Saturday 6 December 2014

I'm very aware that most of my posts are usually the positive side of parenting.  The happy beauty we are blessed with as mothers. But like many we have our difficulties.  Our issues with being co-parents for Dàrcey, bedtime tantrums, spoilt behaviour & the exhausting early starts from Ducky.  This week life took it up a notch. I'm writing this as it's the only therapy I know works for me. I'm exhausted beyond belief from the trauma & struggles we as a family have suffered this week. I can actually feel myself stunted writing the next words. We were in a house fire. The huge hurt in my chest is pulsing at the notion. We survived a fire & now we are dealing with the consequences.  I write this in a family room of a hotel our insurance has accommodated us with. It's a nice hotel, it's not a sofa or my brothers bed* (sorry for taking over your home for the week) it's emergency accommodation & I'm not ungrateful for the benefit but it's not home. It's devastating! We have no set plans for our favourite December day. Putting the tree up & shopping for a new bauble or dec. We may not be home in time for Christmas. Our lil home was smoke damaged severely & the basement flat below us where the fire was present is gutted. So until all the repairs, assessments & scary details are hashed out we will be living out of a bag each. We have been so well supported by the dearest friends & family. I am so overwhelmed by how amazing even my newest of friends have been. Jasper has been gifted with brave boy presents, he's had a few sleepovers with his Lil buddy's to help Gary & I & my amazing buddy who I didn't even know before school term started has been incredible to us. Having Jasper for us whilst we had to meet with loss adjusters & take detailed reports on the damage to our home & giving me a place to be when it was school time & i had no place to go.
Jasper my dear sweet angel has been so brave. We woke to the scariest image of a smoke filled home. It was pouring through the carpets & even with our high ceilings it surrounded our home quickly & made it scarily dark. The groggy confusion of waking to this scene & having to make sense of the situation, alert emergency services & try & be calm for him keeps replaying.  We are so very lucky to of woken. We were both suffering smoke inhalation without even knowing & had to be treated in hospital. More so my poor Bubb than me. He had low oxygen & extremely quick pulse.  He showed an adult wise understanding when I explained to him there was a fire when we got out on the front lawn in our dressing gowns, frozen & being watched by school run curiosity. Thank god no-one was in the fire below us & we were the only ones at risk. I will never forget the details of this slow motion horror. My darling Jaspeys face when he had a mask covering half of it, machines on his fingers & blood tests taken. Smiling his unsure smile, wanting reassurance & desperate to be on my lap & safe. He didn't show it then but he's been effected by this. He was too busy giggling at the blow up glove called Charlie Chicken & marvelling at all the fire fighters. Today Nanna asked him what his favourite thing is about the hotel. His stark response has floored me "When we get to go home!!" He had loved staying at Nannas & was so excited for the double beds adjacent to each other that he could jump to & throw on, i stupidly felt he was some what settled. But he wants home as much as we do. He wants his toys & his jammies & his bed. The out of control anxiety is overwhelming. We are safe but sleep is fitful. The worries of what next is too upsetting & like I say we are unsure if we will be in our home for Christmas.  Which has worried both cherubs no end as they are confused as to how Santa will know where we will be. Dàrcey even asked why Santa had let this happen to us. She had to miss sleeping over with us on our access & after having a good chat about the fire & fire saftey to ease her worries she still cried. She said she knows fire can kill & when her mum said she couldn't sleepover as we had a fire she had assumed we had gone. I'm so cross that she wasn't informed properly but also that really this has happened & it happened due to silly negligence that has got to be made aware. It was an accident no less but one that has turned our lives over. The small child who lives below us turned on the hob for his mother's electric oven. It heated up over time & set fire to toys & packages she had on top of her stove. We have lost our home because of such small actions. We almost lost a lot more which is the saving grace in all this that I cling to every single second.  It will be fuel for a better 2015. A better forward & happier times. But as you can imagine the what ifs creep in at points & the surreal, unbelievable events of this past week have sunk me low. I will endeavour to spread the word of fire safety & I am very pleased a lot of friends are listening & have got themselves smoke & carbon monoxide detectors. The smoke alarm did not wake us on this occasion,  once your being poisoned they rarely do. So I can't advocate a carbon monoxide detector enough also.  I don't feel better for writing this so that's shit!! But the awareness is what I must be pro active on, especially in this season when fire hazards are so prevalent.