A very promising progress update!

Text and photos by Ellie Potten

With the winter months chill around us, it’s not the easiest time to be fighting a battle with agoraphobia.  Who wants to be pushing themselves to get out and about when the wind is freezing, the roads are icy and all anyone really wants to be doing is sitting inside where it’s warm?

For me this could have been a time of real backsliding.  For a long time, through the worst of my agoraphobia, I literally had to be doing things every week, as often as possible, to keep my recovery pushing forwards.  No matter how successful my outing one week, if I left it too long I’d be just as anxious again before my next one.  The nerves didn’t subside at all.  I was a little worried that having done nothing REALLY big since Alton Towers in October – just a couple of shopping trips around Christmas – I might find the same thing happening now.

Happily, it seems that I’ve shut some kind of door behind me at some point without even knowing it!  It’s been a pretty big month and to my genuine surprise (and a whole lot of delight) I’ve sailed through it all without a backwards glance.  I don’t know how, I don’t know why – but I like it!

The Dentist

 A small but really terrifying thing for me.  My dentist is lovely, but I had a lot of teeth pulled – nine in total – when I was still at school, ready for a dental brace, followed a few years later by my first ever filling which didn’t settle for several weeks.  Needless to say, The Chair is not my favourite place to be, and I don’t go very often if I can help it. 

Sadly, this year I had no choice.  My wisdom teeth are starting to come through, and my dear mother wasn’t letting my excuses slide for another year.  But I was okay!  Not only were my teeth in good shape (hallelujah!), I very successfully ‘went to my happy place’ during my scrape and polish.  My happy place is the place I visualise when I want to relax.  It’s usually one of two places – a room with huge glass windows looking across a clifftop and the ocean, where I ‘sit’ watching the seagulls on the wind, or a sunny green wood where I can ‘walk’ and listen to the birds and the sounds of the leaves rustling in the breeze.  I kinda jumped between the two on this visit, but they carried me calmly through the work and out the door which is what matters.  Test Number One, check!

Liverpool

This was a really enormous deal for me.  My sister has been at university for years, and the closest I’ve ever come to visiting her was a flying stop to pick her up for the holidays one Christmas.  That was at least a couple of years ago now, and I was petrified.  So going for a REAL visit (an overnight one, at that) was a pretty scary prospect – one I’ve not really been able to even consider before.  But at the end of January, I did it – and once the idea had had a day or two to settle into my mind, I wasn’t even nervous!  I couldn’t believe it myself at the time.

Echo and the Bunnymen on a lambanana!

We drove to Liverpool (about two hours away from us here in Derbyshire) on a chilly Tuesday at the end of January.  We met my sister at her halls, then walked the twenty minutes or so across the city to our hotel.  Far from being intimidated by the bustle and the huge buildings – it’s a long time since I’ve been in a city that big and modern – I found it fascinating, taking photos of some of the most beautiful buildings, and trying not to miss any little detail along the way!  Even when we got a little bit lost, I didn’t feel so much as a flicker of anxiety – a fact that I registered with interest at the time and with great joy later. 

The Port of Liverpool Building

Once we’d checked in we headed down to Liverpool One for my first ever Nando’s, which was delicious.  I loved the busy, informal atmosphere in the restaurant, devoured my meal, and didn’t have to excuse myself once.  Usually after a meal I’m eager to get straight back home in case my stomach starts to play up, but instead we had a gentle wander through the shopping streets and ended up in a shoe shop, trying on boots and shoes at nearly 8pm!

St. George's Hall

The next morning we checked out and took a taxi back across to Hannah’s university flat to dump our bags for the day.  Then we headed down into the city again for breakfast – another fear of mine.  I was convinced I’d have to go really basic to stop myself feeling ill, but ended up having an ‘ah, sod it’ moment and joining the other two with a fried breakfast and a mug of tea at Bhs instead.  I wasn’t quite so sure of myself this time, but again, I was absolutely fine.

Boats moored at the Albert Dock

After breakfast we wandered down to Liverpool One again, and a little further to the Albert Dock.  We had a wonderful time taking photos of the boats and the ‘lambananas’, and browsing the quirky little shops by the water.  Then we went back up to the shopping centre and I ended up buying a load of stuff from Accessorize and some clothes from Peacock’s before we staggered into Thornton’s for another drink and a bite to eat.  Again, not a flicker of anxiety.  We headed home at about half two, and I think both Mum and I found it hard to believe that we’d had such a brilliant, fun – and successful! – time away.

Mum and I outside the Merseyside Maritime Museum

Spring Fair International

As  if that wasn’t amazing enough for one month, on Tuesday we were off to ANOTHER city – this time to Birmingham’s NEC for the enormous Spring Fair International trade gift show.  Again, it’s something I’d barely have been able to consider even a year ago - yet once again, my familiar old anxiety didn’t surface once, from getting up that morning to getting home that afternoon.

Very Official ID Badge

The NEC is about an hour and a half’s drive, plus a shuttle service between the car parks and the venue.  It was like walking into an airport, actually – huge, bustling, noisy and necessary to spend a lot of time peering at signs and poring over the map trying to work out where to go next!  I got a bit flustered in the first cafe because I was surrounded by tall, efficient people and had a ‘blonde moment’ trying to work the coffee machine… but, well, we’ve all been there.  And that was as bad as it got!

 I think we covered about four of the massive halls (a couple of them more than once, oops), hunting down the suppliers we already use to check out their new products, and picking up catalogues from a couple more companies that caught our eye along the way.  Honestly, if it had been a normal shopping environment – where you could buy things individually for yourself – I’d have spent a fortune!  Amazing artwork and lovely stationery and metal installations and funny signs and wonderful clocks, everything you could possibly imagine that might fit vaguely under the umbrella of ‘gifts’, from garden furniture to reading glasses.  Brilliant.

And again, no nerves!  Not when we realised we were going round in circles, not when we stopped to chat to some of the suppliers, not when we piled into a crammed little cafe for a sandwich, not when we queued for the bathrooms, not when we headed back out to the shuttle at the end of the day.  Not once.

So what’s changed?

• Success Breeds Success - Perhaps this all stemmed from that amazing day at Alton Towers!  It’s the same reason why I had to push so hard when I first started fighting my agoraphobia.  You need to have good experiences to create ‘success stories’ in your mind, which slowly start to overwrite the negative scenarios conjured by your fear.  Alton Towers was my biggest, most complete success story so far – the journey, the food, the rides, the walking, the exploration – and it must be a tremendous subconscious boost for my confidence when another new opportunity comes along. 
• Be Prepared - I seem to be much better at calming things down now, so that although I might be very agitated for a day or two when a big outing is first suggested, it dissipates far more quickly, leaving me better prepared mentally to think about what I need to take, and what a great time I’m going to have.  If I’m still a little bit fluttery I make sure I get a really good night’s sleep beforehand, and listen to my favourite music while I get ready in the morning to make myself feel confident and positive about the day.
• No, Really – Be Prepared – I also know exactly what I need to do to get through an outing successfully.  I take tablets for my stomach and anxiety before we leave, take them with me in my bag, and always carry a bottle of water and enough supplements (peppermint, ginger and super-lactase) to get me through the meals and snacks of the day.  Peppermint and ginger calm my stomach after a meal, and super-lactase stops me getting uncomfortable if I have rich dairy products, so they’re real lifesavers for me.  I also carry one of Andrex’s mini loo-rolls-in-a-bag, which stops me getting anxious about getting to a toilet and finding that it’s run out of paper.  I haven’t had to use it yet, but it’s nice to know it’s there! 
• Determination – I think it helps that I’m really focussed on the future right now.  I’m starting to think about Life After the Bookshop – what do I want to do?  Where do I want to go?  What kind of life do I want to have?  I’m sure it must help, because every opportunity I accept right now is a chance to see somewhere different and explore the world a bit again.  And it feels pretty darn good, I can tell you!

So what’s next, I wonder?  Well, half term in the shop (eeek) and a day or two off work that don’t involve big trips, hopefully – just because there’s stuff that needs doing at home, and review books to be read, and all kinds of other things that have been put on hold a bit recently!  At least I now know that I can have those weeks of R&R around the house without then being petrified next time I need to do something a bit more unusual.  

And there’s still plenty I want to do yet.  My first ever live music concert would be amazing – I’ve not been to a big venue since I was a little kid going to see Disney On Ice!  My first holiday abroad in years would be wonderful too, though that’s highly unlikely to happen while we have the shop, sadly.  I dreamed about staying in a sunny resort hotel with a gorgeous pool the other night, and I didn’t want to get up the next morning! 

Still, this is the time for dreaming, planning, wishing and hoping, I think.  And with a handful of big successes behind me, I can finally start thinking about what I want on a bigger scale.  Maybe this is where it all begins afresh? 

SWF, GSOH, wondering where to look for love

Text by Ellie Potten

Sometimes living in a small town is wonderful.  It’s peaceful and scenic and eminently manageable, everyone seems to know each other, and it’s easy to make friends.  But when it comes to love, living in a small town sucks.  I mean, it really sucks.  Partially this is due to my agoraphobia, I know - because once your friends have grown tired of something like that, you have no one to go out WITH.  You don’t wander into a bar and start flirting by yourself, that’s just a recipe for disaster.  But agoraphobia aside, the pickings are just so tiny in a town like this, you wonder if you’ll ever find a special someone ever again.

Working in my own shop probably doesn’t help either, I have to say.  I don’t have weekends off.  I don’t drive (yet) and the local public transport isn’t fantastic, particularly at night.  But even so, there seem to be no suitable men around here!  They’re all travelling with their girlfriends, married, or over 65, it seems.  And there are no women either!  In a tiny conservative town like this, how does a girl even go about finding a gay woman in the vicinity, let alone a gay woman of the right age that she is actually attracted to?  There’s just no one here.

I think university was pretty much my best shot at all this.  I had a boyfriend for two and a half years there, and had finally plucked up the nerve to join the LGBT society when I switched courses and started afresh – but then I left about a month later with agoraphobia.  Thwarted again!  So how on earth do I now, on my own, living with my family, car-free, running a business and living in such a tiny place, go about reclaiming my love life?

Part of me sometimes wishes I had a decent break at some point during the year - a couple of weeks would do - so I could work up some courage and, say, head off to Brighton for a week.  I want to be able to soak up that famously open atmosphere!  I want to be able to immerse myself in a place where it doesn’t matter whether you’re a girl or a boy, gay or straight or bisexual or transgender, flamboyant or quiet, young or old.  Somewhere where it’s okay to just be - to go with the flow and see where you end up.  It’s not like I’m a fussy girl – I like beautiful women and hunky men, but I also like girls who look like boys, and boys who look like girls.  It’s all good.

It’s not really something I can talk about with my family either.  As far as they’re concerned my sexual orientation is a whim, a need to be different, a passing fancy.  It’s something we just don’t really acknowledge, not because they think it’s wrong (I hope!), but because it’s so awkward.  Despite the fact that I’ve seen myself as bisexual since I was about 13, the fact remains that I’ve never actually been with a woman – never had the opportunity to date one or kiss one or even dance with one – and occasionally I catch myself wondering if they have a point.  Can you ever know until you’ve done it, as it were?  But you know what?  Sexuality is a pretty fluid concept - it doesn’t have to be fixed in place!  One moment my heart will be aching over my favourite characters from The L Word, the next moment I might be swooning over a muscled movie star with my mum!  It doesn’t matter!

I guess I just don’t know where to start.  It’s been five years, give or take a few months, since my last relationship ended.  It’s beginning to feel like I imagined the whole thing.  I don’t know where to go from here!  I don’t know where to go to fit in when my non-heterosexual feelings rear their pretty heads.  I don’t know what to do even when they don’t.  Tell me this, oh wise Interwebs: how is this country girl ever going to find love when her life is just so very small?

Book review: The Paradox of Choice

I bought this book because I already had a hunch I’d appreciate Schwartz’s argument.  Although he calls it counter-intuitive, to me it makes perfect sense.  When we have too much choice, we freeze.  We deliberate endlessly, we stress about making the right decision, we become paralysed by the many alternatives – and if we can, sometimes we just walk away without choosing at all…  Want to find out more?  Then this might be the book for you!  This is my review, taken from my book blog, Musings of a Bookshop Girl.

THE PARADOX OF CHOICE: WHY MORE IS LESS (3 stars)

by Barry Schwartz (Harper Perennial, 2005)

I had such high hopes for this book.  I was expecting it to focus largely on consumer culture, and to have some profound ‘light bulb’ moments that would really make me stop and think.  Not that it didn’t try, but unfortunately it never really hit the spot for me.

In actual fact, Schwartz focuses more on the psychological than the sociological, and widens his arguments to cover the choices we make in everything from education and careers to houses and cars to jeans and jam.  The prevailing theme of the book is how the growth of choice in modern society, and the emphasis on the individual as the maker of choices, has taken us beyond freedom and into the realms of tyranny.  Choice no longer liberates us; it spins us into its web and holds us there, stuck in our own uncertainty and fear.  We no longer choose between three pairs of jeans in a store – we choose between ten different fits, three different leg lengths and four different colours.  The same decision, however trivial it might be, now has higher stakes and many more alternatives to consider.  This, Schwartz argues, plunges us into a constant whirlwind of regret, comparison, uncertainty, disappointment and even depression.

I think Schwartz provides a compelling and relatable case against excessive choice, which certainly made me stop to ponder just how much of our time we devote to comparing, researching and choosing between different options in even the most inconsequential areas of our lives.  His eleven methods for reducing the negative effects of choice make sense, though for me as one of his ‘satisficers’ (people happy with ‘good enough’, as opposed to ‘maximisers’ who make their task more difficult by always looking for the best) I didn’t feel I really had too much to learn from them.

My main problem with the book was that it was just too long.  There was a lot of repetition – of ideas, anecdotes and examples – and the middle of the book really started to drag.  Cutting the whole thing down by about 50 pages and sharpening the pace would have improved the reading experience without damaging the argument.  I also noticed from the notes at the back that some of Schwartz’s examples had been directly lifted from other people’s work, without it being evident in the main body of text (the notes aren’t numbered), which I thought was a bit sneaky.  To sum up, maximisers and perfectionists might learn something important from this book, but satisficers – I wouldn’t bother.  It’d be like preaching to the choir anyway, so use your superior powers of choice to take you on to the next book!

Of muscle strains and bookish gains

No, I haven’t dropped off the face of the earth (though I do have a tendency to do that sometimes, oops).  Nope, instead I am injured and boldly going nowhere for the time being…

It’s not a broken leg or anything, but it IS a fairly nasty muscle strain right at the top of my left leg, which leads to occasional ‘Ooops’ moments where pain shoots through it, my leg gives way and I end up suddenly a foot closer to the ground than I was before…  I’m on crutches for the time being (my first pair, woohoo!) and therefore not moving around that much.  Even walking from the car to our bookshop is a bit of a nightmare, so mostly I’m just sitting on my backside with a book!

On the plus side, it’s meant that I’ve kick-started my reading again after a pretty poor run during the summer, giving me a fighting chance of finishing my reading challenge (12 pre-chosen books) even if I don’t hit my target of 75 books read this year.  If you’re a book lover and want to keep up with me while my dodgy leg starts to recover, head over to my book blog, Musings of a Bookshop Girl for bookshop news, reviews and general chatter.  Back soon!

All change for the winter!

Image by Rupert Brun, used under a Creative Commons license

Text by Ellie Potten

The clocks have gone back, the evenings are drawing in, the leaves are falling, the ice-skating penguins are back on BBC1, and hot chocolate is pushing itself higher and higher on my daily menu… winter must be coming!

This winter, thanks to price hikes that have made my summer utility bills higher than the previous years’ winter ones, I’ll be moving out of my damp little annexe and back into the main family home through the coldest weather.  It’s going to be a big change – and a big opportunity – with both pros AND cons to consider.

1. PRO: I get to save some money.  Without heating a flat for one, I’ll be able to tuck a bit extra away in my savings account this winter.
2. BOTH: There are kittens at home.  It’s been a long time since I’ve awoken nose-to-nose with a purring cat, but I have a feeling it’ll be a regular occurrence when I move in.
3. PRO: I’ll be warm and dry!  With frugal winter heating in the flat the damp seeps its way into my wardrobe and chest of drawers, chills my bedclothes, and I feel like I have a permanent very mild cold.
4. BOTH: I’ll be moving from a fully furnished, personalised flat to one little floral bedroom.  Despite the not-very-me decor it’ll be much cosier and I’m anticipating getting more reading done since snuggling on the daybed will be more enticing than watching telly downstairs…
5. CON: There are some scarily large wasps/hornets currently attempting to overwinter in our house, and that room is one of the first they crawl into when they fall out of the rafters…
6. PRO: As a mini-move before our planned bigger one, it’s a great opportunity to go through my stuff methodically, reevaluating what I need and paring things down.  I’ve only moved trousers, t-shirts and undies so far, but I’ve got rid of a few more of each along the way.  Plus, my detachment from whatever stays in the flat should help me let go of even more in a month or two.
7. PRO: There’s an AWESOME power shower in the house which is a million miles away from my little over-bath job – not to mention warmer in winter! 
8. PRO: I can cook proper meals for more than one person again – it’ll help pay my way! – and then bung all the tomatoey/oily pans in the dishwasher instead of clogging up the sink trying to clean them by hand.
9. CON: I’ll be back under parental supervision, with Mum, my stepdad, and sometimes my grandmother and/or sister in the house.  When visitors come to stay there’ll be no escape, and it’s going to be very odd living with actual people again and having to adapt a bit to the general household routine!
10. CON: I love my music, but I don’t think I’ll be moving my hefty old speakers into the tiny room.  It’s got to stay neat if we’re putting the house on the market!  Plus, it’s not so much fun having a mega sing-and-dance-along if everyone can hear you…
11. PRO: I can always pop back next door to watch a movie in peace, or listen to some music, or pick more books off my shelves.  Plus my sister’s
12. CON: Generally speaking, I’ll be permanently on hand.  I’m fairly sure this will mean extra household duties on Mum’s terms (like, “pleeaaaaase can you clean out the litter trays… since we’re letting you stay here!”), and it also means that nice downtime like reading and movie-watching is likely to be interrupted on a regular basis.
13. PRO: It’ll be good practice for when we move house.  I might get another annexe to live in, or I might be back in with everyone again, I have no idea yet!
14. PRO: It’s a bit like being on holiday.  A new room, a change of scenery, and chance to change my routine a bit and mix things up.

So, swings and roundabouts I think, good and bad.  In the meantime I’m enjoying my big telly (that’ll be staying put, obviously), I’m hooked on Young Dracula (again! I can’t get enough of Keith-Lee Castle’s deliciously sardonic Count!), I’ve finally gotten over my reading slump and am devouring books again, I’m colouring big angel templates for our Christmas window at the bookshop, and in between all that I’m continuing the sifting/tidying/cleaning efforts in the flat…  I’ll keep you posted!

A Year of New Foods 5: Beetroot, blackcurrant and apple juice

Image via mysupermarket.co.uk

Text by Ellie Potten

Having already tried the carrot, orange and ginger juice from this range – and loved it – I thought I’d step a little further out of my comfort zone and try beetroot, blackcurrant and apple…

First impressions

Very bizarre.  Surprisingly sweet, but with the bitter tang of the blackcurrants in a real kick of an aftertaste.  I couldn’t taste the apple at all.

My verdict

I really didn’t like this one – I emptied the rest down the sink.  The blackcurrant tang basically replaced the vinegar in pickled beetroot, making it taste as if I was swigging from the empty jar once all the slices were gone.  Needed more apple, less beetroot, I think.

Would I buy it again?

Definitely not!  I’ll stick with the other yummy juices I’ve discovered recently, thanks…

Next week: No idea, really!  Come back and see…

CATCHUP: What have I tried so far?

1. Tomberries
2. Chai tea
3. Mikado
4. Glorious! Tuscan chicken and orzo soup

Alton Towers, baby!

Text by Ellie Potten; photography by Ellie Potten unless otherwise stated

Yes, you heard right – I did it!  On Tuesday I bit the bullet and spent the entire day at the Alton Towers theme park with my mum!  A defining moment, I think, and a 100% success as far as my agoraphobia was concerned…

Usually a scary day like this will begin with me taking steps to keep my cool.  Maybe listening to music, or sitting quietly.  Instead it began as a rather more prosaic day - breakfast and telly, getting ready, a quick trip out to the vets with the cats and a petrol stop. Very exciting stuff.  After that I had about fifteen minutes at home, then we left again.  Not a glimmer of anxiety to be seen, I might add.

I didn’t even have to put my iPod on in the car (another good distraction in fraught moments) – Mum and I just chatted all the way there.  This was a huge deal, and being so calm was almost a surprise even for me!  Once we got to the park and were safely inside, we were free to do what we liked…

Which is where my fun and Mum’s hell really began.  Because really, what says ‘relaxed start to the day’ like Rita?  I’d never been on it before, Mum certainly hadn’t, but in my buoyant mood I dragged her straight into the queue anyway.  Ten minutes later we were up.  My heart flickered with coaster-nerves but hey, this won’t be so bad, I thought.  Well, it was.  They didn’t call her the Queen of Speed for nothing.  You literally never get your bearings, you’re hurtling along so fast.  All you can do is hold on!  Mum’s life flashed before her eyes and I staggered off thinking Jesus, what just happened?!

After that it was time to slow down the pace a little… with the also-new-to-me Th13teen.  Which really WAS a change of pace after Rita.  I went on it by myself, getting almost straight to the front thanks to the Single Riders queue and the 11.30am quiet.  I LOVED IT!  The coaster part was more fun than frightening, and the world-first vertical drop and backwards rush had me giggling hysterically!  SO much fun.  So I dragged Mum on it.  I thought it was much tamer and really unique – she saw her life flash before her eyes for the second time in half an hour.  Oh well. 

Later on in the day it was time for my old favourite, Nemesis.  I’ve been on it a few times before – and so has Mum, I might add – but she wasn’t having any of it.  I think she was still traumatised.  So again, I went on it alone, bypassing the main queue and literally getting straight onto the next ‘train’.  I imagine riding on the front is scarier, but I feel so SAFE on Nemesis.  The snug harness, the comfortable structure of the seats so you’re firmly enclosed, the smoothness of the motion…  Definitely one of my favourites!

Unfortunately, Air closed just as I was about join the queue, which was a shame.  It might have only taken ten minutes for them to deal with the mysterious delay and re-open, but it was my last ride of the day and we didn’t really want to wait around.  It could have been an hour for all we knew!  That’s one bucket list item that’ll have to wait until next time…

In between rides, we had a wonderful time too!  We had a quick, cheap lunch at the KFC right by the towering terror of Oblivion, and perched on a rock in Mutiny Bay with a hot coffee and a warm donut apiece.  We popped into the gift shop on Towers Street for a souvenir of my big day (I was tempted to buy Mum one of the medals proclaiming ‘I survived Rita’ but restrained myself).  We went to the Sea Life exhibition and marvelled at the shark and ray reef and the ENORMOUS Japanese spider crabs, and had a strange manicure by some little shrimps that probe around your fingernails cleaning them! 

We wandered round the outside of the Towers, marvelling at the gothic ruins and the shimmering blue lake.  It’s such an impressive building – apparently when it’s not being taken over by Hallowe’en activities you can go inside and have a look round part of it.  I’ll bear that in mind for next time!

  I must say, I’d forgotten just how beautiful the park is, and how little the densely-packed ride areas actually manifest themselves in the grounds as a whole.  I think I was too young to appreciate it last time, dashing from ride to ride frantically!  While we were walking off our lunch by ambling idly around exploring, we came across the entrance to the gardens.  I’ve only ever seen them from the cable cars, and we didn’t go far in because there was an ominous storm cloud blowing up, but look at this view from just inside the walls!  Such beautiful trees, and the pagoda nestled amongst them.  Something else to add to my ‘next time’ list…

 We also had a good walk through the Gloomy Wood between the entrance area and the Forbidden Valley (where Nemesis and Air are tucked away).  We actually walked it twice, because even though my feet were killing by then, we couldn’t find the cable car station!  Ha, at least we were keeping fit.  We never hopped a cable car all day, it was nicer on foot.  It was a pretty walk anyway, with various spooky props and scary interactive booths along the way.  I had a little play with the abandoned hearse carriage!

 

Last but by no means least was Franklyn’s Freaky Farm, which we actually visited THREE TIMES – including once when they weren’t open yet.  Ooops.  Anyway, one of the big things about my visit was going to be the opportunity to hold a snake.  I did half-hold one, but I don’t think I’d count it for my bucket list.

That aside, it was marvellous!  Our animal trainer/falconer friend James and his son Tom had brought together a collection of alternately cute and horrible animals, in a darkened room lit only by the cage spotlights.  There were tarantulas and fruit bats, a scorpion and two different mantids, a skunk (Sid) and a python, a brown rat and a millipede.  I half-held a tiny rosy boa, but it had its tail firmly wrapped around Tom’s wrist and was refusing to let go – hence the half-holding.  It looked like an Egyptian bangle! 

Image via mirror.co.uk

I also held a baby palm civet, which is one of the cutest things I’ve ever seen!  This pic is the closest I could find – this one’s two months old, the one I held (rather sweetly named Brian) was only six weeks!  It was like a kitten-sized wolf cub with bigger eyes!  Tom – who is so natural with his animals, it’s lovely - had him running all over him, up and down his arms, perched on his shoulder, nestling into the crook of his elbow…  He told me to hold out my arm so Brian could run from him to me, and he was away!  Up and down my arm, trying to get up my sleeve – then he went and hid at the back of my neck, under my collar and my hair!  So cute!

After all this excitment I could have murdered a sit down in a cafe with a cup of tea - I was so thirsty! – but it was really time to leave.  We had a giddy drive home, stopped off at the supermarket en route for some cat litter, and finally staggered in through the door at well gone 5:30pm.  I was exhausted, but still had trouble getting to sleep that night because every time I closed my eyes I felt like I was still on a rollercoaster!  I even did the ‘falling off a roof’ jerky thing as I went down a drop on my imaginary coaster and woke myself up!  But I was one very happy bunny.

So was it the hypnotherapy?  Was it a good dose of forward planning so I knew I had everything covered and everything I’d need?  Was it the fact I’d been before and knew Mum was probably more terrified than me?  Was it the glorious sunshine and crisp breeze?  Was it just that I’d had a good month to prepare myself so that my anxiety had all been dispelled by then?  Who knows.  All I know is that I haven’t felt that alive, happy, excited, liberated and generally care-free on a day out for many years.  It was AMAZING!  And from here, the only way is up.  Success!