The introduction to this blog needs to be updated a little….

If you are interested in why I started this blog in July 2018 – you can read about it at the top of this page/blog – enjoy! For those of you who just want a brief intro and an update as you’ve been following me (thank you!) here it is…

It’s been about ten month since I set off in my caravan, for the first time, with about 3 hours of tuition on how to connect, tow, drive, set up, get ready to move and generally be able to operate and live in a caravan, all on my own. It was quite an experience (as you can read in the blog posts) and one that will stay with me forever and taught me many things.

Looking back on my first post and the bullet points I included on what I wanted to achieve, I can conclude…

AIM:  Navigate my way around a few places in the UK I not been to, all alone, with a caravan attached to my car that I have to detach, set up, make safe, have fully functioning, fix any issues in, re attach, reverse, get around corners, keep upright, keep safe etc (not anxious at all…)

RESULT: I did it! Big tick in the achieved column! As you will see or know from my blog, it wasn’t without its eventful moments, some worry and upset and a few minor disasters, but I did it, on my own and made it back safe too!

AIM:  Enjoy myself, learn things, keep myself safe and healthy (as well as my car and caravan) and do something many people wouldn’t even consider doing.

RESULT: Again, fully achieved this and would do it all again in a heartbeat.

AIM:  Keep this blog up and running throughout my travels (therefore keep finding access to WiFi)

RESULT: Tick again…this is going very well so far….Go me 🙂

AIM:  Stop worrying so much about what people think of me. I spend way too much time thinking I’m not good enough and listening to other people (all well-meaning) tell me what I should be doing with/in my life and really taking it to heart and getting upset and doubting myself and the decisions I make. Well, I’m doing this my way and doing it alone. If I can do this –I’m on my way to knowing in my heart I can do anything – without others people’s opinions mattering.

RESULT: Hmmmm…… I would say I am 87% on this. The impact I have on others through what I say and do will always be part of me, because I care about other people! But I now know that in the past I have often put other people’s feelings before mine in order to make sure I don’t upset them and keep them happy.

Over the last 10 months I have begun to change my mind-set on this a lot. I still want to make the people in my life happy, but not to the detriment of my own feelings and health. In short, I’ve begun to focus more on me and how I want to feel, and have come to the understanding that I am the only person who can make myself feel a certain way. If I want to be happy, I do something that will make me happy. If I want to be alone and quiet, I find a place I can do this. If I want to be out and about with a friend, I arrange it. If someone says something to upset me (if they do this on purpose or not) I am the only person who can decide how I react to that. I can choose to obsess over it or I can choose to ignore them and focus on more positive things.

One of the biggest results of this is that I have lost 2.5 stone! I had a ‘euphoria’ moment at the beginning of 2019 and realised that I wanted to feel good about myself and one of the best ways to do this was to get healthier. I’ve always been pretty active, but stepped this up by working with Rachel Benton, an amazing Personal Trainer, who not only helped me with diet and exercise but also with my mental health. I call the first 15 minutes of each of my sessions with Rachel ‘Treadmill Therapy’ as she really made me look at how I thought about myself, my relationship with food and helped me address a lot of the problems I’ve had in the past that I tried to solve with eating my feelings!

I believe the process started when I decided to do something totally out of my comfort zone (and lots of other peoples by some of the comments I get when I talk about it!) and just take myself off in my caravan and has gone on from then. I’m not cured, I will always have ‘issues’ with food and how I perceive myself, but I am SO much happier than I was a year ago.

So what next? Well, it’s about time I got a job and this is all in progress – watch this space! But never fear, I will still be going on and documenting my travel experiences, in or out of my lovely caravan, so please keep reading!