Safe

No bombs are pounding your house, no zika virus is threatening your baby, no rebels are kidnapping your daughters, no mafia, no nothing. It’s pretty safe, the Netherlands.

Your children can go to school, and you can work or do whatever else takes your fancy. You can call your GP if that hamstring injury is causing unbeeeeearable pain, you can down a couple of paracetamol and crawl into your safe, warm bed. It’s pretty safe, your own existence. If you’re lucky, that is.

Mothers
Me and millions of other mothers just like me, have learnt what life and death is. The only thing that we want is for our family to remain safe. A mother recently told me something quite momentous. She was talking about her 3 mischievous little monkeys, who are now strapping young adults. She said: build a safe nest, and your little monkeys will be fine.

She got me thinking.
Our family is safe. But but but! Shouldn’t mothers be safe too? Ah. Parkinson’s. Are you still safe if you’ve got Parkinson’s? Is your family still safe? And what, exactly, is ‘unsafe’? The future? Your income? House kitchen garden? Attention? Quality family time? A peaceful environment? What safety risks are you running?

I’m starting to twig

Safe is trust’s little sister

You have to trust in yourself. If it was that easy of course, I wouldn’t be writing this blog …

But a serious health issue will slowly gnaw away at your confidence. Until you’re in a permanent state of high alert, an emergency Code Orange, a threat level 4. You’re constantly on the run. Running to and fro, monitoring your banks of trust. Because – just imagine what would happen if they burst? Run, run, run!

Come on! Snap out of it.
That constant running, that constant state of emergency results in flu and torn hamstrings. I know that now. Not much fun for your family. Oh, yes! That family you so desperately wanted to protect from just about everything. Which you can’t possibly do. What you can do though, is trust in yourself, your family, your life. That’s how you build a safe nest, suitable for little monkeys. Regardless of whether that little monkey is your child, this most unwelcome Parkinson’s business or something else entirely.