School holidays, pools and a bit of bouncing

After the realisation while on holiday that once in the water, I can do pretty much anything, my physio and I have now decamped to the pool for my sessions.  Walking up the steps with my gym bag was a surreal moment – I definitely never thought I’d be doing that again! And those of you who are sniggering and thinking appearances would suggest I didn’t do it do it often enough before I became ill are correct too. ;-)

I love the pool at Castle Royle.  It’s wonderfully underused (wonderful from my perspective - less so, I suspect from theirs), so I expected to find the usual serene, quiet pool when we arrived.  I had visions of having an almost private environment for my rehab, which would have been ideal.

Unfortunately, I hadn’t factored the Easter school holidays in to that vision...

What we actually walked into was very different. It was full of children. I mean, really full. There must have been about 40 of them all shrieking, screeching and squealing. The noise was deafening. I cannot comprehend how parents cope with that. Kudos to you if you do. All I can think is that you must need industrial strength ear plugs, medication and therapy on a regular basis.

It might as well have been Dante’s seventh circle of hell as far as I was concerned and I wanted to turn tail and abandon this clearly foolhardy plan until the Easter holidays finish.  My physio however, is made of stern stuff.  She grabbed my elbow and marched me towards the pool, while telling me to wave my walking stick around in an out of control/threatening type way.  It worked.  In no time at all, we had a section of the pool to ourselves with all children and parents giving the strange, stick wielding ladies a wide berth.  Excellent. 

The session though tough, was really good, although I’m not sure bouncing (yes, bouncing) two lengths of the pool has done anything for my personal credibility.  Aside from the obvious lady bits, there was far more of me bouncing than there should be.  I did feel for the poor child swimming past me underwater with goggles on.  He'll probably never be the same again...

Nevertheless, it’s all helping get me where I need to be.  And that’s what it’s all about.