So I’ve had my lil pet for almost a week now. She’s a pretty lady budgie, white with blue breast feathers and some yellow here and there and I’ve have called her Fanny.

She and I are bonding slowly, but you can’t rush these things, can you? I think it’ll take a while for Fanny to let me into her trust, but with a tactic of lots of smiling and gentle words, I hope that I will be able to stroke Fanny soon.

For now I smile as Fanny flaps around.

Fanny flaps loudly for a little bird, and the cage is big enough for her to fly a fair bit from perch to perch, and have a peck at various things I’ve put in there.

She has a bird bath so Fanny can get wet, though she hasn’t yet. Or maybe that’s what she does in private, when I’m not looking?

For sure I’ll look after and love my little pet, and definitely take Fanny’s maintenance seriously.
She’s in safe hands!

Now my wheel won’t come off so the whole chair has been taken away to a workshop. They gave me the world’s most basic replacement chair which makes it impossible to go out now.

Blimey, if this had happened a few days ago, I think id have fallen apart completely, but I’ve definitely rallied a bit, so won’t I think, but I can’t now go to a gig tonight or a course tomorrow.

Bloody hell.

So I’m en route to visit my psychiatrist, when two of the 3 struts to my left wheelchair rim snap. There follows a long and slow trip home with a constant clanking and creaking, and risk of the chair collapsing altogether – a touch psychologically stressful then… not what I expected ( but exactly the opposite )  from a trip to the psychiatrist.

I’m stranded at the moment therefore, but as it happens they are coming to service my chair tomorrow… and will bring a spare chair  in case they can’t replace my wheel ( as as well as being broken it’s also jammed onto the axle, and has been for a while.. )

Not exactly lucky, am I ?

My brother, Stu, sent me this picture of him  

He’s like a cross between Indiana Jones and something off Lord of The Rings.

My lung hadn’t changed btw, and he recommended inhalers to help my voice and breathing, so let’s try that then.

I didn’t realise I hadn’t written anything for a week until a lovely  friend texted me to ask what the score was

I think that when I’m down it can manifest in apathy, including ‘ bothering ‘ to write anything here.  My memory has also seemed to desert me too, I’m forgetting all sorts of stuff that I classed as engrained in my brain

The news is that I’m home, and have help to make that possible, courtesy of a lady called G who is helping me. My stay in hospital definitely led to an almost complete lack of positivity, that almost led me to the end of my road. I’m still definitely not ‘ ok’ but I’m better than I was a week ago for sure, better being defined as actually wanting to bother being alive. I’m struggling to ‘ be myself ‘ with full awareness of my being very subdued in every way.

I’m engaging in counselling though, to see the light in the dark and we’ll see what happens.

Yesterday’s trip to the theatre was a bit spoiled by the torrential rain in London- jeez you get wet when sat down rather than standing up. I’m not sure whether my ‘ mood ‘ made the play not very entertaining, or whether if I saw it again I’d really like it? I’ve liked all the other Pinter plays I’ve seen, a lot..

ive had my wheelchair semi serviced which has improved my posture a bit, though I do need a new one. That doesn’t happen quickly though so it’ll be the spring before I actually get one that’s made for me ( measured and suitable for me) I think.

Today I saw my lil brother and Mandy – thanks for dropping in, as in driving from Wales (!) and have had Wendy here this weekend, being her lovely self. What a totally giving and sensitive girl she is. I’m lucky to have her in my life, for sure

Tomorrow I have more medical appointments, including the results of that lung scan I had recently. I’m definitely aware that my breathing is shallower, and my already weak voice is of late weaker still, so something is up I’d say.

Im forcing myself to exercise, with the various means I have for that, and bought a speedball to punch. Wendy and I attached it to a wall- her first encounter with a drill, but she excelled as always. Yes, it’s still on the wall, and have used  it every day ( 3 days in total mind ) It’s obviously fitted low down, too low for another person to use, unless that person is a boxing midget of course. Thanks to G for the loan of her (pink ) boxing gloves which have saved my knuckles for sure, and go with my metrosexual gender neutrality

In the endeavour of keeping on keeping on, we are going to a gig tomorrow in Brixton that I booked ages ago. Sigrid is 18 and so very talented.

And I now have a pet.. a little friend that’s  non judgmental etc. She seems to be warming slowly to me, though her activity isn’t yet at normal speed I’d say , as she gets used to her new home.. watch this space for pet updates then.

🙂

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.

❤️