In order to see things you need to look at them from the outside. Everybody knows (and would agree) that you only see trees when you’re in the wood, but never the wood itself. Few realise what that means.

Here is what happened to me today.

I haven’t been out driving on the road through the city on my own for some time. Worse, I was so sick for days, I was ‘deprived’ of any stimulation of any of my senses because they just didn’t seem to exist anymore. So today, these are just two examples of a myriad of incredible, amazing things I saw when I got out again for the first time.

A logistics company with a an email address: info@con-log.ie. I mean “CON-LOG”??? Does that not make you think immediately of a new crime-stopper initiative you hadn’t heard about yet??? And never ever of a LOGISTICS company??? I ask you, who under the heavens came up with this name? Almost sounds like somebody tried a bad joke.

And then a little red, pretty worn, but solid as usual, Nissan Micra – wait: SPORT! Ok Ok – Micras are great little cars. And: I get BMW “Sport”, even FIAT “Sport”, but Nissan Micra “Sport”??? I mean, honestly, this sounds exactly like ‘open secret’, ‘living dead’, or ‘military intelligence’ – what linguists call an “oxymoron”! Could you think of anyone, I mean anyone, who would come up with even the idea of calling a Micra a Micra “Sport”? I wanted to overtake the car to see who the poor devil was who had been landed with this oxymoron of a car – but in one way or another, the sports label must have worked on this poor soul’s self perception down on Gardiner Street and made him belief that he was no other but Ralf Schumacher driving a Ferrari down the Nürburgring. When the lights turned green, he revved up and disappeared in a split second on the horizon.

There is so much irony surrounding us, we usually don’t see it anymore.

Soon we will have a chance to demonstrate what the support survivors of sABI, their families and their friends have a right to should look like. We will have to demonstrate this together and create a service and a place like no other. Not a rehab centre, not a rehab hospital, not a sad place where sad people meet who require our pity. But a bright, sparkling, energetic, funky, open space full of life where sABI survivors get all the support they need to live their lives as independently and as much integrated in society as possibly, a space for live, a resource for life, designed for life.

Everything else would turn the term ‘health service’ into an oxymoron. A bit like, you know… 🙂

(PS1: A private message to my millions of followers: still only a few hours up every day, but getting over the worst!)

(PS2: A private message to info@con-log.ie: change your email address. Today.)

{PS3: A private message to Nissan: If I was you, I’d remove that “Sports” badge from the Micras. Seriously.)

For all the millions of followers out there who are wondering how am I doing. I’m getting better. So much so that I managed to get out of bed for a few hours today. While I felt really positive about it, I wasn’t allowed to get near anybody or anything, and instead of the tender loving care I had expected I was greeted by people offering me face masks and hand sanitiser. I guess that at the end of the day, every (wo)man for him/herself:)

While I had my first bite to eat for a while I watched a bit of the evening news. During a commercial break they showed an ad by Laya Healthcare, one of Ireland’s largest health insurers.

Not sure what you think about this ad. I thought: Ok: people, animals, stuff, stumbling, falling, rolling down a steep hill with paint guns exploding all around them proves that “it’s good to live”? Are they for real?? And then, when I did a bit of research, I discovered that the company paid 2.5 million (!) euro for this integrated ad campaign! They even have a variation on the tumbling down theme with a health coach  timing the tumbles of all the apples, bikes, dogs, and people, before they’re all hit by paint balls.

Maybe it’s because I’ve been out sick in bed for a few days and still feel a bit dizzy. Maybe I’m getting too old to get into this kind of swing? I know healthy living is all about moving, but – tumbling down a steep hill while being shouted at by a health coach just before being shot by giant paint balls?

It’s either a big mistake or well, somebody is on to something big here…

One good thing that transpired over the past days: life for everybody, including for Pádraig, went on without me. I’m sure it wasn’t half as much fun. But: it did. Which is, though it might sound a bit odd, something really reassuring to know. Pádraig continued with his exercises and while he couldn’t go swimming today, life continued, and not all in a bad way.

Another good thing is that we’re planning to sign the agreement with the HSE next week for the An Saol pilot project. Another step forward.

Last but not least: thank you all for your kind words and messages! They really helped to keep the spirit up!

Still down in bed all day with a terrible cold. Didn’t know it could be that bad. But it’s giving me a taste of what it feels like, not being able to get up!

This morning I felt to bad that I had to spend all day in bed. It’s just a cold, but it drains not just my nose and throat, but also my energy of which there is absolutely none left. Nada. So here is to a good night’s sleep and a better tomorrow…

Saturday is sitting-beside-the-fire day, chatting and listening to the Saturday newspaper. Pádraig really enjoys that. The company. The news. The comments. One day, he’ll be able to tell us what he thinks about what’s going on in the world.

Today is also Nollaig na mBan, ‘little Christmas’, the day that women relax after the busy Christmas period and men take over the housework. In my mind, even the concept is strange. But – as over the Christmas period:) – I cooked a nice meal for the women in our family and joined in, together with Pádraig who ate and drank exactly the same food and drink we had. Mightn’t sound like much but it still feels like a small miracle each time he does it. Which now is every day.

Three years ago, this night, we couldn’t sleep. Pádraig was in the Schön-Klinik. We were in Forbacher Straße. The next day, we were going to bring Pádraig, in an ambulance, to the University Hospital, the UKE, to see whether his tracheostomy could be removed – against the expressed, repeated, and long standing advice of his doctors. He was about to be discharged from the hospital and his doctors had decided that prior to his discharge he needed an operation to make his tracheostomy ‘safe’, i.e. permanent. We didn’t agree and had asked, for the umpteens time for a second opinion – and a removal.

My nose is running, my head feels a bit dull, and I’m sneezing like a level one hurricane. And I’ve been listening to several radio shows about how people will change their lives in the coming year. At the moment, I don’t really feel like doing anything drastic any time soon. But, of course, doing nothing ain’t an option. So I’ll turn Pádraig, go to bed, pull up the blanket, and think of something nice that happened today.

Like having a really nice dinner with the family and Pádraig beside the Christmas tree.

Pádraig put his hands upon the wheels today and it looked liked as he had decided to go down to the roadhouse to have a real good time… Let it roll baby roll…

It was completely unexpected. He was just tired to have his arms up on the table. So he moved them back and his hands came down beside him. We put he hands upon the wheel – and when he noticed he could move his wheelchair forward and backward – that is what he did. Sure, it was more a rocking motion than a moving or driving motion. But there was motion. And he had it under control!

The future is uncertain and the end is always near – in the meantime, we’ll keep moving and we’ll keep having a real good time, the best we can under the circumstances!

Thursday evening with Pádraig’s friends. Has been going on for months now. Brilliant idea. They set up a whatsup group and make sure that every Thursday evening one, two or three of them call in to Pádraig. They chat, have a bit of fun, they bring something to eat and to drink.

This is Pádraig’s table after they had left tonight. Some paella from Juan’s famous Spanish kitchen takeaway, vino, Coronas, minced pies – after all it’s still Christmas!

Pretty messy. Beautiful.

The last visitors are leaving. Carers and therapists are coming back. And I am confronting all the things I didn’t confront last year, those things I wanted to address during the quiet (!) Christmas period, but, of course, never did. No surprises here.

From tomorrow, we’ll have two days of (almost) normal routine again, before another weekend break to finish up the last Christmas sweets and to put away the Christmas decorations for another year.

I suspect Pádraig will need a few days to get back into the swing. It’ll be as difficult for him as it will be for us, at least physically, to start with the daily exercises and routines that were all thrown over-board for nearly two weeks by now.

It’s the every-day stuff, the things that you don’t see anymore, you don’t hear anymore, you don’t feel anymore, you don’t taste anymore, you don’t smell anymore because they are so familiar that they pass by unnoticed.

Like this message from an automatic ticket machine in Dublin Airport telling me that “Change is possible”. ” YSE, it is!” I thought.

I needed this re-affermation today because, to be honest, I feel absolutely exhausted and tired. Christmas was fabulous and being in the company of so many good friends and family members was exactly what I think Christmas is all about. But the last two weeks or so, without carers to help, was also very tiring. And as always, it’s when you stop, when it’s over, that you feel the exhaustion.

Pádraig went with us today to the airport again to say good-bye, this time to his uncle.  The amount of people leaving Ireland after the holidays was phenomenal. So were the queues. We spent almost two hours waiting for the check-in, getting a real feel of what it means for so many to leave family behind to go to very far away countries to make a living. For all of us, including Pádraig of course, it was much more, for the second time in just a few days, than just getting out of the house for a few hours. It was experiencing this deep, sad, hurting feeling of people leaving their loved ones. First hand.

Some things are beyond our control. We can’t influence or change them. But there are things we can. Change is possible. And we’ll demonstrate that to all who want to listen, to see, to taste, to smell. To all who want to discover the ordinary every-day stuff for those living extraordinary lives. With an emphasis on ‘living’.

There is this thing of being comfortable. When you live in a place with people under circumstances and in an environment that I’m familiar with that I feel comfortable in. Life kind of ‘plätschert so vor sich hin”, it moves along with few disturbances. I stay within my comfort zone, I’m in control of my life, do the stuff and am in the company of people I’m comfortable with.

And then: “bang”, it all goes up in smoke.

I’m learning fast and the hard way, that life can catapult me almost instantly way out of my comfort zone and that me controlling my life is nothing more than an illusion.

To be able to adapt to such situations, it’s good to practice, to see what it is like when I’m moving outside my comfort zone, when I need to push myself that little bit harder.

It seemed like a good idea when we planned this some weeks ago. To go swimming on New Year’s Day at the 40 Foot out in the sea in Dun Laoghaire. Last night, I had secretly hoped for storm, wind and rain, so bad that we might have to cancel our plans. While it was very windy, there was no rain but a blue sky with just a few clouds. Bitterly cold – but no reason to cancel our outing.

Getting into the water was the hardest part. When we got  out, I really felt fabulous. It was unbelievably good.

So here is the plan for 2018.

Get out of my comfort zone. Do things I haven’t done before. Experience the thrill, the rush, the excitement. And feel comfortable doing uncomfortable and, at times, very upsetting things.