Yesterday, I found these scribbled notes , written in December 2021, and while they’re hard to read, I’m glad I wrote it all down and find the final few lines particularly interesting.

March 2020-lockdown- all school author visits cancelled. No paid work. Can’t write. Can’t focus. Horrendous anxiety about Covid, particularly as my daughter Sal is working in covid wards with rubbish PPE.
April-October 2020 Very anxious. doom scrolling constantly. Hair is falling out. pains in my side and insomnia. Scan shows gallstones. Sal gets Covid, is ill for three weeks and I can’t go and see her. Pain in side is getting more intense and often.
November-emergency 2020 op on necrotic gallbladder. Get out of hospital and have to go into isolation for 14 days as patient on ward had covid.
December- A & E in agony – MRi scan – small bile duct stones diagnosed. Quiet Christmas. Mum deteriorating badly. 
Jan- June 2021 helping to care for mum at home- final stages of dementia. School visits on zoom- 2 or 3 a week. Try and have two nights away in May and have to rush back as mum gets a UTI and is poorly.
July 3rd Mum dies. Ian has a heart attack same day. Organise funeral. Visit Ian in hospital. Feel totally shattered but get on with it.
Sept-Dec 2021 New book comes out {Secrets of the Last Merfolk} Trying to promote it, despite all the current barriers, and do school visits both virtual and in-person, start author in residence at Cumbrae Primary, start a new novel about dementia. Join a gym. start yoga and Spanish classes. Trying to get myself back together.

So, it’s now the 1st of May 2024. I still go to the gym three times a week and to my yoga class on Fridays. The Spanish classes ended but I’m still learning Spanish on Duolingo every day without fail. And reading those old notes gives me a real sense that I managed to get myself back together.

The new novel about dementia, Ice Cream Boy, is coming out this month and I am so excited and positive about getting it into the hands of young readers. I am even having a proper in-person launch with wine and cake, my first since 2019.
Ice Cream Boy is dedicated to my mum.