A New Direction

With my new blog header and layout (what do you think? I am pretty proud of it) comes a new focus for my blog.  I want it to be more refined with definition and direction.  I want it to be themed with clear interest and passion.  I want it to inspire and awaken the enthusiasm in others.

I am tired of my little blog being left behind, the last thing on my list, it excites me, I find it both therapeutic and enjoyable as well as challenging.  It helps me to develop my thoughts, overcome my obstacles and to grow as a person, so for this reason I not only want to but MUST devote more time to it.

I want to create more posts on and about weddings and love stories, I love weddings, I love planning and I love LOVE.  I want to talk more about my travels and share the experiences I have had in places other than home. I want to help others to make travel decisions or get more out of their experiences.  I want to share tips and tricks on achievements that I have already accomplished, not that I am an expert but experience speaks for itself.  I want to post enough that I am not just always updating on my life but actually sharing something of value to others.  I want to create more photo posts, to take more photos.  I want to create so many more photo posts it's not funny, photos speak for themselves.

So there you have it, I am planning and setting goals, I am feeling inspired and I hope I can hold onto this inspiration.  I am feeling like I am able to achieve something that I really want to do and I refuse to let anything get in the way.  I promise you that you can expect positive change here at Hakuna Matata.  With a wedding post to come this weekend, stay tuned.

Talk soon,

P.S. some of my old posts might look a little wrong in the way of formatting until I re-edit them to my new blog size, be patient :) 

Collateral Damage

I haven't really felt like blogging lately. My mind hasn't been in the best place. I found out from the GP a fortnight ago that I had more than sprained my knee. I had torn something in my knee and needed to be referred to a specialist. A week later I saw the specialist who confirmed that I have torn my Medial Collateral Ligament and strained my Posterior Cruciate Ligament  The GP had been a little wrong in his diagnosis of a torn meniscus but not as incorrect as the GP who told me it was just a sprain and sent me on my merry way.

Thankfully after five days of little improvement I took myself back to the doctor to get a second opinion. Who knows how long I could have been walking around thinking my knee was sprained. Unfortunately for me this kind of tear must be operated on, it tore where it joined my bone and has rolled down on itself, I have to have surgery to unroll the ligament and reattach it to the bone. This all has to be done within around four weeks of the tear before the ligament starts healing to itself (another reason I was lucky I went back to the doctor). So this Wednesday I go under the knife. Unfortunately this ligament cannot be repaired via arthroscopic surgery (key hole) as the ligament is wide and not located in the knee joint, I will have to have a little square cut in my leg. I have to stay overnight in hospital, take at least a week off work and spend 6-8 weeks in a knee brace. 

meet Buddy, my companion for the next few months :(
we don't always get along

Along with the usual life pressures this has challenged my mood and I have been a little grumpy and sad. I am scared about surgery, about the pain and about waking up from antiseptic but I know it needs to be done. I just want Wednesday to hurry up and be over already. Wednesday will be four weeks since my crash and I want to start seeing an improvement. I have only been wearing my brace for six days and I am already so sick of it and I haven't had to wear it to bed yet which I expect to after surgery. I am tired of the pains in my back, hips and calves and I just want to stretch. I am not looking forward to arriving at the hospital at 7.30am and not being able to have even a sip of water. I drink a lot of water, this is going to kill me! But it may do a nice job of distracting me from thinking about surgery. 

I have the best surgeon, he is just awesome and I am confident everything will be just fine. After all he does this stuff three days a week. My knee is to him what Microsoft Word is to me, second nature. Every man and his dog seems to have had surgery done on one of the four ligaments in their knee and have been telling me it takes forever to heal and a lot of physiotherapy, damn it I just want to bend my darn leg already. I am yet to find someone else who has torn their MCL and the surgeon said he has only seen one other tear to this ligament before. Great, I seriously am the most uncoordinated weirdo ever born!

So if my coming posts have a slightly negative style, this is probably why. But hey, I am only human and everyone feels crappy once in a while. Getting my wedding photos would surely lift my mood but nope still no photos :( Maybe if the husband makes me pancakes and buys me a camera I will feel better! Anyway thank you for joining my pity party I look forward to talking soon...hopefully I will be in a better mood! I will endeavour to use my time away from work to read all of the books I have started and have been meaning to read, that sounds nice and positive, look at me I am setting goals!

Anyone for some concrete?

You may have noticed after a long weekend of blogging I was a little quiet the weekend just gone. Well my mind (and body) were not in the best place. I injured myself in a bike crash last week (more on that to come) and was limping around in pain for three days at work, add an extra stressful working week and I wasn't the nicest girl to be around. I figured I wouldn't force my nasty mood onto anyone who didn't have to listen to me, hence I refrained from blogging. Sitting at the computer desk was also not the most comfortable either. 

me grumpy after a very wet ride home a few months back!

Is my mind much better a week later? No, not really. To be honest, I need to swallow a cup of concrete and harden up. Limping around for week is really nothing to be upset about compared to what others have to deal with. Alex told me yesterday that I need to stop feeling sorry for myself. But in my defence, I am getting extremely frustrated with the amount of time it takes to do the most simple things and my muscles are aching and begging for a stretch because I am walking differently and carrying my weight differently. If I could just sink into some amazing yoga stretches for the hamstrings and hips I would feel so much better but with a knee that barely bends or straightens this is kind of impossible, sometimes I am so agitated I just want to chop my leg off. 

a very fat and ugly knee of mine

I am off to the doctor tomorrow to get the final verdict on this knee of mine, is it just a simple sprain or have I done something more serious? After throwing a heap of money at the doctor and a machine I might just find out it is merely a sprain in which case I will feel rather silly and embarrassed, and all sympathy from Alex will be out the window from that point forward. But of course that would be the best outcome. Having never had a sprained knee before I am not sure how long it should take to recover and regain the movement of my leg. Having sprained my ankles numerous times they usually heel up to normal walking point within 3-4 days with pain continuing for specific movements for a few weeks depending on the severity of the sprain. Well I currently cannot straighten my leg or bend it at more than a right angle and twisting is out of the question. I have been limping for a week and my calf muscle is pinching and aching, I think from walking differently. 

Anyway I will find out tomorrow and maybe then my mood might get better, at least then I will know what I am dealing with. 

Talk soon,

P.S. we should get our wedding photos very soon, plus our printed coffee table book which I am really excited about! It is the book that is holding it everything up but I am sure it will be worth the wait.

Happy 1st Birthday

That's right about a week ago my little corner of the world wide web turned 1! Hakuna Matata has (barely) managed to stay up and running during its first year. My first year blogging was almost a failure, not enough postings from me, not enough replying to the comments of my lovely readers, not enough photos and not enough references to everything wonderful, but I survived. 

Year one for my little blog was nothing like I had planned, with inspiration and encouragement from others, this time one year ago I decided to start my blog. Hoping to do many updates, share details of my wedding planning and to share my experience with depression, I was excited and nervous to finally publish my first post after spending months thinking about. Looking back I didn't share nearly as much as I had hoped. Why?? Well life got in the way I guess! I still have a long list of blog post subjects I can't wait to post about and I rarely lose the inspiration to do so, just the time and sometimes my ability to write. Sometimes I know what I want to write but putting sentences together to get the feelings I have across can sometimes be very challenging. Luckily though I am still as motivated, passionate and inspired as I was on day one.

So lets try this all again in year two! Lets hope for more posts, updates and more honesty from me. Thank you to my readers for standing by me this past year, thank you for your love and support and please keep reading during year two. 

Happy Birthday to my blog, thanks for being my outlet for all of my thoughts and emotions this past year. Here's to a second year of more posts, photos and readers as well as a brand new blog header to come very soon!

Talk soon,