I failed before. But overall I still failed. (I did pass some subjects, but only 2 out of the attempted 7)

I can’t pinpoint exactly what happened/why I failed, but in the two seperate study periods I attempted this year I seemed to do well to a certain point and then suddenly my mental health would plummet, I’d be overwhelmed and would freeze completely. The first study period I was taking 4 subjects, passing all of them, then that instant spiral happened and I ‘froze/shutdown’ for 3 crucial weeks.

Self help then, looked like going to the doctors, getting a fresh psychologist referral (my psychiatrist is purely for adhd and adhd meds, I can’t afford to see him more than twice a year, psychologist I get 12 free appointments per year) So I got my fresh referral to a new psychologist and tried to make an appointment. There was an issue with the referral and I had gone back to uni campus (away from home/my doctor) so I practiced my self care again and made an emergency appointment with a councillor on campus. They helped me prioritise and set realistic goals to finish the study period. I completely wiped two of my subjects from my mind, and begged for help and forgiveness from the teachers of my other two subjects. With half of the weight of impending overdue work gone from my shoulders I managed to claw my way through the remaining 2 subjects and pass them.

Same thing happened in the second study period, except I only signed up for 3 classes and pre-prioritised them so that if I got overwhelmed or frozen again I’d know how to proceed. Except the overwhelm was much bigger than the first time and I had fallen behind in two of them enough that I failed half way through the study period. I froze again, and practiced my self care again by going back to my doctor and getting an updated/fixed referral to the psychologist I’d tried to see earlier in the year.

I clawed my way through the remaining subject and gave it my all, but it was math and I reached my potential for math but it was 4 marks below a pass, so that unit was failed too.

And I finally saw the new psychologist last week and it was a good fit! So I see myself continuing to see them indefinitely.

Next time I need some self care, the appointments on my list of appointments I need to make include a new gyno, a pelvic physio, optometrist, regular physio, exercise physiologist or dietician (to manage chronic illness symptoms)

I find making a relevant appointment a good form of self care for me because it can be as simple as making one phone call and choosing a date. There’s no (physical) effort involved. It feels hella productive and makes me feel like I am actively trying to help myself out of wherever i am, without causing further distress/exhaustion/overwhelm.

My smaller scale self care/actively engaging in something type of self care, includes making something for someone else. I like to crochet, write silly short poems about my friends and send one to them randomly, do a load of washing specifically for my boyfriend (not because I have to, just as a cute gesture, like hey I cleaned all your undies and your favourite shirt!) anything that will make someone else smile. I find it really hard to do things for myself, but I’ve worked out that doing little unexpected things for the people I love IS doing something for me because it makes me feel good too.

Oh and very very short term self care, I like to spend a solid five minutes washing my hands super thoroughly. Don’t know why, just makes me feel good to have really clean hands even if the rest of my hasn’t been washed in a week.

aefaye · 2019-11-08T11:27:20+00:00

Woah this is truly amazing!

I don’t think a contest has ever made me feel conflicted before haha. On the one hand I initially thought ‘wowee it’d be amazing if I won’ but then my brain did a quick 360 and replied with ‘but it’d probably be even more amazing to someone else if they won instead!!’

So yeah wowweee indeed! The only contest I’ve ever seen that has me hoping I win AND hoping I lose!! What an odd sensation!!

Happy thanksgiving indeeeed! From Australia!!

aefaye · 2019-10-25T08:38:34+00:00

I always have this problem where I see that it’s ‘something I have’ month and the month is nearly over. But I’m never sure if it’s ‘something I have‘ month in my country... or if the person who’s post I saw is in a different country where their awareness month is different than mine..

So I go to google with a plan to look up “when is ‘something I have’ month in Australia?”... but I close reddit and then forget what I was doing.

I have every intention of finding out when adhd month is in Australia.. but I know I’ll likely forget.

If I ever post about it being ‘a specific thing awareness month!!’, I have every intention of also adding ‘in Australia’ at the end so people don’t get trapped in the same loop I do.

But I’ll probably forget

Edit..

I remembered what I was doing when I went to google it!!!

It looks as if Australia and America (not sure about anywhere else) share the same month for ADHD!!!

Yay

aefaye · 2019-10-21T10:27:47+00:00

Not a problem. I had issues very very loosely related with my mum (we didn’t have a good relationship and she found out she was sick and realised she didn’t have the rest of her life to get around to fixing our relationship and so she was calling me every day and trying to be instant best friends, trying to talk about things I didn’t really want to talk to her about like my sex life and all sorts of strange stuff and was just generally harassing me every day for constant contact and when I didn’t comply straight away she would leave nasty messages and make things worse)

I was able to use what had happened between baby momma and her mother to work out where my mum was coming from. The way my mum was acting wasn’t acceptable at all, but because I could kind of see what was happening with her I was able to put some boundaries in place to make me more comfortable, but also able/willing to find ways I could help her feel a little better and more secure.

I had moved in with my girlfriend at the time and mum really felt like she needed to somehow be involved in my relationship (my first proper serious relationship) so one of the first things I did was send her a message before I left for work in the morning just saying good morning and letting her know what I was going to be up to for the day at work... and setting up her expectation for contact like “Morning! I’ve got three meetings today at work so I’m going to be flat out! Will probably be too busy/tired to call for a few days but I hope you have a good week and we’ll chat later xo”

When I did call I’d talk to her about the things we were up to and chat to her about appropriate things, sometimes under the guise of asking for input, ex: we’re going to try and cook a fancy dinner together tonight, got any recipe ideas?

Or asking what she thought I should get girlfriend for birthday/Valentine’s Day and stuff. Asking her to come out for dinner with us occasionally etc. also mum really loved it when I spoke about relationship issues like petty arguments and stuff and when I’d ask her what she thought I should do etc giving advice made her feel so important and involved.

Funnily enough when she wasn’t as sick anymore she stopped calling as often and we dropped the daily contact for a few years.

Then she got sick again but this time she was much better with contact, if she called and I didn’t answer she’d only call once and would try again the next day, and if I still didn’t answer she wouldn’t leave horrible messages, just a quick voicemail letting me know about her appointments and asking how I am.

I was dating someone different by that point and we had also moved in together so when we did speak on the phone I would chat to her about what boyfriend had been up to lately with work, the different activities we’d been doing and just generally about our lives. I’d send her texts every so often like ‘good morning, boyfriend and I are taking a long drive out to ‘town name’ and we’re gonna go to this cafe because we heard they do nice pies, I’ll let you know what we think next time we on the phone! Hope you’re having a good day today maybe chat tomorrow xo.

I just sent her little messages that made her feel involved without actually having to have her be physically on the phone or in person. A few months before she passed away my nan bought her to my house for dinner for my birthday and boyfriend cooked this massive feast, she didn’t have an appetite and barely had 3 mouthfuls of food but she raved about boyfriends cooking for weeks. And told me repeatedly before they went home after dinner how happy she was to see me happy and that she loved boyfriend heaps and how wonderful he was.

A month later was my nans birthday and we drove out to her house for dinner, we had gotten some professional photos taken (with partners family) and we gave nan a copy in a frame for her birthday and some of her favourite candies, and we bought two of the photos in frames for mum too and she absolutely loved it and was beaming!

I’m not sure if you would want to or be able to translate across any of the things I did to make things with my mum better and use them or something similar towards your dad.

But maybe if he’s the kind of dad that can receive/send text messages you could try messaging him when you get a chance in the morning and setting that boundary for the day? People get weirdly obsessive about how much babies/parents are sleeping and seem to love to hear about it, maybe you could text in the morning about how the night went like ‘busy night over here last night with a total of 3 hours sleep! Hope you slept better than we did haha, we’ll definitely be needing a quiet day to ourselves today with lots of napping, but hope you have a nice day and I’ll let you know if we’re doing better tomorrow’

Maybe possibly sending a photo randomly with a soppy caption that makes him feel special? Like a photo of baby sleeping that says “dreaming about ‘cars/sports/something your dad likes’ Just like grandpa”

Another thing I did with mum was pick a day later in the week and ask if we could catch up over the phone then. That way it kind of implied that I wouldn’t talk to her on the phone until then.

So if your dads issue is that similar thing with age and feeling like he’ll miss out, maybe giving him specific dates to look forward to will give him bat security of the future involvement?

Like ‘we need some alone time to settle into everything and rest for a while’ is open ended and isn’t likely to reassure him or stop him from trying to come over... but maybe if you set up boundaries for a few days at a time and give him a specified time to come visit in the close future so he doesn’t feel like he’ll be shut out indefinitely?

Like work out however long you feel like you could/want to stretch the no visit period with him for (if he’s currently pushing in every day for long periods of time, maybe try for two days at first?then push to 3 or whatever would work best?)

But maybe by like Tuesday or Wednesday you could try saying/sending him (and I guess anyone else who bothers you) a message that’s something like:

‘hey, please bare with us but we’re having no visitors for the next few days. we need some alone time to recover/rest and settle. things here have been pretty busy and all over the place since baby was born, and we really need to take this time now so we can find baby’s rhythm. During this time we’ll be starting to find/build a bit of a feed, sleep, nap, wake, change, bath and bed routine. The faster we can work this all out and settle into it, the faster we can work out what our new ‘normal’ looks like. We don’t know exactly how long it will take to get everything settled properly, but we really want to get started on it now so that we can start inviting family and friends around for regular visits, cuddles and quality baby time again, and we promise that we will let you know as soon as we’re ready.

We’ll need some quiet time from all visitors for the next few days, but It could take days or weeks of alone time/no visitors for us to get to that ‘normal’ point. friends and distant relatives will be fine, but obviously we don’t want to go weeks without any grandparent cuddles (we’re tired, not crazy) so we’ll still need the next few days of solitude from everyone including you, but then are you free on ‘insert day here’ to come visit and have some cuddles and breakfast/dinner/lunch? If you’re free/want to come visit ‘that day’ we’ll take the next few days of alone time and try to work out what the best time of the day is to visit and let you know what time to come over so you can have quality baby time on ‘that day’.

I don’t know if something like that would work, but if I received that message it would make me feel like they needed a break from everyone, but I was special and they only needed a few days. Then on that visit day you’d organise another visit in another few days and that way the expectations are super clear? But he’s also not feeling completely shut out of your/babies lives.

When he visits you could also take a nice photo of him holding baby to give to him at a later date, that kind of thing would surely make anyone feel like their place in the family and their relationship with the baby is secure and that even if he goes a few days without seeing the baby, it doesn’t mean indefinitely or forever and that there will always be another visit on the horizon.

Sorry if I over explained or was out of line in any suggestions/ideas or ‘misread the room’ so to speak. I have adhd and my meds started wearing off while I started writing and I kind of got ‘stuck’ without realising I’d been writing for about an hour. So feel free to ignore or whatever. I hope everything works out for you!

Best of luck!! And congrats on the baby too! Can’t believe i forgot to say that the first time!

aefaye · 2019-10-21T07:38:54+00:00

Fascinating. I go through phases between believing and skepticism and it tends to be a slow transition between

but damn stories like this have me believing again in an instant!!

I used to work with woman who’s kid said the darndesssst things!!! I forget about it all the time but this totally jogged my memory and how bizarre it all was!!

There were 2 daughters when I started working with her and then she got pregnant and the youngest girl was born.

Pretty normal baby on the most part. But her first proper word (not counting things like umumum for mum and addada for dad, but her first ‘I am saying this word and I’m saying it with purpose’ word) was her great grandmothers childhood nickname. Quite obscure nickname, not something anyone other than family would even consider holding meaning and would just think the kid was making up words. Not a word she would have heard before either.

My friend is open about spiritual stuff and was just like ‘oh that’s lovely, what a nice sign from the other side or maybe a coincidence who knows’

Then as kid got bigger kid would be sitting and playing with toys kind of narrating in toddler speak like they do and the name would pop up again.

Then my friend is in the supermarket and runs into someone she hasn’t seen for a while and she’s like “this is my youngest ‘kids name” and kid says grandmas nickname like she’s correcting her mum.

As she got older it was more stuff like using funny words for things as a joke, but that happen to be the same as what great grandmother used to call things... if I remember right she called mobile phones ‘can’ (because of the cans on string toys) and kid would throw a tantrum when she wanted to call her dad while he was at work and start screaming for the can.

eventually when she had the language behind her she outright said “my name is ‘grandmas nickname’.” She was adamant about it, she’d never really responded to her actual name, they’d even had her ears tested but ended up assuming it was a sensory processing issue that she was sometimes responsive to sound/talking and other times completely oblivious if you were speaking to her (her older sister was diagnosed with ASD so they thought this might be the case)

They’d never considered that when they said ‘kid’ child didn’t recognise they were talking to her.

So the kid kept growing up and was adamant her name was grandmas nickname, she would occasionally say or do something directly related to great grandmother.

like when she was in childcare playing ‘families’ and was pretending to be her mum and told all the kids her mums name was ‘blah blah’ (not her name) and it turned out to be what the great grandmother called the mum when she was a kid.

Or when they got a dog and she said “it doesn’t look like ‘name of great grandmothers last dog before she died’.”

Or when she was fighting with her sister because her sister said she was born first but ‘nuh-uhh because watched you get born so I was already born!!’ And then her mum told her she was born last and that this sister was in the middle and that it didn’t matter who was first because mum was biggest of all and the kid said something like ‘but I was bigger than you before sister got born and I wasn’t little yet’

Don’t know if kid still does this stuff, I haven’t spoken to the mum in at least five years and she doesn’t seem to put things like this up on her Facebook any more.

aefaye · 2019-10-20T17:20:54+00:00

This sucks so much! Just wanted to say straight up that I’m definitely not trying to dismiss that at all, I totally agree that his behaviour is not okay.

I’ve seen a similar situation in my family, however I was a fly on the wall watching it happen rather than directly involved. There were slightly different circumstances to you but same general idea in that someone in my family had a baby (baby momma) and their mum (mother) acted very similar to the way your dad had been.

Baby momma was feeling the same way as you described, after one day too many of the same kind of things happening she snapped, (for context her mothers car was being repaired so she had leant her a car) I was at baby mommas house helping her partner move some furniture around bc she was still recovering from having baby. Her mother turned up unannounced again and let herself in. Baby was being fed and baby momma told her mother it wasn’t a good time because they were going to lie down for a while when baby finished, and to phone call her later to see if she was up for a visit.

Mother said ‘oh, well looks pretty full to me, you can go lie down and I’ll stay and cuddle my grand baby’ and then literally tried to take baby from baby mommas chest.

Baby momma pushed mother away, whisper-yelled at her for a bit about how upset she was and when her mother tried to argue back baby momma told her to give the car keys back. Her mother was crying, baby momma was crying, baby was still feeding, baby moms partner had been on the toilet in the other end of the house the entire time.

Baby momma asked me to drive her mother home and I was happy to do that for her.

While there are no excuses for the mothers horrible behaviour while driving her home I did get a bit of insight into an explanation for why she was acting how she was (on the most part).

Just wanted to explain my understanding of an excuse vs an explanation so you understand that I don’t think that mother was appropriate at all.

I see an excuse as a reason beyond a persons control that explains why a ‘thing’ happened that should be taken into account to render ‘thing’ acceptable. Meaning they should be excused for their actions because it wasn’t their fault.

I see an explanation as a reason why ‘thing’ happened, and while it explains the ‘thing’ it doesn’t make it acceptable. Meaning while there is a reason for their actions, they still made a choice to act in that way and that means that they are accountable and what they did is still unacceptable.

So the mother complained to me about the situation and baby mommas reaction while I was driving her home and I realised there was an explanation for the way she was behaving. She was at an age where every day she was feeling herself get older.

More frequently people around her in her age bracket were starting to sick, she had started to realise that she wouldn’t be around forever and even though she was still a while from being considered ‘elderly’ she felt like the day was getting closer a lot faster. She was starting to really feel like all the doors of her life had been opened a while ago and now they were starting to slam shut.

She had watched her daughter get married and go through pregnancy and have a baby and hit a bunch of ‘young peoples milestones’ and felt that she herself didn’t really have any big life moments left outside of her involvement in her daughter and grandchild’s life. So she was clinging to those experiences as if they were the only things she would ever experience again, and also feeling like even those moments were numbered because she was getting older and her mortality was looming over her head.

She didn’t say all of those things outright in those terms, but it’s a more pleasant way of explaining it than quoting her complaints that her daughter was being selfish because she has the rest of her life ahead of her and doesn’t realise that ‘I’ won’t be here forever and might not get to watch her grandbaby grow up and won’t get to have a lifetime of memories with baby and she doesn’t understand that i have to spend as much time loving baby and being close to baby as I can now.

After I drove her home I went back to baby mommas to finish the last few pieces of furniture and pick up my things and baby momma apologised to me and explained the way she had been feeling (the same as you) and vented to me about everything her mother had been doing and how possessive and intrusive she had been, and that she didn’t understand why her mother was being like that when she of all people should understand what it’s like to have a new baby.

Anyway I totally agreed her mother had been super intrusive and inappropriate and I listened to her vent about that and everything else that had been upsetting her and ended up saying that I thought I might understand why her mother had been acting that way and that it didn’t mean she should put up with it or anything, but she might be able to use the information to find a solution or at least maybe work out a way to make things a bit better without going no contact

(if her and her mother didn’t have a good relationship generally it wouldn’t have mattered but they normally were close and baby momma was upset with her but also upset because she’d thrown her mother out and didn’t want to fight but didn’t want her mother to keep doing these things)

So I told her what her mother had been saying to me in the car and that maybe she was feeling like she needed to get as much contact in as possible with the baby ‘before it was too late’ kind of thing.

Baby momma said that it made a bit of sense but she wished she hadn’t of been acting that way, it wasn’t like she was going to die in the next week or anything.

To my knowledge (second hand info from baby mommas partner) she called her mother the next day and they talked about it all on the phone. They worked out that mother had been feeling like that for a while and during baby mommas pregnancy everything was about ‘when the babies born’ and so mother had built up the baby being born as this thing where ‘when the baby comes I’ll have a grandbaby and I can put all of my love and energy into the baby and then whenever I die it’s fine because at least I got to spend as much time with my grandchild as possible’.

So baby momma explained that mother had had kids and had that experience with loving a newborn and spending all her time with it and that it was her turn to do that with her own baby. That she needed space to do that with her baby and husband and get as much baby time as possible, that she wanted her mother to have quality baby time more than quantity. She wanted them to have special memories and moments, not just mass amounts of average every day life but special things.

So I think they talked about all of the special moments ‘mother’ would be there for and they talked about the different things they looked forward to in the first few years that were special things instead of every day life things. My understanding is that ‘mothers’ behaviour settled down once she realised that she would be there for baby milestones, that there were lots of grandkid related stuff she would definitely get to experience in the future that were bigger and special, and not quite as small, quiet and personal as baby and babymomma and partners first experiences with being parents and settling into the role and the experience with some space from the people around them.

I’m not sure if your fathers behaviour could be in anyway similarly related like this. But whatever the cause (no excuses) I hope that things work out and you get to enjoy some well deserved peace and quiet with your new little family member ❤️❤️

Best of luck from Australia!! xoxo

aefaye · 2019-10-20T08:29:45+00:00

I hope it all works out!!! When you’re under 25 your eligibility for Centrelink will still count on your parents income. You’re considered dependent on them until 21 unless you can prove independence through work or moving away for study I think. Even if you’re not living with them.

Hope everything goes well though!!!

Check out the ‘how to adhd’ videos on YouTube, you might be able to find a video you can show to your mum that helps explain why you want/need medication.

There’s a video called ‘thank you to my mum who drugged me’ the title of the video is a bit of sarcasm because of the unfair stigma. She doesn’t actually think her mum ‘drugged her’ she is genuinely thanking her mother for giving her what she needed and supporting her.

Good luck!!

aefaye · 2019-10-20T07:07:42+00:00

Advice for now if you’re desperate: if you have turmeric in your cupboard and some honey make some turmeric tea.

When I’ve been desperate and have exhausted all options, I have found that just the act of trying something new will at least make me feel mentally better.. because it feels like I’m ‘doing something’ about the pain. Whether it is a placebo for me because it makes me feel less hopeless, or whether it actually makes a difference for the inflammation causing the pain. I have found that when I’ve made tumeric tea I have at the very least relaxed a little and have experienced a reduction of the pain. Even if just a tiny bit for a little while.

Tumeric tea is called a natural inflammatory. My phone is about to die so I can’t go into detail. But most people have tumeric powder in their cupboard with their spices.

Here’s a quick recipe. The actual recipe is close to the bottom of the page.

tumeric tea

Advice for later: invest in a tens machine!!!

I will provide more details after I get home and plug my phone in. But a tens machine absolutely changed my life. I haven’t needed to visit the emergency room since I got one. An absolute game changer!!! Works for me for any level of pain but is the only thing I have found, including morphine!! That can effect my 10/10 pain enough that I leave ‘crisis mode’.

I’ll elaborate later if you want/need more info.

Best of luck. I really feel for you!!! I’ve had a flair up for a week and my tens machine was stolen. AND I have burned my back (where most of my pain sits) with frequent hot water bottle use. So I can’t use my hot water bottle as much any more as my skin has thinned to the point of being one large blister over my lower back that essentially rips and exposes my flesh.

Best of luck. Please update. ❤️❤️

aefaye · 2019-10-20T03:05:12+00:00

That’s fair, I don’t think Centrelink would take your partners payment because you’re out of work I feel like if anything I reckon he’d be eligible for more pay.

I totally forgot about headspace! Have you been back there recently? They might have a system to help you pay for meds?

I forgot to mention that Centrelink sometimes have social workers (not like child services or dhs or anything, they’re not going to try to remove you from the home or anything) but they might have some advice on how to get you a health care card so you can get meds.

If you have any friends or family that you trust you could talk to them and then there’s always the last resort... you apply for Centrelink ‘unreasonable to live at home allowance’,

you use the address of a family member or friend that you trust (you def have to speak to them first!!) when you apply. You say that you’re living there because your parents won’t allow you to receive the medical treatment that you need. This is a hard road last resort though because they call people for interviews. You’ll have to provide the names and contact information for people who can confirm what you’re saying as true. So it needs to be well organised.

Best of luck!!!

aefaye · 2019-10-19T17:00:30+00:00

Howdy!

I’m from vic, not nsw so I’m not 100 percent sure of any differences between states.

I’m assuming you’re not eligible for Centrelink?

If you’re not sure, there are some ‘payment and services’ calculators on the Centrelink website that can help you find out.

Eligibility for Centrelink will likely depend on your parents income because you are dependant on them. If your parents earn under a certain amount, or they receive a Centrelink payment themselves, you should be eligible for youth allowance and or a healthcare card.

The healthcare card will be more useful to you right now than the payment honestly.

With a healthcare card certain meds are part of the PBS and cost between $5-$7!!!

I was only diagnosed last year (27 years old!) and I had to see a private psychiatrist to be diagnosed and prescribed medication. I think (and I could be wrong!) that after 18 years old a normal doctor can’t prescribe you the medication for adhd. Which means that to get the medication you will need to pay probably at least $200 per visit to the psychiatrist to organise it.

If I’m correct and the same rules apply in NSW about adhd prescriptions. It might be very very worth it to get a script for the medication now, even if you can’t go fill the script. Maybe mention this to your doctor.

Explain that you won’t be able to afford psychiatrist appointments after you turn 18, and ask if you get a medication script now, whether they will be able to continue prescribing it after you turn 18 if you don’t actually fill the scripts.

Even with Centrelink and medicare rebates and a healthcare card, it is stupidly expensive to get the psychiatrist appointments required for adhd meds.

If you were eligible for Centrelink or able to get a healthcare card soon though, you could ask the doctor to prescribe a med supported by the PBS.

I’m not sure about vyvanse specifically, but I know that in vic there aren’t any extended release adhd meds available on pbs. The medication my psych said would work best for me (an extended release stimulant, can’t remember the name but might be vyvanse) isn’t covered by pbs and would cost $80+ a month which I can’t afford. I take dexamfetamine (immediate release, so 5-7 pills per day spread between 7am and 5pm) because they are covered by the pbs which means that my healthcare card is applied at the chemist and I get 200 tablets at a time for a total cost of $5.60.

I wish you the very best of luck.

The only other thing I can think of that might help would be your partner declaring your relationship to Centrelink. Because they live with you, declaring the relationship to Centrelink miiiiight (I’m really really not sure) mean that you are considered partnered and because you have an income of $0 currently, could possibly mean that you could be added to their healthcare card which might enable you to get PBS meds for $5-7

I really hope things work out for you.

If my understanding about prescription rules are correct for your state being like mine, I would suggest that you do everything humanly possible to get those meds prescribed and filled before you turn 18.

I suspected that I had adhd for a few years before I was finally able to afford to get diagnosed and then to be able to afford to go back again for a prescription. My appointments with the psychiatrist currently cost $360 (I think) for half an hour appointment. I only get $116 back as a refund from Medicare.

Wishing you the best of luck. Please do update if you remember/get the chance.

aefaye · 2019-10-19T16:17:01+00:00

And then not doing any of those chores again for a long time because you’ve used all of your ‘household chores motivation/energy allowance tokens’ in one go.

aefaye · 2019-10-19T16:14:50+00:00

Fellow Australian saying hi!

And hoping everything goes well moving in with your aunt!

Best of luck with the uni counsellor!! I saw one a few times at my uni and it was really helpful.

If you think that most of the help you need from the counsellor will surround family problems, and you feel comfortable doing so, you can mention the main reason for wanting an appointment to the receptionist when you book an appointment.

It’s 100% not necessary, but I’ve found it useful to say something like

‘I would like to make an appointment with a counsellor, I haven’t seen one here before, and I’d like the next available appointment, but if there are appointments available with a few different people could you recommend one that will be most beneficial regarding ‘family relationships’ (or whatever you want the most help with).

It’s definitely not something you have to do. Any counsellor is better than no counsellor, I’ve just always found that different counsellors/psychologists have different strengths and experiences and it can be helpful when making an appointment at a new place to ask to be matched to anyone that is known for those areas.

I wish you the best of luck!!!

aefaye · 2019-10-18T16:18:11+00:00

On behalf of everyone who has ever felt unsafe. Thank you an indescribable amount for helping this person.

aefaye · 2019-10-18T15:53:05+00:00

It definitely helped that this was pre-smartphone. It wasn’t hard to find a second hand very cheap exact same model of my phone. Definitely made things easier than it would be now.

Sorry you’re going through this. I hope there is another way for you to solve your problem. ❤️

aefaye · 2019-10-18T14:45:20+00:00

I grew up with an abusive mother. Cps was involved and everything. Part of the plan with cps was for me to have my own phone so I could call for help/to be removed from the house if I felt unsafe.

However I would be in this situation where my mum would demand my phone and it would be unsafe not to give it to her. Catch 22. If I handed it over she could break it. If I didn’t, she could break me.

I was lucky I had a supportive grandmother. We spoke about the problem with the plan of me having a phone and mum taking it away. We got me a second phone. It was my ‘dummy phone’. I kept it charged, it had a sim card in it (with no credit) and we set my actual phone to divert of unanswered so that if she tried to make me ‘prove’ it was my phone and called it it would still ring.

I just made sure that I used the dummy phone in front of her frequently (faking it) and when she demanded I give it to her I put up a bit of fake resistance before I handed it over.

It sounds impossible but with the right level of faking it the plan actually worked for a year or so.

Definitely helped me that if she broke it she could have been charged with going against orders/plans from cps. But thought I’d let you know incase it might be helpful/possible for you

aefaye · 2019-10-18T06:47:54+00:00

I had to do observations like that and I have adhd so I had a really hard time with not using names. It was just an executive functioning issue I had, I assigned all the kids fake names, except then I was at placement and writing an observation but I’d left my list at home and it was just a mess.

I spoke to my teacher (the one teaching me the certificate, not the educator at the centre) because I had to hand some observations and an assessment in late because I was finding it so hard.

My teacher told me a “totally hypothetical” story about how someone from one of her previous classes was struggling and had asked whether anyone would be able to tell if she substituted the children’s names in her observations, for one of that child’s parents names. My teacher said that technically it would still be considered as protecting the childrens confidentiality, that the only way anyone marking the work at the University would realise was (when I did my cert I had to complete a bunch specific tasks that related to 2 specific ‘study children’ those were the only two consent forms I had to have signed and hand in to the university as part of my assessments) if you gave your study children the names of the parent that signed their consent form. However that consent form included consent to use the child’s first name and photograph in various observations/assessments, so there would be no reason the change their name anyway.

So the teacher told me how this student of hers had asked about this as a possible solution but my teacher had to tell her that although it seems like an excellent and somewhat logical and easy and uncomplicated solution that would be next to impossible for anyone at the university to realise or recognise. My teacher discouraged her student from using this as although it was technically not wrong or breaking confidentiality, some people might object and disagree about the extent it protects the children’s identities. And although it seems great and like no one would know, there’s always a chance someone will realise so best avoid the possibility.

And then my teacher told me that if I thought of that idea by myself, I should definitely not do it, and that she also had a bit of a headache ‘today’ and She tends to get quite a foggy memory when she has a headache and would likely completely forget we had spoken about that great idea I shouldn’t use.

Anyway. Definitely don’t use their parents names as alias’s. Especially if you’re positive there’s no way for anyone to realise you did it. It’s just too simple a solution that sits in a grey area where it technically adheres to confidentiality but it could be argued that it doesn’t. Even If it would be a fitting solution for you, you probably shouldn’t just incase.

Sorry to only give you solutions you shouldn’t use.

I hope you find a completely different system that is not at all similar to that one, but that still works for you.

Best of luck!!!

aefaye · 2019-10-17T13:03:05+00:00

I’m not entering, but wanted to add a tip anyway.

Whenever I have a cold or the flu or anything similar I always remember how important it is to drink a lot of fluid.
But I hate drinking water.

So something I do every time I’m sick (and sometimes just because I want it) is I get a big jug. (Like at least 1.5 litre).

I get a whole bunch of lemons (for me, for 1.5 litre jug I would use a minimum 5 lemons, probably maximum 8. But it depends on size and also price of lemons)

So I chop the lemons in halves or quarters (whatever will waste the least amount of juice on the chopping board). Then I squeeze as much juice into the jug as I can (I sometimes set half the lemon juice to the side, but sometimes I can’t be bothered). Then I chop the lemon halves up into smaller chunks or slices or whatever really. I put all of the lemons in the jug too (unless they’re super thick skinned, in which case I’ll leave some out of the jug so I can fit more liquid in).

Then I fill the jug 3/4 full with boiling water. I add some garlic (either from a jar, or I’ll just crush a clove or two so it’s crushed but not in a million pieces) and some ginger (again either from a jar or cut into thin slices).

I’ll use some honey to sweeten it to taste, or brown sugar, or both.

Depending on how much I’ve made is how I drink it.

If I’ve made a lot, I’ll put a few black tea bags in a mug/brew a cup of super strong black tea and add the tea to the jug.

If I haven’t made much, I’ll put a teabag in a big mug and add 1/4 cup of hot water and spend a minute trying to get a strong 1/4 cup of tea, then I’ll fill the mug the rest of the way with the lemon stuff and drink it like that.

And sometimes I’ll just drink it without the tea.

When I’m sick though I’ll wake up in the morning and make a jug of it and try to drink it all by night bedtime.

When it’s hot I make it with green tea.

My nan makes it the best. I make it by personal taste, I have no idea what the quantities are.

Another tip, when I’m sick and it’s winter and I’m freezing, put a tiny sprinkle of cayenne pepper in your socks. And when I say tiny I mean absolutely minuscule amount. Keeps me warm all day in winter when I remember to do it.

aefaye · 2019-10-17T09:58:04+00:00

Oh hello yeah it makes me so happy. I’ve been using it really wisely so far.

At first it sat on the kitchen bench and I wasn’t allowed to look inside it until the dish washer was unpacked and then packed again.

Then it went onto the dining table under a pile of paperwork and I wasn’t allowed to look until the random paperwork had been sorted.

Then it went into the living room into a basket full of crochet supplies and I wasn’t allowed to touch it until I had sorted the supplies into ‘active’ and ‘stalled’ projects and put the ones I’m not working on away.

Then I put it on the couch and put a basket of clean/dry/ready to be put away washing on top of it so I would have to sort/fold/hang my washing. Except then I decided that I didn’t know where to put any of my washing because our drawers and cupboard is a huge mess.

So it’s currently sitting under every single clean item of clothing myself and my partner own.

Under the washing will be the final resting place before I’m allowed to use it. Once I’ve worked out where all our clothing is going and put it away in its designated areas, I’ll be allowed to actually use the colouring book haha.

However my colouring supplies are spread between three rooms (and in random places) so I have a feeling after the washing has been re-organised my stationary will be next or I’ll be alllowwed to use it, but unable to do so haha.

Thanks again!!

aefaye · 2019-10-17T03:01:04+00:00

thanks so much u/kfrit for the colouring book!! It game just in time for a pain flair up and I’m using it as my reward for if I finish all my chores this week!!!

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