More life philosophy-on a Monday, too!

What idiot said that what doesn't kill you makes you stronger? That makes us all need a hitman!

After the surveyor inspected my flat last week and pronounced it unfit (and downright dangerous) for me to live in, I started looking for private accommodation. I've realized-after two years of council rubbish-that the only way to live where I want and how I want is to return to the private sector. Honestly-you don't know what you are going to get anywhere, but at least I can find a place where I can have a dog!! I think it will be a Rottweiler (they are beautiful, they eat you out of house and home, but other people are frightened of them).

This is a neat little segue into my Rottweiler story (I promise I'll be brief. For once.). Years ago, I had a hairdresser who had a Rottweiler, a rescue dog (a terrier cross) and two cats-in a bedsit (studio, they are starting to call them here-but still one room-about the size of a breadbox). Peter's other half worked for London Transport, was very butch, and unwillling to "come out" because of the impact it might have on him at work. So the boyfriend used to go out with the other lads after work, get completely wasted, and come home and beat the living crap out of Peter. I would see him with a black eye and a bruised face- it was terrible. So I used to go visit him-and the rest of the family (the four-legged family), and I would tell the Rottweiler to jump on Pete's partner (I'll call him Steve, just in case someone who knows him is reading this) the next time he hits my friend.

For about three months, this little training of mine had no effect; Peter would come into work, black and blue, and would cry on my shoulder. One day, I was in Peter's place, playing with the Rottweiler (known as Rocky), and Steve came in and began to push Peter around. In a flash, Rocky was on him, and the dog gave Steve a nasty bite on his arm. And that was the end of Steve; Peter told him that if he touched the dog (or him) again, the police-and London Transport-would be notified. Hah-the joy of having a dog!! I think I want two, even though I might have to take out a mortgage to feed them!

That's the thing with dogs: as long as people don't abuse them, and take care of them and show them affection, the dogs are (to me, at least) better than having children. They (dogs) are at the door when you get home, wagging their little tails, showing how happy they are to see you. You don't need to buy them a car, buy them everything that all their friends have, send them to college, bail them out of jail, get them off drugs-pay for their wedding, divorce, rehab-dogs are the best. I don't feel the least bit guilty about not having children - give me a dog any day (the four legged kind. I've known enough of the two-legged kind).

So there is my philosophy about life-part of it, at least!!

On Friday, I went along to Queens Square for my last vestibular rehabilitation session. This should have taken place in May-but I had two other physiotherapists, and Ben is my last one. And-he turned out to be the best one!

He had me go through all the exercises-but this time, I had to be barefoot. It was awful-I felt like such a klutz, you wouldn't believe it. He then informed me that I was doing several exercises the wrong way, and that I was omitting the ones that make me feel sick: those are the ones I attempt to do with my eyes closed.
We talked about neuroplasticity, and the fact that I have to do everything-and more-if I want to get back that 80%. He said that I can, even with the CVID, the chest infections, the gentamicin toxicity that destroyed the entire vestibular system-no matter, he said, as he gave me a list of exercises to do-daily, and religiously.

He said that the more I do what makes me uncomfortable-the more times I do what I don't seem to be able to do (or do really badly), the more I challenge my brain, and the more balance I will get back through the nerves in my legs. He also said that I have been more than a little lazy, and that I have been more than a little fatalistic. And I thought about all that-and I have to say that he is absolutely correct.

For two years, I thought that I was doomed to be unable to go out after dark unless someone was with me; I thought that I would forever be unable to do certain movements, and that my life was over.Wrong!!

My life is far from over; my life as I knew it before might be over, but my life is not over. Not by a long shot.
This visit last week really got me thinking-and I did exercises over the weekend, and spent a lot of time thinking. I've been spending all my time fretting, angry about the nasty old fart upstairs, and angry about what happened to me - but I haven't spent nearly enough time doing all the things I am supposed to be doing. I also haven't spent any time actually living. I've been a recluse. This isn't the way I want to live my life-and nobody can do anything about it but me.

Nobody can tell me what to do, how to do it, when to do it-nobody else can live my life. If I don't start making a life for myself, regardless of the circumstances-then the people who caused this (and I know it was incompetence and stupidity, that they didn't do it deliberately) have won.

The only person who deserves to win-is me.