Photo Sunday - My garden work starting to bloom

 Purple Sensation Allium - slowly opening

 

Blue Convolvulus Springing to Life

 

Hot Pink Geranium in Bloom

Special Saturday : Latest Achievement

Special Saturday is a great hashtag.  It encourages everyone with whom Special Needs features in their lives, to write about it, status check it, tweet about it and link up in order to try and raise awareness of living with Special Needs.  As you know I am always interested in any ways and means of raising awareness for this very reason (hence why I started The Disability Diaries) so I will be joining in this fantastic movement.

This weeks Special Saturday theme is 'Latest Achievement'.  I mention frequently that I am amazed and astounded at what J1 achieves on a daily basis, be it an attempt at rolling, or getting him to do just one extra movement during physio, reaching and pincer holding something or counting to 5.  He does so much that fills me with pride, that it is difficult to think of one thing to highlight.

However, I have got to say that this week, with it being half term, and obviously getting much more one to one time with him, he has opened my eyes to how much more he is comprehending.  A fabulous example to give of this is the 'Days of the Week'.  For some time now, thanks to his wonderful school and teachers, he has been able to recite the days of the week.  It has been in a parrot like fashion and this on its own has been pleasing. 

But, in the last few days we have had very clear and concise (again another improvement that I could only have dreamt about a few years ago) conversations about what is happening on particular days of the week.  In addition to this he has quoted the correct days when asked questions; that is - what was yesterday; what is today; what day will it be tomorrow. 

This extra ability to demonstrate real comprehension of such things is something, I have to admit, I did not think would ever happen.  He is starting to show real development in his mental capabilities that is just stunning to me.  Some of those things that I grieved he might never be able to do are now becoming a reality and other realms of possibility are starting to open up and become reachable.

I guess the moral of this story is, never underestimate what your child can do.

#specialsaturday.

The Disability Diaries (The Life of J1) : Dark Days - The Big Day : Marathon 2006

Final part in a series of 'Dark Days' posts for Disability Diaries Feature. 

View parts one, two, three.

Beating depression is a highly personal thing.  Unless your mind, your brain, your thoughts want to banish it there is nothing anyone else can do, or say to make any difference.  If you are lucky enough to dispatch it out into the great unknown, that does not mean that it is going to stay floating out in space leaving you in peace for the rest of your days. 

For me, having suffered with depression for a short period in my life - in reaction to discovering my baby boy had suffered brain damage, with the consequence being he is afflicted with the condition Cerebral Palsy - I feel relatively safe that I can keep depression at bay.  I think it would take something pretty huge and grandscale, like what happened to J1 to take me back to that stage.

But I am mindful.  I was obviously susceptible to a degree, otherwise I would have made it through that period without anti-depressants.  To that end I respect, more than ever, the power of the mind and the need to keep it healthy, as much as the need to stay physically fit in order to be able to care for J1.

I was helped out of my personal 'black hole' with the help of science, but also with the suggestion of some good old fashioned 'Health and Fitness'.  From this suggestion I fell in love with running for the first time and decided that I needed to face a challenge.  A real challenge that could try and give me some tiny, small insight into what sort of strength J1 would need to have on a day to day basis.

I applied for a Gold Bond place with a charity to run the London Marathon 2006 and was successful.  After months of training, that in my opinion now should have been much more dedicated, we found ourselves at that wonderful weekend in April.  The roads of London were closed off.  The Mall was adorned with Union Jack flags.  Hotels were booked up with crazy Marathon wannabes.

We decided to make a family weekend of it.  My parents booked us a family room at a hotel for three nights and on the Friday morning, packed like loaded donkeys we took J1 on his first train journey to London.  It was exciting from the start.  We had a packed weekend, starting with going to the Expo to register at the Excel centre. 

It was wonderful.  A world of running and adrenaline surrounded me as I went from one stall to another, ate pasta and picked up all of my equipment needed for The Big Day.  A chip for my shoe.  A running number.  A bag for all of my personal belongings with '2006 London Marathon' emblazoned on it. 

On Saturday we were invited to a Pasta Party with the charity.  It was a fantastic boost as I got to meet other runners and hear their own personal stories of what had brought them to this point.  J1 got an amazing reception and many attendees said meeting him reminded them even more it had been worth all the effort of training.  It was a beautiful afternoon so we took J1 for his first ever visit to Hyde Park and enjoyed the City of London.

Out of everything, the thing I was most worried about was making my way to the starting point for the Marathon.  I have zero sense of direction.  I needn't have worried.  As I left the hotel I found myself constantly surrounded by other running attired people and at that time of the morning on a Sunday very few others.  The tubes were opened freely for travel by runners as part of the Marathon and there was a wonderful, excited buzz on the journey. 

Once off of the tube there was a fair walk to the start.  It was a unique sight seeing all the different running vests bobbing along.  By some miracle, both colleagues who I knew were also running I bumped into on the walk and it was nice to see a familiar face.  It helped take some of the pre-start anxiety away. 

I decided to be sensible and use the bathrooms before I joined the masses to get through the start gate.  That is quite a feat in itself.  There are plenty of toilets, but the queues for them are massive.  When I see the overhead shot on the TV now it always makes me smile.  Again, everyone just found it an opportunity to chat to others.  By the time I got through that queue the bulk of people had made their way through the start, so I didn't have to wait long before the big starting arch was in my vision.

With a lurge in my stomach, I checked I had everything where I needed it.  Felt that the chip on my trainer was secure for the millionth time.  Started, stopped and cleared my own stop watch and gamely set off on my Marathon Quest 2006.

It was still super busy at the start so I couldn't get running until about a mile in, and the excitement of it all; the crowds rows and rows deep full of cheer and support; the television cameras; the bunting and advertising meant I was at Cutty Sark before I realised it.  The next marker was Tower Bridge.  Half way.  They register your time here on your chip so all I could hear was 'beep, beep, beep, beep' of the runners times being captured, a memory stored forever.  My next marker was the Charity Cheering point at mile 18.  I was starting to feel it by the time I reached this point and was glad to see my family and J1, wearing his 'Run Mummy Run' T.Shirt. 

I took the opportunity to change my shirt and pick up extra sweets here.  It had rained non stop from the start and I was saturated and chilly.  I don't know if the stop was the trigger to hitting my wall, but at mile 19 I walloped into it with force.  The next four miles were bleak.  It is a pretty dull part of the race with scarce crowd support (it might have been due to the torrential rain which had by now set in of course). I was back to be absolutely soaked to the skin. I was sick of my sweets and Kendal Mint cake.  I had had enough and wanted to give up.  In the darkness of one of the tunnels I stopped.  I wanted to sit down and never run another step again.  I wanted to get a lift to the end. 

It was here I realised the importance of having a strong mind when doing a distance like the Marathon.  I had ignored this element of it and now I was suffering.  I had to go back to my key thoughts of 'I have the ability to do this run or walk, my child does not.' 

I plopped a tear as I realised that I had no clue where I was.  No phone signal to get some moral support and the only thing I could do was carry on.  After this low the rain eased up a little.  Then I saw it, the magical sign for 23 miles.  My final marker before the end.  I had trained my mind to repeat the following mantra on long runs - 'Only three short miles to go.'  As I crept out onto Embankment the support from the crowd lifted again to the heights it had been at the start.  I decided to start jogging again.

Three miles, at 23 miles is not short.  But as the two mile marker came into view I couldn't help feeling a buzz.  I was looking forward to running up the Mall to the Marathon music and to meeting my family at the end.  Just as I was coming into the Mall I heard my name being screamed.  As I looked I saw my family had managed to get to the front. They had lifted J1 out of the warmth and dry of his buggy and was waving his arms around.  He was in hysterics  and loving it and this pushed me to sprint the final 'point two' miles. 

Going over the finish line was immense.  I donned my medal and spotted a photographer and thought 'I have to have this picture'.  Lovely volunteers were wrapping me in foil and giving me drinks and asking how I felt at completing the Marathon?  I didn't know.  I felt exhausted and elated but it hadn't sunk in that I had actually completed that challenge I set myself the October before. 

It didn't sink in for a while either.  Everyone else who had supported me were more excited than I was.  It felt great to get my photos from the race arrive, and to see my name in the list of finishers in the newspaper.  My work did a follow up article about how I did.  Nowadays it is something I look back and think wow, what an amazing experience - how did I do that?

After the Marathon I came off of the anti-depressants.  I went back to my proper work hours and our life had truly started to have routine, that included all the world of disability and we were coping.  As I say, the sadness of it doesn't go away completely.  But I had made my way through the grieving process and had finally got to acceptance.  That had taken longer than 26.2miles and had been far tougher than the Marathon.

 

What Has Made Me Cheerful This Week?

This post is a little later than normal as it has been quite a busy week.  As usual with The Great British weather, I learnt from the reports our run of sunshine was to be short lived, so I decided I had to make the most of it and get outside to have fun with the kids, garden and exercise, thus the blog took a bit of a back seat.

Then of course, the chilly days and rain set in and in amongst trying to get the house a little straighter I have managed to start putting together a few posts to get out this week.  So no better time, with the grey skies putting a bit of a dampener on the (extra) long Diamond Jubilee weekend, to think happy thoughts and sum up 'What Has Made Me Cheerful This Week?'

* We got the business accounts done for this quarter, always a weight off of the shoulders and a reminder that we shouldn't leave so much to the last minute.

* What better reason to be cheerful than the fact we had, not only a long weekend, but an 'extra' long weekend with the wonderful, and unique celebration of the Queens Diamond Jubilee.  I was thinking about this earlier, this really was a once in a lifetime celebration.  We had bunting.  We had flags.  We had a 'Very Royal High Tea', including using all our super special Royal Albert China (this is rare because I can't put it in the dish washer...)

* The blog hit another new month view record.  I am so happy that the blog is slowly but surely growing.  Not only that but I am getting more pleasure and satisfaction from writing the longer and more frequently that I am doing it, rather than growing tired of it.

* It is half term - always a reason to smile.  Extra time with J1 to be had with lots of fun planned, including a session in the sensory room that J1 loved on his birthday.

* The Hubby and I had a 'surprise' night to ourselves this week.  It was amazing, we laughed, talked, ate, played pool and really reconnected.  Something we had both said earlier in the week we felt had been a little lacking of late.  We won't leave 'us' time so long next time.

* I have managed to fit some form of exercise in almost everyday for the last week and it has felt amazing.  Mixing runs with non impact exercise, like swimming and cycling has really made me inspired to keep this going and I am now seriously giving the Marathon in 2013 consideration. 

On that high note I urge you to be inspired by others positive thoughts over at Mummy from the Heart :

The Disability Diaries (The Life of J1) : Dark Days - Getting Lighter!

Part three in a series of 'Dark Days' posts in the 'Disability Diaries' Feature.

For part one click here.  For part two click here.

At the end of the last instalment of Dark Days, I had got to a point where I was starting to cope with day to day life.  I still had bad days, plenty of them.  But with the help of the anti-depressants, getting back to work and a change to a more healthier lifestyle I found I was beginning to accept and acknowledge that life for J1 and I was going to be very different from what I had thought it would be.

During my move to a 'healthier lifestyle' I had set my sights on undertaking a Charity 'Challenge'.  I was investigating the possibility of signing up to trek the Inca Trail in Peru, with the aim of raising about £1800.  A good friend also wanted to do it and the first step, before parting with registration money, would be starting to get fit.

Due to financial constraints I decided to get fit I had to start running.  This was the source of many wry smiles from friends and family, for the main reason that I had always been rather vocal about being anti-running.  I did what I always do when starting something new; purchased some reading literature on it. I bought my first of many Running Magazines and I enjoyed reading it.  I gave me a lot of inspiration.

The most useful article I read was Top Things To Remember with Running.  The key point that stuck with me, and still does when I run today : The first ten minutes are the hardest.  I really clung onto this little pointer on those first few tentative runs.  I stuck to a 'complete beginners' guide, which encouraged building up slowly.  I would run for two minutes and walk for one.  Soon I found I was comfortable enough to run for four minutes and then six and then eight etc.

It was after a Saturday morning jog that I came home to find my mail on the door mat.  On a high from the exercise, I opened a large envelope from the charity I was hoping to do the trek for.  It was a large advertisement for one of their other 'challenges' and it made me smile immediately : The London Marathon 2006.  I knew instantly this was the 'challenge' for me.  I completed the registration form, found my chequebook and walked the application to the post box.

I didn't tell anyone but the friend that had shown an interest in doing the Peru trip.  He was happy that I had found something that had inspired me, and insisted that he still wanted to register for the Inca Trail.  I found some literature on Marathon training programmes and started to train against that.  I would not hear for sure if I had been allocated a place for the Marathon with the Charity until at least October so in the mean time I continued to build on my running and started to brainstorm fundraising ideas so that I was prepared.

I got the good news that I was going to be a London Marathon participant and euphoric told everyone.  I think my parents were happier that I would be staying in the UK than disappearing to Peru.  I had found my mum slowly starting to drop tid-bits of information in like 'Rather large spiders in Peru'.  Although I wouldn't be going abroad I still had to rely heavily on my parents for support for all the training hours I was going to need to put in and for the fundraising target I needed to hit. 

As with everything new all training and motivation started with gusto, but as the dark, cold nights started to draw in, going out for runs became less appealing.  I was also going out more socially, as I was feeling much stronger.  Although this was good in one way, it meant that I was drinking more, which was not conducive to focused Marathon training.  Long runs were missed due to hangovers. Evening runs were abandoned in favour of spending the extra time getting ready to go out.  Or I felt I couldn't ask my parents to have J1 as they had already looked after him so I could go out. 

Then two things happened that made me realise the importance and scale of what I was doing.  I had registered for my first run in the January.  It was a 10 mile race.  I wanted to get used to the etiquette of racing and thought it would be a good starting distance.  The race came around much quicker than I expected and suddenly I was faced with the fear that I was going to be participating in a race that I was just not ready for.  That filled me with dread.  What if I just couldn't finish and then was lost?  What if I came last?  Not only last, but so long behind everyone else that the organisers had packed up and gone home? 

At the same time the University where I was working ran a feature on a both myself and another member of staff running the Marathon in the monthly magazine.  It was a lovely piece and displayed a beautiful photograph of J1.  When this was published I noticed the donations on my 'Just Giving' page went up dramatically and small and large sums of money were being pledged by University staff, most of them I had never met, all with kind and supportive messages.  It came screaming home that what I had signed up to do was real.  It wasn't something I could just decide not to do.  I had committed to it and I needed to pull my finger out and get serious. 

Along with the Just Giving page I also did a few different fundraisers; the main one being 'Party in the Pub' - a childrens party for adults.  This entailed a 'crisp and sweet only' buffet (big hit); giant games (also a big hit) and bouncy castle (biggest hit!).  We held a raffle and did various other 'pay and play' games and this raised a huge chunk of my target.  The support was overwhelming, everyone believed that I could do this and it was time I started to think that way as well.

I am glad to say that I did complete the 10 mile race.  I also found that I loved the whole atmosphere of the event.  Other runners were so friendly, and immediately interested in J1's story and the reason I was undertaking the Marathon.  And it was the first time I really felt like 'A Runner' - and that was a label I liked.

After that I made a lot of effort to enter races, in a variety of distances as these were great motivation for me to get out training.  Looking back now with the benefit of hindsight, I was out training and getting races under my belt but I only within my comfort zone.  I only entered one half marathon and this really wasn't adequate.  My longest run was about 16 miles, not really long enough or frequently enough and in the end I just ran out of time. 

Whilst life almost became all about the Marathon for six months we were also making a lot of progress with J1 too.  We now had the official diagnosis and this made getting the help he needed easier.  I still do not know how those parents that care for children who remain undiagnosed cope. Along with appointments about equipment (always was and I fear always will be the toughest nut to crack), physiotherapy and speech and language therapy we also got access to a weekly hydro-pool session.  This session meant we met other parents of children with disabilities and special needs - a huge support. 

Soon April had arrived.  I was feeling mentally and physically much better than I had for a year.  I was proud that I had reached race weekend without injury and was looking forward to taking J1 to London for the first time.  I was elated that I had not only reached but exceeded my fundraising target.  I was ready to face my physical challenge of a lifetime, but never forgetting the lifetime of challenge that J1 was facing.