A Smile A Day : July 2015

Motability

I've ordered my new car!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I can't wait for it to be made especially for me. I'm getting a Fiat 500c, Light green, cream interior, cream soft roof and cream vintage tyre caps. This is what I originally ordered anyway.

Ordered a few weeks ago but forgot to mention it in my last blog post! I'm SO EXCITED FOR IT!!!!!

So I told my nan about it straight away and she was like "you cant! Don't order it in mint green, green cars are really unlucky!!" And I had my heart set on this!
But I did have a mint green car before I passed my test. A mint green ford KA and it got written off before I'd even passed my test! A car went into it when it was parked outside my nans on Foxhollies road and a car went straight into the side of it! It was only a cheap little car for me to practise in (illegally) before passing my test.
So with the worry of me even driving again, I thought I best not cause any further worry! So I called the garage back and asked for the baby blue version. To be fair, I was stuck between these two colours to start with anyway. They said that was fine, but for me to wait for this one to be made, I wouldn't get the car until October. The quickest turn around they could do for me was with a white car with a black soft roof. So I've gone for that one now. Finally offer!

Ironically my nan is much happier with this colour scheme, even though the car I crashed was white/cream with a black soft roof! I don't really care too much about the colour anyway, I just can't wait to get back to normal and have my independence again.

I'll have it by late september anyway eeeeeek! New reg plate too ;) If I could say how lucky I am, you'd be here all day. So I won't.

The Katie Piper Foundation

Camouflage make up!

Makeup came on Monday for my scars. Covermark cream and Veil powder.
I'll start putting it on and getting used to it each day now.

It will be like applying my old mac foundation in no time. I think it's a good protection for the scars too, covers them up so that other things can't irritate it. Like too much sun, air pollution etc. I'm very happy with it anyway.

I'm so so glad I went to a weekend retreat with the Katie Piper Foundation and met the lovely lady Kerrie, who is a camouflage practitioner. She's a star and I'm very pleased to have her as a friend.

Thank you Kerrie! xx

QEHB

I went to the QE hospital on Wednesday to see lovely Sally. The young woman who is giving me a few shots of Botox on my good eyebrow side.
I say good side, both of them are good, but the left one still doesn't move because of the nerve damage. So she's trying Botox on me to see if it can help with the nerve development.
It's not doing anything at the moment though, so she thinks I may have an "anti-body" or something, which rejects the Botox. So it's a bit of a waste of time for both of us if I go back to her. It was worth a shot anyway.
I personally think, they could whip a nerve out from somewhere else and put that in, surely? I'm always thinking of new ways they could do things and I am a very impatient young woman, so it's frustrating at time. They're doing their best for me anyway, so I'm very grateful for all their help and time.

The QE is a major part of my life these days. I spent like 3/4 months in there after my accident.
1 month in ICU and about 2/3 months on the Burns Ward. So I've made good relationships with people there, surgeons, nurses, therapist, janitors the lot! I'm still going back and forth to see them for things they can do to repair the damage to my face from the crash. The surgeons are giving me a few months break from it all though, as I've spent the last two years in and out there.

So I was absolutely delighted when a young woman contacted me about a fundraising event that was going on in September!
A charity abseil on Sunday 6th September. It will be so cool to try out something like this with my leg anyway! So I'm excited to be giving it a go and at the same time to be raising awareness and valuable funds for the charities that have helped me the most since my accident.

The fundraising page is click here with a target of £500 .The majority of the money raised will be going to the two departments that helped me the most during my time at the QE. The ICU and the Burns Ward.

Then on top of that, with the extra funds kindly raised by you lovely people, the money will be going to the two charities that have helped me the most since my accident. The Katie Piper Foundation and LimbPower.

Charity abseil on Sunday 6^th September 2015.

Location: Hampton by Hilton Hotel, Broad Street, Birmingham

Time: 1pm-5pm

Deposit required to book your place: £35 (paid)

Minimum sponsorship required to take part: £125

So please do help me out with a big thank you to these wonderful people!

If you'd like to donate a £5 click here and please then share with others to kindly donate too. The more it's shared the better! I need to get it to £500 by September. So lets get pestering for pennies!

Fingers crossed I'll get to my target of £500 before 6th September!

I'll be reminding you all on every post I do from now until then. Then I'll share with you lots of videos and pictures of me actually doing it! Hanging from a roof top with my metal rod

Obviously I was a little dubious about it, how I'd actually get down with or without my prosthetic on, so I youtubed it to check out some other people doing it and I found this lovely lady Leanne.

And seeing her doing it has made me even more excited to give it a go!

I can't wait. Roll on September 6th!!!

Fitness

So fitness wise, I haven't done too much lately. I'm going to see the lovely Physio lady Louise at the Maltings next week, to show off my running attempts with my old trusty leg, Leonard. I've given it another go in the garden today at my Nanny Js. Hopefully it will be good enough for them to put my name down for a blade! To buy a blade it's bloody expensive! Puts the saying "costs an arm and a leg" into reality!!
Hopefully if I can show how eagerly I want a blade to run with, they'll put my name down and I'll kindly be able to get one through the NHS. Which would be AMAZING!!! Fingers crossed people!!!

I need to buy a bike too. I'm geared up with the lot! A seat cover, trainers, cleats, cycling clothes, the lot! I just need to get a bike and a helmet now! If anyone fancies taking me bike shopping this week, give me a call.

I'll have my blade and my bike in no time! Then I'll be a triathlon trooper!

Girl Crush!

I have a MASSIVE girl crush on the beautiful Australian Paralympian, Kelly Cartwright!

She is beautiful and powerful and I really look up to her as an amazing role model!
She has the exact same amputation as me, right leg above the knee and she is an athlete, has a cute boyfriend who she's pregnant with and she's dancing on the Australian Dancing With The Stars.

She is seriously unstoppable! An amazing young lady who I admire so much! To follow her journey click here

As you can see, she's wearing a cool running blade. I can't wait until I get one myself!!!!!!!! Fingers crossed I'll get my hands on one before the year is out.

Anyway, until next time.
Bye xxx

Happy Sunday everyone!

Ok so it's Sunday, I'm a little hungover and I'm back to hating Olives, I'm 100% back to normal now!

(Apart from the odd scar and missing body parts)

I've had an amazing couple of weeks! Manic busy, but with lots of great things taking up my time and energy! Well worth the mini bits of stress and panic though! My god did I cause stress and worry with my family on Wednesday!!! (I'll go into that later in the blog)

Florence Bella Hilton!

It started off wonderful, with my dear friend Charlotte giving birth to her gorgeous baby daughter on Monday 22nd! Happy very first birth day to this little beauty!

"Its with immense pride that Charlotte Hilton and I can announce that at 3:26pm today, weighing in at 9lb and 9oz, our little princess, Florence Bella Hilton arrived into this world after being delivered by an emergency c section. Mum is recovering well and little Florence is being cared for by the neonatal specialists and is getting all the support she needs. We'll update you all as soon as we have anything else to report but in the meantime, here's a picture of our beautiful little angel. Xxx"

Osseointegration

I went to Milton Keynes with my Nanny J, to meet a lovely surgeon from Sydney, Munjed Al Marids. It was very interesting to hear more about this cool alternative to a general prosthetic leg.

I've made a few friends who have had the surgery and they are so happy with it. It's not a necessity for me, just a cool alternative.

Currently I don't struggle too much with my general NHS leg, it does the job! I want to feel totally free from any type of pain or nuisance though. It can be annoying if I go on a long walk and it get's uncomfortable. And I do want to get more and more active, so that's going to get more and more annoying and painful.

I think it's a great option to have this surgery and not have to worry about the relationship you have with your leg attachments.

To read more about it and Munjed Al Marids, click here

I want to have this operation!!! It's not on the NHS though, so I think I'll wait until I'm back at work before getting it done, I don't want to use my current money on an operation and flights to Australia, when I'm currently unemployed! That would be reckless, I'm trying to work on my reckless spending at the moment, so I won't sign up for this operation just yet!

But they can certainly put me on their waiting list for it!!

I met a lovely chap called Michael Swain, who did a little talk at the conference as well as Munjed. It was great to meet him, as we had spoken briefly on Facebook. He's doing so well with his Osseointergration and seeing how well he is walking, really makes me want to have it done!

I know a young lady called Viktorija too who had this operation a couple of years ago and she's loving it! I met her at the weekend at the LimbPower event. I'll hopefully meet up with this lovely lady again soon.

Arctic One

Unfortunately I missed an event I was interested in going to on the Sunday after the conference. The Arctic One para-tri, an event at Dorney Lake. As I said above, I want to get more and more active, stronger and capable with my leg, so I really want to do this Triathlon! I wanted to check out the venue for the event Arctic One run, and I also wanted to meet some of the lovely people I've met online with the organisation.

It's a shame I missed this one, but I'll hopefully make the next event they do, which is the 'Aquathon' in August. Click here to see the event.

I'm well up for this, I go swimming a lot with Anna, 2 or 3 times a week, so I'm trying to edge her into doing it with me! It would be fun to give it a go. Although I normally do a casual brest stroke in the swimming baths, so I'm not sure how this would go down in a lake! It's definitely worth a go anyway! So COME ON ANNA!!

Why Not People

So I went to the first Why Not People event on Wednesday 1st July.
I won a competition too apparently, some sort of RT on Twitter or something . So I got to go backstage and chat with Jameela Jamil. That was cool. I didn't really know what to say or ask though as I had completely forgotten about it. So it was more of a friendly chat really.

She told me that she got her friend, who has a disability and was a virgin at 28, laid through the whole Why Not People craze! I was like, you should set up a dating site called "Why Not Date me?" for Why Not members to go on dates together. I'd definitely download it onto my phone and flirt with everyone!