looking forward

2014 was a challenging year for me, for us.
My attitude tended to veer towards un-acceptance. Frustration. Sorrow.

But the earth kept on spinning round the sun. And now it is January once again.


For once, I'm not gonna try to "turn over a new leaf". 
The world doesn't change, we change.
Not who I am, but how I feel about myself.
About this. 

So this is 2015.

Where the past year was a collection of endless endings, then these months just about to unfurl will be surely marked by new beginnings.
Where the past year was tinged with a deep rooted despair, then we step forth into the blinding light of this new one with a renewed sense of hope.

So this is 2015. Welcome. 

*****

Inspired by the gorgeous words of Rachel Violet: 

"Despite all the heartaches this last chapter has brought me, as 365 blank pages unfold I am filled to the brim with hope that day by day we will all be reunited with our health, happiness and love."

looking back

As the old year passes, I take to the hills. Not literally, not physically. But in my mind's eye. 

Drifting off into that place between waking and dreaming, there is no real time to mull over 2014 before I surrender to sleep. No need really either. These past twelve months, I've done enough mulling to last a lifetime.

But it's good to take a cursory glance back across my shoulder, back down the mountain of the year. For it is only now that I can see it has all been worth it, that I did the right thing to keep going, to keep on hoping and not bail out when the going got tough.

That is what 2014 has taught me, to keep on going...no matter how slowly.

Because as is often the way out in these mountains, it's only when you've slogged for hours up that hillside, worked through the sweat and the tears to stand high on the crest with the sun on your face that you can truly measure just how far you've come. 

Here on the cusp of the mountain, it's finally easy to see where I've been...and where I'm going next...

Joining in with these gorgeous and inspiring girls: 

Anna: Health doesn't equal happiness

Faye : 10 Things I've learned in 2014

Katharine: What 2014 taught me

already

December, already. With it's misty mornings and first sprinklings of snow. I've not been well of late, and have been spending seemingly every waking moment either curled up in bed, or nestled in an armchair by the fire.

November began full of intention and plenty of exciting projects on the go, but quickly trailed off into a mist of extreme fatigue, aches and foggy head.

Things are a little better than those first few weeks I spent camped out in our sitting room, sleeping pretty much day and night by the fire. But there's still not much energy around these parts just now, and I'm having to listen to my body and pull right back. 

So work has sadly had to come to an end for the foreseeable future. And not a lot of spinning or knitting either.

Instead, plenty of home-made tisanes to keep the fluids up, snuggling up on our woollen mattress, heaped up with woollen blankets and a podcast or two in my ears when I'm feeling up to it.

starfish

There are times when it can feel as if the rough and tumble of life has left us washed up on the rocks, forgotten in the sand by the retreating tide. Just like this little starfish I found on the foreshore last weekend. 

But just as on the foreshore the tide will always turn, so too in life things will inevitably change. It can be hard to stay calm whilst we're waiting. Sometimes it's easy to loose perspective and get swept away by such feelings, to feel as if we'll be marooned forever. 

It's at times like these we have to hold on tight to all the good things we have. To remember that we are not alone. And to acknowledge that all things must pass. Even the really hard stuff. 

And sometimes when all that is to hard, we have to surrender and let those wonderful people who are there by our sides look out for us. Let them pluck us from the sand and safely put us back in the sea, as it were. Because we are all holding each others lives. And together we can get through the strongest of tempests.

All things will pass. Just as everything will be ok. Because he is by my side. As he has been for the past five years.  

tarte aux pommes

A bowl of apples from our secret orchard were turned into a delicious (gluten and dairy free) tarte aux pommes in the hands of my chéri. Just the thing to raise the spirits on a particularly poorly day at the end of last week. 

(Needles to say, it was so delicious, there wasn't time to photograph it before *abracadabra* it had been magicked away...)  

in equal measure

 

Day and night in equal measure. Enough rest, not too many worries. 

From it's daily rising to it's setting, the sun doesn't hurry across the sky. She takes her time, going at her own rhythm. No need to rush, her daily path is already drawn. 

As we gently slide into autumn, it's the moment to take heart from the sun, to slow down and put balance at the centre once again.

Location: Messanges beach, at sunset. (Les Landes)

standing still

We went to Lourdes and had a picnic by the lake. 

A kingfisher darted back and forth, nothing more than a flash of russet and bright blue skimming across the limpid waters. 

But not everything in nature rushed around. A heron stood for over an hour, poised and concentrated, waiting patiently for the right moment. 

Not everything in nature rushes around. Why should I? 

back to school

September already. With it's comforting feeling of both newness and familiarity. I am easing myself in slowly to the new school year. 

We've been adjusting to the new timetable, the darker morning starts. I have to pinch myself nearly every day at the thought that I'm back in that classroom doing what I came here to do: teach languages to young and old. 

Given what happened last time, I've been understandably a little nervous to start again. Only difference from this year to last, I'll be setting the pace this time around. 

easing in slowly

September already.  N came back from a mountain walk earlier today, his arms full of parasol mushrooms - my favourite kind of bouquet! And a sure sign that Autumn is loitering...but not yet here.

I'm slowly beginning to resurface from the month that's been, gently easing back into a new, slower, everyday pace.  
 
I am so grateful for a brand new month, for slightly better health and improved mood, for scrumping in apple orchards and for gentle afternoon walks, for freshly washed sheets and home-made summer vegetable soups. 

And I am grateful to have emerged from the haze of the cure into the golden, sun-drenched daze of late summer.

la cure

July and August. 

For the French, these are the holiday months. Suncream. Straw hats. Ice creams. Coffees on pavement cafés. Apéros on the balcony. Festivals and village fêtes stretching long into the night.  Market stalls groaning under the weight of plump, sweet summer fruits. Peaches, nectaries, plums, apricots, strawberries. Melons. 

For me this year, July and August have been a time to emerge from my hibernation. To slow down, take stock. And finally get looked after. 

Daily baths in thermal pools. Hosed down. Plastered in hot, stinky, thermal mud. Balneotherapy. Physiotherapy. Group therapy. 

Eating better. Sleeping better. Walking better. Living better. Feeling (a little) better. 

As hippy-dippy as it might sound, my time spent up at the thermal baths has felt like a re-birth. 

It hasn't cured me. Sadly nothing will do that. But it has helped me to accept the situation. Myself. My life now and my life in the future. 

At the end of July, I was waiting for the baths, a downtrodden and defeated English girl. At the end of August, I've emerged a more confident, more hopeful English girl, who's now a little more French around the edges. (After a month as a curiste, it would be impossible not to feel a little more gallic, after all).

July and August. The holiday healing months. Healing my body. Healing my mind. Healing my soul. Three weeks up at Barèges. Hours spent being pampered. Making wonderful new friends. Dreaming of other possibilities...

Days saturated with mud and water and golden summer light.

be kind

Be kind to your sleeping heart.
Take it out in the vast field of light
And let it breathe.'               
Hafiz

During group therapy at the thèrmes today, we were encouraged to think about being more "kind to ourselves". The psychologist asked us to share with the group the things that make us happy, that help us to be kind to ourselves.

Knitting and spinning were of course at the top of my own list. Whilst I learn to find my own rhythm once again, it looks as if there might be a lot more woolcraft going on around here for the next few months. 

taking the waters

Summer pasture lands just above Barèges, July 2010

And finally,
the big day comes.

I get up later than expected from my after lunchtime siesta and trundle over to the Tourist office in our village. The bus for the thermal baths is slowly filling with patients when I arrive ten minutes later. 

The driver takes us up the Barèges valley, along the road to the col du Tourmalet. We overtake panting cyclists wishing to measure themselves against the greats. 

Ten minutes later, we arrive in the spa of Barège, a long, thin village clinging to the hill slope along the river Bastan. The thermal baths have been here for over three hundred years. 

French people have been coming here every year to take the waters. To be taken care of. To find healing and peace in the shadow of the mountain, beside the bubbling brooks and thermal springs.

And finally.
Today it is my turn.  

graduation

July 20th 2012. Graduation Day. Truly one of those "once in a blue moon" sort of days.

A day we thought would never come.

It was a day of euphoria for me and my family. Rightly so. We had come so far together, overcome so many difficulties.

I can remember on the day being washed along in a tide of immense and deep founded joy: the relief at having finally finished, the pride of achieving First Class Honours, the fun of swishing about town in my billowing gown, the support of my parents who helped me to get there, the encouragement of my big brother and sister who had blazed the trail long before me.

Now when I think back to that day, the thing that makes me happiest is to look at the picture above, to see myself, almost indistinguishable in the crowd. Sat beside my peers, not in a room all on my own.

For once looking normal, just like everyone else.

en attendant le bain

J'ignore completement combien de temps j'attends le bain. Un mois? Un an? Plutôt seize...

Mais je sais ça fait longtemps. 

Malgré l'espoir que pourrait evoquer le terme français pour les soins-thermaux pour une anglaise - une cure - je sais qu'il ne s'agira pas d'une guérison spectaculaire. 

Mais n'empeche que ça va me faire du bien. D'être soigné. D'être écouté. Comprise. Accepté.

La semaine prochaine, ce sera le jour-J. 

※※※ 

I don't exactly know how long I've been waiting for something. Anything. A month? A year? More like sixteen...

Despite the French name - "la cure" - I know a month in thermal water won't cure me. But it might make me feel a little better. To finally be taken care of. To be listened to. Understood. Accepted.

Next week will be D-Day.

hibernation

I feel a bit like I've spent the last lingering weeks of spring and the reluctant start of summer in hibernation.

The past few weeks have been quite intense, yet also very revealing. Since getting back to France my general state of well-being seemed to take a bit of a dip...which then turned into a nose-dive through June. 

Fatigue but also a whole heap of other symptoms means that it was important for me to prioritise rest and really look after myself. I've ended up deliberately going into hibernation by taking to my bed and rarely going out for the past few weeks.

Thankfully after months of feeling very bemused by the apparant lack of recognition, understanding and support for my illness (M.E./CFS) since moving to France, we've tried a new GP with an enquiring, problem solving mind. After much questioning, prodding and poking, she's pinpointed another condition - Fibromylagia - as the root of my current dip in well-being.

For the time being, I need to rest up and take some time to really be kind to myself, continue eating wholesome, organic, gluten and dairy free food, as much oily fish as possible and get out in the sun whenever I can. In the meantime, she's organising a five week course of specialised treatment just up the valley at our local thermal station.

Apparently it might take quite a while for me to start getting properly back on my feet again. But I must admit that it's an enormous relief to finally know what has been going on, and that finally perhaps the French don't collectively think I am a malade imaginaire  after all...

So for the time being, I shall be taking a brief hiatus from writing here. We are off tomorrow for a gentle adventure across the south of France to go to my dear friend's wedding next weekend. And I'm sure I'll need some time to recover quietly and slowly once we are back in our green mountains...

A très bientôt!

living without

Casting my eyes over the plate I see a colourful landscape - the steamed courgettes, the quinoa and split peas, the nuts and the seeds, the buckwheat and chestnut flour bread. Not an ounce of meat. Not a grain of wheat. Not a drop of milk.

Not so long ago, I wouldn't have thought it possible to make something so delicious with so many missing ingredients. Whilst we've eaten pretty much vegetarian for over four and a half years and our diet has never been heavily reliant on processed items, we had a handful of ingredients that always made the top spot on the weekly menu.

And so we've been exploring different ways of living and eating, starting by abandoning those French staples of bread and cheese.

Three months ago, we decided to finally take the plunge and see whether living without gluten and dairy would make living with M.E./CFS and Fibromyalgia any easier. We decided to overhaul our diet not so much in the hope of a cure but rather as a conscious decision to choose a path of food as nourishment, possibly even medicine.

The initial fallout, both physical and mental, was not pleasant as our bodies readjusted. Without the shop bought cakes or biscuits when the afternoon energy dip came, I had to reach once more for a piece of fruit or a handful of nuts.

Breakfast time was initially the hardest and I cursed as food preparation became laborious. I felt especially burdened by the lack of ingredients, choices and alternatives available to us here, halfway up a mountain. Gluten and dairy free products are not as developed or easily available here as in the UK elsewhere and so for a few weeks we were having to make everything from scratch. In order to keep the fire of change burning, we expanded our modest library of wholefoods literature. And most importantly, we kept talking.

It certainly has been a time of much reflection and discussion.

To be continued...

overdoing it

It had become a familiar pattern. At least once a week I'd miss one of my morning or afternoon resting slots, choosing to begin a new project or lingering on a task instead. Often this missed rest slot would pass unnoticed and I'd feel a secret inner feeling of glee as I was able to carry on regardless. "See, no need for resting after all. What a waste of time..."

Often it started with one missed rest. But then the following day, I'd skip all rests. And perhaps do an hour or two too much of teaching. Or "forget" to go to bed early. Other times, I'd "forget" I needed to turn the computer off after dinner and slowly wind my body and mind down ready for bed. This would then of course throw my whole rhyme out of kilter, muck up my sleep pattern and make me become exhausted and anxious.

The new doctor is of course right. 

Somehow, I must break this cycle.

Somehow, I must slow down.
Somehow, I must learn to listen to my body again.

It's just that for some strange reason, in my mind listening to my body equals acceptance of the situation, which somehow suggests giving in to this bothersome illness.

{Yummy organic veggies from the weekly farmer's market}

a diagnosis

Early July.

Am sat in the doctor's consulting room, a swarm of butterflies fluttering around my stomach. On my lap, a pile of tangled threads, my knitting lies forgotten. In my hand, I grip the piece of paper in my hand tightly. In the years I've been sick, I've never particularly liked going to the doctor. It's even harder doing it in French. 

I'm beckoned into the consulting room and the doctor takes the blood test results from my hands, scanning them quickly with a knowing eye. I'm invited to hop up onto the bed, where she proceeds to take my blood pressure, before poking and prodding me in a variety of places on my body. Some illicit a dull ache, whilst others are particularly tender under the pressure from her fingers. She signals for me to return to my chair opposite her. She taps away at the computer for a few moments before asking me questions about my sleep patterns, energy levels and general feelings of well-being.

If you are British and you've never had the pleasure of going to the Doctor in French before, remind yourself what it felt like taking your French GCSE oral exam. Except that the symptoms you are describing are real (and in the case of M.E./CFS, the brain fog can make your thinking less than clear), not icons on a printed examination card, and the person you are talking to is both your local GP, not your French teacher.

Because after struggling to find any support, medical or otherwise, for the past two years, I finally dragged myself out of the house to try a new doctor earlier this afternoon. I went into the surgery a nonchalant English girl with a self-diagnosed M.E./CFS relapse, convinced all she needed was some bed rest and a lemsip.

Forty-five minutes later, I emerged from le cabinet medical looking just that little bit more gallic thanks to a confirmation of Syndrome de Fatigue Chronique, a diagnosis of Fibromylagie...and crucially, a list of prescriptions as long as my arm...including "une cure".

{Photos from a barefoot walk up at the plateau de Saugé, early July 2013}

letting go

If my eyes follow the lines of my arm as it extends beyond my body, they arrive at my hands. Both closed tightly.

If I were to peek into one of the hands, inside I would see everyone and everything I hold dear; my family, my beloved, my friends. But also my personal successes, big and small, my precious memories. 

Now if I were to examine the other hand, I'd see the fingers are clenched so tightly over into the palm, the knuckles are almost white. In this hand sit my life-long and more recent dreams. My secret longings, my most bitter jealousies. My joys but also my sadnesses. My hopes for the future but also my present despair.

With my fingers of both hands wrapped so tightly around these, I can open neither my hands nor my heart to anything else. As if I'd somehow loose myself if I dared to offer them up.

All that I hold in both these hands are part of me. I guard them jealously, unwilling to let them go. And yet.

No one is asking me to let go of my loved ones. No one can take away all that I have achieved. But perhaps I am hanging on too tightly to the other stuff?

If only somehow I could have the courage to loosen my grip, to let go of one handful? Then one day I would wake to find an open palm resting by my side, free to be filled with other possibilities. 

snakes and ladders

 The occupational therapists called it "boom and bust". I prefer to think of it as "snakes and ladders". 

When I moved over into that other place, the land of the sick, I became a player in a never ending game of snakes and ladders. Some days I jog along fine, seemingly unaffected. From time to time an obstacle blocks my path but by dogged determination and perseverance, somehow I overcome. All the time, I'm moving forward. Perhaps a little behind my fellow players. But I'm advancing all the same. 

There are even days, sometimes months, when as if by magic the universe seems to roll me double sixes and I shoot up ladder after ladder without a backward glance. It seems like I'm on the cusp of winning and I can hardly believe my luck.

Then all of a sudden I glance down the path and there's a gurt big snake sunning itself in my way. Before I know it, I slide all the way back down its slimy back and find myself further back from where I started.


When these setbacks occur, as they inevitably do, it's hard to not regress back to childhood and behave like a toddler. You want to sulk and have a tantrum. You wish you were playing a different game. You're angry that everyone around you seems to be doing better than you in their game, having more fun. You shout and bang your fists, hoping to knock their counters off the board but this only serves to set you back even further. 

Of course, there is another way. Instead of being a bad looser and spoiling things further, you can keep your calm, pick up the dice and roll again...