Crash, forms, wobbles

It is 10 days since my car nudged another as we both rounded a bend on a country lane in opposite directions.  Since then I have had to get used to a hire car with too many gadgets, and try to negotiate a pile of different strands of paperwork.

What happened to picking ourselves up and brushing ourselves down after minor incidents of life and being grateful for what didn't happen? In the midst of the hours of phone calls repeating the details a leading question about a stiff neck triggered an unwanted stream of paperwork about my 'personal injury claim' complete with medical appointment dates.  It seems however many times I say I am not injured and have not authorised a claim file being opened I am not heard - finally on Thursday, a week after the event I thought I had got through to them in words of one syllable that I did not, do not and will not be pressing a claim for a non-injury. Even then I had a call back on Friday to ask why!

I am resigned to losing no claims and that it is an accident that will be split liability - or knock for knock as some call it. it seems the other side is hoping to claim otherwise. Friday's post came with a copy of their paperwork, they have opted for the injury claim and in their version of the story make it my fault rather than a 'just happened'.  On one level they would say that wouldn't they? And my insurers were clear when I called about it that it would be 50/50. But that didn't stop me going off into a wobble.

It triggered my 'useless' wobbles, doubting myself as a driver, about my decisions, feeling at fault for even being a share in an accident - in other words feeling a failure for an imperfection. It gets in my head and circles round and round, feeling poorly with a cold brewing didn't help me fight it. Round and round until like being dizzy you can't sense which is the right way up. And then you get the feedback effect of getting 'useless' wobbles for getting the wobbles in the first place.

Today although being full of cold and tired I don't have the big wobbles. A night of sleep, and a new day with sun shining have made a huge difference. And the fact that those are enough to calm the wobbles show how much better I am than a few months ago when I had to go off work.

I just wish the wobbly days didn't come - but maybe to lose them would also be to lose the high days too, the excited moments, the inspired moments. We only know the pleasure of the sun's warmth in contrast to the cold; or the cool of the breeze as relief to burning humidity. Still Don't like the cold mind you!!

The power of honesty

Whilst I was off sick the deadline came for my community newsletter article. It was work but I decided to do it – 200 words in which I was open about my depression and discussed how common it was but little mentioned. I sent it off with the usual service dates etc and rolled back under my duvet.  It came out at the start of February and I have had the greatest response ever to a piece I have written.  I had worried if it was a bit self-indulgent, but at the village coffee morning today I had several conversations with people about themselves or family experiences, others have phoned me to thank me for what I had written. When one person is willing to speak it gives others permission to talk if they need to.

And I have benefited from similar honesty at a meeting of a group of ministers this week, discussing stresses, loneliness, spiritual struggles (as well as the joys).  The opening devotions started with a list of the official criteria for being a minister and how wonderful we must be to tick all those boxes, followed by a clip from the first series of Rev where Adam is ready to lose it in frustration at the job. Being real is part of the chaos of life, and each of us has our own variation of stresses, mine don’t look so bad in comparison – or at least they are familiar and I am used to their quirks.

So all in all I feel affirmed in my wobbliness – we all wobble in our own way and this is mine. And I feel loved and cared for by the people I know and work with.  Nothing is technically different about any of these things today compared to last time I wrote but today I have been very aware of the good stuff, and enjoying that.  Days like today are the life jacket for when the waves crash over and to be savoured.