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My PTSD & Anxiety: A Year On

2019-10-06T06:34:00.001+01:00

“Everyone’s going to think I’m an arsehole but it’s over” he said to me coldly, completely emotional-less. I sat on the sofa in disbelief, two hours previous we had returned home from A&E where I had traumatically lost our baby in the toilets of the waiting room. His words shook me to my core, how could he do this, today of all days? It was the 6th October 2018 and this day, as well as the previous few months leading up to it it, still haunt me a year on. This is my story of a year of recovery.

Mental health, it’s all you hear about now isn’t it? For me it separates into sub categories, those who suffer from it directly, those that have or are watching someone else suffer, those who have a vague grasp of it and those who openly admit that they don’t. The latter normally make reference to “not believing in it,” and I’ve been told this first hand. I’m afraid to say this isn’t Father Christmas we are talking about here, mental health issues actually exists and to a certain extent it’s possibly one of the most terrifying situations to be in to be suffering inside your own head.

Me before I met him

This post is going to be a lengthy one, this is me who’s writing it after all and we all know I can talk for England. As with all of my personal posts, I hope that some of you gain something from it. Telling this story for me, even after all this time, is like trying to breathe properly with broken ribs, it’s extremely painful but I feel it must be done. It’s not a “poor me” post, I’ve had all the love and support of hundreds of people but I wanted to put it together purely based on my experience, the cause, the symptoms and what I did to try to help aid my recovery in terms of treatments. I’m also hoping that publishing this is one of the final releases to what has been the worst 15 months of my life.

October 2018

Let’s rewind all the way back to 2013/2014, I was 28 and in the middle of a year’s course at college doing Pre-Blended Aromatherapy. I was in a marriage that I was no longer fulfilled in and I will try my absolute best to describe my mental state. The grey clouds were in the distance, I could see the storm heading towards me, somehow the air felt like it had changed and everything had the feeling of being different but I couldn’t put my finger on what it was. I told my friend at college “I don’t feel like myself but I can’t explain it.” I remember specifically saying those words to her. A sense of dread washed over me each day coupled by the strangest feeling of almost mini power surges in my legs, the blood pumping violently and making my muscles visibly twitch. It scared the life out of me, how was I not in control of my own body? I was watching my legs with no control, almost like they belonged to someone else. That’s the bit that got to me the most, the lack of control of myself. If my brain could do this and I had no say in it, what else could it do? I was petrified. My husband was a gentle soul but didn’t know how to comfort me and my parents fall into the category of “we know about mental health but we don’t really understand it.” In their wisdom they told me not to go to the doctors as they were worried about me ending up on tablets. They meant well but this unknown world meant I was left to suffer for 9 months, every single day I would wake up with a heavy heart, full of dread and scared that the sensation in my legs would start again and that ultimately - I was going mad.

Ironically, it was during this time that I started this blog. I needed something to sink my teeth into, something I could work on in the quiet hours through the night and focus my attention away from the way I was feeling. I joined the gym and went religiously every morning and finally somewhere around the 9 month mark it lifted and I realised the dread was less frequent and my legs were mine again. It was that strange calm after a storm, what the heck was that? I had no idea. It was a good year or so later that something sparked my interest as I was reading and after a few google searches I had symptoms of anxiety and depression, the mini power surges were anxiety tremors - my body’s way of acting out the fight or flight method and building adrenaline for an invisible war.

Let’s fast forward to 2016, my marriage has ended and I’m in a new relationship. We spoke about what had previously happened to me and he promised me faithly that he would do anything in his power for me to not go through it again, I remember the whole conversation and him saying it.

I also remember a whole conversation at the beginning where he told me how interested he was in NLP. I had no idea what it was so I’ll give you the google definition.

NLP stands for Neuro-Linguistic Programming. Neuro refers to your neurology; Linguistic refers to language; programming refers to how that neural language functions. In other words, learning NLP is like learning the language of your own mind! Let's make this simpler with an example.

To me, NLP was mind control, or so I joked. I asked him if he could read my mind or change my thoughts and he said “everyone manipulates Karen. Babies manipulate, they cry to get attention.”

Ten years older than me he was strong, mature, confident and a gentleman - I believed him. He came into my life and swept me off my feet. He was passionate, romantic, thoughtful. I couldn’t believe he was single! My luck was in to have the love of this incredible human being! I would constantly say to him “how are you even single?! He would shrug and reply “I’m just me.” Knowing I had somewhat of a following on social media he was keen to remind me constantly that everyone in the town he lived in knew him, it was a strange thing he kept saying to me. He couldn’t do enough for me, he went above and beyond to impress me and within 5 months I had moved the 200 miles to be with him leaving all of my friends, family and my business behind.

In April 2018 I earned an all expenses paid cruise with my Scentsy business. I would say our relationship was perfectly fine at this point, from my perspective. I was very happy and proud to be with him. Whilst on board we went into a jewellery shop with my friend and her husband. Her and I did the girly thing of looking at rings and I found this beautiful diamond ring. He came over, puffed his chest out and said to me “is that the ring you want?” I was under no illusion, he was in the midst of a long divorce but he told me he would buy me the £1500 ring to show me “his commitment to me.” Trust me when I say these words were to swirl around my head for the rest of 2018 like dark black clouds.

By July 2018 however everything had dramatically changed. He went from my biggest protector to my harshest critic. He was constantly enraged, flying down the motorway in the fast lane at over 100MPH because he was angry, me crying and pleading for him to slow down with my parents on FaceTime also begging him. He assassinated my character telling I wasn’t good at so many different things, every time he did it I tried my best not to react but in time I realised that this meant his comments were relentless as he wasn’t getting the reactions he wanted from me. Whatever I did wasn’t good enough, I’d cook the tea and he told me I should be doing the dishes as well. I wanted to make him happy so I started doing the dishes as soon as dinner was eaten but then I was told I was “doing the dishes too fast,” I couldn’t win. I walked on eggshells constantly, the mask of his public image was incredibly different to the person I lived with. I watched as he manipulated every situation to his advantage, whether it be his son, his job or gain popularity for potential customers for his other business. For my own survival I needed to be silent but this came as the highest cost - my mental health.

His public persona was a caricature of the real him. If he wanted people to think of him as a certain way I would watch him morph into whatever character was required. In time I had realised this was exactly what he had done to me, he realised the type of partner I was looking for and he simply became it to lure me in. The only issue with becoming something you’re not is that eventually the cracks have to show and the ugly truth will be revealed.

At the end of August 2018 we returned from holiday with his son to which he caused an almighty argument. I had my suspicions and a positive test confirmed that I was pregnant for the second time following a silent miscarriage in 2017. Despite everything, our sex life was extremely healthy so this baby certainly wasn’t a shock. When I say healthy I’m talking most days and often multiple times a day. At this point in the relationship he acted like he hated me but to mentally torture me he would constantly seek intimacy from me. Of course, all I wanted was things to be good between us so I was happy to accept every tiny bit of affection that was kicked my way. It was only 6 months later I was to learn that emotionally abusive partners do this as a method of control. They enjoy punishing you, treating you poorly but that they can click their fingers and still be intimate with you when they choose. It’s a cruel, twisted game and classic narcissistic behaviour.

Another thing that was becoming more frequent was me “forgetting” that he had told me about an extra shift in work, a training event or an appointment he had to attend. Once maybe, I’ll admit I haven’t got the absolute best memory but when it started happening over and again I started to realise that he had no proof he ever told me at all but he was insinuating I was losing the plot. I started keeping a diary of everything he told me he was doing of course, these ‘magic events’ I would forget were still happening.

September 2018 was when my mental health finally started to break me. He was happily taking my life savings to pay his legal fees for his divorce. I loved him, what was mine was his and we were going to have a baby together. He even referred to me as “wifey” that month. He told me after I paid that last payment and my account was now empty that he had already decided to end our relationship beforehand.

So many days are etched in my mind of what he did, we went to the midwife and he humiliated me to her. I sat staring at the floor in her office, willing myself not to cry. On numerous occasions throughout September 2018 he would come home from work and announce he “couldn’t do this anymore.” It became a regular pattern. We would talk, I would tell him what else I would do to make him happy, he would agree and then he would initiate sex with me. I had become completely submissive to him.

One week in mid September 2018 he did the “I can’t do this anymore” routine but then decided he was fine again, pulling me in for cuddle in bed and then having sex with me. Again the following morning he initiated sex again, we went for a scan and found out our baby had a heartbeat. I cried a thousand tears, our first baby I had been told at the 12 week scan those words no one wants to hear, “I’m sorry Karen but there is no heartbeat.” That night however he went back to saying he needed space and left for a few hours. The following day he came home from work and announced once again he “couldn’t do it anymore” and that he needed to get away, he packed a carrier bag and left. These last three incidents are three consecutive days, the final one involving me being home alone all night and totally inconsolable.

That night the tremors had gotten completely out of control. If I was to rate what they were like in 2013/2014 out of ten I would have given them a five, they were scary but this time around they were completely off the scale. I couldn’t eat, I would rock back and forth, crying that I couldn’t feed the baby growing instead me. I didn’t have morning sickness, I just physically couldn’t hold food down when my anxiety peaked. Eventually I did all I could think of in the early hours of the morning with all of my family 200 miles away, I phoned the Samaritans. I’ll never forget that man on the line for the rest of my life - wow I’m actually welling up all this time later just thinking of him. He calmed me down, he listened and I felt that he really cared about me. He could only really listen, he had no answers but he did something invaluable to me, he calmed my tremors down enough for me to be able to eat after a complete 24 hours with nothing but water. As for him, he didn’t contact me at all through the night to check on his pregnant girlfriend. I “slept” on the sofa on tenderhooks, waiting to hear the key in the door through the night that didn’t come.

Questions swirled around in my head constantly, why do I deserve this? What have I done? I’ve given this man nothing but love, been his biggest supporter, became a step mum to his son and he is treating me like I am the worst human on earth. I felt worthless.

The next day, at 9.30am he phones me. I had developed a monotone voice, no matter what he said I was void of emotion, my sparkle had gone. I hated who I had become, I didn’t recognise myself at all. I was greeted with the happiest voice telling me all about the “boys night out” he had been on, how there had been a pub brawl and the police had been called and how he was taking advantage of being in another area and popping by a local business meeting there. In the back of my mind I was upset that I had had such an awful night, struggling to feed myself whilst he had gone out drinking with friends but I was so numb to his treatment of me, I said nothing.

My life had become totally unreal, a mix of guessing and predictions that I was never really going to get right. The goal posts were moved constantly so I could never, ever catch up. He didn’t speak to me that weekend either whilst I was at a Scentsy event in Manchester because in my haste leaving that morning, I had forgotten to put the food recycling bag outside. To him, I deserved silence for the entire weekend as the bag had been knotted but left by the sink only he didn’t tell me why he was punishing me until after the weekend was over. I was so distraught that on my four hour drive up to Manchester I diverted to my parents in a desperate attempt to seek respite from my circumstances. My devastated parents pleaded for me to eat, worried of the effects on me and my baby but I struggled to choke anything down as I sat crying and shaking. Things were so severe that by the time it came to me needing to leave for the hotel, Mum had to come and stay in my hotel with me in Manchester as the tremors had gotten so violent that I couldn’t calm myself down. I was hysterical, I thought he loved me, what did I do to deserve this? I drove home after that weekend with the anxiety tremors in my legs so severe I’m not sure how I worked the pedals of the car. I was greeted with silence from him but a big cuddle from his son. Pregnant and having already miscarried he didn’t care as he left me to drag my little suitcase and bags of Scentsy goodies into the house myself. Eventually after a few hours of that he cracked a smile and opened his arms for a hug, I cried, I was so grateful that he was being nice to me.

Throughout September I was surviving on as little at an hours sleep a night. The air in our home felt like it was filled with something poisonous. He started strangely putting his phone on flight mode at night, he disabled his Facebook profile and I found out he had made a new one which he denied. I only knew this as I was the admin on his Facebook customer group and he invited this profile into his group from his main profile! He would constantly disappear on me and meanwhile, my monotone voice never changed. I was unrecognisable, people who saw me during this time said that they knew something wasn’t right with me but they didn’t want to say. I helped out at his work and he would be snarky with me and then turn to his customers perfectly normal and loving to me in front of them, I sat dumbfounded watching how quick he was able to flip his persona.

I knew I had to be careful around him as whilst he had never been physically violent to me as yet, there was an incident where he insisted I did as he said and picked up something outside of the house. I refused to be spoken to the way he did and walked in the house. Infuriated he grabbed me and dragged me outside, ripping my boot and snapping the strap of my handbag. He would also lock me out of the house and one time he drove off and left me in the city centre. When you’re not from the area and with limited battery life, I was left trying to google where and what transform I could get back to our tiny village, too embarrassed that he would treat me this way. I actually got my mum on FaceTime when I knocked at the door to witness anything, frightened he would do something on my arrival, I knew he wouldn’t dare do it around anyone else.

Somewhere during this time my parents had a conversation with him by phone that prompted my mum to ask if he was cheating on me. He hit the roof but she justified her question that he was constantly disappearing, he was hiding his phone, he made another Facebook profile and things weren’t adding up. He was furious at the suggestion so of course, I felt the wrath of her question later on that evening.

I was convinced at this point he was having some sort of a breakdown and that I needed to be the strong one and get through it. I’d wake up in the night to turn over and he was awake, lying on his back with his eyes eerily wide open and staring at the ceiling. He had said a few extremely disturbing phrases to me such as “I can see model buildings and they’ve all been destroyed” and the other one he said to me more often was “I feel like I’m on a merry go round and I can’t get off.” I needed to be there for him, let him do whatever he needed to do as he clearly loved me otherwise he wouldn’t be having sex with me, would he? He wouldn’t have bought me that fairly expensive engagement ring four months ago? He wouldn’t be giving me the occasional cuddle surely? The odd affectionate moment? He was in there somewhere and I was going to be there for him and we would be stronger than ever. I even called the charity MIND convinced that the bizarre phrases he had said to me could mean he was in danger.

My mum speaks often about the time during this month that I had driven up to theirs on my regular fortnightly trip. At this point I had become wise to his erratic behaviour and I needed witnesses so his calls were all on loud speaker. I sat in their living room with him frantic on the other end of the phone. He was talking to me totally irrationally, shouting at me that he had had to clean the entire kitchen because there were flies in it. He was shouting down the phone about the kitchen and the flies, repeating himself constantly. Mum says that if she didn’t hear that unreal conversation herself she would think I was making it up. This was another example of me thinking he was having a breakdown and I needed to support him so I sat calmly and listened. The following day I mentioned the flies and he said he didn’t remember the conversation.

Then came the trip Majorca that he went on with work which I was told partners weren’t allowed. Another reason to hate me was one of our four bedrooms had a stack of miscellaneous items in it because he refused to use the loft space. The majority of the boxes were mine and he told me he couldn’t even think about our baby until I sorted them. A shadow of my former self I agreed that I would do whatever it took to make him happy with our pregnancy so whilst he was away, I started moving suitcases, portable radiators, clothes from early morning until midnight for those five days he was gone. The most painful part was that he didn’t contact me once after the initial “we’ve arrived” message that Friday. What did I do to deserve to be despised this much? He had sex with me twice the night he left for the airport but he was happy to leave me home alone and pregnant with his child without as much as a courtesy call from Majorca? I say Majorca, a fortnight later I found a bus time table in his pocket from Benidorm and a receipt from Alicante airport, another lie I’ll never have an explanation for.

I remember the tremors had reached a whole new height the night of his return. I had pre arranged to go to Nandos with my friend there and I spent the entire meal sobbing my heart out, she had work in the morning but I didn’t want to be left on my own. I was crying on FaceTime to my parents “what if the room isn’t tidy enough for him? What if he’s still not happy with it?” Looking back now I hate the woman I had become, I was frightened of the man I was suppose to love. My parents looked at me dumbfounded and completely helpless. My dad is a man of few words but he said “Never mind if the room isn’t tidy enough!” When he arrived back in the early hours of the morning the first thing he did was go to the bedroom and turn the light on. “That’s better” he said flippantly and walked out again. This was a game to him, he had gotten me so worked up that he couldn’t acknowledge our baby and when I had pushed myself to my limit to make him happy he just pretended suddenly it was no big deal. Mind games, constantly to try and break me although the truth was I was already broken.

It was late on the following day that the bleeding started and I knew right there and then, our baby was dead. I had moved ten bin bags on my own whilst he lay in bed that morning. Some of them were so heavy that I could only roll them across the floor and lift them only when I had to do get over a door frame etc. I might as well have laid with them for the bin men to collect as that’s how much care he had for me. In a bizarre twist he told his customers he was surprising me and taking me out of a meal that evening, we walked hand in hand into the pub. The following morning the bleeding gradually got heavier. He whispered in my ear that I was beautiful and amazing, I will never forget that. It was another example as to how he intended to destroy me with his mental torture. I lay on my side with his words swirling around, my life has become a sick joke.

The bleeding got progressively heavier until Saturday 6th October 2018 I lost our baby in the toilets of A&E. We had been there for hours waiting for the triage nurse to call my name. I was pacing back and forth as the pain quickly escalated. I had strong painkillers in my bag from the missed miscarriage but I refused to take any in the slightest chance that our baby was still alive. Eventually whilst waiting for a porter to finally take me up to gynaecology, it happened right there in the waiting room toilets. The pain was so severe that my legs and heads went completely dead, I’ve never felt anything like it. If my mental health hadn’t suffered enough, it was about to get a whole lot worse.

Returning from the hospital, I FaceTimed my mum to let her know our news. He sat next to me on the sofa talking normally and then suddenly jumped up and said he had left something at work 15 mins away. Mum watched him kiss me on the lips on FaceTime as he left. Two hours later he returned with the grey drawn expression I had seen many times before from previous weeks but what he said next nearly floored me. “Everyone’s going to think I’m an arsehole but it’s over.” I think it was that moment that my soul left my body and I almost felt like I was looking down at myself and this conversation. “Sorry?” I stuttered. He repeated it. Words came out of my mouth that I had no control over “But you’re a gentlemen? This isn’t you. But you love me? But....?” The person he had gone to see, clearly also void of a moral compass, had helped him reach this decision telling him “well there’s never a good time to end things” (he told me this himself) - today of all days. He continued to tell me he would be staying away for the weekend and then he ‘would sort it from there.’ We have now been home three hours from the most traumatic experience of my life, my relationship is over and I’m hated this much that I don’t even deserve to be looked after for the evening. I didn’t know what to do, my fight had left many months previous. I got my phone out and called my parents. Worried for me they begged him not to leave, concerned I could haemorrhage. Begrudgingly he eventually agreed but an episode an hour or so later had me insisting he went. He had been sat on the sofa next to me in silence. I was clearly devastated, in this surreal moment of my life so I couldn’t believe it when he complained to me that he could feel me shaking on the other end of the sofa, as usual I said nothing. I knew very well I wouldn’t be allowed to cry, he didn’t deal with criers. If I’d ever cried previously he told me he wouldn’t listen to me until I stopped as it was emotional blackmail. We sat there for a while when he suddenly shot up to his feet and started pacing the floor. He went from the corner of the living room, into the hall way, up the stairs and back again whilst chanting constantly “I feel like a caged animal, I feel like a caged animal!” with his hands punching the air. I sat on the sofa in silence, clutching my phone. I was petrified of him and what he was capable of. The scariest part of it was I had made a decision that if he headed into the kitchen I was going to ring the police. To me he had completely lost his mind at this point and was capable of stabbing me, every last scrap of energy I had left was going to make sure that didn’t happen. After probably 20 to 30 times of him pacing the floor and chanting this phrase I convinced him to leave. As he left, I tried to hug him. I realise I’m an idiot but I loved him, I was sure by his behaviour that he was mentally ill. He batted my hands away, he wanted nothing to do with me. I deserved this. I was scum. I was worthless.

Early the next day I decided to speak to his “auntie.” She was a family friend really as neither of his parents spoke to him. I had asked her if I could speak to her in confidence and she said yes. I called her and told her what had been going on and she said it definitely sounded like a breakdown and she would try and get him to her house that day and get to the bottom of it. In sheer desperation I then visited the out of hours service in the local hospital and begged them to give me something to calm me down. I was frantic and lost, I hadn’t slept, I still remember all of those feelings that this absolutely couldn’t be real, could it? No one does this to another human do they? The long and short of it was she gave me a few Diazepam which when I later looked at the dosage, was less than half the required dosage for anxiety. He returned that evening and I took the Diazepam as soon as I saw his headlights. They had absolutely no effect on me what so ever, I was devastated. I had managed to contact his “auntie” after he left hers but before he had arrived back. I knew instantly she had been conned by him as she told me he seems absolutely fine and he’s just not happy with me. I was later to find out he had been so convincing she actually went against her own promise and not only telling him I had been in contact but showing him ever text message I had sent. She clearly was totally oblivious of the danger she had put me in by doing so but, he was so convincing so could I really blame her? I had downloaded the Headspace app which I tried to listen to with headphones whilst he slept in his son’s bed. My anxiety was through the roof to the point where I was silently rocking and crying in our bedroom. I wasn’t allowed to cry, I couldn’t let him hear me. I couldn’t concentrate on the app, I couldn’t even sit still. I was absolutely inconsolable.

I got out of bed at 6am. I noticed that he had left the door to the room he was in half open which was strange. I showered and washed my hair. As I dried it, he walked in and said to me “aren’t you going to talk to me? I left the door open for you” in a friendly voice. Mind games. He was a master manipulator, trying to make me question my own sanity. If I had of gone in he wouldn’t have wanted me there but because I didn’t try he couldn’t have fun with my emotions and reject me. The reason I had gotten ready so early we because I then headed directly to the doctors for an emergency appointment whether he gave me Sertraline, an anti depressant but this was to manage my anxiety and the correct dose of Diazepam if I needed it. The above image was exactly what the doctor said to me, he told me it sounded like my partner was the one that really needed to come and see him but I needed to remember to put my own oxygen mask on first, something I had refused to do.

It was later that day that he was to continue the most confusing, incomprehensible mental torture. “I’ll be honest, I’m in two minds whether to end it,” he said “I’m 50/50.” I sat on the edge of our sofa with my usual emotionless face with him on dining chair opposite me. I asked him what the pros and cons were and if I couldn’t be more dumbfounded, I was about to be. “Well pros are that I love you, we have lovely memories together and I miss you when you aren’t around” so then I asked for the cons to which he replied is the most bizarre fashion sporting a slight smirk, “that’s what I’m trying to figure out.” We went for the scan to confirm our loss. With tears streaming down my face, the sonographer seemed to take ages checking me. He sat beside me watching me cry and refused to hold my hand or offer any comfort to me. If I reached out to hold his hand he shook it so I couldn’t. What had I done wrong to deserve this? I was so deep into this and I couldn’t even begin to comprehend the cruelty he was showing me.

That night, two days after the loss I begged him for a trial separation. I felt that something was going on in his mind and that if I was away he would be able to seek help. He helped load my car with some items to get me through the next few weeks as I didn’t know when I would be back. I found it strange that although I was bringing my cat Poppy with me, he insisted I brought every scrap of her, her toys, her food, everything with me like she wasn’t going to be returning but as with everything, I went along with it. I was to later find out he was livid I brought Poppy with me but I was expecting to be gone a few weeks and with his erratic behaviour I didn’t feel she was safe there. I also brought the ashes of my boy Henry with me which was a last minute decision and thankfully I did or he too would have been dumped into the storage unit.

Petrified I would be caught, I whispered to his son early the following morning that I wasn’t sure when I would be back, it was a gut feeling I had. I will not publish what he said about his own father but he knew something wasn’t right with him. Before he left for school he gave me two friendship bracelets in pink and purple “I thought you’d like the colours” he said “and I’ve got some too so we can match.” It broke my heart to watch him cuddle Poppy for what was to be, the last time. He loved her and they would sit and play with his cars. His dad also cuddled Poppy but when it came to the very last moment for him to say goodbye, he turned and patted me on the head. It beggars belief. In hindsight I wish I had hidden cameras because I realise that this story is already shocking and virtually unbelievable but I wanted to give you the full background as to where my issues stem from.

Three days after the pregnancy loss I was now driving up north to my parents, little did I know for sure, permanently. I can’t even put into words what it’s like to drive away from a home I had created and built up with him for two years, unknowing that his plan to ensure I was to never ever be able to return it or claim all of my belongings.

I arrived back up north early afternoon Tuesday 9th October and instantly a sense of relief hit me. I was with people that truly cared for me, I can’t tell you how valuable that feeling was. This was a feeling I hadn’t felt in a long time and the first night I was there I slept for 9 hours straight. Of course I had friends but they all had lives of their own. I had spent days and nights alone hoping that he would suddenly see that he was destroying me and care but he was about to take it a whole step further. The man who promised he would never let my anxiety return, was about to take this to a whole new level that I could have never foreseen.

He called me that weekend and I briefly got to say hello to his son to whom he promised could call me the following day. He never did, his son told me later he had asked to call me but was told “No because Karen’s in a bad mood.”

His son called me in secret early on the Monday morning and what he was to say was to shake me to my core. The first thing he said was “you know what Dad’s been doing, don’t you?” My anxiety started to build, I braced myself, I had been gone less than a week. “He’s taken your stuff, put it in boxes and then we have spent all weekend going back and forth in the car to a Storage Unit.” He then goes on to apologise to me that he’s had to be the one to tell me, he was only 11 years old after all and that he loved me. I couldn’t believe that at his age he knew how very wrong what his dad was doing and was willing to go against his own father to let me know what was happening in our home. He also told me his dad had changed the locks, he has asked why and he was told the lock was rusty but told me “Karen I saw that lock and it wasn’t rusty!” Since the Tuesday I left he would message me telling me he loved me and that he missed me, it broke my heart what he was being put through. I spoke to his dad straight after, he said nothing had been moved from the house. I didn’t say I had been told but I even asked him if he had moved any of my things and he snapped at me sarcastically “nothings been moved Karen? Why would you think that?”

Weeks passed and I struggled so hard. My tremors were unbearable, I willed time to pass, I cried so hard I would throw up. I felt like I had lost everything, my partner, my step son, my home and I had already decided that there was no way possible I would be able to continue my Scentsy business. Sometimes I’d sleep a lot, others I was up all night alone. I reverted back to being a child, knocking on my parents bedroom door at 6am because I couldn’t bear being alone with my own thoughts and flashbacks any longer. I would go over so many things in my mind, he bought me an engagement ring months previously to show his commitment? He told me he loved me and he missed me when I wasn’t around? He said I was beautiful and amazing to only a few weeks ago, how could this all change?

Fast forward a fortnight, we are now three weeks from me leaving our home and he finally tells me our relationship is over. He gave me four reasons for ending the relationship.

1) I told his “auntie” I was worried about him.

2) I had too many shoes, clothes and Scentsy.

3) I wasted too much food, making reference to a broccoli he had thrown out.

4) We spent all of his money, no mention of my 5k of course that paid his divorce.

Believe it or not, I actually have his phone calls recorded so this isn’t from memory, this is fact.

He finally tells me that all of my “shit” is in a storage unit, telling me he had paid for 6 months up front. He also took this opportunity to say “you think I need help? It’s YOU that needs help! Everyone’s thinking it but they don’t want to say!” After this conversation I had an extremely serious talk with my parents. I asked them if there was something wrong with me that perhaps I couldn’t see, I knew they’d tell me the truth. “Karen it’s him, not you. He’s mad.”

“Does he want me to kill myself? Is that what it is?” I asked my parents. Mum looked at me sadly and said “yes I think that would make him happy.” They were devastated, they couldn’t sleep for worrying about me but also dealing with their own pain. This man had been welcomed into their home on a fortnightly basis when he returned to theirs with me. Mum came into my room one day and said to me “we let him into our home. He fed him and gave him anything he wanted and this is how he treats us” I saw the hurt in her eyes as she said it.

As for the engagement ring that I had soothed myself for three weeks with, convinced that he wouldn’t have bought it if he didn’t see a future. I had left it in the house with him still in it’s box the day I left. I was on FaceTime to my friend a few days later. This was who was with me the day he bought it and she was able to add another piece to the puzzle. She told me after he had bought it, her and her husband had asked if he planned to propose on the trip. He laughed and spat “No, I only bought it for her to shut her up.”

My parents continued to liaise with him on my behalf regarding my belongings and outstanding money he owed which he promised faithfully he would pay when his divorced was finalised. During one conversation I was in my bedroom and all I heard my mum say was “that would be cruel” and I jumped to my feet and went into the living room. “I knew you’d be there” he snarled on loudspeaker. So far I hadn’t spoken to him at all apart from the nasty hour and a half long phone-call where he told me his four epic reasons to end our relationship. Not once had I ever gotten the courage or strength to say anything of what I thought of him but this was my one and only chance. “I was in my bedroom actually and I heard mum say ‘that would be cruel’ and knew instantly she was talking to you because you’re the cruellest man I’ve ever met.” I walked away. I later found out that he had threatened to remove my phone number from his son’s phone and that’s why mum had given the response she had. Not once, in person or any phone call or message to me or at all to my parents did he ever ask if I was okay after losing our baby, not a single time.

His son continued to call me, the conversations of what was happening at home will remain private for the most part but at this point I was trying to battle to keep myself going each day and also appear to be upbeat so as to not effect him but inside I was dying. I was concerned for his boy. He would tell me Dad spends all his time in his room on his phone and he would hear him saying things like “this house is a mess and my life is a mess.” Using his own son as a weapon, he would tell him bits of information such as he had changed the locks to the storage unit so I couldn’t access it and a week after he ‘officially’ ended it he was looking for a new girlfriend and had already been on 6 dates with the same woman. “Karen! I can get you into the storage unit, if you come down here you can pick me up, I know the codes and I’ll get you in to get your stuff!” I meant so much to this child he was willing to be punished by his father for me. His son eventually was asking his mum for a second mobile phone to call me from as his Dad had lead him to believe all of his calls were being listened to, another unbelievable tactic to cut his ties from me.

“He’s trying to get to you” my friends and family would say, “don’t let him.” All I could keep asking was “Why? What did I do? Why has he got such a vendetta against me?” Nobody could answer me. The weeks to follow carried on horrendously. His son wanted to keep in touch with me telling me “he’d never forget me” but his Dad was determined to put an end to it. He called my parents and told them that his son’s mother was getting a restraining order against me contacting him. I wasn’t contacting him at all, his son was calling and texting me (as shown above.). I called his ex wife up immediately for clarification. She told me “Karen, he’s a liar and a narcissistic. He believes his own lies. My son sees you as his step mum and for as long as he wants to talk to you, he can. Honestly, I was left scratching my head at the end of our marriage as I couldn’t work out what the hell had gone on.” She had voiced exactly what I was going through and I firmly believe he has done this many times previously and will continue to do so. All of his exes were crazy and he had been engaged five times, two facts I knew from the start but just dismissed them that he had just had bad luck. He also told me from the start he had punched a ex-girlfriend in the face so I knew he was capable of domestic violence. Of course now I know the common denominator in his previous relationships were all him, many of the women were not local to him so there was no chance of the truth of what he did getting out either which I think is a very clever tactic.

One day he called my parents up and told them that I had been lying to them. I was devastated. They never asked him what I was apparently lying about, they couldn’t stand him needless to say but we worked out between us this was another grenade he was throwing to try and destroy me. If he could plant a seed of doubt about my integrity to those closest to me then I could lose even more of my support network. I was later to find out that many of the ‘customers’ that I knew through the company he worked for were warned not to speak to me with an equally as clever grenadine. “Karen’s been speaking about the brand on social media, they’re taking her to court so as you’re a customer you’re best not to speak to her as it will get her into more trouble.” I actually had some unfriend me on Facebook, can you imagine how upsetting that was? I’ve lost yet another baby, I have done nothing wrong but love this man until he decided he didn’t want me and not only that, he wanted to destroy me! It broke my heart. I would never believe he was capable of this level of evil until I witnessed it myself so I had to comfort myself that he was so convincing that neither me or any of my family, friends or followers could see what was coming and therefore I couldn’t really blame any of these people falling for his lies either. Chillingly the week I left on “a break” he told one of his customers that he had been doing some ‘spring cleaning,’ literally his words. Of course what he really meant was he was giving himself three weeks to look through all of my personal belongings and decide what he wanted to keep and everything else got dumped in the storage unit before finally telling me it was over.

It was the around this time that I started to try and rebuild, determined that this would not effect me long term. I’ll not lie to you, it was so difficult. Friends would tell me “Karen if I had been through what you have, I’d have been sectioned.” I considered myself lucky that I hadn’t reached that point but I needed to find my self-worth so despite some thinking it was too soon, I got myself onto a dating website. I’ll not lie, I had a hoot and whilst that mightn’t be something many would be ready for, it showed me that I was very much desirable and was a good distraction for me. I found myself in some hilarious situations that I have been so tempted to blog about but in time it flagged up other issues.

I also gained my determination to re-launch my Scentsy business now I was back up north, I had kept it going and muddled through helping my team but mentally I wasn’t there. It’s only been this last few months that I’ve found enough strength to actually start talking to people again and next month I have booked my very first event again. My business had been a sore subject in our relationship. I had launched it back in December 2016 and it was virtually an instant success, something he was incredibly bitter about as his two year old business had barely made it off ground level but we were a team, it was never a competition and I would constantly tell him that.

I met someone I was really fond of, the comparison of him to my ex was night and day. As time passed though I realised that I hadn’t gone through this ordeal unscathed. If he didn’t message me after a few hours, my anxiety kicked in, the tremors were back only this time they were coupled with spiralling thoughts. “He doesn’t want you, he’s gone off you, get the hint.” Spiralling thoughts plagued me. I would be crying on the phone to my friend. That feeling of being abandoned remained with me and every time he finally messaged me back, I would calm down until the next time. It was a vicious circle, I was angry, I wanted to walk away from the part of my life without a bruise but it seemed they were there underneath the surface. Eventually on Valentine’s Day 2019 I called the doctor and got the wheels in motion for cognitive behavioural therapy and counselling funded through a local charity.

CBT was assessed in a mental health unit. I’ll admit that I was a little freaked out going there, it’s not the sort of place I would have ever thought I would be visiting but the psychologist I saw was amazing. I was given the option of online CBT or a classroom version once a week.

I opted for an 8 week online course via a website called Silvercloud. I have access to that website unlimited for a year should I want to go back over any of it or listen to the meditations again. Alongside that is a personal “supporter” who checks your progress and assists you. I definitely took a lot from this course, over time the combination of it with counselling allowed me try to stop the spiralling thoughts. It taught me how to recognise the feeling or emotion and let it pass me by. I also think that I can reason with myself more because I know deep down if he hasn’t messaged me for example, he’s working.

The counselling I had was a ten week course. My counsellor was brilliant and whilst we spoke intitially about my ex, the conversation generally stayed around the new relationship. Ultimately that is my future and I needed to make sure that the damage I had developed was not long lasting. Over the course I noticed a change in my thought process and since I did both forms of therapy at the same time I can’t really pinpoint whether it was one, the other or the combination of both. The woman who walked into that first session was very different than the woman who emerged around session 7 and my counsellor told me that she could see the improvement as well. She went from constantly falling into a black hole of self doubt, feeling that she could be abandoned at any moment and helpless back to the Karen she had always been for a while, outgoing, standing up for what she believed in and loving without limitations.

There’s been bumps in the road during the time period of my therapy. My parents went to the storage unit once my Dad had retired and cleared it for me, something I physically didn’t believe I was strong enough to do. The sheer thought of being down there with him knowing where I was brought my anxiety back in awful waves. My parents had checked with him that all of the items I had brought from my house down there to him were in the unit “yep they are” came the reply. My exhausted parents returned and we were mid opening the mess of the boxes they had brought back when I had someone message me to tell me he had started selling my belongings on Facebook. I already knew at this point that the crystal bedside lamps I had bought long before we met he hadn’t given me back but it was difficult to see what else was missing in the chaos. I had only one option and not knowing what else he’d kept planning to make a profit from me, shaking I called the police. The police were fantastic as I explained what had been done to me and he liased directly with him to return the items he had tried to sell along with my crystal lamps, my lovely friends down there collected them on my behalf. I was also forced to sign an agreement that I would now not claim anything else from the property which I did. Two days later we finally finally opening the boxes, where was this? Where was that? Where was £1200 worth of my Scentsy display products? He had kept the lot. “Let him have them” I told my family, I will rebuild my life and he will always end up with nothing. I knew in my heart that I was at breaking point though, I had to keep myself together somehow.

I got my hair done a week or two later and that’s when my friend and hairdresser found a bald patch in the back of my head. It was that that got me, my body now officially displaying the distress I was in and if I wasn’t careful, it would get worse. The above photo is the patch and 6 weeks later, thankfully this warning sign I really listened to and tried to allow everything he was still doing 8 months on to wash over me.

“Toughen up buttercup, you can do this” I thought as I went to Citizen’s Advice about the money he owed me including the £1800 bed I was still in paying that he’s still sleeping in. I’m going to gloss over this a little but basically I sent him a letter before court which he has the ordascity to come back with that he had now decided to charge me rent for our entire relationship, I was to pay for the broadband in the home, my own birthday presents he had given me, the storage unit he said he’d paid for and had dumped my entire life into and the thing that crippled me the most, I was to give him back the vet fees for putting our cat to sleep last year. I therefore apparently owed HIM £1800 but he was going to “let me off” with it. Dumbfounded isn’t the word. I said to my friends and family “I physically can’t do this anymore, I just can’t. I have no fight left. He is evil, he is a monster and I have no idea who I wanted children and spend the rest of my life with.” He never did give me the money he owes me despite promising my parents faithfully he would. It was his final knife in me but in fact, in the end it wasn’t me he stole from but the innocent people who couldn’t have been more welcoming to him.

As for me going forward, I want to tell you it’s all behind me, trust me I do. That’s not the case though. I have flashbacks of so many things, our time together, the false promises, things he said to me and things he did to me. All of the masks he would wear to transform himself into whatever he needs to be to the person he’s talking to. He’s a chameleon, shape shifting cleverly into whatever is required. I wanted a strong gentleman, he became it. It sickens me that I shared him all over my social media and that everyone who followed me on snapchat or in Facebook saw those masks too. I’ve been told since that people would wonder why I was with him, “he was punching” is a common phrase but I was in love and love is blind.

My advice to anyone who recognises any of the behaviours above is to get out, promptly. The night he ended the relationship haunts me because I honestly thought if he went into the kitchen he would be back to stab me. I feel lucky to be here.

The recovery from this has been slow, it’s been very difficult and I’m very much a changed person. The second photo in this photo I took a few days after I returned to my parents because I was convinced I had physically changed in appearance, he had broken my spirit completely. I’m wary now that people are not who they appear to be. I also struggle more in social situations and even meeting new customers I am often very nervous, I know in my heart I’m a shadow of the person I used to be.

I will repeat what my friends have told me time and time again:

He was a one off.

I will admit that my guilt for future victims weigh heavy on my heart, it plagues me that I am leaving this person to repeat this again and again and I am powerless to warn anyone. I know that he is with a woman at the moment and the fact that I am 100% certain she, like me, knows nothing of his past and that she will also end up being trampled by him. This whole situation will perpetuate time and time again and just like his ex wife did with me, I have to move on knowing that he will take what he wants and destroy over and over again. You might wonder why I care, I don’t know her after all. You’re right but I know the damage he has caused me and stranger or not, I would do anything to not know others will suffer the same fate.

I know very well that he’s painted me as a monster in his local area because I simply wasn’t there to set the record straight or defend myself. It was also to ensure that everyone took his side and didn’t speak to me to find out the truth of what he did. The worse part is many of the stories he told are complete fabrications. Whilst I will never see most of these people again, having my name tarnished like to cover his tracks has really hurt me.

I mightn’t have been the best girlfriend, I nagged when the toilet seat was up, when I had just tidied the hallway but the shoes were scattered everywhere, I probably didn’t cook the most excitingly complicated menu every night but the one thing I did do was to stay loyal and stood by someone when I thought they were having a breakdown even though it cost me my own mental health in the end. The flashbacks are most days. Too many things remind me of the cruelty he put on me. I was a toy to him and when my bank account was empty I was no longer of use. Sometimes I can sleep okay and others I will wake up with a jolt and have to do something to distract myself from my thoughts.

In July I requested to go back on the list for more counselling and I am still waiting for that.

I wrote my truth because I felt that my voice has been drowned by this man for over a year to hide what he did. I wrote this for every other person who has suffered similarly but didn’t have the platform I have to share it. I wrote it to remind others still suffering that they are not alone. I would never, ever want someone to stay with me in a relationship who didn’t want to be, I’m better than that. All I expected was to be treated as a human, respectful, with dignity and care and to highlight that mental abuse, narcissism and sociopaths are right amongst us. Remember, murders don’t look like murders either.

Today I grieve for the lost of the second baby. I feel like I grieve alone as it was made clear I was the only one that wanted it despite me not creating it alone. As it left my body I whispered “I’m sorry” as I knew I could have left it’s father and gotten us both to safety but instead, jaded by love I stayed at the detriment of it’s life. October is Pregnancy & Infant Loss Awareness months and a local group has added a ribbon for my two babies to the bandstand in the local park to remember them.

Always be kind as you have absolutely no idea what’s going on behind closed doors or the invisible struggles that they’re having.

NOTD: Pink & Grey Geo Nails

2019-07-24T15:34:00.001+01:00

So it all started with a photo which hilariously I saw on Facebook marketplace advertising the duvet cover for sale. I loved the combination of colours, textures and print and although I didn’t want exactly that, just something along those lines.

This was the photo I was talking about FYI! Pink and grey are such a gorgeous combination.

So let’s run down what’s on each nail:

Thumb: Brighter pink cured. Grey over the top, cured. Black lines, cured. I made a glitter paste with the white AB glitter and top coat and added over the pink, cured and top coat the rest.

Index finger: Light pink with white AB glitter over.

Middle finger: Grey.

Ring finger: Brighter pink with black freehand, cured. Glitter paste with white AB and silver pigment to fill in some triangles. Finished with a top coat.

Little finger: Steel shade with silver pigment over.

You know what? These are probably one of my favourite combinations I’ve worn myself. I love them!

NOTD: Juicy Watermelon Nails

2019-07-09T11:12:00.001+01:00

Don’t ask me why but I have been utterly obsessed with watermelon. I’m going to put it down to the change of weather and just the fact it’s so refreshing. Literally I’ve had watermelon lemonade, watermelon ice lollies so needless to say when it came to my nails it was a bit of a no-brainer that I had to do watermelons on those as well!

I’m going to do a quick step-by-step of how I did them.

I applied the red to all nails apart from the ring finger and finished with a matte top coat.
Then I used a sheer shade on my ring finger and cured.
I then took a bottle green shade, and painted a curve across my nail - do not cure.
I took a lighter green and painted another curve close to it - do not cure.
With the red from the other nails, I filled in the remaining blank space taking the colour as close to the lighter green as I could without touching it - do not cure.
Using a small nail art brush I made tiny strokes going from the lighter green to bottle green to slightly drag and blend the two - do not cure.
Wipe the brush and do the same from lighter green into the red slightly, when you’re happy with it, cure.
Repeat this applying the two green curves, filling in the red, with a freshly wiped brush merge the colours and cure.
A fine nail art brush was used for the black pips. After I cured it I then added the white for definition and cured.
Apple a matte top coat and cure.
I then used a dotting tool and the regular top coat to apply small dots onto my watermelon to make it juicy, cure and remove sticky layer from all nails.

NOTD: Cute Lil Hearts

2019-05-28T16:39:00.001+01:00

I say this time and time again but when I choose my nails they are totally based on my current mood. I took off my “almost bare” style nails and I was up for a little bit of something cute so after a lot of deliberation I decided on hearts, then it was time for colour choices!

I wanted a completely cream finish so that narrowed it down and it was time to sit and paint!

I debated arms for my little love hearts but I decided against it, little legs and feet were cute enough!

NOTD: Almost Bare Nails

2019-05-18T17:28:00.001+01:00

Having had my blue nails on for around a fortnight and the whole fiasco with suffering from serious princess problems and not enjoying the first design, it was time for a change.

I think having such a bold colour on for so long when I actually looked at my nails with nothing on them I really fancied going for something really sheer.

I love a bit of a science experiment so I chose six different glitters as I wanted green but with all the hints of shades like golds and silvers.

Finally I added random polka dots to jazz up my bare look and you know what? I’m enjoying these for now!

NOTD: The Recycled Nails

2019-05-09T16:25:00.001+01:00

I know that you all laughed at the meme that I put up the other day on Facebook about not liking the nails you’ve done for yourself. There is nothing more frustrating is there? Chances are if you’re a nail tech yourself it’s probably taken every ounce of strength to be bothered to do your own after doing hundreds of sets for other people.

Normally if I do my nails and I don’t like them I will just put up with them but probably take them off a little sooner than usual. There wasn’t anything actually wrong with the nails that I did a few days ago but I just wasn’t feeling them, you know? Sometimes it’s the colour, sometimes it’s the design or the combination of both but they were going to drive me crazy if I kept them on.

This time I decided I wasn’t going to do that and instead I would do a little “recycling.” I wanted to see how I could change them into something that would hit the spot rather than completely re-doing everything.

I removed the middle and ring finger and re-applied a silver glitter and painted almost a bubble effect on them in black. Voila!

Solid Cologne UK - For The Gentlemen

2019-04-29T20:25:00.002+01:00

If there’s one thing that you should know about me it is that I am absolutely fragrance obsessed! Ever since I was a toddler I would literally sit and sniff empty perfume bottles that my Nanna would save for me so when Marc from Solid Cologne got in touch offering for me to try one, I jumped at the chance!

Made with natural wax and skin friendly cologne which is applied directly on to the skin. Solid Cologne UK was created for those who travel, as it’s made from wax it doesn’t need to be put into a clear bag whilst going through airport security. This also means it’s impossible to spill and you won’t use as much as only a little wax will help you smell great all day. The cologne comes in a small tin, which fits perfectly inside a pocket or bag. All the colognes have the highest quality of natural ingredients including Beeswax, Shea butter & Jojoba oil. which all support and protect the skin.

The concentrated wax fragrances are portable, natural and moisturizing. It’s so easy to apply, handy and compact too.

With an option of four scents (more are available on their website) I chose Alexander as the description sounded divine!

A sweet, rich and sophisticated scent. The cologne begins with fresh grapefruit, leading to the heart of aromatic bay leaf and jasmine. The woody base includes patchouli, oak moss and ambergris. A truly unforgettable Cologne.

I was really surprised to find that it doesn’t leave a waxy later on my skin at all like I expected. The moment it’s applied it’s invisible which is great. The fragrance really packs a punch in the best way possible, when I wear fragrance I want to apply something that actually does smell to others as well. For a small tin I can imagine that I would get as many uses out of it as a standard smaller sized cologne bottle making it a fraction of the cost of and a lot more travel friendly. Longevity is actually pretty fantastic and I could still smell it hours after initial application.

Overall I couldn’t fault this product at all, the fragrance quality was spot on, the application was seriously impression absorbing instantly and I now think I’m converted to Solid Cologne!

NOTD: Super Girly Nails

2019-04-20T19:40:00.001+01:00

Ooooo get me blogging twice in one month! I’m on a roll!

It was time to switch up my Unintentional Nemo Nails since they’ve grown out to the point where as I was starting to feel a little scruffy. I have pretty high standards with my nails, I never go bare and if they start to get beyond around a fortnight’s growth I have to redo them ASAP.

I always ask myself if I’m feeling neutral, bright or dark and then i’ll brainstorm from there. As I had just had bright I surprised myself by wanting it again but I wanted to go super girly and a little romantic.

Everything’s pretty self explanatory but the heart, little gemstones on the lines and the thumbs were created by mixing three different pink / lavender glitters with top coat to create a glitter paste.

I’m fairly pleased with how they turned out. If I did them again I probably would have painted the heart in black and then added the glitter paste on top to give an even more beautiful sparkle but I’m happy how they are now too.

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Also I'm on Instagram! @liverpoollashes

NOTD: Unintentional Finding Nemo Nails

2019-04-07T15:15:00.001+01:00

Woooohooooo I’m back on my blog where I belong! After a 16 months away from it it feels sooooo good to be back here. You should notice I’m going to jazz this place up and make it look a little more snazzy for 2019 but the main thing is, I’m here!

Let’s be real, these nails were not what I intended. If you follow my Snapchat (@liverpoollashes) you’ll know what I was actually aiming for as I showed my distasterous results and the products just didn’t work together. In a little bit of a huff after the second attempt, I abandoned ship and did these instead.

I’ll quickly run through what I did:

Tropix Base.
Black Pool and a fine striping brush.
I mixed a glitter paste (top coat, silver holographic and silver fine powder) together and applied with my striping brush.
Top coat.

Taaaa daaaa! Here’s the result. Grrrrr I’m not enjoying that Tropix doesn’t really look like this in real life but never mind. I’m pretty pleased with it, albeit it wasn’t what I was originally going for at all. I then show a man, typical, most men think completely different to us don’t they? “They look like Finding Nemo nails?” Now all I can see is glittery clown fish.

Follow me on Facebook to keep up to date! click here
Also I'm on Instagram! @liverpoollashes

NOTD: New Year Nails

2018-01-03T11:36:00.001+00:00

I wanted my nails to be a little quirky for the new year, I’m not sure how long they’ll be on for but they hit the spot for the time being!

Unfortunately the Nail foils are from a company no longer trading but I’m sure you can find similar elsewhere.

Snapchat, Instagram, Twitter & Pinterest - search for 'liverpoollashes'

My facebook page is always updated latest information, tutorials and reviews - click here.

If you want to see more videos from me, my You Tube Channel is here.

CND Five Point Polish Method (for CND Shellac & Vinylux) - click here

To see more of My Work click here and my Nail Of The Day - click here

If you want to read my 'Focusing On' blog posts - click here

Want to see more using Lecente glitter? - click here

Order Scentsy from me - click here

Join my Scentsy team and become an Independent Consultant - click here

NOTD: Nude Shimmers

2017-12-10T17:25:00.001+00:00

I’m back! I told you on Facebook I took a little bit of an unplanned hiatus from mid October to now which I am sorry about but life happens, it’s definitely had its ups and downs but now I’m a Scentsy Director. Nails will always be my “thing” though, I’ll never give up talking about them and showing you fun things but I am more than nails and I want my blog and Facebook page to be about everything, my life and who I am. If you didn’t know, I do Daily vlogs on Snapchat - come see them @liverpoollashes !

Let’s start off with these nails, they’re nothing special to be fair but just a little shimmer (Lecente Neptune) over nude. I can’t even remember when I had these on now but there is more to come shortly so keep your eyes peeled on Snapchat and Facebook!

Snapchat, Instagram, Twitter & Pinterest - search for 'liverpoollashes'

My facebook page is always updated latest information, tutorials and reviews - click here.

If you want to see more videos from me, my You Tube Channel is here.

CND Five Point Polish Method (for CND Shellac & Vinylux) - click here

To see more of My Work click here and my Nail Of The Day - click here

If you want to read my 'Focusing On' blog posts - click here

Want to see more using Lecente glitter? - click here

Order Scentsy from me - click here

Join my Scentsy team and become an Independent Consultant - click here

Pregnancy and Infant Loss Rembrance Day 2017

2017-10-15T11:55:00.000+01:00

I'm not myself right now, I'm not the person I used to be. I'm someone I don't think I'd recognise if I was to compare me now to the me at the start of the year. If you haven't read my blog post - Our Silent Miscarriage and you think you'll be okay reading it I've linked it here. Today is pregnancy and infant loss rembrance day and I wanted to mark this day, to speak out for those who haven't found the words, just to tell you at least my thoughts and feelings since our loss.

It's weird to think that at the start of the year I didn't think I would ever be able to get pregnant. I was virtually allowing the year and then planning to head to the doctors to be poked and prodded. Somewhere, out of nowhere I found my period a week late in April, which had happened before but only this time I had a faint positive pregnancy test. I have a short video of clip of when the Clearblue Digital actually said "pregnant 1 - 2 weeks" on my phone, oh how I cried reading the words I thought I would never see. "This is it" I thought, "it's my finally my turn to become a mummy!"

Today I would have been 32 weeks and 1 day into my pregnancy but I am not. I see pregnant women due a similar time to me but I am not expecting a little bundle of joy in time for Christmas, I will not be in a mother role in 2017 and I am not part of the parent club. I'm sure those in my situation will know what the parent club is, it's the elite club that makes some say things like "you wouldn't know, you haven't got kids" like I'm some sort of an idiot. I'm not trying to be funny when I say that, nor am I lumping everyone into that category but but imagine how much that hurts, nobody knows another person's struggles unless they say.

The pain is overwhelming sometimes, I can't decide what hurts more. It stings when I think that I was unable to keep my tiny baby away from harm because yes, it was a baby to me. A piece of me breaks a little further when I realise that that life had so much potential but was snuffled out at the early stages. I try to not hold on to the fact my body had absolutely no clue Dot had died, I almost feel silly for carrying on for five weeks with a dead tiny fetus inside me. I know I had no signs, not even a speck of blood but that's the cruelty that silent miscarriages do to people.

I am trying to look to the future and to the positive, there is no reason why I won't be pregnant again. I am telling you now I will shout it from the rooftops, regardless of how frightened I will be. Whilst I am more than aware it's highly likely I can get pregnant again, that doesn't stop me wanting the baby I thought we were expecting. If Dot had survived I was due on the 16th December 2017. Rich and I are just getting back on our feet financially and life is starting to get easier as I get very close to becoming a director with Scentsy which could even happen by Dot's due date. My strong team of 35 consultants keep me busy and it's such a good thing, it's what I need and is constantly growing. I want to make Dot proud of me, does that sound silly? I will grow my business and I will take Dot's Daddy, Rich on the Scentsy incentive trip with me next year on an all expenses paid cruise around the Mediterranean. I will make sure that we have a comfortable life, I don't want to have to worry about not being able to provide for any of Dot's siblings that may come along.

Some days the pain is so intense, I feel like I'm alone in this. All of my friends have children and virtually all of my Scentsy team have children but I do not. Everywhere I look I see children and happy families but I am left outside of the gates of parenthood, just waiting for that moment that it's finally my turn but I just don't know when that will be. In my heart I failed at keeping Dot safe but I cannot let this completely break me.

CND Shellac Glacial Illusion and Trilogy Collection

2017-09-05T18:19:00.004+01:00

I can't decide what's more exciting, new colours or new finishes to create thousands of new combinations?! You can imagine how I felt when the new CND Glacial Illusion and Trilogy Top Coats parcel landed on my doorstep this morning from Sweet Squared!

The CND Glacial Illusion Collection consists of:

Radiant Chill
Alpine Plum
Ice Bar
Winter Nights
Cashmere Wrap
Mystic Slate

The CND Trilogy Collection of top coats consist of a glitter, matte and pearl finish.

I love the idea of being able to change the look of the nail with another finish, it just adds that little bit of magic to the art of nails and clients love it.

As usual I have my comparison video where I also talk about the Trilogy Top Coats which I hope you find useful!

Can't see the video? click here

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My facebook page is always updated latest information, tutorials and reviews - click here.

If you want to see more videos from me, my You Tube Channel is here.

CND Five Point Polish Method (for CND Shellac & Vinylux) - click here

To see more of My Work click here and my Nail Of The Day - click here

If you want to read my 'Focusing On' blog posts - click here

Want to see more using Lecente glitter? - click here

Order Scentsy from me - click here

Join my Scentsy team and become an Independent Consultant - click here

NOTD: Nightspell Combo

2017-07-31T08:52:00.001+01:00

This will be the quickest post ever. I wore these nails weeks ago for filming my CND Nightspell Collection video. If I pick multiple colours from a collection and wear them together it's a good way of showcasing them and these worked well.

Below I have on Berry Boudoir, Lilac Eclipse and Mercurial which I loved!

CND Nightspell Collection launches tomorrow, 1st August 2017 in the UK and is available to order from Sweet Squared.

Snapchat, Instagram, Twitter & Pinterest - search for 'liverpoollashes'

My facebook page is always updated latest information, tutorials and reviews - click here.

If you want to see more videos from me, my You Tube Channel is here.

CND Five Point Polish Method (for CND Shellac & Vinylux) - click here

To see more of My Work click here and my Nail Of The Day - click here

If you want to read my 'Focusing On' blog posts - click here

Want to see more using Lecente glitter? - click here

Order Scentsy from me - click here

Join my Scentsy team and become an Independent Consultant - click here

NOTD: Scentsy Family Reunion Nails

2017-07-28T07:12:00.001+01:00

Yesterday was the start of Scentsy Family Reunion aka the huge annual two day event with training and information on all of the new products being released for Autumn Winter 2017. I'm excited as five of my twenty seven team members are up in Edinburgh with me to enjoy it and it will be lovely to get some of our team together as we are literally like a little family.

Since Scentsy's colour is purple it's tempting to got for it all over but instead I went for CND Shellac in Beau. I then used my Lecente G1 brush and applied Lecente Fireworks glitter in Pop to the free edge. I finished the glitter face off by adding Lecente Mortar glitter above Pop and faded it up my nail. After a layer of Clearly Pink I then used my Lecente S2 brush and Cream Puff to paint random little swirls. I have to say, I love these nails!

Snapchat, Instagram, Twitter & Pinterest - search for 'liverpoollashes'

My facebook page is always updated latest information, tutorials and reviews - click here.

If you want to see more videos from me, my You Tube Channel is here.

CND Five Point Polish Method (for CND Shellac & Vinylux) - click here

To see more of My Work click here and my Nail Of The Day - click here

If you want to read my 'Focusing On' blog posts - click here

Want to see more using Lecente glitter? - click here

Order Scentsy from me - click here

Join my Scentsy team and become an Independent Consultant - click here

CND Night Spell Collection (Shellac & Vinylux)

2017-07-19T18:37:00.005+01:00

I love when a new collection hits, all the speculation, all the opinions, it's exciting and the new CND Night Spell Collection is no exception. I secretly love it when the bottles look like existing or previous shades as CND aren't daft, they're not going to bother releasing two identical colours but if definitely could have looked this was with the colours this time.

There are six new shades available in both CND Shellac and Vinylux. The colours are as follows:

Eternal Midnight
Berry Boudoir
Mercurial
Lilac Eclipse
Veridian Veil
Hypnotic Dreams

Here is my usual comparison video!

(click here if not shown)

Snapchat, Instagram, Twitter & Pinterest - search for 'liverpoollashes'

My facebook page is always updated latest information, tutorials and reviews - click here.

If you want to see more videos from me, my You Tube Channel is here.

CND Five Point Polish Method (for CND Shellac & Vinylux) - click here

To see more of My Work click here and my Nail Of The Day - click here

If you want to read my 'Focusing On' blog posts - click here

Want to see more using Lecente glitter? - click here

Order Scentsy from me - click here

Join my Scentsy team and become an Independent Consultant - click here

NOTD: Nails For Sunshine Charlotte

2017-07-02T07:29:00.001+01:00

If you follow my Facebook page you'll know that sadly, whilst going through our own loss with our silent miscarriage my friend's seven month old daughter passed away suddenly. Charlotte was such a bright, smiley baby and everyone on Clare's Facebook profile know her for all of the regular photos with the big juicy grins she had.

Charlotte's funeral and the celebration of her life is tomorrow and we have been asked to wear bright colours. I have redone my nails for her celebration and in honour of the bright little girl. I choose Lecente Milky Way to add that little something special for her.

Snapchat, Instagram, Twitter & Pinterest - search for 'liverpoollashes'

My facebook page is always updated latest information, tutorials and reviews - click here.

If you want to see more videos from me, my You Tube Channel is here.

CND Five Point Polish Method (for CND Shellac & Vinylux) - click here

To see more of My Work click here and my Nail Of The Day - click here

If you want to read my 'Focusing On' blog posts - click here

Want to see more using Lecente glitter? - click here

Order Scentsy from me - click here

Join my Scentsy team and become an Independent Consultant - click here

Our Silent Miscarriage

2017-06-27T16:05:00.001+01:00

Today as I write this it's Wednesday 7th of June 2017. It is a day that will be etched in my mind forever, we thought we would be coming home and excitingly deciding how to break the news that we are pregnant to our friends and family over this next week. Our biggest excitement was telling Rich's son that he would have a baby brother or sister on the way but that won't be happening now. Today was meant to be the day that we finally got to meet our baby at my 12 week scan. Prior to this I have written blog posts documenting my pregnancy so far, they will now all sit forever in a space online, unpublished. Instead I am documenting something else, that is the start of a miscarriage.

My boyfriend Rich and I went to the hospital today for our 12 week dating scan. I've been very nervous and tearful since yesterday. Rich is a positive person and didn't seem to show any concern. I had started to become concerned when I had continued to do the stupid cheap pregnancy tests on the weeks leading up to the scan and the most recent ones had been fainter than before (see below photo.) My pregnancy in general however had been pretty much perfect, sore boobs, a little sick feeling but no vomiting, my chubby tummy had started to get a little more chubby. Having tried to conceive with my then husband for six years unsuccessfully, conceiving with Rich after 8 months of trying seemed like a dream with my perfect man.

I walked into the ultrasound room and was tearful already but I did as she asked and climbed on the bed. I already knew about missed miscarriages (also known as silent miscarriages) but as I hadn't had as much of a drop of blood in my knickers since the day I found out I was pregnant at six weeks, I was hoping that this was in my favour. As I am fairly fat (call a spade a spade here) I was concerned she wouldn't be able to detect the baby from my stomach due to the baby still being small and as she searched around in there I started to get more worried as she wasn't talking. Eventually she said she couldn't find it and would need to do an internal scan so off came my pants and underwear and I'm lying on the bed again. The internal scan was fine, no problems at all but her silence made me tear up, eventually I saw our sweet little baby, no where near the size it should have been and I just knew then, this is where the nightmare is about to play out. She looked and fiddled about and then turned to me and said the words you never think you'll hear "I'm sorry Karen but your baby has no heartbeat. It's measuring only 7 weeks 3 days" or words to that effect as I honestly think I went into a daze, she was actually choked up when she said it. I looked at Rich at the bottom of the bed and he's crying, I cried more. This is the nightmare I had been worrying about, coming true before my eyes.

The sonographer said that we would go into a private room and a midwife would talk to us. I got up off the bed and stood there with no pants or underwear on hugging Rich - I didn't care - nothing mattered. I got dressed and we were ushered into a room that I will now refer to as "the sad room." It's the room that people go to that's not got cute babies or any maternity related stuff on the walls. They're bare with just extension numbers and office bits on a noticeboard. We sat and waited, I was definitely dazed and although there was no heartbeat I was still wondering if the pregnancy had completely failed. I pretty much knew the answer when the midwife came in, just by the look on her face. She said things to me that actually didn't comprehend but I knew the tone of her voice that it was not good news. She said about having another scan in a week just incase the baby had developed further but sounded very doubtful and told me that I would likely expect cramps and to bleed within the next week. If I do I need to ring the early pregnancy unit and they are open 24/7 and will advise me.

We walked out in a daze passing a few expectant mothers which felt surreal as one minute I was part of the pregnant club and then the next I wasn't. I didn't dare to look back as I walked past the lady on reception who had been lovely when we arrived. Rich and I walked back to the car with tiny bits of conversation. I knew the first thing I needed to do was ring my parents, they would be worried. How do you tell them their tiny grandchild has probably died weeks ago? Unless for some miracle my dates are wrong but if the baby was 7 weeks 3 days as they thought it would have had a heartbeat - or should it definitely have been detected? My head was so muddled.

8th June - the day after and I'm now starting to realise the enormity of what's happening. I cried so much last night I was actually relieved as I thought I'd run out of tears but then I somehow found some more. I phoned the early pregnancy unit where I'm meant to be having the second scan on Thursday to ask two things, firstly if the baby measured 7 weeks 3 days then would it definitely have a detectable heartbeat and the other if I absolutely had to wait a whole week for the scan to confirm it had died. I was told that they would definitely be able to detect a heartbeat so I knew for sure that our baby has died. I cried again to the woman on the phone as she said its protocol to have to wait a week but since I know there's no heartbeat, I know I will have to spend the week with our dead tiny baby still inside me, just waiting to have it 100% confirmed. I'm still going to the toilet regularly and my boobs are still sore only this time my toilet visits are always a terrifying experience as I wait for that first drop of blood and I know the miscarriage is on its way, I've been told is highly likely to happen before the second scan.

It's the 9th June at 5am and I'm lying in bed silently crying. Rich had a particularly rough evening last night which I think was a combination of being completely emotionally exhausted and reality hitting that we won't have our Christmas baby as we expected. He cried as he wrote the words to his boss (who knew we were pregnant) that the baby was expected to have a heartbeat at that size and we knew now that there was virtually no hope. He told me it was so painful to actually write it down but I know it was something he needed to do to come to terms with it. He's such a positive person that he would have clung to any hope but I had to break it to him so that he's not broken all over again at the second scan. I'm already writing it down by doing this blog post but he doesn't know this yet. I'm trying to think logically so we spoke about what's expected to happen and how he wants to handle if I miscarry naturally at home. I knew it was going to be a painful conversation but I felt it was necessary. Did he want to see it? Do we flush it? I didn't think I could cope with just flushing it away and it was something he hasn't got his head into thinking yet. In the end we decided if it happens naturally we would want to bury it but as we are in a rented house it would be best to get a lovely big pot and a plant and have Dot buried in that. Actually I'm not sure I've told you but we nicknamed it Dot from the moment I found out. The midwife at 9 weeks encouraged us to name it to help with bonding but we already had. Two other painful thoughts are that we had bonded with it and that by the time I was visiting the midwife for the first time and filling out forms, our baby had died a fortnight previously. I had been excitedly chatting away to her telling her I had no bleeding - not even a drip and she seemed pleased with that. She was such a lovely woman that I was glad to have her with me throughout my pregnancy but we hope to be trying again soon so I would love to have her again. That's the thing, we already know that once we have said goodbye to Dot properly we will be back here again only this time a million times more scared.

As I lay here I want to take some sort of positivity from our sadness and that is that Rich and I are even more closer than we were before. We are a strong couple, if you follow my snapchat (@liverpoollashes) you'll see us both regularly and see what we have together. We are both going through divorces and are so happy that we found each other, I'm proud of our relationship. We bicker all of the time but that's normal eh? Right now though we are there for each other, no one in this world can quite feel how we feel about losing Dot and that is helping us bond and get through it together. I also hope that our divorces are both final by the time our second pregnancy is close to that magic 40 weeks mark and that we are free to marry, that would be the icing on the top of a very delicious cake for us, I'd be honoured to be his wife as he's such a good man.

For now though, I have to stay present in the reality that is now. We've googled plants that have "Dot" in the name as my mum suggested as we want to have the plant there ready. If it turns out it doesnt happen naturally and I need a D&C then we would still want something in memory. I want to point out that I'm conscious that some might not understand how this feels or why I would want to do this for something that happened so early on in a pregnancy but for me a little life formed, a little tiny person with both mine and Rich's genes grew from a group of cells undetectable to the naked eye to the size of a raspberry. A week on Sunday is Father's Day and Rich said last night that it's all he can see everywhere and he's sick of it. I told him he is a father, he has a 9 year old son from his marriage but that we also had Dot. It might have only been 12 weeks (in our minds) and six of those knowing I was pregnant but Rich looked after Dot's mummy so well in that time he deserves the title, he is a dad to one and was a daddy to be to our little raspberry sized baba. The irony is we conceived on Mother's Day, how awesome is that? I've spent all of my twenties thinking I would never be able to get pregnant and my body decided that I would get a ticket to the parent club on Mother's Day.

I think the hardest thing is telling people or not. Obviously like many you wait for the scan photo to do the big announcement so only our closest friends and family knew beforehand. Do you tell people you were pregnant but now you've miscarried/ about to miscarry? Is this why no one talks about miscarriage as they don't want people to feel awkward? I just don't know. Today I decided to message my brother to tell him that I had been pregnant and what has happened and he's just phoned now to say if we need anything etc which is nice as we aren't particularly that close and of course, there isn't anything he can do. In my own opinion (I know everyone's different) but I couldn't bear to put a status up on Facebook sayings "oh yeah by the way, we were expecting but it's died," it's just not my style. I also realise that a lot of people in my "real life" follow my blog and as there has been no big announcements, this blog post will come as a shock.

I've declared today - 9th June as a "no tear" day. Rich can cry if he needs to, he's taken it so hard but I want no tears today. I want this to continue until circumstances change and we either miscarry or I have to have a D&C but if we do get to next Thursday then I will certainly cry my heart out at the second scan but it is a day that Rich and I will both have to work ourselves up to.

We are now on the 10th of June which holds a bizarre place in my mind, today is the 8 year anniversary of deciding (at the time with my husband) to try and start to conceive. Every year this date has come around but this year is different, I know it can happen for Rich and I, Dot proved it, I have hope. I actually made it all day yesterday without crying which was a success. I am however plagued by something I realised last night and I have to talk about it. I am signed up for the forum Mumsnet and although I don't post there much and mainly just read, it popped up with my previous posts yesterday. One of them was when was exactly 7 weeks 2 days pregnant, the day before our baby's heart stopped and I'm talking about how the symptoms seem to have gone away and the only thing I have left is sore boobs. I wasn't very sick anyway but the sickness had gone and the thumb like pressure I felt in my lower stomach had gone. Many replied to me saying pregnancy symptoms come and go and since I still had sore boobs I thought nothing more of it but of course now I know Dot died and I should have trusted my instinct. Next time I would insist on speaking to someone and seeing if I could get an early scan, I know there would probably have been nothing they could do but it would have saved us continuing on this journey happily for five weeks completely obvilious to the reality of what had happened.

It's now Monday 12th of June and I wanted to update where I am and also where I think Rich is. Together I feel like we came to a calming point since Friday, I had a Scentsy party on Saturday night and I believe he did struggle with his mind wandering whilst he was home alone and upsetting him but on the whole, do you know what? We are doing good. I feel like we are both reached a point that we are ready to say goodbye to our little Dot and although having the scan again will bring the emotions back on Thursday, the quicker we can see about speeding up the miscarriage process the quicker we can heal and move forwards. Rich's area manager sent us flowers which we received today. I'm terrible with flowers, they'll probably not last very long here but it's a lovely thought.

I've woken up today, Tuesday 13th of June and it's starting to bring me down again. I thought about this sunday, Father's Day and how I was going to get a card for Rich from bump before we found out there was no heartbeat. I was telling my friend Clare that I am conscious people will think "but it was only a tiny tiny tiny baby, still being formed" but for me it was a little piece of Rich and I and Dot existed. After Dot is gone I refuse to dwell on what's happened, I know I'm not alone and plenty of others go through this. Dot will never be forgotten but I know we will heal and move on to trying again. I just have to get through this scan on Thursday to be told all over again Dot is not alive. I've managed to cast aside the one thing that I thought would freak me out the most, that I am walking around with a dead fetus inside me but I feel like much longer and I may start to struggle with it. It's been five days since we found out but it feels like five weeks, time ticks by so slowly.

I'm still getting baby emails from various companies. When you find out you're pregnant it's easy to go mad and download loads of pregnancy apps and register for all kinds. The pain of receiving my emails this week to say I'm "thirteen weeks pregnant and this is what the baby should look like now" is too much. I've clicked to unsubscribe or deleted the app if I can. Some have been really difficult to update which annoyed me as I don't need to see any more perfect babies just to navigate to the right bit.

Today is the 14th of June, exactly a week has gone by since our world tipped upside down. Rich has been working most of the day so that's kept him busy, I have been at home doing jobs. As I write this I'm literally at the start of the 24 hour countdown to the scan. I already know what they're going to say about Dot but it's how they're going to suggest to sort things out I'm nervous about. I'm hoping for tablets to get things going, yes it will be painful and yes it's the slower option but I really do not want a D&C. I know that it's a quick surgery but I want to avoid being knocked out if I can, the thought of it freaks me out. Another thing I have to think about is that I'm set to return up north in two days time for the weekend to see my family and do my clients. I know on the scheme of things, work isn't important and my clients said that themselves but since I can only return once a fortnight it will thrown everything off if I can't make it. I'm so grateful to have a job that I can work from home, Scentsy has been such a lifeline since I joined in December. I joined with the intention of gaining an income that could work around pregnancy and a new baby and I know I will still have that, just not with Dot. I will be nervous tonight, anxious about having to go through this tomorrow but I am strong - I don't have any other option.

It's midnight on the morning of the 15th June and I'm lying here in bed. Rich is asleep next to me, he's been working all day and he's very tired. I have tears rolling down my face as I think of what lies ahead of me today and over this next week or so. One thing that I keep thinking of is if I will be able to find the words to ask the sonographer for a scan photo. Dot was only little but you could see the shape of the little bean-like baba, I just want a record for myself. I'm not sure if they will say yes or if I will manage to squeak the words out but I'll try. I'm petrified of what they're going to do to remove Dot, none of the options seem remotely easier to me right now, I'm very worried. This past week has been calm after our initial upset last week, to a certain extent the dust is settled and we have accepted it but now it's going to all get dragged up again, the emotion is going to run higher than it's been before as we deal with the last part of this pregnancy. Everywhere I look is all about babies and in a way, I'm not bitter, I'll have ours but if they could lay off the announcements and pram chat around me, that would be great. Of course today is going to be even worse than any advert or announcement on Facebook as this time it will pregnant ladies around me and pregnancy posts on the walls at the early pregnancy unit. It's a different place than the first scan so we will be taken to their version of "the sad room" to discuss how they plan to remove Dot from me. Mum told me yesterday on FaceTime that she thinks I'm not fine like I say I am and who knows at this point.

It's now approaching midnight and it has been certainly been quite a day. Firstly hospitals are mazes and we ended up getting completely lost, meanwhile the clock was ticking as I hate being late for anything and I didn't need the added stress. Obviously I have already thought of every detail of what I knew would happen so the first one happened when we walked into the waiting area. I expected to see pregnant women everywhere which would potentially upset me but instead there was one lady who was around 20 weeks and two other women, all close to tears like I was, this spoke volumes to me as we all avoided eye contact. When I was finally called in I was surprised to see three ladies in the ultrasound room who were all very kind and compassionate. Oddly one of them ran through some questions for me before the scan starting with "how have you been?" which I legimately did not know how to answer so I choked something out about not having a single drop of blood so far as I figured she wanted to know if the miscarriage started. I thoroughly expected for them to go straight for the internal scan but they decided to check through my stomach first. Rich says she picked up Dot slightly on the monitor but still decided to do an internal. Before I lay back on the bed I did manage to ask if it was possible to have a photo and this seemed no problems at all. I had already said to the three ladies that I was basically just waiting for them to tell me again Dot had died and after scanning me the words were said and this time, I didn't cry. Rich was crying, he told me later he had kept that tiny bit of hope and I think that's why we reacted differently as I just knew for sure.

Underwear and leggings back on it was time to sit down and discuss my options. I could either keep it completely natural and wait to miscarry. I dismissed this option almost instantly since my body hadn't realised after 6 weeks since Dot had died I had no faith it was going to happen any time soon. My next option was "medical management" which is the tablets, one that had to be taken orally in hospital there and then and then four that had to be taken vaginally two days later which I should then miscarry within the six hours afterwards. I could do the second part at home or in hospital as a day patient. My third option was surgery to remove Dot. I opted for the tablets and to do the second stage at home. I explained I was away up north working and visiting family for the weekend so we've arranged to go in on Monday morning for the initial tablet and then Wednesday should be the day it all happens. I am also picking up cocodemol for pain relief and antibiotics to help fight infection. Finally it was time to have my very first blood test and I was so nervous that I started doing my one woman comedy routine with the nurse which is my version of a "fight or flight mechanism." We left the hospital and drove straight to Miller & Carter as I adore that place and haven't had steak in so long as I refuse to have it well done!

We looked at our scan photos of Dot later and I have to say that's definitely not Dot's best angle! Rich saw much clearer images on the screen and we both did on the first scan but I'm pleased that we have our two photos of Dot nevertheless.

I don't want to get ridiculously soppy on you I want to say what a true man Rich is. He's a very emotional person which I love, he feels things deeply. To some they might think that him crying won't help me but it really has, he needs to let those emotions out and in a way I also need to see that I am not just feeling this grief on my own, Dot was wanted so much by us both. He has taken care of me so much, in so many ways and has been truly there by my side. You may say "as he should do" and of course that's true but I know many men (I mention no names) that would have no idea how to comfort and support me. Rich has shown he is my best friend, by my side, holding my hand when he sees that I'm getting scared or breaking down, protecting me in every way he can. He is really anxious about the tablets on Wednesday as I have shown him information of useful advice by others who had gone through a miscarriage. Together we are virtually planning for a war with talks of locking all doors and windows, curtains closed and we shall sit and watch films whilst we wait for the storm and it's aftermath to happen. Rich's work colleagues have managed to cover most of his Weight Watchers classes for the trips to hospital and Wednesday as I am told that I am not allowed to be alone during this time, just incase I need to be rushed to hospital. As you can imagine right now I feel pretty rough, I've put on weight and as Dot is still there I hardly feel attractive but yet Rich tells me in so many ways that I am.

Sunday 18th of June, Father's Day, a day we had been dreading. I don't want to be making a huge fuss of this for years to come but I wanted a little something to give to Rich so I got him some Caramac and wrote on it "happy fathers days from someone small x" My Dad opened his presents from us as we were up there with them and that's when we received some devestating news. In a closed Facebook group full of fellow nail techs I saw a post that I read at least three times before I remotely could comprehend what it said. My friend Clare, who I've mentioned already in this post, had a beautiful little daughter called Charlotte who was seven months old. Charlotte had died suddenly earlier this morning without warning from suspected SIDS. I started shaking, I couldn't believe what I was reading. Clare's Facebook had been full of photos of a family day out yesterday with smiley Charlotte lighting up each photo. I absolutely would never wish this on anyone but this happens to people you don't know, thankfully rarely but it's never anyone you know and care about personally is it? Until now. When people say about "finding the words" to say I truly know what that means now, Clare has helped me through this and was messaging me last night to check up on me. Our situations are totally different and I absolutely would never compare mine to hers, she has gone through the entire pregnancy, labour and got to know her beautiful daughter - far more heartbreaking than mine. We got home back to South Wales later that night to find a gorgeous bouquet of flowers has been sent to us by Clare and had arrived yesterday whilst we were away. I was hurt that she had been comforting me whilst completely unaware of what was to happen to her family. My mind is now constantly thinking of her and their family, it really puts into perspective how fragile life is.

Monday 19th June and Rich and I are heading to the hospital. The duty nurse comes to a "quiet room" (aka, sad room) with us clutching a A4 sized plastic NHS bag of medication and a glass of water. She goes over what everything on the bag was for. I thought to myself that this is like an NHS version of those lucky bags you get as a child only less fun and probably pretty expensive contents. In there was the tablet that I had to take in hospital although I was still baffled that they couldn't just give me it all Thursday since the rest I was being trusted with to take at home. Every medical person I'd spoken to had made out that it was Wednesday's dose taken vaginally that would actually cause me to miscarry so this one today seemed less of a big deal if you get me?! Along with that in my NHS lucky bag was Wednesday's four tablets that all get stacked on top of each other and then go on the nifty looking applicator and go as high up near my cervix as I can get, two different types of antibiotics that I am to take today to prevent infection and some jelly lube to help insert Wednesday's dose. She also asked me about covering for our bed and gave us a sheet similar to a large puppy training pad which was kind of her.

Rich and I went food shopping after the hospital and basically starting preparing for war. We had no idea what to expect, I'd read it was a lot of blood and all kinds about sudden gushes that soaked trousers through so we bought simple food to cook, big bottles of water as it's currently a heatwave over the next few days (worst timing ever) and covered our bed in extra sheets to protect it. Around six hours after taking the tablets I suddenly realised I had an odd feeling in my lower back near my coccyx. The best way for me to describe it was like when the dentist numbs your cheek and you can feel it being touched but not as it normally does, only down around my coccyx. I knew then that that was no coincidence and the tablet must have done something. Everyone we had spoken to during this process said that I could expect spotting after the first tablet and I could go to work as normal, it was the Wednesday dose that I needed someone with me just incase I passed out or lost so much blood that I needed to be rushed to hospital. I know that being told this was the thing that scared Rich and I the most, hence the war preparation.

Tuesday 20th June - where do I start? Rich and I have his son with us Monday to Wednesday mornings so he dropped him off at school and Rich had a day of Weight Watchers meetings ahead of him. I woke up at 5am with cramps which we were told was normal, when I went to the loo it was my very first sign of blood. I started shaking because despite everyone saying it would just be "like a heavy period" I knew it wasn't, it was our Dot making it's way out of my body. It also wasn't spotting but the type of blood that wouldn't soak a sanitary towel if you get me. I had already prepared and starting putting them on just incase by that point. I got back in bed and told Rich that Dot was on the way, I figured I would put up with light bleeding today and that's when it dawned on me, I would have to insert the tablets tomorrow whilst bleeding so I hoped it wouldn't effect it or make it more difficult.

Rich went to work and I had Scentsy orders to deliver to Jody who was an hour and a half round trip away. Jody knew was happening and did offer to come collect them at the weekend. I didn't want anyone to have to wait for their orders and in my mind, I would only be spotting, my car would be air conditioned so I would have that time out of the 30 degrees at home. As the morning progressed I did have cramps but nothing too awful. The house was getting hotter so at midday I left to deliver the orders. I did go back into the house as I thought it was sensible to take my bottle of water with me but that was all. As I drove further away from home I started to have a sense of dread - what was I doing? My miscarriage has started, although it wouldn't be happening until tomorrow I could still bleed all over my car, I didn't have any painkillers with me and I would be far from home. I then started to panic as I realised I probably shouldn't be doing this and the cramps were still there. As I got closer to Jody's house I realised I just needed to get the boxes dropped off and then I could count down the minutes until I was home. I dropped the boxes off super fast and got back into my car. The heat wasn't helping and I realised I was starting to lose focus with my driving. The pain was getting worse at this point with a few sharp stabbing pains. I kept my sat nav on the whole way as although I knew a lot of it I couldn't concentrate on the road at all, I was constantly looking at the estimated time of arrival and even when it got to 8 minutes left I was giving all I had to get home. Things got so bad with the pain that there were points that I started talking to myself saying things like "See? only 8 minutes left and you'll be home and near the toilet" and I was speaking out loud what I was going to do when I got out of the car. In the end I got home, climbed out of the car and tried my best to shuffle calmly towards the front door. I walked in and went straight to my NHS lucky dip bag on the table grabbing it, the house phone, my mobile phone and my bottle of water and went into the downstairs toilet. I was in a lot of pain but at least I was home. Eventually I got up and went into the living room. I sat on a leather footstool because I was so frightened of an explosion of blood so I knew I could wipe it up. I took a cocodemol tablet and started leaning over the footstool, wriggling in pain. Just then my mum face timed to see how I was, this was the last thing she needed to see as I was white as a sheet and panicking. Eventually I went back to the toilet, as I sat there and felt drips and then suddenly something big fell with a loud "plop" into the toilet. I knew there and then it was Dot but did I dare to see it? I sat there not moving. I'm screaming in my head "This wasn't meant to happen today! The tablets tomorrow was meant to do this when I had Rich with me! What if I pass out? I'm all alone." Eventually I turned around and I knew it, I knew that had to be Dot. It was a huge mass about the size of my fist. Rich was at least 45 minutes from home so my next thought was "now what?" We had planned to bury Dot rather than flush but did either of us her the strength to get Dot from the toilet? I didn't think I could and the more I thought of it, I didn't think Rich could - it would break him. It hadn't dawned on me that also the toilet would be full of blood making it even more of an awful task. I messaged Rich and I just said "phone me as soon as you can." He rung minutes later and I tried to stay calm enough to tell him that the pains had gotten really severe very quickly and that I thought I had passed Dot. I didn't want him to drive dangerously just to get home to me but equally I needed him by my side. I didn't want to ask him over the phone what we were going to do with Dot so I waited until he got back. I kept asking him how long he would be but the pain was rippling through me. I tried to take another cocodemol but as I put it in my mouth I had the urge to throw up and managed to throw up water and bile all over our tiles on the kitchen wall. I was trying to talk to let him know I hadn't passed out or anything but my words were getting mumbled as I tried my best not to throw up again. What felt like an eternity later he arrived at home and came through the door with a matching pale expression. He kissed me on the forehead and asked what I needed of him. I have no idea what my reply was but I knew he would need to build up to looking into the toilet and deciding what to do. Eventually Rich and I decided it would be more traumatic to have to get Dot out of the toilet and that the plant pot we had bought would be more of just something to remember Dot by. We both stood there when I flushed it but also, I know that we said our goodbye and that we must move on from this.

Wednesday 21st June and it's the day I thought our miscarriage would actually happen. We phoned the early pregnancy unit yesterday and asked them if I still need to insert the second dose of tablets since it seemed I had passed Dot (which by the way - they refer to as "the product") We have been advised to still take the tablets vaginally as advised just incase it has not all been removed so I nervously put the tablets into the special applicator. I was apprehensive all week to take these as I felt the information given from the hospital was that these would be what would do it so I worried what it would do to me. Either way, it had to happen so I nipped the loo first as I knew I had to lay down for an hour. All done and after the hour I got up and went to the loo (I'm female, I'm always in the loo) and was shocked to find one of the tablets had come out. Rich and I figured that three staying would be okay so we carried on with our day and nothing happened. The bleeding at this point I would say was fairly light. I'm someone who has dealt with seriously heavy painful periods in my teens so this was light to me.

I woke up on Thursday 22nd June and went to the loo to find that the other three tablets dropped out. I couldn't believe it and naturally it started running through my mind that if I had need to take those tablets to finish this process off then I may need to have a D&C afterall and that is not what I want if I can avoid it. I contacted the early pregnancy unit and explained what had happened over the past few days. The lady I spoke to was lovely and said that my description of a fist sized clump sounded like I had lost Dot on Tuesday, that the tablets can sometimes come out and don't always dissolve but just need to be in for an hour to work. I felt relieved! I did also talk to her about the light bleeding as I was under the impression it would happen for up to 7 - 10 days but she said that everyone is different, it does sound like that Dot has gone so I can expect for it to get lighter but not to be concerned if it does get slightly heavier again before it stops.

Today I went to my first Weight Watchers meeting with Rich since it happened on Tuesday. I go there to help out and figured I would be fairly safe there as m everyone is lovely. Since we found our baby had no heartbeat I've seen plenty of babies, children and pregnant women and it's been okay. The one thing I wasn't banking on was seeing one person who had gotten pregnant a few weeks after me. We don't normally see her anymore and whilst it's not her fault she will of course want to talk about her pregnancy which she's entitled to do. Seeing her left me speechless and upset, I squeaked out some words but it just wasn't what I needed when I feel so fragile and raw about it all. One of the members brought me flowers, she didn't know what had happened but knew that Rich and I weren't there last week and one of his colleagues had covered the meeting. In my heart I feel that she must have known what had happened as she had tears in her eyes as she gave me them and hugged me.

It's now Friday 23rd June and apart from the very faint pains I've been okay, still bleeding but pretty light. I figured that everything was healing and the process was nearly complete. What shook me was I went to the toilet and whilst I was doing "the business" so to speak, I thought I could feel some thing coming out of me. With a plop I felt it so when I turned around to see I was shocked to see something else had come out, totally different to Tuesday and this, without trying to be too graphic, was like a toilet roll textured deflated balloon or sack. It looked quite long but it might have been as it was now in water and formed that shape. I couldn't believe that I had something else come out and this worried me so I phoned the early pregnancy unit and the nurse I spoke to said to me that what I described sounded very normal, she wasn't concerned at all and people find all different looking parts will pass.

It's Sunday 25th June and I'm fed up if I'm honest. The bleeding has virtually stopped but it's just giving me an annoying pink tinge when I've been to the toilet. I just want it to be done so I can move forward. Miscarriage is hard enough to deal with but in my case, since I knew this was going to happen since the 7th June at the first scan, I'm 18 days into this whole situation and it's starting to feel never ending. I was told I could bleed for up to 7 - 10 days so I know it's been 6 days since it started but it's the fact it's just very watery pink and has been for ages, I just want it to stop.

Tuesday 27th June and I'm still wiping away pink tinges every now and again when I go to the toilet. For those who say it's "like a period" it is to a certain extent but then it isn't because my periods seem to go lighter to completely stopping within a day normally and this has been like this for around four days now but I know it's normal. Physically in every other way I feel fine, my sore boobs have gone and I am now waiting to do a pregnancy test in just over two weeks to confirm it's negative so that we know that the miscarriage is complete.

Now, I wanted to put together a few recommendations of things I did to cope with my miscarriage. Sadly I'm not the first person to experience this and I certainly won't be the last but I did have a couple of things I did which I think helped.

In terms of prep, if you were in the same boat as me and knew a miscarriage was on the cards I recommend you getting various sanitary towels ready. I did also buy maternity towels but it certainly wasn't heavy enough that I needed them but I believe some people do need it.
When the miscarriage happened and I started to bleed I got a large make up bag and I put in it my sanitary towels, nappy bags, painkillers and baby wipes. I did this so that I had all of my essentials together if I was going to be moving between the upstairs and the downstairs loo. I found it handy because I was anxious that Rich's son would see any of it in the downstairs toilet if I was down there as there's no cabinet and I knew I had everything with me if things got that bad and I needed to camp out in there.
Sleeping in something like a pair of leggings is fab to keep your sanitary towels secure and help prevent leaks.
Sitting on a puppy pad on my fabric sofa could be a good move or you could sit on a bin bag - how classy?! I want to stress though that I didn't leak once as my bleeding just wasn't that heavy.
Cry if you want to cry but try to find positives where you can. At some point you will find a positive in what's happened. I personally feel stronger, I have coped with this both emotionally and physically and I am more confident in the process of pregnancy which may sound odd but before I wasn't keen on being in hospital or the thought of having a blood test but I have done both. I also know that by the time our next pregnancy happens I will be further along in my Scentsy business, have lost some weight, saved some money and Rich and I are even stronger than ever before.
Deal with this how you feel you need to deal with it, if you feel you want to talk about it, do it, if you feel you need to keep it between you and your other half, that's fine too.
Be prepared for people to say random things that may hurt you. It's almost certainly not their intention but they're trying to find something to say to you, it's a sensitive subject and emotions run high. I don't want to give any examples here of things said to me but I'll just say that regardless of how little your baby was, it was still a baby to you and have a right to talk about it as it is and grieve the loss of it also.
It may be an idea to gather some essentials together if you need to go to hospital as it will be the last thing you'll be thinking of.
Be prepared to bleed far longer than you thought, it will hopefully be light like mine but that stage drags out far too long!

I don't want to dwell on this time of my life for the rest of my life. It was sad, we were upset and we questioned why it happened but I wrote this post as my support and coping mechanism for everything I was thinking and feeling at the time which did help.

To Dot - I held you every second of your life. I will move on from this but I'll never forget you.

NOTD: Not My Favourite Nails

2017-06-26T13:21:00.001+01:00

I don't like these nails, I have no idea what I was thinking with them but I will share them with you as thankfully everyone's tastes are different!

I adore CND Shellac in Scarlet Letter and why I didn't just leave it like that I have no idea. There's nothing wrong with Lecente in Girlfriend Pink Glitter at all - it's a stunner but it just didn't do it for me over Scarlet Letter. This photo was taken ages after I did them, you can tell by the grow out and that I just wasn't excited about them at all!

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CND Five Point Polish Method (for CND Shellac & Vinylux) - click here

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NOTD: Virtually Barbie Nails

2017-05-31T19:14:00.001+01:00

For a long time now I've continued to not really be too excited about doing my own nails. Back in the day I would change my nails once a week (sometimes less!) but life has gotten busy, I have many other things on my mind so I am only doing them when I have to.

Don't ask me why but I insisted this time I would pick a colour I haven't chosen before. I've had a hankering for pink recently so I decided to go for my amazingly unloved bottle of CND Shellac in Future Fuchsia (which in my head I always refer to as Futuristic Fuchsia because I think it sounds better...!)

Anyway, I paired my bright pink with Lecente Silver Holographic Multi Glitz Glitter and now I feel like I literally have Barbie nails on but that's ok - it's summer - I can pull it off!

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CND Five Point Polish Method (for CND Shellac & Vinylux) - click here

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NOTD: Something Subtle

2017-05-15T18:40:00.001+01:00

The penny has finally dropped! The last few sets of nails I've done on myself I've just not been happy with. I spoke about this on snapchat (@liverpoollashes) and so many snapped me back to say they were exactly the same. Eventually it clicked why I wanted happy, I wanted something subtle. I was craving something that wasn't a block colour. I know I'll sound crazy but it just didn't occur to me that that was why everything I thought of I was like "pink - naaaaaah" "blue - naaaaaah" and it would go on and on.

Finally I have what I really wanted and I love them. I used CND Shellac in Beau over all nails and then added a mix of Lecente Firefly and Waterfall to the tips only. After a layer of Clearly Pink (to seal the glitter) I added dots to create flowers with Cream Puff and Locket Love. Bingo! I'm happy!

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CND Five Point Polish Method (for CND Shellac & Vinylux) - click here

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Lecente New Releases Summer 2017

2017-04-30T16:13:00.001+01:00

It's finally time to talk about the new Lecente release which are available from tomorrow, 1st May. I've had this collection for a little while kindly sent to me from them and straightaway there is definitely been a distinct three favourites amongst my clients which I shall mention later on.

The summer 2017 collection consists of four glitters:

Girlfriend Pink Irridescent Glitter (pictured over CND Shellac in Hot Pop Pink)
Boyfriend Blue Irridescent Glitter (pictured over CND Shellac in Digi-Teal)
Snow White Ultra Fine Glitter (pictured over CND Shellac in Cream Puff)
Silver Slipper Ultra Fine Glitter (pictured over CND Shellac in Silver Chrome)

It also has four chrome powders, two of which are Chameleon Chromes:

Bronze Chameleon (pictured over CND Shella cin Leather Satchel)
Copper (pictured over CND Shellac in Leather Satchel)
Purple Chameleon (pictured over CND Shellac in Tinted Love)
Black (pictured over CND Shellac in Black Pool)

So I will tell you that the two favourite glitters for me are Boyfriend Blue and Girlfriend Pink. I've used both of them so many times and they're just absolute winners, the colour combinations you could do either of them are endless! Silver Slippers is another stunner and I burnished it into my own nails when I wore it. Snow White is nice but it seems to be a little chunkier so I do recommend two layers of top coat with that one.

As for the chromes, the Black Chrome is gorgeous! Oddly my other favourite was Copper (I say oddly because I was expecting for me to favour the chameleon chromes but that just stole my heart! You need it!)

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CND Five Point Polish Method (for CND Shellac & Vinylux) - click here

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Slim Down Sunday 2017: Week 17

2017-04-30T09:39:00.001+01:00

This is going to be the shortest slim Down Sunday post ever. This week has had its ups and downs as I have been that well. In a nutshell, I have gained 2lbs and whilst I'm not terribly upset or shocked with that, I will be taking a break away from these posts for the entire month of May. I'll be back in June with new posts.

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My facebook page is always updated latest information, tutorials and reviews - click here.

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CND Five Point Polish Method (for CND Shellac & Vinylux) - click here

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NOTD: Blue Shimmers

2017-04-25T19:03:00.001+01:00

I have to have admit that I've had these nails on for nearly a week and haven't put the blog post up and it's purely for the fact that it's driving me mad but I can't get a photo to show how gorgeous is this combination is...!!

I'm wearing CND Shellac in Blue Eyeshadow with Lecente Ocean Irridescent Glitter over it. In real life these nails have got so much of a mix between a green and the blue pigment, it's probably on a ratio of about 60% blue and 40% green but you can't see it well! I used a MoYou London plate over it to add the little bows.

I shall put a little video up of them on Snapchat to hopefully capture how gorgeous they (username: liverpoollashes) but I've had so many compliments!!

Snapchat, Instagram, Twitter & Pinterest - search for 'liverpoollashes'

My facebook page is always updated latest information, tutorials and reviews - click here.

If you want to see more videos from me, my You Tube Channel is here.

CND Five Point Polish Method (for CND Shellac & Vinylux) - click here

To see more of My Work click here and my Nail Of The Day - click here

If you want to read my 'Focusing On' blog posts - click here

Want to see more using Lecente glitter? - click here

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Join my Scentsy team and become an Independent Consultant - click here

Slim Down Sunday 2017: Week 16

2017-04-23T18:27:00.001+01:00

If I'm honest I really wasn't going to write this post this week. I have spent the week with the wrong frame of mind and honestly I don't really think I've tried at all.

I was going to just skip this week and just not put up a blog post but I made a promise to myself that I would still write regardless and I know that there are a few view that always look for these posts.

I couldn't help myself but I really really wanted some ice cream on Thursday so I ended up going in getting this huge sundae which I throughly enjoyed.

It's actually crazy but I forced myself to still away and although I thought I had put on possibly maybe two or 3 pounds I actually stayed exactly the same this week so clearly what ever I've eaten I've worked off as well! I will be back next week with another update!