1) In the Beginning....

For years, I struggled.  I was always short for my weight.  I was passed some serious umpalumpa genes from my parents. I spent my twenties and thirties on and off, but mostly on, anti depressants.  I had no energy and what little I did have, I deployed like a mad woman at work leaving me with no chat at home.  The children (Wakey 9 and Pukey 6) arrive and sleep becomes a thing of the past.  I was diagnosed with bipolar disorder and put on all kinds of weird shit medication on top of the antidepressants I was taking.  I had blood tests, all of which came back normal.  I still felt exhausted, I was gaining weight (not helped by the meds for the craziness) but I had 2 young binlids, a full on career - we’re all tired right? Wrong.

I digress....this is all with the 20/20 vision that is hindsight.

I had a back back. It started as a niggle every now and again in my lower right hand side, around my hip.  Then it was just sort of there all of the time.  Then I has to stop wearing heels and started chugging down pain medication. I decided that I wouldn’t bother the GP with and self referred to a physioterrorist.  Yup that was a bad idea, got worse.  Blamed the physio and decided that a chiropractor was the answer.  Good guy, lots of clunking and clicking, some relief but not much.  He declared that I probably had a prolapsed disc.  About this time, I started getting rib pain - it was so sore that coughing, laughing, turning over in bed was horrendous.  Decided that I wouldn’t bother the GP with it (you notice a trend here?) and sought advice from the always reliable Dr Google.  Damaged my intercostal muscles.

By this time I was starting to walk a bit like Quasimodo according to my friends.  I put it down to having to clamber in and out of a new, very high car....obvs. I hobbled into an appointment with my psychiatrist who suggested an oestopath.  Well, I may as well have smoked 70 quid. She spent time telling me that I was seriously hyper-mobile and that my rib pain was probably because my bra strap was too tight and I was fat.  Had I thought about losing weight?

Then Pukey jumped on my back when we were playing, the pain was excruciating, so bad that I was physically sick. After that, I decided that I should probably go to the GP, after all, this had been going on for the best part of 6 months.  Got some pain killers and told to come back if things didn’t improve.

Then my mum got ill, really ill. Cancer. Diagnosed on the 14th December, dead on 13th Feb. I just got on with it, plus I had a new job with my dream company so no time for Drs.  I remember packing to go down to see my Mum for what would be the last time, and having to crawl up and down the stairs at home. My back was fucked. I cried getting in and out of the car. At my mums funeral, I was so immobile, I had to be ferried to the graveside on the back of a golf buggy.  Not funny but actually hilarious.

My poor Dad was so concerned that he basically emotionally black mailed me into going to see the GP and and demanding a scan.  I did it to get him off my back.