quick question for meg

hi meg - i read your story and could see so much of myself in it! i just wondered how long you would say your recovery took? jo x

Oh Jo, What a tough question..

It depends on whether you mean recovered enough to go back to work, recovered enough to function independently with support, recovered to when I was 'fine' again - but still having blips or recovered to the point when I was not even thinking about being anxious very much at all.

All very different stages, but each was vital to me to go through and to be very honest, as it took me ages to figure out quite how to go about it, there was lots of plateaus and dilly-dallying and times when it was just too hard for me to push forward any more for a while, plus blips that I possibly could have avoided but didn't see the signs and those that came as a result of pushing too hard too fast and thus stayed a bit too long as I was fragile.

It really is the story of the length of a piece of string and I tend not to put a time on it as then people gauge themselves and compare to others which is just setting some people up for disappointment and feelings of failure which are so unnecessary. We all have our own differing issues and beliefs to crack open and deal with and some simply take longer than others. I do find that there is a anedotal correlation to how much you really really need to improve. I had to get back to work so managed that as a very steep curve however rubbish I felt but the following bits of travelling independently - not to my workplaces - were harder, as the reality was, that it wasn't crucial to my livelihood and survival to be able to do this daily.

Sorry if I seem very vague and I can quite remembering being desperate for some sort of time frame myself so I'll just say that each stage took weeks, but practicing one or two stages enough to be ready to push on up another notch took me several months to work through, others may be able to figure it out quicker.

Just keep plodding if you're on the right path. It's not a race.

What great advice from Meg again. Think she's just so helpful and it's great to have a success story.

Do you fancy a chat Jo as I see myself in Meg's story alot too?

Sarah x