Distorted thoughts

I literally have no idea what I was blabbering on about last night, all I know is that the dentist assured me that I wouldn't have any pain once the numbness had worn off....well, POO on you Mr Dentist man, my tooth hurts like hell!!
Today I have struggled to hold myself together, partly because I am niggled with pain but mostly because I am feeling such anger at the injustice of the things we are dealt in our lives. Its SOOOO very important not to compare our lives to others, and to remember that our experiences are our own, there is no-one that has that exact same experience, no-one feels the way you do about it and no-one can put themselves into your shoes.
I hate that from time to time, an event or something will come along and remind me of 'what could have been'.....a completely useless thought, but none the less, these thoughts have crept into my mind and there is no ignoring them until I have processed the way I feel and managed to filter out the damaging thoughts that completely distort my mental health.
So, I wonder what I would be doing if my sight wasn't so poor. I cant help but feel cheated in life, I feel like my brain is fully (ish) functioning but I'm broken so I will never be able to work at my full capacity. And that's not bloody fair! 
Don't get me wrong, I totally understand that everyone finds themselves thinking in this kind of way, I have two friends, one whose Mum passed away recently and has been left juggling home life, work and her broken father. the other friend, lost her Daughter many years ago, each of these ladies must wonder what could have been, and I feel incredible empathy for my friends. BUT at this moment my grief feels enormous, time is supposed to be a healer, frankly, that's crap. We fold all our thoughts and feelings away into little boxes in our brains, we learn to live with these boxes. We accept they are there and always treat them with respect for fear of the boxes falling over and all the contents come spilling out all over our nice straight forward lives. 
My boxes feel like they have been knocked over and stamped on! The trouble is, I am one to focus on what is happening in the present, so the past is, well, its the past, so when an event for example pops up and causes me to remember the past, things I might add which are happy memories, I some how manage to distort those happy memories into dark ones by remembering what my sight was like before, and then end up comparing then to now....are you all still with me?
All this thinking business drastically upsets my mood, and I just feel sad. Sad and angry. So, I sink into a not really wanting to talk to anyone mode while I let the memories flood back and I try to pop them back into their boxes once I have straightened them out a little.
This process, I've noticed. gets harder each time, and I think it is because I don't really know how much I am capable of. There is no line or barrier which says 'Lynda, You cannot pass beyond this barrier, so turn back and just stay in the safe zone'...so how do I know what to aim for?
I do know how lucky I am but, today, it doesn't stop me wanting to know what I would be doing today if I could see better Somethings, I suppose were always going to happen, but what about the other things like driving and the job I have.
And just like that, one box is picked up and packed away....as I wrote about my job in the last sentence, faces popped into my head, faces of the people I work alongside and faces of some of the customers, and I smiled! A big fat stupid smile as I think about a stupid conversation that was had this afternoon while putting out a soft drinks cage. Suddenly I feel like I've brought myself back to the present just by talking to you!
Earlier, I stood looking at the rain hammering on my front garden and thought about all the times I had mown the lawn until it had to be taken up because I kept mowing over the electrical cord....What I wasn't seeing was this...

I did that!! Well, the plants did the growing themselves, but I dug up all the grass, replaced it with shingle and planted all these plants from the bargain bench at my local garden centre!

I am not daft enough to think correcting any form of mental health is as easy as that, but we all function differently, I loose my way from time to time, and become fixated on the negatives, but I'm aware that I am doing this, I suppose in a way its a kind of self harm, I want to feel that pain and grief because I should, because I must remember that I was once a sighted person and that I have been CHEATED out of having a normal life!!

I wonder what sort of a normal sighted person I would have been! Maybe I would have been a brain surgeon (lets be realistic) maybe I could have had a driving job OR maybe I could have progressed to being a higher level teaching assistant in the job I loved, maybe I could have been a pilot!

But would I be the person I am today? I certainly wouldn't be sitting here writing to you and I certainly wouldn't have met some inspiring and wonderful people through a charity that I probably wouldn't have taken a second glance at. 

Maybe being me isn't so bad after all! Maybe I should take all of those special little memories and take them for exactly what they are...MY memories, no-one else's.

..MINE...and no-one, no matter what they say or think can remove those memories.

Well, now I've had a good cry and my contact lenses are all foggy I suppose I should go and get ready for ladies night at the swimming pool, after all, no matter how shitty we feel, life has this habit of carrying on without you, so I feel I have two choices, be sucked back or keep a step ahead....betchya cant guess which way I'm heading?....Tomorrow is a new day. Speak soon x

Tooth ache

Afternoon all!
As I am sitting here waiting for the swelling to go down in my face, I thought I'd drop you a line or two!
Tooth ache descended two days ago, and as most of us do, I totally ignored it, took a shed load of painkillers and hoped it would go away. Unfortunately it didn't, and after having what I can only describe as 'proper tooth ache' a couple of years ago and ending up in hospital having morphine squeezed into my system, I am more than aware that if tooth ache doesn't go away within a couple of days, then I need to get my backside to the dentist asap!
I changed dentist surgeries about 18 months ago, not because there was anything wrong with the actual dentistry I was receiving, but because the receptionists were like a group of Rottweilers that had been starved for a month! 
The receptionists at the new dentists must have gone to a completely different school of 'how to be a receptionist' because they are super lovely. They have it on my notes that I am RSS and therefore always help me fill in forms without and arguments, they always explain where the examination room is...instead of barking that I need to go wait upstairs in waiting room one!
The dentist is a young chap, with lovely black scribbly hair and a gentle manner. My emergency appointment today found that I've a tooth which has died and is now causing nerve damage.  
I recon the biggest mistake I make when I go to the dentist, is looking at the size of the bloody needle!!
Even when the dentist says....'just a small scratch'.... I'm lying there thinking, 'how the hell will something that size make nothing more than a small scratch!' 
Anyway, the tooth has been drilled and packed, next week I've an appointment to have the tooth removed
Tooth ache makes me grumpy, I hate everyone and it makes me feel crappy. I am annoyed that having a simple normal thing like tooth ache, can make me feel so tired, why is it that the smallest change takes time to adjust. 
Its like hay fever, lets talk about hay fever!!
If you are a contact lens wearer, you will understand the irritation of the snotty film that forms across the lens, rubbing, scratching and itching just spreads the snotty pollen into a different position on the surface of the lens. I don't ever remember having hay fever as a child, in fact I'm sure I only started with it last year. Why do some people really suffer and others don't? 
I mean, I don't really 'suffer' but the snotty stuff just distorts the little vision I have, I recon I must take my contacts out about twenty times a day, clean them and put them back in again, only for them to snot back up again a few minutes later!!
PLUS, I recon its worse after its been raining. I though the rain was supposed to dampen down the pollen.
Right, enough moaning! I can feel my tongue slightly, which is good because I'm starving!
Its crazy really, I'm sure I must have looked and sounded hilarious, constantly dribbling and talking like I've got a mouth full of marshmallow! 
I'm off to cook my microwave meal which I chose specifically because its soft and there's not too much chewing involved, there is nothing worse than biting your tongue while you're numbed up, then when it wears off you've got one hell of a sore tongue.
Anyways, I'm off to enjoy my chicken korma.
Speak real soon x

exploring the 4x4!

Do you ever get those days where you don't seem to have gotten anywhere? Time has been ahead for me all day, I made a list of jobs that I must get done today and out of the fifteen things that were on it, six have gone onto tomorrows list! 
Anyway, writing was on the list, so here I am!
As promised, Just a little blog on the 4x4 driving experience day!!!!!
Thursday night I got myself all prepared for an early start the next day and decided to have a earlyish night, went to lock my front door and my keys were missing, a casual look through my bag soon turned into a frantic hunt, tipping the contents all over the kitchen table, and searching in the same places ten times just in case it had magically appeared!
Mentally retracing my steps I realised the last time I had them was at work and that's exactly where they still were. This meant my meticulously planned morning had to be re jigged to include a trip to work to retrieve my keys. 
So, My plans had to be moved forward an hour and 5am Friday morning found me walking Ralph over the fields, although I have to say, that time of the morning is very beautiful, and Ralph was happy to sit and watch the deer and rabbits!...NOT, the crazy bloody dog was chasing the poor animals all round the fields, with me screaming at him to come back like some crazy woman, then he decided it would be a great idea to roll around in fox poo, he comes running up to me with this stupid flappy grin on his face, all pleased with him self..'smell that Mum, don't I smell fab'....no, you actually smell like you have been living in the bottom of a food waste bin for the last three weeks! I suppose the only consolation was that there's no-one else about that time of the morning, so the only person that he shared the smell with was me!!
I had to pick up the train from Hitchin instead of Arlesey, but it didn't seem to be a problem and I was let through the gates, found myself a seat on the platform and sat relaxing in the sun.
The train from Hitchin to Cambridge was on time and I was quite shocked to find there were plenty of places to sit. I arrived into Cambridge about 7 minutes before my friends train was due in and about 14 minutes before our connecting train to Thetford would leave. The train was already at the platform and again finding a seat was easy! Once my friend and I were settled in our seats the journey to Thetford just flew by as we chatted and nattered. 
Once at Thetford we were met by Malcolm! Now, Malcolm is in charge of the 4x4 experience days, but, just flipping back a minute, So all the while we were travelling we were two blind ladies, no one really interacted with us, we immediately accepted each others disability and tuned into the level of assistance each of us needed and just got on with it. But, when Malcolm met us, I noticed something I hadn't before. I feel a little ignorant that I haven't thought of this before. 
Malcolm leaps out of his 4x4 in the car park, introduces himself and chats about the programme of the day. It was all very normal, until he asks us to get in the car, the three of us make our way to the car/truck thingy, (three because a young man had joined us) and there, as my two fellow blind people went to put themselves into the truck, I held back ever so slightly and saw Malcolm have a awkward moment where he didn't know how much help to offer. In that second I saw 'politically correct' (or disability correct) flash across his face..how much support do I offer...I don't want to offend...is it ok to touch the persons arm to help them in the truck....etc
Suddenly I am looking at sighted folks in a whole different light. How difficult is it for regular people to know what we need? Talk about treading on egg shells! and then I saw relief in his body language as Brad had jumped in the front passenger seat and Suzanne had nipped around the truck to get in the back seat beside me, leaving Malcolm still standing on the tarmac, the trip to the Elveden Estate was nice and relaxed as I think Malcolm had worked out that we didn't consider our disability to disable us in any way!
Anyway, my excitement was level 10000 and after we had had our breakfast at the on site restaurant I was ready to rumble. We had a de-brief and as there was 11 of us blindies driving, they take two couples in two trucks. 
Who wants to go first.....ohhh hell yeah, that'll be meeee!
I was paired up with Suzanne and I know she wont mind me telling you that watching and feeling her elation at being able to drive again was almost as wonderful as my own experience behind the wheel. Suzanne had been told to send her driving licence back to DVLA two years ago, although I had driving lessons in my teens, Ive never been able to drive so I think we both experienced completely different emotions. 
I absolutely loved it, I couldn't see beyond the bonnet, but the instructor was so good I didn't feel at all worried. The truck was automatic so no bothering about changing gear, just concentrate on the accelerator and steering. It was strange because the first thing I did was check my mirrors, not that I could see out of them, its just a process that all learner drivers learn, and I hadn't forgotten it.
For me, I was ecstatic that I had been driving around farm tracks and through a forest, and at the end I felt happy but sad that this wasn't 'real' I will never be able to drive.
For Suzanne, it was very emotional, a skill which she had lost, been taken from her. The day must have been so much harder for drivers, for us non drivers it was great fun, but I cant grieve over something I've never had!
It wasn't just the driving that made the day so special, I met some really incredible and inspiring people, plus, it turned out that my youngest was taking her driving test exactly the same time that I had my half hour driving, and she passed!!
An amazing day all round. The journey home I kept sighing with satisfaction and I had the biggest smile pinned to my face! In fact the smile hasn't worn off yet. Saturday I was so tired, I am always astounded by how much travelling exhausts me so travelling and driving all in one day was too much concentration, no wonder I was passed out on the sofa early afternoon, thus the reason none of my jobs have been done.
If anyone fancies a 4x4 Experience day. Contact Malcolm via email at Explore 4x4 experience days, Elveden Estate, Norfolk.

HUGE thanks to Suzanne and Warren for organising this event 💖