Just before his final exams in early 2013, Pádraig did a media course (film making) in Connemara. He learned how to handle a camera, how to structure documentaries, how to plan them. Each participant in the course was asked to come up with a concrete idea for a documentary that should highlight one particular persons life that for one reason or another had dramatically changed.

I had to think about this non-stop when Maria and I were driving up to Connemara to the studios of TG4, the Irish language TV broadcaster. I also had to think about Pádraig giving out about those ‘people’ who had been living for decades in the country and didn’t speak Irish – he didn’t have to point the finger at me, it was clear who he was talking about:)

So here is my promise:

learning Irish will be one of my top priorities over the coming years. Things are a bit busy right now, but I’m sure that some time in the not too distant future they will calm down a bit, and I will do it. Not that I hadn’t tried before, but I’m not going to give up that easily – and I’m sure that there’ll be plenty of people out there to lend me a hand.

The programme that we had been invited to is a weekly programme called “Róisín” – you can look it up on the TG4 player (once today’s edition will be up, I’ll link to it; it’ll also be on the air again tomorrow in the early afternoon). Róisín herself is one of the most kind and generous people you could find, and you will see that if you check out her programme.

Maria talked about Pádraig and how our family is trying to cope. Roisín herself highlighted our plans to establish An Saol as a house for persons with severe brain injuries who have no place to go to other than nursing homes, unless they can be looked after by their family at home. If you have elderly parents or are elderly yourself you know that nursing homes are not exactly popular amongst elderly people. They are even less suited for young people with severe brain injuries.

So, we were very happy that we had the opportunity to highlight not just Pádraig’s case, but also the widely recognised need to establish An Saol. If you are into Twitter, check out @RoisinTG4 and #blogawardsie.

Pádraig’s day today was as straight forward as they come. He had a MOTOMed tour d’Schön session, he was out and about on the roof garden, and some pureed food – not much, but enough to get a taste and to keep practice his swallowing. So far, he seems to tolerate the new course of the new medicine ok. No visible or noticeable reaction so far, in either way. I guess, it’ll take a few days to show some effect. Let’s hope it’ll be a positive effect this time around.

The days seem to get longer and the nights shorter – more like spring than autumn, really. It’ll be a very early morning tomorrow, and it feels already like a late night…