Oh dear, not feeling so well at the moment. It really took it out of me to travel down and look at this flat, and make the decisions I needed to make. I'm also feeling quite down, and it's left me feeling less confident about finding somewhere, as there are very few places available and I'm not sure about my abilities to deal with the things which need dealing with.

This week I travelled down to view a flat; the first one I've actually been to see. We'd found it in the local paper the weekend before and my sister, who lives close by, had already been to see it. She thought it looked suitable for me. However, when I saw it I it felt too small for me; first, because I'll be spending most of my time in the flat, especially when I am less well, and so I'll need a place in which I can spend large amounts of time without feeling cramped, and second, because I have a lot more stuff than could fit in that flat. The other problem is that it is on a busy main road: not too bad as far as my sister was concerned, but when I was there the noise of the traffic quickly started to make me feel quite ill. There were lorries thundering past every minute or two, and I really don't think I could live with that; it's what I'm trying to get away from, only even more severe than I have at the moment.

I'll write more about how this process actually made me feel, because that's interesting, but the hardest thing was trying to make a decision at all, especially when there was the pressure of taking the flat if at all possible as I am desperate to move as soon as possible, balanced against gut feelings of this place not being right for me.

I feel exhilarated right now. This afternoon, as it has been such a beautiful day, I made the effort to go to the lido which has just reopened in an area not too far from where I live. I only found out about it a few weeks ago from friends who have been using it. What a joy! There are so few pools left in my area of London; the nearest 'proper' swimming pool – i.e. not a fun pool – is a long a tiresome bus journey and is always full of schoolchildren. While I think it's wonderful that children are given plenty of opportunity to swim, there is something peculiar about the acoustics of swimming pools which makes the ebullient noises of children even more difficult to bear than usual (see posts passim on problems with sensory input). I have therefore found it too difficult to swim there, and haven't swum for almost 2 years.

On a day like today, nothing could have been more perfect than swimming in  a lido. It's only a shame I could do so little, as the feeling of being suspended in water is something wonderful, and swimming is an activity I had always enjoyed immensely. (In fact, when I use a visualisation exercise in relaxation, the 'special place' to which I retreat has a beach – tropical, of course – and I always go swimming in the sea, which transports me to a more relaxed, happy, powerful state of being.)

I had a stressful and upsetting session with my occupational therapist yesterday. Stressful and upsetting because of my reactions, not because of anything bad she did. I'm going to try to post something about that in the next day or two, because it will help me to think through why I found it so difficult.

A bit of a corny title, perhaps, but apt in a way. Or rather, two ways.

I’ve posted before about the mindfulness meditation which I’ve been practising (on and off) over the past 3 years – see 'Stop. And continue stopping' – and want to add some further thoughts. I’ve finally, this week, managed to get back in to regular meditation practice, for a reason that I’m quite proud of: I’ve finally managed to get some help in learning how to use the mixing desk software I have, and so have been able to put together a CD with a chime from a Tibetan singing bowl every five minutes. This won’t mean much to someone who hasn’t tried meditating (and especially someone who hasn’t tried to do it on their own), but it is immensely helpful to have something to remind you to move from one stage of the meditation to the next. The meditations I practise are, as I mentioned before, forms of mindfulness meditation, and each have a series of stages which help you to subtly shift the focus of your awareness, and this helps to heighten your awareness of your experience in that moment. Having this CD that I can now play has been just the impetus I needed to get me back in to the habit.

I'll write more on this theme as my practice develops.