PERSPECTIVE

Don't you just love relaxing days? I had one today and it was so very welcome. Late this morning, Elly, mum and myself headed for the west coast. We parked at Cobo and walked along the beach to Grandes Rocques. We overestimated the temperature and ended up shivering walking by the sea as there was quite a breeze! It was my first time seeing the sea since the operation and, as you may have guessed from the name of my blog, it is one of my favourite things in the world. I (of course) filmed a few shots of the waves and glittering bright blue water but accidentally deleted the final video off my phone so I can't post it here . I'm not happy with myself about that, but I'm sure you all can picture how pretty it was.

We then decided to get fish and chips for lunch which is not something I think I've done before! Usually they'd be eaten on the Cobo sea wall like proper Guerns watching the sunset. We took them back home and ate them on the patio. It wasn't my easiest task (I had to blend the chips and mash up the fish, ew) but I somehow managed to eat some batter too, which is my favourite. Yay!

As it was a lovely day here today, our patio was a sun trap as ever and so we decided to make the most of it and relax this afternoon. I had downloaded Katie Piper's autobiographical book Beautiful onto my kindle before the operation to read in hospital but, as you well know, I wasn't up for much in the end. So I thought this afternoon was a perfect excuse to do so. I then thought this afternoon was also a perfect excuse to try and cross 'read a book in a day' off my bucket list. I surprised myself with how fast I can read and I'm currently 82% of the way through it! I can do this.

I just want to talk about this book quickly because it really had an impact on me today. I knew it would. If you don't already know, Katie Piper is/was a model and TV presenter who, in 2008, became the victim of rape and then, a day later, an acid attack, by her then boyfriend. I had known this prior to starting the book, but I'd never known a lot about it, despite knowing who she was, naturally admiring her and even having received a tweet from her once.
I was excited -if that's a word that can be applied- to reading her story and a little apprehensive. It wasn't long after reading the horrific detail of what happened to her that tears sprung to my eyes. Her description of the unimaginable pain she felt as it happened and her account of her treatment and recovery really hurt my soul. Like her, I will never be able to understand how someone could be so cruel. Reading about it, it was worse than I dared to think about and really put things into perspective for me. A week after a 'major operation', I'm sat here with a slight headache from reading for hours on end, a weird tightness around my mouth and a little frustration about not being back to 'normal' yet. But I have nothing to complain about. Nothing at all in comparison. The swelling in my face has reduced enormously in the past three days and even in the past few hours, but still, at lunch time, I was saying "I'm fed up of looking like this". A few hours, a few kindle pages and a few tears later, I really am not bothered that I still don't quite look like me. Because Katie, though now so beautiful again thanks to wonderful surgeons and strength, won't ever look like how she used to. I am absolutely, one million percent okay.

She is a 'national inspiration', but she is also a reminder that the little things in our lives which we consider to be bad, annoying, frustrating... they're insignificant. She is also a reminder that friends, family and inner strength are so valuable and simultaneously so priceless. She's put my current slightly-less-good-than-usual situation into perspective, and so many other things too.

I suggest you read her story.

Now, if you don't mind, I'm going to put down my laptop and pick up my kindle. Then it's time to catch up on Coronation Street!

Namaste x