19:00 GMT Friday 26.06.2015

I awoke after deep sleep not disturbed by tendrils of a bad dream reaching out to pull me back into the darkness where my fear is naked and fresh, despite having always been with me. No, the night had been free of that.

Luque, Mary-Grace and Whitney were all on John's side of the bed. He was up and not there. The room was dark and sultry and I had to call him several times, so loudly I thought I would have a sore throat. 

I bit down on my panic. I couldn't move, my body as yet refusing to awake despite it's obvious presence being felt with shards of pain shooting around my body, as if my body were a gaming machine with various areas competing to see which part could hurt the most.

Eventually John appeared. I wanted to scream at him about how he should have his hearing aids in but I resisted. After all he had entered our room carrying my relief, medication, and a bottle of Pepsi Max.

He found the remote that controlled my side of the bed and he handed it to me so I could raise myself into a sitting position. I am feeling low and tearful, my body trembles as it comes to the full cacophony of it's life.

Slowly I start to swallow my drugs, starting with the small leading up to the large, the final one having to be chewed, once a pleasure now chewed with a plea not to gag.

Now I stayed sitting glad for the slight breeze though the open window and the light brightening my face. I look at John as he stands, side on to me, looking out of the window. I feel a mixture of deep love for him, gratitude for the way he takes care of me without asking and without resentment, and a deep shame toward myself for having become so dependent.  

Teetering on the edge as my tears were, I made them stay put as I told John that all my teenage fears had come true-I was useless and pathetic and the terror of once again ending up being 'cared for' in a home only kept at bay with the knowledge that I know how to make sure this never happens. I assume that my husband goes on that journey before I. I don't want him to live in the shadow of ice that is the cruelty of loss and this only after finding ones way back to the surface and breaking the ice that encases one or there is no fight, no reaching up to the surface in which case I have no idea what would happen. 

I have fought for every breath all of my life and do not know how not to. 

Tiredness brings me to an end. For now.