Introducing Me...

So hello! Welcome to my first ever post of my first ever blog Slowly Mending Me. Whether you're a full-time sufferer, an optimistic recoverer or purely an external observer to our little M.E world, I extend to you the warmest welcome. 

From L-R: My boyfriend and I at is his graduation, my lovely doggies, cake- because I love to bake, my family on holiday last year.

  

I myself fall somewhere between full-time sufferer and optimistic recoverer. Having recently made it to the end of my three year university course I can now proudly say that I am officially an unemployed graduate. Woo! Rather than fill me with despair and worry, this is in fact the biggest relief. Having struggled through university carrying the heavy load that is M.E along for the duration, having an empty future laid out ahead of me gives me the much needed break my body desperately craved. So now, here I am- rested, relaxed and ready to embark on the long journey to recovery.

I've packed my bags, meticulously pealed blue tac off the walls and headed back down from the Midlands to Essex for the very last time. For the first time in three years I'm now properly living back home. With all the home cooked meals and mummy-care that that entails, I'm finally in an environment in which I can just be ill and hopefully, as time goes on, get better and better.

I've had M.E for such a long time now that I don't even know what it's like to not be ill. Little was I to know that sharing a drink with my glandular fever riddled friend at the age of 14 would change my life in such an indescribable way. Over the years I missed a significant amount of school, have had to sit home while my friends go out, and, most heart-breakingly, I had to give up dancing- M.E robbing me of my dream of dancing professionally. 

However, I am determined not to let M.E get the better of me. In fact, as this quote I happened to stumble across while browsing through pinterest suggests, I intend to look at the stars. And by stars, I mean the positives to come out of this experience, the little steps I shall be blogging about on my road to recovery. If it wasn't for M.E I'd have never started yoga (and I LOVE yoga), I'd never ventured into gluten free baking, eaten vegetables or considered reteaching myself the German I've forgotten since I left school- though I probably would binge-watch a lot less American tv from the comfort of my bed. 

Every cloud's got it's silver lining, and after years of struggling and feeling defeated by this illness, there's now a far more positive relationship between me and M.E.

So, that's me. Me and my M.E.

Welcome to my blog :)

Alice x