This post is something of a newsflash – I have created a sister blog to this one which, going forwards, will concentrate on topics exclusively to do with health and lifestyle choices, leaving Scattering the Light to concentrate on bigger themes and the art-perspective that I so love to bring to everything. The blog is called “Health Reunited” (renamed Living Whole Life 2016).

To help explain the rationale behind this decision, I am going to share a portion of the About section of Health Reunited (Living Whole).

For four years, I’ve written some really meaty, all-encompassing posts (here) about my recovery experiences, my health epiphanies and my progress. So, why start a new blog about health now, you might ask? Well, where I am in my journey feels like somewhere between 80 and 90 per cent recovered (depending on which day of the month you ask me), with a steady feeling of inching closer towards 100 per cent the more the sun shines but what I have also come to realise is this…

• Whenever I STOP thinking of myself as broken in some way, I recover at lightning speed, holding those recovery milestones for the most consistent periods of time, and feel the most complete in myself.
• Whenever I appreciate all the MANY gifts that I have received along the road to my ‘recovery’, I realise that – with all my heart – I don’t regret a single step I have taken and wouldn’t change a thing.
• Whenever I act as though I am ‘already there’ – whole and complete, living fully and appreciatively in this moment, I AM there; there is nothing missing from my world.

To anyone that has been through Fibromyalgia, ME, CFS or one of the many chronic illnesses out there or even through the trials and tribulations of menopause, hormone swings, diabetes…the list goes on and on…you will be familiar with the feeling that ill-health can feel like you are scattered, blown on the wind in many directions; your system no longer feels cohesive or like its all marching to the same tune. As you strive towards recovery, it can feel like, just as you get one thing lined up relatively neatly again, another thing goes completely wrong. If you are like me, you will have spent a lot of time researching and trying to understand how all the different parts of your body work, how they are connected, how one thing happening in one part of you can apparently trigger-off a completely different thing happening somewhere else entirely (Myofascial Pain teaches you that one like nothing else). You will, very likely, have delved into the complex subtleties of hormones and the endocrine system, honing a layperson’s expert grasp of the see-saw effect these can have upon one another that would leave most conventional doctors standing. You may well have stepped into the realms of energy-healing, seeking relief from acupuncture, Reiki, Bodytalk and many other (still considered ‘fringe’) modalities. Better still, you may be working with this aspect of your health yourself through the practices of visualisation, affirmation, meditation and yoga. If so, you are, very likely, noticing that the more you work at reuniting all these aspects of health into one big picture, the more you are feeling – well – healthy!

Because to be healthy is to consider the whole picture; to be healthy is tobe whole.

More than that, you will have – hopefully – begun to glean that it doesn’t matter how broken up into parts you feel, there is always a wholeness that underlies it all, even at your worst moments; one that cannot be harmed, that keeps on chugging along in the bumpy waters of life and which never reallygives up hope. That part is YOU, it is the Self at the core of it all, having the wonderful sensory experience of all that it is to be alive – ok, perhaps FEELING it all in a slightly more exaggerated way than some people but that’s because you are probably more tuned-in, one of the highly-sensitive, empathic types who feel everything most acutely. If you are having a long-running bumpy ride with your health, its likely that you are one of those people who us tuned in to absolutely everything (and then some), from other people’s moods, the weather and solar flares to the amount of fear running amok in the collective consciousness because of whatever ‘the news’ is harping on about this week. All of these super-sensitivities are gifts and can be handled a whole new way, when seen from a different perspective.

Another thing that felt very dispersed at the beginning of this journey, but which years of research, trial and error have brought much closer towards reunion, for me, is the pool of information about what chronic illness is (and, equally, what it is not, including “incurable”). A big part of the reason for how all-over-the-place the available information is comes down to the long-running rift between ‘conventional’ pharmaceutical-based medicine and all the more natural~energetic approaches, though I am glad to say that there have been signs of some truce-calling and collaboration between these two more recently. This is another area of the recovery topic that made the title “Health Reunited” feel so appropriate since I envision a world where all medical professionals are open to the whole vast pool of many resources we have available to us when it comes to knowing about the human body, not just the very limited approaches that have been dictated to us via mainstream medicine for so long.

It seems to me that every single experience of pain or physical challenge that I have encountered over the past decade has been an early warning system of something that desperately needed my attention and for that I am extremely grateful. Its no coincidence that these ten years have seen me revamp my lifestyle like never before…and I LOVE the lifestyle I have now adopted whilst feeling more confident than ever that it will see me into a long and healthy “old” age (though my idea of what constitutes “old” has also changed very radically…). These are all aspects that I intend to speak about in this new blog. With each (diet, exercise, outlook, routine, etc) tweak that I have made, it has felt like taking a giant leap towards a more holistic way of living; with each part of me brought another step closer towards full-body team effort, unity and so health.

In short, it felt like it was time to carpark some short and punchy posts about diet, herbal remedies, aromatherapy, yoga and much more. Health Reunited feels like a doorway swinging open into an unlimited playground where I can explore these topics in a whole new, expanded and interconnected way.

If you happen to be someone with Fibromyalgia or any other chronic health challenge, a woman going through menopause (a topic I am keen to give a makeover as the best time of a woman’s life) or just someone looking for some inspiration and shared tips,  I offer the new space that is Health Reunited as an information pool, a sounding-out space. It is, quite simply, for anyone that can relate to the experience of wanting to reunite all the many parts of themselves into one beautiful, well-functioning, active, healthy WHOLE. I will repost anything on bigger themes and that is relevant to both audiences here but to sign-up for, specifically, health and life-style related posts, hop over there now and drop your email in the box.