UK Life Update
Well, I am what they call "rubbish" at blogging.
It seems as though COVID controlled and slowed my life to a snail's pace for so long that once the gates opened back up, we went running, and have not sat down since (including to blog).
Those of you that read my posts, I believe to generally be family wondering about life updates and friends interested in what life in the UK has been like for us. I try to post on social media as things are happening, but really just enjoying life here and soaking it up as much as I can. Maybe it still feels unreal and that this moment will pass me by? It is reality that this is what we call life and we are happy with that, but something has always felt 'un-final' since Daniel and I have met. Whether here or America, it always feels we live in a moment of, "this is where we are, and this is our life, and we are happy... what will come next?"
Not only have I had some comments on my social media saying, what is happening over there!? But we have some pretty big updates!(As you may have seen photographed, and hence clicked to view the full update.)
How about what's been happening first...
I left off with it being August of 2021. Summer Holidays.
Fall 2022, we enjoyed England autumn and all the Halloween activities possible as it is Emme's favorite time and holiday of the year! We went trick or treating, and she still remembers and talks about it very frequently. Imagine if she went trick or treating in USA!? She would be mind blown. Not that it's not great here, just less popular and much more a 'scary' thing. What I mean is, people dress their homes in quite creepy scenes, and dress in quite creepy costumes. Typical horor story vibes, less princesses and lollipops with pumpkins on them vibes. The crazy thing is Emme LOVES it, haha. In just a short week we will do it again, and she canNOT wait.
Next up was Thanksgiving that I have continuned to keep alive in the UK by hosting at our home on the weekend after Thanksgiving. I order USA supplies and make the recipes I know from back home.
We then went straight into Christmas which is arguably the BIGGEST deal in the UK. We (for the first time since our move) did not have COVID or the government regulating who we could see or where we could go for Christmas. We hosted the Christmas Lunch/Dinner for my husband's parents and grandfather at our home and then had the rest of his immediate family (siblings and nieces) over in the later afternoon/evening for a buffet style 'tea' and games. We have created our own traditions here and continue to try to keep making great memories at the holidays for Emme and our family.
In January 2022, we went on our first "abroad" trip to the Canary Islands. We went to the island of Lanzarote for about 5-6 days and enjoyed some warmth and sun. It wasnt super hot, it was max of 70 F in the day and would go down to 50-60 at night. We stayed at a place completely catered to children with entertainment and a mini disco every evening. There was a kids club that Emme loved, and so did we! They had hours of operation where she could join and do arts/crafts, playing, and dancing while we enjoyed some adult time next to the pool (we were never too far away, haha). Essentially, it's babysitting. She loved it and would enjoy seeing her teachers later in the evening at the disco and would win "awards" for the day. For example, the child to have the best butterfly drawing of the day. Emme felt very seen and important on this holiday haha. We were steps away from the beach and several shops and restaurants which we always felt safe walking around and going to. We left the resort daily to explore. The one and only negative of the trip was just hours before we went to bed the night before leaving the UK, Emme had an accident playing with a toy which chipped her tooth. Unfortunately, she was in a lot of pain during the trip and we even made a visit to the local dentist in which my knowledge of Spanish didn't take me very far. The Spanish language spoke in the Canary Islands (off of Spain), is not the same Spanish we are taught in High School to cater to a holiday in Mexico, haha. We returned to the UK and she had to have the tooth removed (which we opted to do privately and pay for to make her most comfortable during the procedure, not to mention the NHS waiting list was 6-12 months long. It was the most expensive Tooth Fairy I have ever heard of?)
January 2022 was also when we had to "apply" for primary schools for Emme. It seemed entirely foreign to me that A) I had a choice of where my child would go to school and B) that I was doing such for my THREE year old in January 2022 when she was not to start until September 2022. In England, every child has the opportunity to start attending school from the September after they turn 4 years old. In Emme's case, she turned 4 on August 20, 2022 and then attended just a couple weeks later in September. However, those that turn 4 on September 1st, will not attend until the September the following year, when technically they will be 5. We ultimately put our top 3 choices down based off of proximity to our home and where our little niece attends as we felt having a familiar face would be good as well as I can help take them both to school, and equally my sister in law offered to do the same. Our top school, while about the same distance from our home as our catchment (district) school, it was not technically in our catchment (district). We were fortunate that it was a low birth year and we did indeed get our first choice and Emme now attends the same school as her cousin, which has been really good. She is in what they call "Reception", no idea why it is called that, but it is similar to kindergarten. She attends all day, no nap times, and there is play as well as learning. She has been learning to read, write, math, and phonics. It is full on, where she comes home with new letters and books every week as well as online assignments. UK doesn't play when it comes to education! Next year she will be in Year 1, then Year 2, 3, 4, etc. She will be at this school until Year 6 then will attend secondary (middle) school. The same process where we will need to apply will happen.
Spring of 2022 went by in a flash with not much to report other than Emme attending preschool 5 days a week 915-345 as well as myself working 2 part-time jobs. I did change jobs in this time. Those of you that have been following, I work at a private clinic in our town as a paediatric nurse part time and I had been working from home for the COVID team of my hospital in our town as well. I decided to start looking around for another home working/remote job that would allow me to use a bit more of my pediatric background. I found a job that was higher seniority, better pay, and a working from home (for the most part) job out of London. I still work for the NHS (National Health System) as a pediatric nurse who assesses children who may require assistance and care at home due to their medical diagnoses. In USA we would probably call this homecare. I don't provide the homecare, but I assess the children to see if they are eligible for the home care (paid for by the NHS) and then set them up with an agency that can provide that care. I also case manage these children and re-evaluate them on a annual basis to see if they have an increase of needs, decrease in needs, or if they have stayed the same. I enjoy the job, I do a lot from home and virtually. It is a lot of investigating their notes from doctors and specialists and scoring them on a tool for eligibility. I have enjoyed the relationships I am able to build with the families and I also enjoy seeing the children in person for a face to face assessment. Driving to London is not really my favorite part of the job, so lately I have been utilizing the train more. It is about a 1.5 hour trip each way as I have to switch trains. The last assessment I did was in central London, which is a straight train, about 45minutes, and I had to pinch myself walking past the London Eye en route to the hospital. I do both jobs part time and have set days I do for each. It can be difficult juggling two different hats at times, but I enjoy both the clinical side of my clinic job as well as the critical thinking side of my home job. Daniel is still working at and enjoying his job with a pool and spa company.
Summer 2022 was much the same, I continued to work through most of it and Emme attended a "childminder" (in home babysitter) 2-3 days a week. She enjoyed playing with other children and "helping take care of the babies". Over the summer, we went to Legoland for a day and my husband and I took a week off to do day trips with Emme and family. We did not opt for abroad as it was really expensive during this time. We instead decided we would do a holiday in the autumn (November 2022) to save on money. During our week off, we did a day at the beach, a day at a children's discovery center and indoor water park, a day out bowling and to lunch and a day to an outdoor pool. We had a few heat waves in this summer which were a bit hard to bear and we did break down and shelled out a bit of money on a single window air conditioning unit for Emme's room that we all would sit and enjoy, haha. We had our annual 4th of July party at our house and I went away for a spa weekend with my sister in law to celebrate our birthdays. We ended the summer with Emme's 4th Birthday party that was disco themed. All in all, a good summer.
Which leads us to September 2022 and the information you all have scrolled past the above to read about, ha! Shortly after Emme's 4th birthday, we found out we were pregnant with another little one. Those of you that know me and how I was with Emme's pregnancy are in shock that I would ever do it again!? Well, we decided she's had to ask for a sibling for far too long and we would give it a go, haha. Emme's first week of school (2nd week of September), I was doing OK, but started to have the usual exhaustion and nausea. I was able to work that week and enjoyed seeing Emme off on her first days at school. Unfortunately, I did not stay so lucky with minimal symptoms and by the 3rd week of September I was extremely ill and admitted to the hospital with dehyration and ketosis. They uttered those awful words "hyperemesis gravidarum" to me and prompty started me on IV fluids and IV antiemetics (to stop me from being sick). This was my first experience in a NHS hospital (or for any hospital outside of the USA for that matter),and I would love to say it was sunshine and rainbows, but it was really hard. It was not the comforts of the USA hospitals and I unfortunately was quite let down. For the first few hours of my admission I was in a room by myself which was basic and LOVELY (I was just across the hall from the commual toilet). I thought to myself, OK so the TV doesn't work unless I pay for it (not that I felt well enough to do so) and OK that the internet doesn't work for me to use my phone (again, didn't care much at this point), but atleast my stay is FREE and I am in a room on my own, score! The IV fluids started to make me feel a bit less comatose, and the IV meds were giving me a bit of relief, however at night shift/shift change I was told that since it appeared I would be in for the night, I was going to be moved to the "bay". Basically, that means I was being moved to a large room with 4 beds all seperated by a blue paper curtain each. I was really tired, and the IV meds were making me loopy and I just said "OK". Off I was wheeled to a bay, where there was actually only one other person (at that time) and I said to myself...not so bad? I fell back asleep to be woken moments later by that same person being sick (throwing up) in her sick bowl (basin). As you can imagine I thought, "well she must be pregnant and going through the same thing as me, poor thing". Only, this went on ALL NIGHT LONG, approximately every 10 minutes or so. It was absolute torture (I know for her), but also for me. Comes to find out on rounds the next morning, I overheard the doctor say she has gallstones. Not a great thing, but she wasn't pregnant and I thought to myself, why in the whole world would they put me next to this person they know has been throwing up every 5minutes since arrival? Anyhow, 2 other women came in at some point in the night and early hours of the morning, and it's safe to say, I think I was awake for all of it. By morning it felt like I was in a three ring circus with one nurse attending to all of us and I am sure more outside our bay. When the doctor came around to check on me in the morning, I said "yep, doing fine, switch the meds to oral", full well knowing, I was NOT fine and I just wanted to go home. She switched the meds from IV to oral and they definitely were not as effective, but I was out of there by 5pm. I arrived home, took a shower, and collapsed into my bed where I think I slept for about 18 hours straight. The next month and a half to follow isn't a lovely one to blog about. I did not leave the 4 walls of my bedroom other than to use the bathroom and occasionally get myself some broth, ICE, or popsicles from the kitchen. I was still frequently sick (throwing up), constantly had nausea, and definitely in a fog/or completely asleep from the medications designed to make me stop from throwing up. I was not able to care for Emme at all, hardly well enough to care for myself. I have to put the biggest and loudest shout out to my husband, sister in law, mother in law, and brother in law for taking the best care of Emme. My husband would feed and dress her for school every morning and take her to my sister in laws who would then take her to school. She would then also pick her up from school (her or my mother in law or brother in law) and care for her until my husband returned home from work. He would then help her do her homework, feed her dinner, give her bath, and put her to bed every single night. He (nor the rest) never complained, never asked if I could do it, and never made me feel bad for the fact I wasn't able to be there for Emme. This has been the hardest part of this pregnancy, having another child that I could not care for. My husband and I have always co parented and been both very involved in her day to day routine and care, but he basically had to become a single dad for the last month and a half. He is the best.
You have probably guessed, but no I have not worked since the day of my hospital admission. The NHS may have its faults in terms of patient care, but when it comes to working for them, I felt very safe. As long as the doctor signs you off as unfit to work, no questions are asked, and you are told to "go take care of you". Both of my bosses have been amazing and supportive. I have had weekly phone calls with each of them to talk about how I am doing, and not talking a bit about work. There is no such thing as a "sick bank" of hours that you must accrue to then use in the event you are sick and need to be off. If you are sick, you are sick, and you are paid as normal based on the years of service you are with the NHS. For me, I was with the NHS in my second year during my illness so was entitled to 2 months full pay, 2 months half pay. (Thankfully I never got to 2 months) Should I have been with the NHS for 5 years or more, it is 6 months full pay, 6 months half pay. I remember with my pregnancy with Emme, I had not been in my job in the USA for very long, and similarly I was off until about 13-14 weeks pregnant, and I was not paid for most of that. I had not accrued the hours. It was very stressful and financially difficult back then. I have been so appreciative that whilst I am going through some of the worst times personally, I never had to worry about work or how that would affect my financial situation.
Fast forward to present, I am almost 13 weeks pregnant. I still have frequent nausea and take both medications prescribed to me, but I am SOOOOO much better. I have similar aversions as I did with Emme where I can't stand most smells and have a limited food palate. However, I have energy in the day time and I am able to EAT stuff!! Breakfast and lunch go pretty well, however I start to feel an increase in nausea and symptoms from about 4-5pm onwards. This was the same for Emme's pregnancy and unfortunately the evening nausea and sickness did not go away until the day she was born. We had our first scan (ultrasound) this past Friday, and babe looks good! I couldn't believe how much we could see on the first scan, I don't remember that from last time? It felt like such a milestone to get to that scan as when you have HG all you pray for is 12 weeks, you pray that you are one of the lucky ones that has relief of symptoms suddenly at 12 weeks. I wouldn't say I have this overwhelming relief, but I definitely am so much better and no longer bed ridden, haha. Daniel took the day off to go to the scan with me and we went out for lunch after (for the first time in forever) and took a quick trip to the toy store next door. We picked out a baby toy that Emme could "give" the baby when we told her about the baby. She was at school this day and we waited until she got home and changed her into her "Promoted to Big Sister" t-shirt to tell her the news. She had no idea that's what her new rainbow t-shirt said, and I still don't think she quite understood when we showed her the ultrasound images. She continues to state she wants a baby sister, that baby boys are loud and noisy. She also told some others the news by stating "Mummy ate a lot of food, she got a tummy ache and was sick, and then she had a baby inside her belly". She has enjoyed playing with her baby dolls and treating them like her baby sister (never baby brother). It is such a relief to be able to tell Emme that this is why I have been so sick, and it has also been a relief to tell some friends and family that this is why I have been so anti-social, ha! For those of you that worked with me through Emme's pregnancy, you probably heard me say on a daily basis, "I can't ever do this again", well...I am saying that again, haha.....Babe is due first week of May and we are very excited to be SURPRISED by whether it is a he or she :)
Where do we go from here? Life plans?
Thank you to some of my friends who have asked this a lot of me lately.
My current spouse visa runs until July 2023, and I have the option to renew that visa for another 2.5 year period. It is advised by our lawyer that should we want to renew, we start the process in January 2023. We decided quite early on into this move that especially with COVID, we really did not get to do much of what we have wanted to do here. With the amount of effort and money it took to get us all here in the first place, it does not feel right to turn around and leave July 2023 (not to mention I will have a 2 month old baby). We will renew my visa to extend us a bit more time, and we can decide after I have lived here for 3 years whether we want to apply for my UK Citizenship. This would make me a dual citizen and I would have 2 passports, 1 for USA, 1 for UK. This is currently what my husband and daughter (and soon to be next child) all have. As far as where we live, we still live in the same rental home we have since moving here. We like the size and location, but just like anywhere here, it is pricey. We did look into buying property, however, no bank will give us a loan with both of our incomes until I have that next step in my spouse visa, so we will be continuing to rent until atleast next summer. With interest rates being so high and the housing market prices so high, it really isn't the best time for us anyhow.
I have no good answer for those who say, are you ever coming back to the USA? We really don't know. We know we enjoy it here and we know Emme does too. Not to say she wouldn't enjoy living in the USA, she just knows this as home for now. We miss our family and friends back in the USA so so much, and we both miss our old jobs, but also enjoy our current ones. It is so hard to answer which place do I like better? I love the amount of time I get off work here...I feel that I have so much more time with my family here. I love the weather here (I know, right?), it does not have the extreme cold and hot like back home. I love being an hour from the beach and an hour from London. I love the maternity leave options here (another blog to be written closer to time). I love our social life here, always something going on it seems. I miss...American food, haha. I miss American football. I miss pumpkin everything. I miss coffee creamer. I miss the colors in the autumn time. I miss Halloween in America. I miss my family and friends most at the holidays. I miss trips to Florida. I miss our American home. I miss my income to cost of living ratio in America. I DO NOT miss American health insurance and the prices associated. I miss a cold beer and American style hot dog with relish at a baseball game on a hot summer's day. I miss the autonomy I had as a nurse in the USA.
Right, I think that is enough typing for now. It's been entirely too long since I've had my last snack and I am feeling it!
Happy to try to blog more, especially about the differences I experience in this pregnancy under the NHS system vs USA... I will do my best. I return to work next week. Pop some comments or questions in the box on here and I will try to incorporate next time!!
Love to all,
Jamie
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