The cause? The British weather. I had been hoping to get down to the fish shop today to buy some fresh prawns for a curry. However the Mean Machine (my electric scooter) doesn't like the wet.
When I got up all was dry outside. By the time I'd had a wash it was wet. I had breakfast - dry & turning sunny. Maybe after all I could go. I get my coat on, find some cash, get as far as the garage door & the sky turns grey & threatening. What to do? Go or not go?
I finally decided it is only sensible to get something out of the freezer instead. So I go back inside & get on with preparing some of the Fox's new potatoes to have with some salmon this evening. Well, it's still fish & probably better for us with all that omega-3 oil, than the cholesterol-filled prawns. Mind I'm still hoping to get the prawns for tomorrow instead. Needless to say, the rain has so far failed to materialise. Typical!
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I was perturbed to hear on Channel 4 news yesterday that they have now decided to read blogs & Facebook in the hope of catching out benefit frauds, especially when it comes to disability claims. Is this why I've still not heard about my DLA renewal? Should I be writing, if I continue to write this blog, crossing all the "t"s & dotting all the "i"s of the impact of disability on my life? What a bore to write & I should think what a bore for you, my readers, to read!
So let me state here & now, when I say I go for a walk, I mean I'm either in my wheelchair or the Mean Machine. Equally when I do something in the garden, I am usually sat on a wall, chair or stick/stool. The cooking is only done with the active support of the Fox. Showers are only undertaken when the Fox is around to help if I need him. Life is quiet, never much done, as the only way I can cope with things. And even then it would be impossible without someone, usually the Fox, being there to help, to get me up from chairs to go to the loo, to make me tea later in the day, to put me into bed. The bank & other administrative affairs are done by the Fox as I can no longer cope with the stress. Often I write in my blog that I hope to do things but that hope is often not achieved, but for me, that hope is a necessary coping strategy. Thoughts of suicide are never far from my mind, with the result the Fox is reluctant to leave me for long in case I make them into a reality. Without him working so hard to keep up my morale I would just sink into the pit of depression & not bother trying to get out.
Instead of writing about all this I tend to put a gloss on it, to concentrate on what I can do, not what I can't, for my sake as well as for yours. Just occasionally something gets to me. I have a particularly spectacular fall. I'm getting a lot of hassle with benefits. Something relating to disability changes in my life, then I will write about it. Being disabled doesn't have to mean being permanently a misery. Even suffering from depression doesn't mean that.
What, too, is not reflected is the amount of effort, & consequent pain & exhaustion endured, is necessary to do what I do. Equally I do not dwell on those consequences, such as, at the moment, I'm popping pain-killers like nobody's business & sleeping appallingly largely as a result of that DLA medical & the stress of still not hearing the outcome even though my DLA &, with it, my entitlement to a parking blue badge, disabled bus pass etc, all of which run out at the end of the month. The situation hasn't been helped having workmen in last week, having visits from the Occupational Therapist department, coping with the change of routine, & the stress of having a stranger in my home for 3 hours while the Fox does his Carers' course ( Don't get me wrong. I think he should go to the course. I dare say once I get a regular carer coming each week, which should happen from this week, things will get easier & less stressful.)
Having got all that off my chest I will now go back to writing about the more positive side of my life, about food & the garden with all its flora & fauna, of friends, of art, of trips out, of thoughts, of the whole myriad of wonders that can be life.
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