In its simplest form, behavioural activation is splitting up your day into Morning, Afternoon and Evening and putting one thing in each section of your day that you would enjoy doing to motivate yourself gently out of depression. I did a lot of this part of CBT in hospital and it was really helpful. I desperately needed to get back in touch with my values and rediscover why life was worth living.

Now my depression is lifting and I feel as if my grief is getting under control, I want to revisit ba, but in a slightly different way. I find I get too absorbed in having to get everything done at once, starting many jobs and never being able to finish them because of time, lack of experience, energy.. This hamster on a wheel thing gets me down. I drove for 5 days straight this past week due to family commitments and then instead of resting, over the weekend I worked solidly in the garden pushing myself because I always feel like I'm trying to catch up with jobs just to stay level (not even ahead of the game!) I drive myself barmey.

In the pain management program, I learned that this type of yo-yo of activity is not great for Fibro and we covered a lot of groundwork on pacing. I think this is something I will be continually working on! But not just with pacing. I often cram my day with chores upon chores and then have little time for creativity and relaxing my mind. Since my last post, I haven't once used my new creative space to chill out.

Over the coming week, I'm going to use the ba method and see if I can add some fun into my week so I don't feel constantly overwhelmed at being a home owner and having to manage everything on my own. I can't promise any change in my behaviour, but let's see..

As I said to a friend this week, that's why I take holidays so I can escape! Not that I'm bitter about not being in Canada right now..

The pain in my back has been challenging so I was so thankful to finally be able to have a myofascial release massage for two wonderful hours on Tuesday afternoon. How I have missed this treatment! Prior to that I really pushed myself in PT in the morning (we can now have outside sessions) and I kept moving for a whole 12 minutes doing the Coopers Test. It was wonderful to jog/run and not care about anyone or anything. This is something I'd love to have the confidence to do on a regular basis, but with weight gain thanks to medication, I don't feel ready yet.

Thursday early morning (the first time I have got up at 6am for a 7am start in ages) I had a wonderful two hour yoga 1-2-1 session over Zoom. It really set me up for the day. I have forgotten that feeling of being energised ready for a new day since the fatigue of Fibro now clouds most of my mornings / days.
I would love more of this!

And finally, on Friday I was able to have face to face acupuncture and even some little magnets in my ears, which I've kept in so far. Plus more myofascial treatment on my sometimes numb, sometimes weird tingling thigh - again, thanks Fibro. My physio said my chi was really low, not surprisingly. I am having trouble moving emotions through my body at the moment and I've been feeling "stuck". This in turn keeps my mind whirring when I really need to sleep!

So, despite the social distancing, the face masks that steam up my glasses and the not being able to hug friends and family, it is great to be getting back to seeing people face to face as restrictions lift. 

but weren't - lots of adventure such as Wind in the Willows, Treasure Island and Robinson Crusoe, some of the Classics such as Wuthering Heights and Sense and Sensibility, and books that I remember reading as a teenager and being deeply moved such as Judy Blume's Forever and Robert Swindells's Daz4Zoe. Now I just need a lovely bookcase to put them all in!

Continuing with the retrospective book reviews, I think I purchased this one for South Africa, early summer 2017. I had begun a trend of buying books at WH Smiths at Heathrow to distract myself from my grief because I was acutely aware I wasn't enjoying travel as much, even though I continued to travel and had further trips planned for the year (Canada and Prague). It was on my flight to Canada later that summer when I watched the film and was disappointed to see it had been Americanized. I'd had in my mind that they would keep the English backdrop. What I'd loved about the setting for the book was that it was familiar to me; the names of the places and the stations along the train route. To me, that does make a subtle difference when I'm reading a storyline; something that's only become noticeable to me in recent years.

So, to the story! It really is full of twists and turns and again, like my previous review, I did not see the ending coming. I whipped through it because I quite literally couldn't put it down. I think it's incredibly clever writing when you reveal pieces of information bit by bit and timed to perfection. Hawkins is controlling the narrative superbly through a drunken, unreliable spokesperson. "Suburban Noir" - I love that description. Taking ordinary, potentially boring lives and twisting it into something thrilling and suspenseful. Extremely good psychological fiction.