Ringing The Changes and Staying The Same

Although my beloved has had the whole week off work, the primary benefit has been quite simply enjoying each other's company for rather longer periods than her usual work routine permits. Watching the occasional light-hearted DVD, whilst still abed in the morning, has helped make ma belle's time-off seem more like a holiday. For all we'd love to change the world, in terms of social justice and the far too prevalent inequalities, and have both been activists in the political arena, our own needs are quite simple and we thoroughly enjoy the privilege of being able to spend time together in our home and garden.

My stamina level isn't particularly brilliant at the moment and, an increased tenderness of glands beneath the chin and in the armpits, alongside aching spasmodically painful limbs, has done little to alleviate this far too familiar situation. Our only two expeditions of the week have been a visit to the garden centre at Otley and, yesterday, a visit to the local tax office to sort out my anomalous tax situation, paying tax on a small pension even though my total income is more than two grand below my personal allowance (the allowance having increased when I attained full senior citizen status last June).

The taxation problem seems to have arisen as the companies paying two minute pensions are allocated to different regional tax offices. Evidently the code duly allocated to one of the pension providers had never been issued! Hopefully, after the valiant efforts of the tax office staff in Harrogate, this problem has now been resolved! Late morning, we made a preliminary visit to the office and were able to arrange an appointment for the same afternoon. This allowed time for us to go back home, where I quickly concocted a spicy chicken risotto for our lunch before the appointed hour. It feels like quite an achievement to have made and kept this appointment as, ever since succumbing to M.E. back in 2003, pre-arranged appointments in town have contributed to panic attacks on top of other excruciating ailments. I even managed to enjoy a grocery shop at Waitrose before returning home!

The day's activities caught up with me later in the evening, as lower limbs painfully refused to be fully co-operative; a vice like griping pain, seemingly emanating from thigh and shin bones rather than the muscle, made traversing the room seem more akin to attempting to skip the light-fantastic at the 72nd hour of a dance marathon. Having emerged from my duvet cocoon at around 11.00am, by 10.00pm my head was exhaustedly floating, leadenly anchored, in a mercury bath. My beloved concernedly assisted my passage to the bedroom where I swiftly collapsed into sleep mode.

A relatively comfortable emergence, into this new day, has been assisted, in no small part, by the efficacious administration of tramadol hydrochloride to alleviate the griping spasms in limbs and torso. By the time I'd managed to remove myself from bed, and attained a degree of verticality, my beloved had already headed off to her volunteer duties at the Acorn Centre.

FALSE DAWN

Yesterday morning, bright sunshine greeted my emergence into day and, most unusually I was feeling wide awake long before 9.00AM; the general rule is that a state akin to wide awake is rarely [even half-heartedly] achieved by yours truly before 10.45AM! I even felt that my nights sleep had been of a refreshing variety, despite my having run two marathons in one day before getting lost in the centre of an unknown town, unable to find the loos. Dreams are certainly peculiar things!

How could I account for a good nights sleep, dream sequences notwithstanding ; the only aid I could think of was having partaken of an extra shot of macchiato at the Café Culture the preceding afternoon. Now there's a paradox!

Anyway, whatever the reason, this unusually early alertness continued throughout the morning, relatively pain and ache free [a most unusual ante meridian experience]. By late morning I was ready for a walk down to Waitrose with my beloved; the walk entails a 15 minute stretch along the Leeds Road before taking the tree-lined footpath across the stray, approx 7 minutes, and a further 5 minutes in the direction of the town centre. That's one helluva long exercise for me but, I managed it and, even enjoyed the walk back home.

All went well with the day until early evening, when an excruciating sense of despairing helplessness overwhelmed me, the sheer pointlessness of everything. The cause for that dramatic change; I'd started wondering how the hell I could get the tax people to sort out one of my pension providers who tax me on every penny even though, all other incomes having been taken into account, I have a further £3 ½ grand tax free allowance. I've never been averse to paying tax but, having completed endless forms, both prior and subsequent to attaining state pension age, no progress has been made on this front! [The pettiness of the issue is that the monthly payment is a mere £62 gross and I'm having £13 take away in tax each month – but when one feels shattered the whole issue takes on gargantuan proportions].

Even my preparation of the main course for Sunday lunch – always pre-prepared on Saturday evening – held no pleasure for me and, subsequent telly-gawping proved absolutely disastrous. The Vile Twins [that's not their stage name by the way] getting through the first stage of boot camp [we're talking X Factor here] made me quite apoplectic; if ever there was a case to be made for abortion, or even euthanasia, these twin contestants are it. Before their miraculous advance, I'd already declared that their advancement would sufficient to prove that there is no god, no evolution either for that matter!

A further cause of my general sense of irritating helplessness is the constant petty bitching experienced on all of the ME sites run by fellow ME sufferers; no wonder that no progress is being made. Doubtless the condition is a physical neurological one, of possibly viral origin, even though the vested interests of medical insurers and pharmacological industries are more than happy to support the psychologizers arguments.

Where my fellow sufferers find the stamina to continue with their virulent nit-picking squabbles is a mystery to me! I suspect that part of the problem is, by its extremely debilitating nature, this neurological ailment tends to breed a kind of re-active depression. Certainly, in my case, the onset of ME also found (or produced) a far more deep-rooted tetchiness than had been apparent as part my nature for the preceding decades.

Basically, I'm just a little pissed off and you, my dear readers, are the outflows recipients. This morning, my naggingly aching body, had to be forcibly removed from the duvet realm by a sheer effort of will. It seems like I'm almost back to normal.