Goodness me. 2018 has certainly been a challenge so far! I can’t believe its already February – and that I leave my teenage years behind and turn 20 tomorrow!

So I had tonsillitis, which wasn’t fun. I had gastroenteritis and a really bad flare of my neurological bowel problems as well. Then, my tube broke meaning I had to go to endoscopy to get it fixed. I luckily avoided a hospital admission because it happened on a Wednesday (It’s a Monday to Friday service!). Thanks to my subcutaneous fluids I could stay at home overnight, then go home again after the procedure. My tube snapping is classed as a medical emergency because I cannot tolerate anything orally; the only way I could describe my tube breaking is that it is like someone jumping up on you – at any time on any day of the year – and saying “right. From now until you go to a hospital one and a half hours away and have an operation you can’t have any food or water”. It’s scary.

I am also under investigation for a condition called cyclical Neutropenia – which is a condition whereby your white cells reach very low levels every 21 days. By ‘low’ I mean chemotherapy style low, so that’s why I have been picking up every bug under the sun – and refuse to meet up with anyone who is sick (sorry, to those I have cancelled at the last minute, it’s nothing personal). My small fibre neuropathy in my hands has continued to be painful, and my dislocations due to my Elher Danlos Syndrome seem to have been worse as well – explaining why I haven’t been blogging or doing my YouTube channel recently.

My medications have been making me feel very spaced out over the last couple of months. Nerve pain is a very tricky beast to tame, if you aren’t on it the pain is horrendous, like nothing I can describe – but when you’re on it you can feel quite detached and spaced out.

In better life news I am very pleased to say that I had two poems published in Acumen and Under the Radar magazine, which were very welcome mail!

In great life news I will be running an event this year at Litfest in Lancaster! I am going to be running a talk and Q and A session on starting a BookTube style channel and starting friendships online. I remember looking at this event last year, when I was thinking about starting a BookTube channel. Little did I know that the very next year I would be running it – and that my channel would have 2,000 subscribers! I still can’t believe I have reached such a huge milestone. Thank you to every single person who watches and reads my thoughts. Knowing people care about me and my opinions makes things so much easier to manage. You can book to come along on the LitFest website.

I will also be performing alongside two other Wayleave poets on the poetry day at Litfest. It would be lovely to see you there.

While on the thread of thoughts I should address that I haven’t been replying to letters this month. I am dictating this and everything I do is very difficult at the moment – but I promise I will reply soon. I feel really rude because quite a few of them are from before Christmas; but as you’ll gather from this post life has been pretty hectic coming in to 2018!