Somewhere over the rainbow...Part One

"I have so got this! I'm healed!" I thought to myself as I dragged Harry on a massive hike through the woods. The sun was shining, I felt great and practically myself again. 

That morning, I'd finally identified that I was experiencing anxiety and that my main symptom was an overload of adrenaline. It was making me jittery and on edge. I tried doing starjumps to burn off some of the pent up adrenaline. I won't go into too much detail here, but unless you have one hell of a well-trained pelvic floor, I would strongly advise against doing starjumps at two months postpartum. 

Having established that starjumps were out of the question, we went for a hike in the woods. I told Harry I felt amazing - practically myself again. Later that day, I came across an old saying, "A walk in Nature walks the soul back home." It is so true and, although worse was yet to come for me, I am still a huge advocate of being outdoors and of using Nature to help heal.

So that's my first piece of advice, I suppose. Get outside. 

In the days and weeks that followed, I enjoyed being outdoors less and less, and that saddened me. But I still got up and went for a walk every day even though I lost the enjoyment of it. I hoped that one day, if I kept doing the things I used to love, I'd start to love it again. But from the beginning of October, walks for me were colourless and filled with anxiety. I couldn't escape my thoughts regardless of who I was with. But I did often feel better an hour or so after a walk.

I later got told to remember the things that worked for me to help heal and to keep doing them. So I knew I needed to keep walking and trust that my passion for Nature and hiking would override the illness.

One of the most important elements of healing, I've found, has been faith. Faith that I will heal. Faith that others before me have recovered. Faith in the people around me who are supporting me and showing me the way.

This is a picture taken today. Even though much of the image is cloaked in grey clouds, the beauty of the rainbow shines through. Sometimes we need the darkness to appreciate the light.