My Experience of Bell’s Palsy – 3

After the ED discharged me, my Dr picked me up once more and an appointment was made to see him a week after the initial event. My main concern by that time was the debilitating tiredness I was feeling but was told that this was exactly how I should be feeling as what I needed was total rest. Not just rest for a few days but for a whole month so my body could repair and heal. My body, he explained was fighting the virus, the meds and trying to put things right. After hearing that I understood and so just gave in to it all. The steroids were to continue as long as there was improvement and I was prescribed a months supply of antivirals.

I discovered over the following days that I could do small things that lasted around 10 minutes, any longer and I was totally wrecked and so I allowed myself one small thing a day and then only if I wanted to. Everything else either waited or got left out, there was nothing I needed to do except heal. I put myself under no pressure to do anything whatsoever. Anything that needed me to follow instructions, use a knife or heat was done under supervision. Needless to say I went nowhere near driving my car at all, I certainly would not have been safe to try and drive.

Very gradually over the next week my jaw began to move more normally and eating became slightly easier. At the same time my speech became harder to understand when I spoke at normal speed and some days I could feel my lips and teeth getting stuck on some letter formations and sounds. When I remembered, I tried to slow down when speaking. The real highlights though were realising I no longer needed the lid on the keep cup and then the fact I could drink out of a normal cup once again without ending up wearing the contents. Food still often ended up around my mouth as opposed to in it, but less and less as the days progressed. For some reason the hardest thing to eat proved to be ice cream. One happy day I even managed to eat fish and chips. Ok so I broke everything into small pieces but I still ate it.

I am not someone who gets sick, nor am I the kind of person who willingly does nothing yet here I was able to give myself up to the need to rest 100%. Usually I would have tried to push through, to accelerate the healing process, to deny my body what it needed above all else, which was the time to be still and to carry out the phenomenal healing that all of our bodies are capable of. This is something I do not believe I have ever done before but resting, being still and watching the smallest of changes take place gave me the incentive I needed to continue to do so. It helped of course that I had read in several places that trying to get the muscles working before they were ready and the nerve had healed could be counterproductive. I certainly wasn’t about to inflict any further damage upon myself.

There was also the additional benefit of being sick during a pandemic as even if I had wanted to work I wouldn’t have been able to as all therapy work, like most other sectors was closed down. I had no excuse not to rest, I wasn’t letting anyone down and nothing mattered except my own healing.

My Experience of Bell’s Palsy – 2

The steroids and antivirals given me by the hospital made me debilitatingly tired and I could do nothing at all, however small, without needing to sit and rest. Unable to read I dug out some headphones and listened to audiobooks. I say listened to but in reality they played away while I dozed in the chair. It is quite a weird feeling being totally wiped out and wired all at the same time but that is the effect the medication had on me.

I couldn’t drink out of a cup at all without dribbling it down me but luckily a friend had given me a keep cup with a soft travel lid and this proved perfect. Eating was a nightmare. Everything had to be cut up in tiny pieces and ideally soft. I could swallow and chew but because my jaw didn’t move properly I could neither chew nor swallow easily. Moving food around my mouth was tricky and eating anything took about four times longer than usual. My sense of taste was unimpaired, which I now understand isn’t always the case, but I had no interest in food at all. I did know though that I needed to eat to keep my strength up so somehow managed to get through anything that was put in front of me however long to took.

For the first few days my eye was very sensitive and so I fashioned an eye patch from an airline mask and wore this under my prescription sunglasses. I also found some wrap round sunglasses which I wore whenever I didn’t have my glasses on. I was mindful of any air movement and the need to protect my eye at all costs. After about three days, when I had the smallest of movement back in my eye and it became uncomfortable to wear it, the eye patch went but the glasses in some form or other remained at all times. At night I slept with my eye taped closed as advised by the eye Dr and wore another airline eye mask.

At the start of the pandemic I had set up a WhatsApp group for some of my past and present Reiki Masters so that we could support each other if needed. Little did I know at the time it would be me needing support. The day I had been rushed into hospital I had been due to work via Skype with one of my Reiki Master students and three days later had been due to meet one of my Reiki Master friends for a socially distanced coffee. Once these two knew what had happened they began sending me Reiki and a request was made via WhatsApp for the others to send.  Another friend asked to send me healing and once I gave permission began doing distance shamanic healing. I knew then that I was being well supported and could just relax.

Dozing one day I slipped gently into a shamanic journey which provided both healing in non-ordinary reality and a place I could go to rest and recover. I rested in this place every night when I went to bed, safe in the knowledge of all the support I was receiving from my guides and allies

Having worked as an energy therapist and shamanic practitioner up until the start of this  year there are more than a few things I have in my toolkit that I can still draw upon. In the kitchen cupboard I always keep two Australian Bush Flower Essences; Waratah and Crowea. Waratah is described as being for the ‘black night of the soul’ and is brilliant for depression and stress. I was not depressed but knew that I had had a huge shock. The body cannot begin to heal until the shock and trauma have left it so it was important to do something quickly to help this happen. I had also been warned to mentally prepare for the fact that 30% are left with some symptoms and 30% have no recovery.  This meant that I was aware of the need to mind my mental health and so I took a double dose of Waratah for the first few days. Crowea is a rebalancing essence and I knew the shock had thrown everything out of balance and so again I took Crowea for a few days checking in with a quick bit of dowsing to see how much, how often and for how long.

In my work over the years I have, on many occasions, used a singing bowl to help clients with nerve damage. As Bells Palsy stems from inflammation in the CN7 nerve or its sheath my husband worked around my head with the singing bowl for me, allowing it to breaking up any blockages it found and reconnecting the energy. Sometimes the singing bowl works hard and fast, at other times like this it works oh so gently. It always knows what it needs to do as long as whoever is working with it gets themselves out of its way and allows it to work.

I also used the tiniest amount of Better You Magnesium Skin body lotion twice a day around the muscles on the affected side of my face. I had no reason for doing this other than the knowledge that our muscles need magnesium to repair and so trusted it would do no harm. I have very sensitive skin and would usually avoid using anything like this on my face but needs must and my skin coped perfectly.

Prior to the onset of Bell’s Palsy I had been taking Zinc  B12. Knowing both Zinc and B12 can help with nerve damage I continued taking these.

Nothing major or immediate happened but over a week, very gradually the numbness around my mouth began to wear off and my jaw became easier. My eye became easier to close a little and although there was still a lot I couldn’t do, there was some slight progress which again helped me cope mentally with all that was happening.

My Experience of Bell’s Palsy – 1

I’ve been thinking long and hard about whether or not to post about my experience of Bell’s Palsy but having been through it and come out the other side I have decided to do so in the hope that it may help anyone else going through it themselves.  There are seven posts and I will be adding one each day now.

It all started very unexpectedly really, although looking back my eye had been sore for a couple of days and my sinuses had been niggly which was setting my teeth on edge. This was nothing new though as I get hay fever which at times sets off my sinuses, ear and teeth and so have had this all happen before. Then late evening, shortly before heading to bed, I noticed my jaw didn’t seem to be moving properly. I have a friend who dislocated her jaw once and so all I remember thinking was that I hoped I hadn’t done something similar. No pain so I went to bed.

The next morning when cleaning my teeth I realised my jaw wasn’t right and that I couldn’t open my mouth properly so spent a few minutes pulling faces in the mirror. Dressed and downstairs I realised my mouth now felt as if I’d had an injection like at the dentist and was quite numb. After this it all happened very quickly. The right side of my face then started to feel numb and I discovered I couldn’t close my eye unless I closed both of them.

My Drs, during the Covid19 pandemic, had set up a consultation form for non urgent tele or video appointments. Was this urgent? I really didn’t know. So I emailed them listing all that had happened and saying I didn’t know if it was urgent. I then sat down with my coffee and promptly dribbled it down me. This definitely wasn’t ok so I rang the surgery.

There was no hesitation, they were making a home visit and shortly afterwards my Dr and one of the practice nurses arrived in the rapid response car with blue lights going having called an ambulance while on the way.

Within minutes I had an IV line in, bloods and blood pressure taken, had pulled lots of faces showing what I could and couldn’t do and my speech had begun to slur. The prognosis was either a stroke or Bell’s Palsy but whatever it was I needed a CT scan hence the ambulance.

It turns out that being taken to hospital during the Covid19 pandemic is actually a good thing. ED was quieter than it would have normally been, no-one was waiting on trolleys and as soon as I was out the ambulance I was in a cubical and being swept up by the stroke team.

What followed were a lot more tests, a CT scan, fortunately clear, and the decision that it was Bell’s Palsy not a stoke. I saw the eye doctor, was given eye drops, a Vitamin A cream for night, tape to keep my eye closed at night, advice on how to protect it from cornea damage and a follow up appointment in case I needed it. The ED Drs gave me more tests for coherence and cognisance and five hours after I’d arrived I was discharged back to my own Dr with a heavy dose of steroids and antivirals.

At this point I knew next to nothing about Bell’s Palsy.

Practicing Self Care

Photo by Madison Inouye on Pexels.com

This year has been a bit of a shock all round what with lockdown, social distancing, hand washing, mask wearing, daily figures……….I could go on but you all know how it is and the effect it has on our mental health and in some cases on our physical health. Many of the avenues we would have used to practice self care have been closed off to us and where those have now reopened, or are in the process of doing so we may not wish to take the risk, however small of accessing them.

In the past when I needed to give myself some self care it would have quite likely taken the form of getting a hands on Reiki treatment as well as booking myself in for a massage, reflexology or something similar. Earlier this year though I had a health scare which occurred during lockdown so nothing like this was available to me which was difficult at a time when I was not well enough to fall back on my own resources.

One of the things that was gentle enough for me at the time was the free weekly guided meditation sessions via Zoom with Dzochen Beara. The other form of self care I used was to reach out to friends who could do distance healing with Reiki and Shamanic healing. Once I was feeling up to it I also began to join in a weekly Reiki self healing and found the group energy helped support me there.

Listening to my body, what it would allow me to do at any time, what it needed me to do come to that, focusing inward rather than outward and really paying attention to both my physical and mental health have been a really powerful form of self care. I used to always be reminding clients and students to do this and although it is something I have always tried to do I am not sure I have ever done so to this extent.

My self care so far has included, in no particular order:

• walking barefoot in the garden
• stepping outside to take in the fresh air
• opening all the windows for fresh air
• listening to audio books when I couldn’t read
• reading ebooks once I could read again
• allowing myself to sleep as often during the day as I needed to
• going for very short walks that gradually increased in length over time
• walking on the beach
• listening to music
• attempting not to get caught up in the news too much
• painting or drawing for no reason
• simply sitting and being still and not feeling I should be doing something
• using Reiki to support me at all times
• beginning to move my body again through gentle exercise – Feldenkrais, Somatic Yoga at first and now light resistance work
• giving myself permission to do whatever was needed
• recognising when I wasn’t ok
• letting others help me
• not reaching out to help others when I wasn’t really ok to do so
• putting my own health before everything else

I am sure there are other things I have been doing as well but underpinning everything has simply been listening to what I really needed and still need rather than letting my mind try and dictate to me. Self care at its most fundamental.

Navigating Difficult Times with the Web of Life

These last months have been difficult ones for all of us and it stuck me today exactly how many of the adverts popping up on Facebook are for Mindfulness courses and how much most of us are in need of support right now. Today I also read an article in an online paper relating to the growing popularity of Tarot and the fact that in these times of uncertainty people are turning to ancient practices both through therapy and as a form of practical advice and guidance as well as to provide support and comfort.

I have shared here before the Moon Books free ebook Weathering the Storm which is a great source of support but until I read about Tarot today, had completely overlooked suggesting my own Moon Books Publication Web of Life as a means of support in these challenging times.

Web of Life is a way of deepening your connection to the world around you, a modern way of accessing the ancient wisdom of the medicine wheel but one that is personal to you. Within the book are exercises that help you to understand how you connect to everything, plus where and how you can find guidance that is specific to you. There is also a way of making cards for yourself that can be used for insight, to plan a path or to see your way through a time in your life or even a project.

Working with the exercises in Web of Life will help you to learn more about yourself, how you connect to everything around you and can provide comfort through helping you to know exactly where you are and giving insight into what is happening.

I’m going to share a few reviews here to save you trawling back through posts to find them:

https://solitarypath.wordpress.com/2017/08/16/new-book-review-for-web-of-life/

https://solitarypath.wordpress.com/2016/11/28/shaman-pathways-web-of-life-review/

https://solitarypath.wordpress.com/2016/06/13/shamanic-web-of-life/

And of course if you feel drawn to work with Web of Life you can find it both as an ebook and paperback at Amazon UK and Amazon USA

Still Weathering the Storm

I don’t know how it is where anyone reading this is living, but here in Ireland it’s not exactly getting any easier. At the beginning we knew where we were, the advice was clear, precise and easy to follow. Although we only had a caretaker government, I for one had faith that the decisions taken were considered ones. Just before the change in personnel though, the country skipped a stage of reopening, moving us forward quickly and this looking back is where many of the problems associated with reopening the country probably began.

We have had a new coalition government for some months now and things are going downhill fast. There seem to be conflicting views between officials about the way forward with the pandemic, fierce lobbying from interested parties such as airlines and ‘wet’ pubs to get everything opened faster and the numbers of Covid cases increasing everywhere with outbreaks in all kinds of places. The number of contacts everyone has has increased and contact tracing is also getting more complex it seems.

The upshot of all of this is that on one hand we are hearing that local lockdowns are the way forward and on the other being threatened with full lockdown if ‘we’ don’t get cases down. It no longer feels like collective responsibility and that we are ‘all in this together’.

A stressful situation is naturally being made worse by all of this, plus weekly announcements from everyone, where anything can happen it seems.

Not having had any kind of break we decided to look at booking short ‘staycations’ which has been an interesting experience as the first question has become not do we want to stay somewhere, but what is their cancellation policy. I know from talking with friends we are not alone in this but it is hard to know whether to chance it or not.

In amongst this uncertainty I am trying to listen to my own advice to live in the moment, one day at a time and so on but somethings do need to be planned in advance. Life even in a pandemic has to be lived otherwise it is just existing which is not the way things should be for any of us if we can help it.

So when we can’t do what we know we need to be doing and need new strategies to cope where can we go? I have mentioned this before and have no difficulty doing so again as it is something I am dipping in and out of; the free or almost free ebook (it depends where you download it from) Moon Books Collective ‘Weathering the Storm’

If you, like me need a bit of variety in your coping strategies as the situation changes and you haven’t yet got your copy yet, do go off and download it now.

 

The Strangest of Times – Stay at Home Week 11

(image is a free download to colour in from hello@deborahpanesar.com)

 

I suppose it is telling me something that I am only getting round to starting this on Friday this week.

As I write this we await to hear officially, the changes about to come with our shift into Phase 2 of lockdown on Monday. This will likely mean being allowed to travel 20km for non essential purposes and all small non-essential shops being allowed to open. Over 70’s and others who have been cocooning will be able to have visitors for short periods, under strict conditions such as social distancing and everyone wearing gloves and masks and the rest of us can meet friends in groups of up to 6 indoors for a short time with the same precautions as when visiting cocooners. There will also be more people allowed to attend funerals than the current 10 people, but only immediate family still. Some elements of Phase 3 are likely to be brought forward such as larger stores with entrances onto streets can re-open and some children’s playgrounds, if they can be supervised and disinfected regularly, may also reopen. Marts are also re-opening so farmers can sell livestock. Shopping centres are still to remain closed as are restaurants and cafes for all but take-aways, pubs, hairdressers and barbers.

Small changes but a little normality beginning to return.

The slogan is changing from ‘Stay Home’ to ‘Stay Local’, so I’d have to change the blog title anyway but I do feel it has served its purpose now.

Actually we have just heard the distance we can travel for non essential journeys has been extended not to 20km as expected but to anywhere in our own county. Co. Cork is huge so I am not sure that feels like a good or safe move at the moment. It does though allow tourism to move towards re-opening at the end of this month so will possibly help the economy. On top of this we have just heard that instead of 5 phases in the easing out of lockdown we now only have 4 as things are being shifted around. This means one more phase at the end of June and one in July if everything goes alright. One thing that doesn’t change in the current crisis is how fast things change, how often we need to readjust our thinking and how important it is to bend and go with the flow.

I think everyone is a little stunned by the changes to Phase 2 and the relaxing of a lot of the lockdown. I know some small shops and even larger stores that have been caught off guard by being told they can reopen on Monday and who are actually deferring their reopening for some days to get ready properly. It does feel a lot all at once but I am sure we will all survive. No-one says we have to go shopping, drive around the county or rush to book holidays here or abroad after all.

So what has my last week been like apart from this? Much like the others really and I actually expect that to be the same in the weeks ahead even with the new changes to our lockdown. As I said I will continue to choose not to travelling far, use public transport or physically visit shops unnecessarily. I will also continue to meet friends outdoors on the grounds that I don’t want anyone in my house at the moment so wouldn’t expect to be in someone else’s either.

Plans are afoot here to pedestrianise streets in a number of our small towns to give people more space to socially distance, to allow cafes and restaurants to have outdoor seating for take-aways and generally to make it all a bit more comfortable. This would be brilliant but whether any of this happens remains to be seen although funds have been made available to support it so maybe it will.

The amazing weather we had been having has now disappeared with cooler weather and strong winds arriving. It has been incredible being able to eat and have drinks outdoors in the garden most days so I hope summer returns soon. I am much more suited to a mediterranean climate than an Irish one 🙂

It has also been great having the time and space to be outside in the garden, tidying and making some much needed improvements. I have really enjoyed being closer to nature and observing the changes in trees, plants and wildlife, both in the garden and when walking. This is something I always mean to do and which as an OBOD Ovate student I really should be doing, but life usually gets in the way somehow. Last evening I was down in the part of our garden that is given over to wildlife, everything is allowed to do it’s own thing, it is not ‘gardened’ ever and so is a space I watch from afar rather than step in to very often. Yesterday though I stood down in the space and realised that we had inadvertently allowed nature to create a grove of Pine, Apple, Plum, Ash and Hawthorn, all without us doing anything. This is brilliant for me as I now have a grove to work in as well as a stone circle. I intend to hold onto this closeness to nature long after lockdown ends.

We also braved Lidl this week as my husband needed a few things that they had in as specials. Our Lidl is an older store and aisles are narrow so it is harder to move and socially distance than in our newer Aldi. Neither of us felt very comfortable so I think this will be our one and only trip there for the foreseeable future, unless they should get some dumbbells in (which I still need) of course. While we were out I nipped into SuperValu supermarket as it is the only place I can get Ramen and Soba noodles for some reason. This felt ok so it is nice to know that I can shop there for things I can’t get in my shopping delivery. Nice to have some choice without feeling unsafe.

I have just been asked to take part in the trial, track and contact trace app for the virus here so of course have said yes. I needed to answer lots of questions online and now have to access the app and record my symptoms or lack of them daily. This is all anonymous and all data is deleted after the trial but it will at least help get it to a state where it can be unrolled for community tracing. It feels a vital part of our moving forward and living with the virus.

This will be my last blog post in this vein, so this is me signing out. I’ll post when there are any big changes or when I feel the need and am sure I will be blogging about other aspects of my journey in the future, so I will see you all again at some point. Stay safe x

The Strangest of Times – Stay at Home Week 10

I am not sure how much longer I will keep writing the ‘diary’ now. I began as it felt important to keep a record of these times, what was happening, what I was going through etc for myself so I would never forget what it was like. I seem though to have reached the point where nothing much is changing week by week. I am still staying at home, still keeping within the 5km when exercising and still getting our food shopping delivered.

We are now in the second week of Phase 1 of our easing of lockdown. If all goes well and our R number stays low then further easing will take place on June 8th including the distance for non essential travel being extended to 20km. A good amount of a 20km radius from us will be in the sea, so again I don’t envisage a lot changing here although for others it may as they will be able to reach the beach for the first time in weeks. This is lovely for them but will of course will make it busier and potentially less safe for those of us who live here so it’s not all good.

Some non essential retailers and businesses are likely to be allowed reopen but at the moment I can think of nothing I would like to do less than go shopping for anything that isn’t essential. I certainly can’t imagine choosing to go browsing in clothes shops for example. Just the thought of handling things that others have handled and trying on things that others have tried on, leaves me cold. I was reading in one of the Uk papers about clothes and shoes having to be quarantined if they were tried on or returned and not being able to touch things in shops, if that’s the same here maybe the future of shopping looks nothing like the past. I can’t imagine the little clothes shop in our nearest town, run by a lovely Italian who imports beautiful clothes, being able to survive if it is.

I’m wondering if this is to be the new norm? The feeling of not wanting to do things that previously were the norm for example. Or as the virus has less hold on us will things change again and will we become less cautious? Only time will tell I suppose.

There were no deaths from the virus here on Monday but there are still new cases every day. Lower than they were but still there. The problem is we know county by county the number of new cases but Co. Cork where I live is a big county and includes Cork City. Early on we were told where clusters of infection were but now we never get this information so have no idea whether it is safe to relax our guard slightly or not. It does make things harder than they could be but on the other hand it does stop us being complacent.

This all sounds a bit doom and gloom so I apologise for that. I think I just needed to take the time to reflect a little on where things are at the moment.

Having started this blog post by saying nothing is changing I have since discovered that is not true at all. I could have gone back and rewritten everything but then it wouldn’t have been a true reflection of where I am in any way. So I have left it as it was.

As part of Phase 1 we are allowed to meet up outdoors in groups of up to four people as long as we stay socially distanced and of course stay outside. So, one day this week we went to  lunch in the garden of some friends ,which was really lovely and the first time we have seen anyone, other than in passing by when out walking, for weeks now. I also met a friend for a socially distanced take away coffee. Perched on a wall near the coffee shop we spent a happy half hour catching up. We had been talking throughout on WhatsApp but there is nothing like a catch up in person to make things seem more normal. We had another invitation to call to friends who have bought a new table and chairs so they could have outdoors catchups. We couldn’t go as the shopping delivery was due but it’s there for another time and of course we can also have return visits. This is all a huge change and even though it is not normal in any way we are really lucky to be able to do it and to be blessed with amazing weather so we can comfortably be outside. Long may it last.

Being at home more means I am spending more time noticing changes in the garden, one of which is that we now have a tiny baby bunny. It turned up early in the week and was right down by the conservatory door, all alone. It has entertained us nibbling anything and everything it has come across, things that are growing and leaves on the ground from where we had the hedges trimmed. It’s clearly not fussy. We saw it the other day, half way down the garden with an adult rabbit so it is safe and being looked after.

I have also been amazed at the number of different shades of Aquilegia there are this year, maybe they are like it every year but I am too busy to notice. We have purple and white, pink and white, pale pink, deep maroon, dark pink, plain purple, lilac, white and purple and I am sure some I have missed. They are nearly gone over now but the foxgloves are on their way. Between the two they do kind of take over the garden, dwarfing some of our pots but I would hate them not to be there so am happy to put up with the overgrown areas for the weeks they are in flower and let then seed so we have some next year before tidying up. Were have tried transplanting then to the world area but they aren’t having it at all 🙂

The other plus of being home and not being able to work is that I have managed to get back to my Ovate training with the OBOD. Looking back I can see I began this 5 years ago and I am at best half way through. The saying that it is the journey not the destination couldn’t be more appropriate than it is here.

Of course one of the highlights this week was the space launch of Crew Dragon which we watched live on television before standing out in the garden to see if we could see it pass over. I saw a flash of light about 8.40pm which would have been right and then at 10.10 we watched the space station fly overhead but sadly didn’t see the Crew Dragon again. Nice to simply know it was there flying high above us though.

And finally to finish on a note of positivity, many of the restaurants and cafes here are opening at weekends to provide take away meals. One such cafe ‘Cracked’, in our nearest town is celebrating opening six months ago. Their food is lovely and we are all delighted to see them still in business having opened and then had to close due to the virus. To celebrate their six months they had an Facebook draw for a picnic box for 4 people and I won it. I never win anything so I am delighted. On the grounds we have seen enough people this week it will feed the two of us for the whole weekend 🙂

The Strangest of Times – Staying at Home Week 9

I like siting in the garden and quite enjoy doing ‘big’ things like building a new bed, a path or a wall, but hate the fiddly stuff, so as a non gardener I am fascinated by the fact that this year I am lovingly nurturing lettuce. They were purchased, planted in small pots and have now been transplanted to larger ones so they have room to grow. The photo is an early one and some are now big enough for us to be taking leaves for our tea. Some lettuce plants are also in a small bed in the garden and I visit daily monitoring their growth and comparing the potted ones with the garden ones. Now it seems it’s not only lettuce I am growing. A few weeks ago I had a conversation with some friends online about growing coriander from supermarket seeds. We all took a different approach. Both of them bruised their seeds as recommended by his Indian father, one soaked hers and planted hers in a pot, the other planted his straight in the pot. I researched online and placed mine between sheets of wet kitchen towel and waited for them to sprout. After about two weeks of nothing happening I got fed up with watering mine and with nothing happening, threw them away. At the weekend I was sent pictures of both sets of coriander plants, tiny little shoots peaking above the earth. So I have now bruised seeds and have them planted out in pots. Three weeks time all being well I should have tiny shoots appearing. If I am still writing this blog by then I will let you know.

This week I actually managed to do a live online yoga class. Really gentle yoga that worked on the psoas muscle. I have had an ongoing abdominal injury for well over a year now. The ‘it settles, I do something and it goes again’ kind of injury. Nothing serious but annoying enough to stop me doing lots of things such as a lot of exercises in the gym and also now Zumba which I am really sad about. Anyway, the psoas muscle connects to the abdominal muscles and by the end of the session of slow stretching, the right side of my body which is where the injury is, had felt tight at the start had loosened a little. So far so good 🙂 I woke up the next day and was aware my ribs were sore, by the end of the day I could hardly move. I couldn’t get out of the chair, cough or laugh without it hurting. Not an injury but muscles that hadn’t been used for the last months being woken up. So much for slow gentle yoga! I am doing it again as soon as this settles enough for me to move 😉

We are now a few days into Phase 1 of easing the lockdown. Online there were pictures of queues at DIY shops and MacDonald’s which opened 6 of its drive throughs in Dublin. For me though the only difference it made was that the small garage in my village opened and I was able to get my car serviced and so keep the warrantee valid 🙂

I tried to do Yoga Nidra this week, something I usually love but found it hard to settle in to. I am used to doing it at the end of a yoga session and not as a stand alone so this may have been part of it, maybe it wasn’t right for me today, or maybe I am just too scattered to relax in to it at the moment. I’m going to let it go for now and come back to it another time, see how I feel then. Like everything at the moment it seems best to simply acknowledge it, let it go and move on.

On a positive note I have managed to read not one but two books recently which is a huge improvement on how I was a few weeks ago. My concentration seems to be improving as far as reading is concerned at least.

I am still working with Air which is the energy that connects to the mind and so governs the intellect, reasoning, memory, thoughts, knowledge and comprehension. It is interesting that I have now begun working with yoga which focuses a lot on the use of the breath, the inhalation, the exhalation and the sigh, the cleansing breath to release as the body is allowed to settle.

I’m not sure how long my Air phase will last but I am certainly less ‘scratchy’ than I was last week, a little calmer and feeling a bit more like myself.

 

The Strangest of Times – Week 8

 

I’m beginning to find it harder to know what to write here now as the days are all starting to merge into one and it is getting difficult to recall what has happened and how I am feeling. This may of course be a bi-product of the lockdown as I read somewhere the other day that confusion and forgetfulness are common when the brain is not being used in the same way as it is used to. Not too sure mine is being used at all really.

So how have I been spending the time? The garden is getting a tidy up in areas that we have been putting off for years. We have actually finished sorting out a large corner in the front of the house. I say finished because we started this about a year ago. The guys that cut our hedges have, for the last two or three years, been itching to get in there and cut it all back. Every year I stop them telling them we have plans. Last year we cut back overgrown shrubs, cleared brambles and ivy and there it sat. Until the last few days that is, when we moved large stones to form a border, raked earth, made a small curved bed and filled the remaining space with gravel to connect it to the drive. Our stone Buddha was moved from the back of the house and ornamental grasses planted in the bed. What was really lovely was that the whole time we were working we were joined by a Robin searching for nesting materials and any bugs we dug up. Nice to be working in harmony with nature.

I think this work in the garden fits with the clearing out and decluttering that was suggested as part of my work with Air 🙂 I kinda think the author, Denise Linn, had rooms in the house in mind but as the garden is part of my home for me it counts. We have also been rescuing plants, shrubs, hedging from overgrown ivy which definitely counts as clearing out.

Although we are still getting home delivery for our shopping we made an Aldi run this week to get some things we can’t get online. No browsing, structured list each according to shop layout, a trolley each, a quiet time of day and we were in and out without a bother. Our wine rack is full, we have nuts, seeds, hand soap and hand cream plus of course a few things that were on neither list of course, but no browsing and nothing from the middle aisle 🙂

I also had to pick up a repeat prescription this week and our pharmacy has a system where you text and they have it ready for you at the pick up time you request. This is a million times better than going in, ordering and having to wait around while it is done so I do hope this is one thing that carries on after the lockdown.

I have been doing some art work this week and am enjoying working on a new piece. It helps that I took a photo that really called me to work with it, so it is something I actually want to do. All our exhibitions are cancelled or postponed for the foreseeable future so I have no purpose for doing this other than that I want to, which is lovely.

Also I have begun to read again, not snippets online but an actual ebook. I get ebooks online from our library and usually get through one every few days. Since the lockdown I have had to renew every book I’ve borrowed at least once. I had only been managing a about a chapter before I lost interest and found my attention wandering, but the last couple of days I am up to four or five chapters which is a huge improvement. It would be nice to stop feeling scattered and unable to concentrate on anything for long, so I really hope this continues. It does feel a step in the right direction.

I have noticed that I am getting a bit ‘frayed at the edges’ and that others seem to be the same. I have been getting a lot of ‘your lockdown is easier than ours’ online because the sea is within our 5km, but this is hard for all of us wherever we live. I think we all need to bear in mind, myself included, that we really have no idea how anyone else is feeling or how they are coping with the lockdown. We still have a long way to go with this.

The weekend saw a welcome break for all of us here with our village community online Bingo. This was 2 hrs of much needed craic. We had all registered online, been sent bingo cards for two games, prizes of chocolates, wine, spirits, vouchers were donated and last night everyone logged on to the youtube channel and the fun began. Prizes for a line and a card and spot prizes throughout, online live chat and a good bit of banter made the time fly.  A lot of work went into the preparation and execution but it would be really good to do it or something similar again.

The coming week sees the first easing of our lockdown. Garden centres, hardware shops, opticians. garages, electrical, phone and computer repair shops and a few other ‘essential’ services can reopen. This is good news as my car is due a service, We can also meet up with four other people outdoors as long as we maintain social distancing. We have pretty much been doing this anyway, by chance, when coming across neighbours or friends when out walking but it’s official now anyway. Golf and tennis are also allowed reopen but only to those within 5km. We are all still staying at home and exercising within 5km apart from shopping, medical etc so this won’t mean any change for me at all except I have had a friend, who lives locally, ask if I’d like to go for a socially distanced walk one day. I will, as a new person to chat to while walking, even if it is from either side of the road, could be nice 🙂