CW: medical matters, described by one doctor as “some fucked up traumatic shit” Now with the history out of the way, let’s talk about the past week, especially yesterday. Last week we went away on our narrowboat for the week, a less frequent than I’d like activity but not unusual. Infact I’d just gotten back off the boat in 2021 when The Event happened. During that week, as is usual, I didn’t use my walking stick whilst inside the boat because there just isn’t room and I can bounce off things as needed. Halfway through the week I had a moment that was one of the scariest I’ve ever had, worse than all my diving near misses and worse than that time I unexpectedly ended up underneath my own boat looking at the spinning prop above me. We’d been out to a pub for dinner and on the way back in my wheelchair I got cold, very cold, cold enough that my legs started to seize. It could have just been my medicinal cannabis talking because fuck did I need it that week, but it felt identical to the 2021 event. For about 15 mins I thought I was going back to square one, only this time through sheer determination, assistance, and probably a hefty dose of medicinal help, I managed to make it back on board the boat myself and things relaxed when I warmed up. This hit me hard, I was shaking for the rest of the night. Yesterday therefore had a really interesting experiment available to me that would have made any physio yell at me. With the recent weather the ground isn’t too hard, and given I’d managed all week without a major bump on the boat I wanted to see what walking without my stick outside was like. So we went onto the field behind our house and, I just walked. Not even just a few steps either, halfway around the field. It hurt, it felt deeply uncomfortable, but I did it. Now UK might be wondering why this is all significant enough to warrant such a massive essay. Well, the big question on my mind is why now? What’s changed? Physically, I’m a little bit stronger than I was having spent an active week but that’s not unusual. Confidence, perhaps the week without my stick helped but I don’t buy it. That leaves psychological, which raises so many more questions about the still undiagnosed Event than I was ever prepared for. By far the biggest concern is what’s to stop this all happening again. I haven’t been crippled through lack of psychical and mental effort, so if it was psychological there’s a deeply broken part of my brain that was causing it and it’s a bit I can’t access. Tl;dr: despite being a massive step closer to being mobile again I find myself more concerned about my future. I should be overwhelmed with joy, and yet I feel more anxious and on edge about my body than I have been since this all started.