Invisible Illness Visible?

Yesterday I attended a hospital appointment to get the results of various tests I'd had done over the last three months. The tests included a 24 hour heart halter and a tilt table. The results of these tests concluded that I have POTS, or it's full name - Postural Orthostatic Tachycardia Syndrome. It's an autonomic disorder which means some of the functions that should work automatically in my body, don't. For instance my heart rate goes too fast sometimes, evidenced by the heart halter when I was sat at home in front of the TV. There are many things this syndrome does. I feel dizzy and lightheaded for little reason, I struggle to sleep and live with headaches and migraine. These are just a few of its effects.

POTS is fairly common within people living with Ehlers Danlos Syndrome. Even though I have both these disorders I live my life as many other people without them, do. I work full time, I socialise, spend time with my family and try to write. Some days these things take it out of me more than others, but I don't let it dictate who I am.

It is on this point that I wondered about the visibility of invisible illness. My Twitter profile and this blog tell of the illness that no one can see. My thoughts on putting it out there was to connect with people who live with and understand the disorders. Twitter has been great for that. Yesterday though, as I thought about blogging the results I questioned the reasons or need to put this information out there. Should I leave the information visible, thereby raising awareness of a little heard of disorder and champion invisible illness in an small voice fighting stigma, or should I remove mention of it and live my life in spite of two disorders that attempt to restrict me?

What do you think of seeing this information, either as a well and healthy person or as someone also living with invisible illness?

Wish I Was Here

Todays blog post is a bit of an escapism post. It's about sharing your ideal place for escaping the mid December madness. The post is in celebration of Janice Hortons release of her eBook Reaching For The Stars.

In the book, the main character Chef Finn McDuff feels he’s had enough of all the food campaigns, the TV cookery shows, the constant frenzy surrounding his private life and disappears into a self-imposed exile for a while. Hence the theme of the launch day extravaganza is ‘Wish I Was Here...’



So where do I was I was?

Surprisingly it's not some hot, quiet, getaway island. The place I would love to be as is the top of my list for places to go is New York. And what better time to visit than the run up to Christmas. You could easily get lost there and simply enjoy the sights, sounds and tastes of the big city. I want to walk in Central Park and eat in a cheesecake shop. I want to walk amongst the towering buildings and watch the craziness of the yellow cabs. I want to visit the statue of liberty and go on the Staten Island Ferry. With everything I want to lose myself in over there, I think I need the rest of December!



Where do you wish you could be?

Visit Janice's Blog to see fellow bloggers ideal destinations.

My New Favourite Place

 Today I found my idea of heaven. A place that caught hold of all of my senses. A place that felt warm and inviting and a place I fully intend to make a frequent place to visit.

Scarthin Books in Cromford, Derbyshire.

I fell into this wonderful wonderland of books by accident. I was with colleagues when we called in for a hot drink while travelling and the result was I nearly had to be physically dragged away because I just didn't want to leave.

As you walk through the shop door the smell of books hits you straight away, and then the sight of floor to ceiling books adds to the feel of a real old fashioned, cosy, comfortable place to be.



The shop was on three to four levels, I can't remember, I was feeling so excited. I actually felt like a child during that first Christmas where you start to understand the joys Christmas can bring. The entire place is filled with books including the stairways. Everything you could ever wish to read about, you could find here. I saw books I desperately wanted, but had never considered reading before. Non-fiction books that drew my interest but are something I wouldn't necessarily browse for when I shop online for ebooks, or even hardcover books for that matter. The world opened up in that one shop I very nearly didn't get to know about. It showed me that bookstores like this really do have a place in our technological world.

There was a wonderful childrens room, which had the ceiling decorated very originally and was obviously created with children in mind. I've already discussed the shop with little man and said we can spend an afternoon there and he was thrilled. Especially when I showed him the photographs. I love that he shares my love of books and hope that this continues as he grows.

I completely feel like I'm on a sugar rush, even hours after leaving, only it's a book rush. It's a wonderful place and I'm so glad I came across it.





I will leave you with a couple more photographs and a suggestion to visit it if you can.

 Do you have a similar book shop you visit? Tell us about it. They really are wonderful places and deserve our support.

Time To Read

It can't be denied that reading is good for us. It's educational, inspirational, motivational. It widens horizons, shares experiences and provides a place to escape. It exercises the brain cells, promotes spelling and language and can be experienced anywhere you want.

So, with that said, why do I feel guilty when taking that time to read at home rather than before going to sleep or while I'm eating my lunch at work?

I work full time, I write, I spend time with my family. Sitting down with a book feels a little like I'm using up valuable time I should be making better use for.

As a writer I often hear that reading is a must, after all, how can you write if you don't read. So reading is a must. I keep reminding myself of this, that reading is a necessity rather than a luxury but my brain can't convince my emotional side.

Do you find sitting down with a book easy or do you have to convince yourself it's a positive? I'd love to hear how people deal with this quiet pastime within busy lives.

Patricia Cornwell In Harrogate

Last weekend I was lucky enough to get a ticket to an amazing event in Harrogate where the United States queen of crime, Patricia Cornwell was being interviewed on stage and then book signing.






Prior to the event I met up with a couple of lovely friends and we shared a cream tea. It was heavenly, if only the service would have matched the taste.





After that we all filed into the hall to find our seats, where after sitting somewhere close to the back, I was found a wonderful seat, just four seats back.

The event was great. Patricia talked about how she has stopped ageing Scarpetta as she doesn't want to age her and potentially retire her.

She explained the moment Lucy walked into her line of sight in one of the episodes and she found out Lucy was gay. It's a very organic way of writing. The characters have their lives and do their own thing.

Cornwell did admit to regretting killing Benton off, almost immediately, so she brought him back.

She did say she absolutely would not kill Scarpetta off, so that's a blessing for fans.

As far as the movie goes, it's still early stages, I think screenwriting was mentioned. Angelina Jolie is still "attached" to the project. The film will not portray any of the books but will stand alone and in Kay's earlier career, hence using a younger actress I presume.

After the interview she stayed around to sign books. As far as social media goes she's very interactive with her twitter and Facebook. Check her out.

I will leave you a slightly blurry image of her signing some books.






A truly great evening and one I was glad I shared with friends

Something For The Weekend

I haven't had a great deal of time for reading recently as I've been going full pelt at my manuscript, but I thought I share with you, some of what I did manage to read.

Now this book, when you hear what it's about are either going to say - yay! Or put your head in your hands and wail.




The Radleys, written by Matt Haig.

Book blurb:

Meet the Radleys - Peter, Helen and their teenage children, Clara and Rowan, live in a typical suburban English town. They are an everyday family, averagely dysfunctional, averagely content. But, as their children have yet to find out, the Radleys have a devastating secret. In this moving, thrilling and extraordinary portrait of one unusual family, The Radleys asks what we grow into when we grow up, and explores what we gain - and lose - when we deny our appetites.



My Thoughts:

The Radleys family secret is that they're vampires. The children are unaware of this at the start of the book but that changes one fateful weekend when a party goes wrong for the Radleys daughter. She is stunned to find out she's not actually ill as she'd originally thought she is in fact a vampire. I really really liked this story. It's set in suburbia based "normality" and the vampires are living pretty ordinary lives. It's a lovely modern twist on a vampire themed novel. I loved that the family could be anyone and anywhere. They tried so hard to blend in. It's wonderfully written and something that is worth checking out, even if you're not a vampire fan.

Liebster Award

The ever lovely Liz Crump a wonderfully chatty writer who can be found over on her blog here, has very kindly nominated Life in Clarity for the Liebster award .

Liz made an incredibly kind comment about the Life in Clarity blog and it made my day, so thank you Liz. I urge you to go check out her blog.

So on with forwarding the award to five other blogs.

In accepting the Liebster Blog Award, the recipient agrees to:


- Thank the person who gave them the award and link back to that person's blog
- Copy and paste the award to their blog
- Reveal the 5 blogs they have chosen to award, commenting on their blog to break the news!
- Hope those people in turn pay it forward by accepting and awarding "The Liebster Blog Award" to bloggers they would like to honour


This award is for anyone with fewer than 200 followers. :)

The five blogs I award the Liebster award are:

Teresa Morgan at The Wittering Woman. Teresa is an aspiring romance writer who blogs with honesty and humour, oh and yes, a fair share of handsome hunks appear on her blog pages. A girl can't go wrong!

Working Stiffs a collective of crime writers. If you're a crime kind of reader, you can't go wrong.

Annalisa Crawford who is wonderfully lovely and honest and has a blog that makes me smile.

Linda K whose dogged determination is inspiring. Life always manages to get in the way, but as writers we need to keep going. Linda does just that. A lovely blog.

Ranae Rose a lovely but red hot romance writer :)