Time is a great healer, how many times have you heard that saying before? When you are going through a difficult time, some bright spark says to you....don't worry, time is a great healer, and in a week, a month, a year, you will feel different....and how may times do you look back after that year and think...yes, I do feel different? What we actually do is look that person in the face and say..yes, I suppose so, when really we are thinking, why don't you sod off and mind your own business! Then that time slips away and the very last thing you want to do a year down the line is think back to how awful you were feeling at the time.
HOWEVER, yesterday I was thrown back in time and it was very sobering, because I had forgotten. Forgotten where I was standing, both physically and mentally seven months ago and I had forgotten to remember how far I had come, and instead of being cross and frustrated with myself each day I need to be giving myself a big pat on the back.
Last September, as you all know, I had another deterioration, and in the October I went off to stay with my friends in Suffolk to re-coupe, when I came back I wrote a blog called 'Healing'.
I never read my blogs once they have been published, but I have just re-read 'Healing' and I am totally astonished that within such a short space of time I have achieved so much.
As its half term for me and the girls had a few days off we grabbed the opportunity to make the trip to Suffolk to visit our friends and we took Ralph to meet Daisy dog (We have come to the conclusion that Ralph has little dog syndrome...known as small dog who thinks he is a Great Dane).
Anyway, the weather was beautiful, and we walked, picnicked and soaked up the sun, yesterday afternoon my friend took us and Ralph to Shingle Street. Once again I found myself walking along the marshes towards the shingle beach, and each step I took brought a memory flashing back into my head. Seven months ago I was a blubbering mess, I needed support, I needed my cane. I was frightened for the future and what was going to happen to me.
Seven months ago I walked arm in arm for support from my friend along those marshes, yesterday I walked independently. When and how did that change happen? I hadn't noticed and the change caught me off guard. For some reason that I don't really understand, I felt really sad. I remember as clear as crystal how scared and unsteady I was, I remember standing in front of the sea needing to scream at it and at the same time wondering if I would ever see it again. I remember having to listen and concentrate on my every single move, I remember feeling crushed, my heart, confidence and everything that makes me 'me' was crushed.
But that was seven months ago, this time I didn't even take my cane, my brain has adapted and my confidence is restored. I am doing things I never thought I would do again, like return to work, go out with Friends in unfamiliar surroundings, cooking a meal in someone else's house. The last time I was with my friends at their house in Suffolk I was broken, I didn't do the things I used to do when I visited them, no cooking, no washing up, no making cups of tea. OK, my tea making and my washing up skills might not have been the best this time, but the difference is, I tried and I did it. How bloody good is that?
When I got into the little bed in the spare room last night, with Ralph curled up at the bottom of the covers fast asleep, I did cry and I cried hard, and when my friend called through the door to ask if I was ok, I lied, I cant remember the last time I cried that hard for myself! except maybe seven months ago!
This morning I got up early, clipped Ralph onto his lead and made my way down to the river for my tinkling boats fix, except the air was still and the tide was out, but it didn't matter, I sat on a wet bench and watched the birds in the mud and considered the next chapter in my life. I know I will be set back again, and I am aware that each time it will take me longer to adapt to new ways of dealing with the sight that a deterioration leaves me with. So, sitting on the bench I decided there nothing I can do except enjoy what I have, so I stood up with determination and positivity only to realise that my arse was wet from the bench and so spent the whole walk home trying to avoid people in case they thought I had wet myself.
Luckily there wasn't many people about that time of the morning!
xxx
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