Smiling through life with MS
The other afternoon, I got on the tube to go home from work. I was tired, I didn't feel great, my leg was particularly wobbly. I sat on the bench on the platform as I waited for the train to arrive as I wasn't up to standing. After a few minutes the train pulled in… Continue reading I’m a fighter, not a lover
A couple of weeks ago, my husband and I and some friends went to the Bluedot festival at Jodrell Bank in Cheshire. I was slightly daunted to be having my first festival experience in nine years, and my first with mobility issues, but all went (almost - of which more later) smoothly and it was… Continue reading A day at the Bluedot
For a long time before I became disabled and was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis I used the tube and buses in London on an almost daily basis. I would consider myself a kind and thoughtful traveller, who would always stand up to let someone who needed to sit down have a seat. But from the… Continue reading Priority seats; or How to be Kind
The seventies, when I was born, is an almost unrecognisable place. Back then, even into the eighties, attitudes in Britain towards people of non-white ethnicity, non-British origins, non-heterosexual orientation, or disabled people were largely acceptably offensive by today's standards. Terms that are now understood to be deeply insulting were an unremarkable part of the everyday… Continue reading Labels
"What is that which has one voice and yet becomes four-footed and two-footed and three-footed?" This summer was challenging. In April I started relapsing, my fatigue becoming overwhelming and my walking getting markedly worse. I tried high-dose steroids to treat the relapse for the first time, but they didn't make any difference to my symptoms… Continue reading The Riddle of the Sphinx
I try to be positive about my life, I try to tell myself I have worth despite my illness, but sometimes things come at me out of left field that make me question whether I should bother. Yesterday I read a story in the news about Michael Forsyth, who is being asked to repay all… Continue reading Four things I’ve learned about the welfare state
Falling & Laughing 