The Disability Diaries - Are coming back

It has been just over a year since I last posted on Lynsey The Mother Duck.  As explained in my last post, Beginnings, I wanted to take the little time I have available to start writing a first draft and to start a book review blog.

I am pleased to say I have managed to achieve both of those things, I am in the process of writing a first draft, via a structured course with Retreat West, and my review blog The Very Pink Notebook, has just celebrated it's one year anniversary. 

2016 proved to be somewhat of a stressful year for the length and breadth of Britain and for our family there was no exception.  It was a year for forcing the hand of change, with that came positives and negatives.  The biggest change was probably our move from England, across the bridge to Wales, and I am pleased to say it has been very positive. 

As is usual with any move, from a parental point of view, the biggest source of anxiety came from changing the children's school.  However, both boys have adjusted to the change amazingly well. 

J1, the little 4lb, 8 week premature baby that once fitted in my vest for kangaroo care, turned into a teenager at the end of last year, and some days we do see this...

Kevin the Teenager

(picture : wtffashionshark.com)

...which, given all his disabilities is, for us, brilliant news!  But a heck of a lot is going on with him at the moment and it is for this reason I have the compulsion to start writing on this blog again. 

So, I think I am going to bring back The Disability Diaries.  These are posts, written from the heart, about my real life experience of caring for a child with severe physical disabilities.  From the heartbreaks to the triumphs.  From the kindness of strangers to the fights over services and accessibility.  Written to help raise awareness of the day to day struggles a family can go through but equally to express the joy that can only be felt, when your eyes have been opened to a whole life you was not expecting.

  

 

Wowzer

Where does the time go?  Seriously.  I have just noticed it has been almost three months since I last gave the blog any attention.

 

Dear blog. 

 

Sorry.

 

Regards, Lynsey The Mother Duck.

 

The last three, beautiful, summer months have been fun, fast and furious.  The school six week break flew past.  Our Mexican holiday was enjoyed and too soon became a wistful clutch of memories and photographs on the wall.  J1 enjoyed respite and quiet at his grand-parents by the seaside, while J2 indulged in some parental one to one time.

 

The count down to J2 starting school turned from months, to weeks, to days until eventually the school uniform was donned and the battle of walking to school commenced.  My mother asked if I shed a tear when my littlest hobo took those first tentative steps into school.  My response?  Hell no!  I delivered him, waved goodbye and left the playground doing a Friends, Chandler-style victory dance!

 

I love my boy as much as any mother could but he was so ready to go to school and honestly, I was glad that the time had come.  He was desperate for more.  More stimulation, more company, more knowledge.  More than I could give him on my own.  The time was right and he is loving it.

 

For me, having both children at school is something I have openly looked forward to.  However, it has still taken me these last few weeks to get used to.  The first week, from the minute I left the school I did not stop.  I had lists of house projects that I was determined to get done.  And get them done I did.  I was glad I had allocated September for 'Project Clean Up'  My home is more in order than it has been for, probably, the last 10 years.

 

I knew unless I did it first I would not feel comfortable kick starting the writing effort.  As I turfed out cupboards, ordered units and gadgets to assist with the mammoth sort out I started to feel overwhelmed by just how I was going to achieve my writing goal (GOAL : to have a first draft written and the first three chapters polished ready for The Festival of Writing in September 2015).  The Fear started creeping in.  As I de-cluttered more and cleaned harder I started to procrastinate.  I avoided going into my Writing Room.

 

As my house 'to-do' list shrunk, my panic grew.  I had waited almost three years for this time to become a reality and I was freezing up.  Then an email came through.  An email inviting applications to join in a six month project.  A six month novel writing project.  It was a beacon of light guiding the way.  A supportive, helping hand being offered. 

 

I applied.

 

I was successful.

 

So, suddenly I am doing it.  Writing a first draft in six months.  A week in and we have been served with foundation exercises that I have never considered spending the time doing before, but already I can feel has helped develop and grow my plot, idea, setting and characters.  It is fantastic to be learning again too.  I am doing things I will definitely do and use in the future.  I love how we have a calendar and schedule, anyone that reads my posts will know I am a routine and structure lover.

 

I have asked myself why didn't I think of that before?  Well, it's all new to me, novel writing, not the idea but the actual physical production of it.  Yep - hand up!  Newbie alert!  I have done the usual jump in writing, get to 20k and stop.  But I have never actually stopped and given the time to do the background work, probably ignorantly thinking the time would be better spent writing.  How wrong was I.  As I said, I am learning a lot already.

 

So, wowzer!  I am actually doing something I set out to do.

 

I am writing.

 

I am writing, a novel.   

 

My novel writing course is with the lovely Charlie and Amie at http://www.urbanwritersretreat.co.uk/