The Specialist.....

is pleased, and does not want to see me again until December. The flip side of this is that what I have then will be all that I will get! So be it.

I have also started swimming again - Tonbridge School has opened its swimming pool and other facilities to the public - on payment of quite a decent sum, actually, but I think it will be worth it.

I have also started digging again so we may get a few beans this year, but I am putting most of what I have down to soft fruit, so we shall probably have to get a new freezer if it all works out.

And if that sounds hopeful, you should see my gait, which needs sorting out. That is what the physio is all about, but I have had to learn to walk again, and I am just past the toddler stage. I always thought that there was something about a bottle....

About all for now. All visitors and messages welcome.

Further progress!!

It's a month since I last posted. Progress is monthly, rather than daily, but it is still there. I am now walking around the house without sticks, and have progressed to the grounds. There is still the problem of risking my knee giving up whilst walking down stairs or down a slope, but that is a symptom of what I have actually done, which is damage my right femoral nerve. When that happens I fall over which creates consternation among all around, but I have practised falling over and rolling, rather than crashing to the ground. The nerve is slowly reconstituting itself, but I guess it will take many months to recover fully. Still that is the stimulus I need to keep on doing the exercises 3 times a day.

Jonathan Nicholson, from Cayman, visited the other day, which was very nice, and Tim and Lorna from South Africa did likewise yesterday. It is always nice to have visitors from abroad, as I am not keen on the long walk to the aircraft that always seems to be my lot. And they never give me the electric trolley - it is always the wheel chair with a frail young lady to try and push me along.

About all for now - we see the specialist next week, when I may have some more things to say.

Getting on

Well, progress has slowed up - or so it seems. The physio seems satisfied that she can see improvement, and I suppose that over 3 weeks she may be right, but I should like it to go faster. Sleeping seems to be the problem at the moment - I get cramp and wake up about once an hour throughout the night. I get some quinine pills today that I hope will sort it out. I would have thought gin and tonic would be a better source of quinine, but you cannot get a prescription for that. Otherwise life goes on satisfactorily. I am driving quite happily now, which is a great relief. And I see the physio again in about 3 weeks, which will be the next entry unless things happen.

Further improvement

As expected, the physio has given me more exercises, but I am now getting around the house without sticks. A bit ungainly, to say the least, as there are a lot of atrophied muscles to be built up, and some nerve fibres to be regenerated before I am walking as freely as I would like.

However, we went to Cardiff a week ago and stayed at the St Davids Hotel on Cardiff Bay. Recommended! Luckily Sonia is quite happy doing long distance motorway driving, as although I am driving, I find sitting too long in one position induces cramp, which is embarrassing at 70+ m.p.h!

I am also finding the Blue Badge that I persuaded Kent County Council to issue to me is a boon and a blessing. Parking on yellow lines with impunity is a luxury that I shall find hard to give up. But it means I can go anywhere, really, and do my own shopping. You also get the best parking spots in the hotel car parks, and such like.

So, all in all we are getting there. All phone calls are still much appreciated, though, as are suggestions for lunch at pubs and so forth. I just wish that the sun would shine for longer than an hour at a time!

Better and Better!

Saw the consultant yesterday - he seemed pretty pleased and gave me the OK to drive, even though I still have little movement yet in direction that I want it. But where there is a will there is a way, and I drove to the allotment today and finished pruning the raspberries. All very positive. I still have to do the exercises though - 4 times a day, with promises of more. But definitely a move in the right direction.

Further Progress

Actually progress is difficult to follow if you are the subject being monitored and also doing the monitoring! But the physioterrorist who only sees me once a fortnight seems satisfied. I now have a programme of exercises that take about 20 minutes that I have to do four times a day. I am discovering muscles that I never knew I had, and also finding muscles that refuse to do what I ask them to, which is disappointing. But there is now very little sciatic pain, except at night, and the main problem is muscles that have been underused for nearly 9 months, and have become atrophied. Walking to the pub is now quite easy, with 2 sticks, and I actually went to the allotment yesterday and tied in the loganberries. The next task is to cut out the remainder of last year's raspberry canes and have a huge bonfire. And after that I have to sow seeds and so on. Fortunately last year before all this happened I decided that more of the plot needed to be put down to soft fruit, so that there would be even less digging, and now three quarters of the area has fruit bushes on it. There will be more by this time next year!

I go to see the man in the white coat on Tuesday, and he will tell my fortune. I suspect that it will be pretty uninformative, and that I shall be told that so far as he is concerned, I am doing OK and it is now down to the physio to do the rest.

Continued in our next, which will be after the consultation.

The Village has been reached!

Well, I managed to reach the village this week on 3 separate occasions. The pub was not open on a couple of days, and I had forgotten the wherewithal when I got the timing right. One of the things that one forgets is to put all the usual stuff in one's pockets when one is dependent on a third party to get one from A to B. So we learn.

This weekend is the Brain of Bidborough Quiz. I got inveigled into writing the questions, but that apparently means that I have to deal with all the stroppy people who come and complain that they got the answer sufficiently correct to be given the point even if they have been so wide of the mark that they are in the next parish. I shall attack then with my sticks!

Continued in our next...........

p.s. The spell check on this site suggests that for 'Bidborough' I really meant 'Bedbug'!