"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 British girl. At the end of August, I've emerged a more confident, more hopeful British 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.

storm clouds

 
Truth be told, things have been a bit of a struggle of late. I've been struggling to accept how things are to accept myself and what I'm facing, this current relapse.

Knitting helps unravel my anxieties. Spinning helps quieten my racing mind. He helps in every way he can think.

But despite these, it's hard to not get downtrodden. To wonder when my life will actually begin...

In those quiet moments, sometimes I wonder, when?

All around me, dear friends are getting engaged, starting new jobs, developing their careers, becoming mothers, preparing for marriage. No matter how hard I try, sometimes it's hard to feel genuine happiness for them as their lives progress and their opportunities widen because it feels as if my own life has ground to a sickening halt.

But whilst I cry over the loss of my livelihood, chances of a "proper" career, the absence of babies, it's easy to forget amid all my suffering that my dear friends around me also have their own struggles. Whilst they might not have suffered the loss of job, the indignity of having to be taken to the bathroom by their boyfriends, in my own way, they face their own storms.

Loosing a beloved parent to aggressive cancer or a failing heart. Living half-way across the world from a husband because of over-strict immigration rules. Waking up one morning to realise they are stuck in the rate race. Having to cope with long-term unemployment despite having a top degree from a top university. Having to face the prospect of long-term single-hood.

Yes, they do not know my struggles intimately....but then, I don't know their suffering either.

But what I do know if this. My own life would be much more empty and harder to bear were I to cut myself off from those friends...

At least together, we can help one another brave our own particular storm clouds.

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. 

walking out

People often ask me, where did it begin?
 

Muscles tensed. One leg planted firmly on the earth, the other swinging forward as a pendulum. Heel touched down and my body rolled forward onto the other foot. The legs reversed position and the whole thing started again.

As simple as that. We met in the village library. But it began on the mountainside.

Five years ago, I walked towards the summit, step by step. Not my first steps in the Pyrenees. But my first steps walking out with Nico. 

Five years later, and we're still walking together, albeit much slower than back then. Walking through the mountains, through the valleys, through the world.

on teaching and self employment

It's now six months since I stopped working from home. There are moments when I see the bank balance slowly emptying that I wish I had kept going longer. Then I remember those last six weeks of teaching, remember just how badly my health suffered, just how physically, mentally and emotionally spent I was. And then I wish I had pulled the plug sooner.  

In the weeks before stopping, I would often sit at the dinner table, my eyes heavy, the mere suggestion of a conversation overwhelming me through the fog of the fatigue. I woke in the morning after a long night of sleep, knowing that rest had nonetheless alluded me.


I was so happy to be building my little teaching business. To finally have more than enough students on my books to pay my half of the bills and even have a little over to put aside for a rainy day. Independence and security. More than I could have hoped for.

As well as working with students directly from home, I was also working four or five days a week in a language school down and out of the valley, over half an hours drive away. At the back of my mind, I knew that it was all a bit too much. That eventually something would have to give. I just wish I had stopped sooner. Then perhaps it wouldn't have been my health that had to suffer.


But despite my heavy load, there was a part of me that felt I needed to be so busy, that I should work like everyone else. Should. Such a powerfully strong word that we so often inflict upon ourselves as justification for things that are not good for us. So unnecessary. But still, it was what I believed at the time.

Despite my steadfast belief, there were many occasions where I admitted to Nico that I needed to slow down. He wholeheartedly agreed with me and offered his support. But I kept on going. Why?

Because I didn't have the confidence and self-belief to decline the opportunity to work more hours or take on more classes.

Because I didn't have the strength to stand up to my own fears of financial uncertainty to cut-back on my hours.

Because I didn't have the courage to accept that a little is more than enough, because in the eyes of other people I was "doing the right thing" for once. 

A sort of haze had installed itself when I first set up as self-employed back in 2013. Complete with blurred perspectives and a powerful determination to make my little business work. It was heavy and unyielding and I couldn't see my way out of it. Hence I kept on going. 

But then nature decided for me; I got really sick, had no choice but to stop. And just like that, it was over.

Months later, I'm still trying to recover from that relapse, but am also basking in the lifting of that self-employment cloud. Yes, there has been much sadness and grief at the current loss  of my livelihood. I have waded through strong feelings of shame at the thought of having let others and myself down. Not to mention quite a lot of frustration and anger.

But little by little, as I let all those "shoulds" loosen their grip on me, there has also been profound relief. Although I'm still waiting for the energy to return, for now, I'm feeling calmer and more at ease.

I'm never going to get things exactly right: treading the rope strung between what I need to do, what I want to do and what is best for my health and well-being is not an easy path to tread. Therein lies the complexity but also the opportunity for a challenge.


For me teaching languages, especially working one to one with students of all ages, has never been simply the physical act of imparting knowledge from one person to another. It is also work that comes from the heart, an opportunity to build relationships, learn and exchange from one another. It is something that brings me great personal joy and satisfaction...as well as stress and worry if I don't keep a check on things...and myself.

I still haven't quite decided if I'll return to freelance teaching or not. For the time being, I just need to concentrate on getting back to a place of stability and balance with my health and better well-being in my life.

If the time comes for me to embark once again on a new teaching journey, I'll do so with gratitude but also a little more care than the last time. I know I'll bask in the opportunity to once again sit down with my students, connect to different aspects of their lives, craft lessons and guide and accompany them in their personal learning journey. 

But I'll also try to go about things at a slightly slower pace. Be a little less ambitious of my physical capacities, a little more careful of my workload, a little more mindful of the impact teaching also has on my own health.

I'll take it day by day and this time round, I'll aim to continually take note of my health and well-being. I'll ask myself: "What's best for me?" - because I'm important, too. 

And if for some reason I decide that teaching is no longer a possible activity for me to pursue...well, we'll cross that bridge when we get to it. 

floating

I was nervous. Until I lowered myself into the water. First my feet, then legs, then belly, then arms. All the way up to my chin. 'Trust me,' the physio said.

I realised in that moment that I've become wary of trusting strangers with the knowledge of my illness. For fear they'll make cruel judgements. For fear they'll laugh at me.

'Trust me,' he said. And with my heart racing, I lowered the rest of myself in, until the water was all the way up to my chin, closing over my body. I let the water come, I let the physio hold me, I let myself stop being terrified.

I let go.

Because there, in that moment, it didn't matter if I'm tired or achey. If I slept badly last night. The only thing was the water swooshing around me, holding me up.

The physio gently manipulated my muscles and limbs. Not trying to hurt me. But helping me to feel a little better.

The only thing was the water moving me from side to side. The deep wrinkles slowly forming on my finger and toe tips, rather than on my brow.