I took the proactive step of talking to professionally qualified people about how I was feeling, and the thoughts I was having. Even whilst doing it I was thinking ‘ this is pretty pointless because it’s not going to change anything ‘. But actually it did ultimately help, and the worst passed again, the worst being my own little Jiminy Cricket telling me how pointless my being alive was.

A few days later I’ve done quite a lot of worthwhile things and I’m glad I was around to do them.

I saw my surgeon on Friday and well, either he’s an EXTREMELY good actor, or ( in his opinion ) nothing has moved in my internal frame. His positivity about my skeletal state was definitely reassuring to me, and we also established that my 5 year old wheelchair needs replacement, as it is breaking, and has been breaking,   for some time.

A new and therefore more rigid chair will give me support in the right places, combined with a new seat cushion that fits my arse, and a curved back rest that supports me properly. As I can’t actually feel the seat or thé backrest all I get is the outcome of how they fit me rather than the actual feel of them. I therefore know they aren’t right from how I appear to struggle in them to be upright, rather than being able to actually féel the problem directly.

Wendy and i saw a band too – The Feeling. I think I’ve realised that whilst being ‘ big in Chiswick ‘ they aren’t anywhere else. Anyway they were ok, in a packed with Chiswick types Shepherds Bush Academy, no one really getting very animated except for the quite vocal gay following they have, which was very amusing. Freddie Mercury may be dead, but his disciple wanna be’s live on and were in Shepherds Bush at the weekend.

After the gig we went to a bar next door. Never have I seen such a juxtaposition of ‘ letting yourself go behaviour ‘ in 2 different crowds separated by 50 feet of street.  One crowd was, well… ‘ very contained ( like the headmaster was watching) ‘ and the other was actually having a laugh, dancing, laughing, and extremely friendly with it. It’s been a bit since i had 3 people fall over my wheelchair in one night, had my drink knocked over, and been talked to by so many people I’ve never met.

It made me miss my iBot which no longer seems to work, but that I’ve not given up on. Jeez that thing made gigs SO much better. Today I’ve had a go at getting it working and it does seem to accept electrical charge, but won’t function properly. It just makes a lot of alarm and malfunction noises instead… which makes it not do what it does when working ie stand up on 2 wheels etc.

As a strategic manoeuvre I’ve decided to get a pet … for the company to a degree, but also because to have something that’s reliant on me means you have to stick around.

I imagine that’s what kids are for too, as a rule

Also my proper exercise brain is kicking in. I am very limited as to what I can actually do, and almost everything has to be with one arm at a time, but you do what you can do, as you can’t change what you can’t change. I’ve redeployed my arm grinder machine ( yes I’m home with help temporarily) and I’ll do / am doing a fair bit of strenuous ( non weight bearing ) exercise.

I have a CT lung scan tomorrow to see if that thing in my left lung looks worse ( probably curtains if it is ) but I’ve bought people Christmas presents in advance this year, just in case!

My sincere gratitude to the amazingly lovely Wendy for all of her compassion and help recently. For the record Shes a total star.

Thanks too to thé quite a few people that seem to be looking out for me, including my ( worried ) Mum.

❤️