Christmas is here!

MERRY CHRISTMAS!

Today we celebrate Christmas (Joulu) in Finland. Unfortunately I was unable to go to spend it with my family so I am at home with our dog as my boyfriend is with his family. So I get to celebrate tomorrow with my boyfriend and our dog. But I wish you all happy holidays what ever it is you are celebrating today/tomorrow.

And as I wished, we DID get a white Christmas :D

Christmas Concert

About a week ago I performed at a Christmas rock'n roll concert. I did most of the back up singing and performed two songs with the help of my friend. We performed Winter Wonderland and Walkin in the Air :) The show was great, I was very pleased with myself. The only problme was that I was so tired afterwards that I still haven't regained my energy back... I loved performing but the rehearsals and all the stuff before the actual performance were really hard on me. I think I started this too early after the surgery and all but I'm still happy I did it :)

Here you can also see my new hairstyle and the new color I just had a day before the performance :D And some of my lovely artist colleagues. There were more people performing but it was so hectic so we didn't have much time for photos :D Oh well maybe I'll get to do this all over again next year :)

Christmas is coming

I'm already looking foward to Christmas! I'm a huge Christmas fan. Though in my family Christmas was never celebrated as a religious holiday as it isn't in many Finnish families. We still have most of our pagan traditions included in our Christmas traditions which I think is so cool. Also the  name of Christmas doesn't have anything to do with christianity in my language, it's called joulu here and pronounced pretty much the same way Yule (pagan x-mas) is.  For me Christmas is time of joy, peace, happiness and giving. I do love to get presents (I'm a big child at heart) but the best thing is to give presents especially to those who are most dear to me.


Usually for Christmas we have two parties (me and my boyfriend). In Finland Christmas eve, 24th of December, is the day we celebrate. Tradiotionally we eat rice porridge in the morning but as I go to see my family to my sisters or brothers place, my boyfriend goes to his family home, so we are separated. So my family has rice porridge for lunch before the big Christmas feast. The morning starts usually with children watching TV and mostly hot line for Santa Clause/ Father Christmas. There kids can call and tell Santa what they want as a present and they also show how Santa gets ready to leave to take presents all over the world. I watched this show when I was a child and it still come every Christmas, live from Korvatunturi where Santa Clause lives :)


In the evening the whole family gathers around a big table to eat. Most families have the tradiotional Christmas foods that hey have every year. These foods Finnish people have eaten for hundreds or years during Christmas and other celebrations though nowadays they are only eaten for Christmas. They include: swede casserole, potatoe casserole, carrot casserole, ham, fish in different forms (mostly herring and salmon and yes, we eat raw fish here it's either salted or marinated. But we also enjoy our fish cooked and my favourite part of Christmas food is oven salmon :P), potatoes, sauce for the ham, rosolli (like salad that's made out of preserved vegetable and herring topped with whipped cream made pink with beet root juice), peas and white fish with lye (not my favourite thing and many Finnish families don't have it anymore as it's not very popular). For dessert we have joulutorttu (Chrismat tart) which is a star shaped pastry. We also have a traditional Christmas pudding in our family that has plums, rice, whipped cream and quark (and of course made sweet with sugar). In addition there are all kinds of sweet pastries, gingerbread, pies and cakes that can vary depending on the family.

Besides food we also have a decorated Christmas tree. In Finland the Christmas trees are mostly rather simple compared to the huge glitter bombs that people seem to have in USA :D But this also depends on the family of course. Our Christmas tree has always been in the middle, not too flashy but still has lot of ornaments and stuff on it. When we were kids it was our duty (I have two siblings) to decorate the tree. Now I have my own Christmas tree to decorate.

I also LOVE buying Christmas presents. It's hard as I don't have much money and other people in my family do... So they are acustomed to such different quality stuff then I have. It's hard to find things to get for them. My friends are easier as they are  not as demanding as long as I get something from my  heart (which is easy when you are buying for your best friends).

The pictures are: 1. me and santa last Christmas 2. my niece on Santas lap 3. Didn't find a picture of my familys Christmas table so this is my friends Christmas table 4. My X-mas tree in my little room. We normally have two trees, the real one in the living room and small one in my room :) 5. My favourite tree ornament! 6. This years X-mas gifts for family and friends. Few presents still missing that are for my dog :D

BlAh

Well no good news here... I have been at the stoma nurse now twice within two weeks time and still there is no solution to my problems. There is only one soft convex flange available in my country so that's the only option for me. But the problem is that I've become allergic to it. I have a rash that itches like crazy. Today I got some large cohesive seals that I'm using now and so far it feels pretty comfortable. It's still itchy but not as badly. Also the flange seems to stick better around my navel area so that's always a good thing, I don't feel so vulnerable with it.

Anyways, the wound on the side of the stoma is still hurting a lot and not getting any better. I'm starting to wonder if I'll ever get rid of it. Also the wound on the opening of the stoma isn't getting any better. When I move it feels like someone is ripping the wounds open as the flange presses against them and makes the skin move. So the only comfortable position is on my left side lying on the bed or sofa... Yay. My apartment is starting to look like hoarders apartment as I can't do any cleaning, I'm unable to bend almost at all and the whole thing just feels so uncomfortable all the time. It feels like a big piece of plastic that has been glued to my stomach that's pressing against the wounds and pulling everything down. I know I'll get used to the flange eventually, but now it still feels really bad and it's on my mind 24/7.

I still need to wake up every hour with alarm clock so I can go and empty the bag. It doesn't seem to matter how little I eat, or at what time I eat. But I guess this will be my fate for the rest of my life as it's not like my body hasn't gotten used to having no large bowl as I had J-pouch for years. If I could just get rid of the pain and be able to move around like a normal person. I feel so confined and really like an invalid as I can't even walk properly :(

And one thing I really hate is the smell! Yes it smells, no matter what I do. I change the flange every day and I block the air valve with stickers but still the smell comes out... And I can totally remember my stoma nurse telling me there is never any smelling problems with stomas... Oh really?!?!? I'm guessing she has never really met people with stomas... Though I do have an extra sensitive nose as well as an extra sensitive skin so that might be one of the reasons this is so hard on me. But my boyfriend has also noticed that I do smell in the morning when I come out from under the covers... Not really looking foward to beeing a smelly person for the rest of my life, any ideas? I've used some stoma deodorants but they are really not working at all...

Oh I'm so waiting for the day when I can come here and write something positive about my stoma! But right now I just can't :(