BLAH ugh sniff bleuuugh pah... you may be forgiven for thinking that my guinea pig has just wandered across my keyboard and typed random letters, but you would be mistaken. No, I am feeling under the weather, below par, out of sorts, ropey, rough, not well and at such times I resort to mutterings and various sound effects to convey how blah I feel. Trying to encapsulate these in written form produces something akin to scrabble letters before someone with a brain not fuggy with cold has ordered them in to dictionary recognisable words.

I don’t deal well with coughs, colds or sore throats. I eat avocado, drink green tea, exercise and thankfully, whether these things are contributors or not, the end result is that I am relieved and grateful to say, I am not often sick. So, when I am, I don’t shrug and think, ok, rest up for a few days, drink plenty of tea and you’ll feel better soon. No, I get all grrrr and harrumph and boo hoo poor me, because I don’t have time to be ill.

Life is a fine balance of family, friends, work, general life admin aka ‘stuff’ (always a good word). There are schedules, activities, dates to hit and ‘to do’ lists. On none of these is, take a couple of days out to chill and recuperate.

But, it has made me think more broadly about health. There will be some people reading this who are coping with horrendous health issues; living every day with a painful condition; who struggle on feeling rotten; for whom daily life is fraught with difficulties from mental and/ or physical ill health. There will be some reading this who care for others who have significant, maybe life-limiting health issues and I think particularly of one of my friends doing just this.

I saw her recently for a lovely lunch and we talked about what she is experiencing. She talked of the logistics, coordinating hospital and GP appointments. We talked about the financial side of caring for someone and at length about the emotional side. Because the person she cares for is so close to her and the care that she gives is inextricably bound up with a myriad of emotional responses to events going back years.

I was struck, as I often am about this particular friend, by her determination, her courage, her ‘get on with it, suck it up, make the best of it’ attitude. She is not a martyr and nor does she wallow. She is neither seeking nor receiving praise or recognition. She is doing what she is doing out of love, loyalty and because it is the best thing for her and for the one she is caring for.

It made me stop and think about the importance of our health, mental, physical and emotional. We can’t take any of it for granted. We can only be grateful for the good and hopefully be there for one another in the bad.