Sorry about this. Try and do the normal 'count sheep' or equivalent. Sometimes when you feel particularly panicy, taking deep breathes and listening to each deep breath helps. and/or watching the tick tock of a watch, focuses you away from how youre feeling. If you cant sleep, watch or listen to something that makes you happy. remind yourself that your worry cannot change things and you are strong xx

I find a healthy distraction can help me. I like to watch Bob Ross painting shows because his voice is so calming. If that's not for you, I have also tried science shows too which seem to calm me down and get me sleepy again. I hope you find a way to cope!

I find a healthy distraction can help me. I like to watch Bob Ross painting shows because his voice is so calming. If that's not for you, I have also tried science shows too which seem to calm me down and get me sleepy again. I hope you find a way to cope!

lol. I bought a house in Levin. The guys cut it in half, down the hallway. there was this one big room that had all its wall on the wrong side of the cut so it was just a cave. They just sort of nailed up some 4x2s to make it stay put.. ish - and that was it.

They stuck that house on 2 trucks, and drove it over the pahiatua track at 3am. over the rimutaka mountain ranges on a skinny, obnoxious, winding road. That saddle road barks like a dog.

Can you imagine the shaking? Can you imagine the rattling, the swaying, the wobbling?

The shuddering, the bending, the wiggling, the contorting?

Well, they got that house over the saddle and onto my land in the Wairarapa, and they stuck it back together.

And I have NEVER been even slightly bothered by earthquakes ever since. I think the first big one I got over there, the house wobbled and I looked at it and I thought 'you got NOTHIN on what this house has already been through' and I laughed.

Are you in a wooden house? They're amazing for flexing and wobbling. They are probably the safest thing to be in.

Yea my house is wobbly and old so it moves well. I know I'm safe in the house but it's the shaking and the sounds that make me paranoid

If it's old, that's good. It's probably sarked. Sarking is in place of dwangs: they have the studs that go up the wall, and then these big long 6 x 1 boards that go across all the way up the wall, a bit like cladding but not overlapped, on both sides of the walls. Makes for a VERY strong building.

Windows rattling can be annoying, waking a person up. But that house that came over the mountain? not one window broke or even got a crack. Not one window. :) make sure you don't have any shelves above your bed with heavy books on them or anything. Make sure your bed isn't under teh window, or if it is make sure your curtains are drawn at night and go down to the floor so that if anything breaks it is contained behind the curtain and doesn't land on you. Make sure anything tall is secured like they tell you in the ads, you can even screw some screws into bookshelves and run a line of elastic across the front, or a thin board, to stop things falling off the front once they are secured.

Things falling is probably the biggest danger in a wooden house. they are telling us now to stay in bed, and not to get under a doorway. Lying in bed with your covers on you is the best place to be.

:)