Miss most

So we have accepted that I am going in for major surgery .......... again. I really do seem to specialise in being opened up - I am thinking of asking them to insert a zip this time to make life easier if they need to do it again.

The things I am going to miss most? Well just one - my riding. I started on ponies when I was two. I know - it was a thing in our family - you got stuck on an equine before you could walk properly.

I spent most of my young life on a horse and only stopped because I had to do my exams and think about a career that didn't involve stables.

I went back to riding several times but my break of twenty years that has only just been stopped, is the longest time I have been away from horses in my entire life. So now I am back into it all, I am really really really pissed off that I will have to stop.

I haven't been riding for over a fortnight and if my calculations are correct, I won't be back on a horse again this side of February. This gives me plenty of time to forget all the Western stuff I have learned ................ just when I was making spectacular progress.

Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhh phooey! And just when I was going to get myself some decent boots for Yule.

At least I won't have to miss Tonto, my motorbike - he is laid up for the winter because I wouldn't be riding him in this weather anyway.

More meds please

And just because life is pretty fraught and not very funny at the moment ......... I have decided to take Dr W's advice and up my medication.

I am sure it will be a good step.

All go, innit?

So now we know

As predicted I am going to have to have an operation.

The gutman jumped up and down on my tummy, sucked his teeth and said "That's a bit sore" - that is why HE is a specialist and I'm not. I agreed but couldn't speak because I was wondering if I had bitten my lip hard enough to make it bleed when I tried to stop myself screaming.

He is a nice man - he is going to poke things up my bottom once my infection has cleared up with the help of half a ton of antibiotics per day. We have played this game before - you have to eat a silly diet for three days, take gallons of medecine which make you gallop to the loo and then go to hospital to have a camera shoved up yer ass.

Nice.

But they need to do that because they need to know how many metres of intestine is to come out. In three weeks I have my insides filmed and then straight after I will go to a hospital in Dijon to have my guts out.

Strangely enough I now feel OK - I have been on a major wibble for over two weeks knowing that this might happen. Life hasn't been easy and I have been torturing myself with the operation looming over me.

But now it is for sure, I am fine. OK so it won't be good, I can think of better ways to spend my pre-Christmas holiday but it is necessary and once I get rid of my ulcerated intestine I will be able to eat whatever I like and won't be prey to diverticulitis every couple of months with the risk of peritonitis which gets worse with every incident.

And with my usual luck I have arranged it that I will be operated on at the beginning of December (a year since my hysterectomy) and that will give me three weeks to recuperate - our two weeks usual holiday plus a week I am reclaiming from the summer when I was in hospital ............ again.

But I am OK - no sweat.

Being friends

It is very difficult to be friends with me - even more difficult to be even closer but just being my friend is very hard.

I am overwhelming - I do everything at 200 % - good, bad, happy, sad, positive, negative .... I go for all of it in spades. This can be very disturbing for my friends.

I am also a pagan - I attribute everthing to my gods and goddesses, I tend to speak about my deities as if they are mates who live here .......... any other pagan will accept this but other people will find it disturbing.

I expect my friends to be able to understand that Epona is as real in my life as any of you are. When there is a thunderstorm I expect my friends to accept that I will rush outside to greet Thor.

I look at the sky and talk to friends ............. you don't? OK I can accept that.


it is not easy - I appreciate those who try ............ some fall by the wayside ......... some stick with me...... some are scared to death but some, those very few precious people, can let me be me and still love me.

Positives

Understandably I am a bit low at the moment - despite the fact that from a Bipolar perspective I am on a dangerous "up", I am sad.

I am so "up" that my beloved Dr W is talking about upping my meds. I have been on the same dosage for two years and it is a very low dose. My reactions are too emotive, I am crying too often and I am in almost constant giggles.......... it's not good.

So tonight I am going to play the game I play with my students to make them feel good about themselves - the achievement game.

I can knit, sew, crochet, make all kinds of crafty things and turn junk into art. I can sing - I can't dance for toffee but I can sing very well. My cooking is appreciated.

I've fired a machine gun. That's a pretty big one. I've also won an assault course with my team - most people don't ever get to go on one but I competed with a military team and won.

I've touched a dolphin. I've stared into those big liquid eyes not a metre from my own and seen the intelligence there. I've cried my eyes out at the privilege of being able to touch a creature from another element.

I've never dived - because I have done a swan-dive off a cliff and fractured my skull, I have never been able to dive but I have snorkelled. I've had a Ballan Wrass knocking on my face mask and nearly drowned laughing at the face on the damn thing. I've nearly died of fright seeing a conger eel a couple of feet from me.

I've flown a plane. I used to think I wanted my pilot's licence but a few lessons showed me that I didn't - I really wanted to fly a helicopter but that wasn't an option so I gave it all up, but I have been in the co-pilot's seat doing aerobatics and I've flown a Cessna in the sky above Cornwall.

I can ride - I've ridden most critters that will give a lift to a passing human - horse, elephant, llama, camel, there isn't an animal on this earth that I don't love. I've had snakes around my neck and spiders in my hands ........ and I love my motorbike. Tonto and me ... like that, us. Love my bike.

I can sail a boat and ride a windsurfer - if it moves on water I can usually give it a whack. I've lived on a sailing boat.

When I was little and people asked me what I wanted to be it was always a toss up between "wanna be a cowboy" - well I'm kind of doing that now, "wanna be a pirate" - well I did that for over six years and "wanna be a highwayman" - well swap the horse for a motorbike and I am still kind of doing that.

Try this game - what can you do and what have you done - you might surprise yourself.

Guts

here we go again.

I have an appointment with the specialist in three days' time. Unfortunately, due to the fact that I have NO medication, I am in severe pain.

I went to work this morning, I did two very good telephone lessons, helped out a client with some tricky prep and then suddenly doubled up in pain. I was hanging onto the work surface in the relax room and couldn't stand up.

So now all my colleagues want me to go home but are worried about me driving myself for an hour. I tell them not to worry. I will go - I don't want anyone to take me and I certainly don't want the Old Feller dragged down here to leave a vehicle behind and take me home.

I make it back. I get down to the doctor. I eventually fight my way through a bloody host of reps (why they are allowed to wait in the consultation line like patients I do not know - they should have an out of consultation time system, not litter up our precious moments) and I got some medication.

All it took. A couple of Spasfon. That's all. I can shovel these down my neck for three days until I get to the specialist.

Blessed be.

Strange dream again

Last night the Old Feller and I were travelling in Russia, a country I don't know at all - this could be down to my recent shock of realising that I don't really know the French very well either.



We stopped at a place that had wooden chalets - now I know that this has come up a couple of times in the week with clients - they wanted to know the English word for chalet ........ underlining that there are SOME similarities.



A girl I recognised from work (not exactly a colleague but works upstairs) offered us a ride as there were horses at this campsite / centre. I was given an enormous horse but I wasn't at all afraid of him as I just knew he was a gentle giant - I was just frustrated that the reins seemed to have been fixed in such a way that I couldn't relax them. I had to use the gentlest of touches to guide the horse for fear of hurting him - is this me? Am I so scared of getting hurt again? Or am I too aware of hurting big people who seem hard but I know are very vulnerable.



That seems to be the case because later in the dream a young, brash man turned up, trying to tell me how to manage the horse. I stuck it for a while and then told him to shut up. He offered me beer from "home" - now that is weird, where is home these days? He meant beer from the UK. I didn't take it.

He cried when I told him I didn't want his help. He went from a Jack-the-Lad, cocky little shite to a snivelling wretch ............. a warning? An affirmation of my view of men? Are the gods agreeing with me?