I go back to see my neurologist, my brain doctor, next Friday. I haven’t seen her for sixth months now about my expected full recovery from the brain haemorrhage I suffered two years ago. The plan is that she will book me in for what could be my last brain scan which should show that the blood has finally drained from the haemorrhage site. I am hopeful, of course, but not sure that I am better.
I still have a strange sensation around the left hand side of my head by my left frontal lobe, the scene of the crime. This may be normal, we will see.
Over these two years of recovery, I have gradually been able to do more and more things but I have had to avoid letting my head take any impact. I have knocked it a few times and really known about it but mostly, with a few set backs, I have felt increasingly well over the last months. well enough, in fact, to have an urge to do a cartwheel – exactly what I am not meant to do.
Before my haemorrhage, in my kungfu classes, I was finally fulfilling a life’s ambition. I have always wanted to feel that sense of abandon that comes from letting your body flow in freedom through the joyful movements of a cartwheel. I was actually geting there, well by my grossly uncoordinated standards, in the weeks before my illness.
Our Prime Minister, yesterday, announced that he was going start gauging the nation’s happiness as well as its economic progress and we are being asked to think about our own happiness.
Happiness, as anyone who has been seriously ill knows, is returning to health. It is like the morning after the morning after a hangover – total freedom from suffering. It should be celebrated by the body if you are lucky enough to recover.
If I do get the all-clear next year, in January I hope, I shall return to my quest. Even if I only do it once, I will try to perform a perfect cartwheel.
If you feel the same, here is a short video guide to help you out: