15th September Miranda muses

 

A sentence that goes, 'Hand on heart I am not a 'real' fan of Miranda', feels like it is the kind of sentence that needs several more sentences to explain it. So here goes. 

Hand on heart I am not a 'real' fan of Miranda, mainly because it is not a program I have watched a great deal during its three series that contained 20 episodes and two Christmas specials. I suspect it was because it was simply on at the wrong time or clashed with something else. 

It was, just to make clear, certainly nothing to do with not liking Miranda Hart as a person. Thought I'd better make that clear up front just to avoid yet another celebrity on line feud. I have caught odd shows from time to time,(mainly at TOM's who loves it) and have enjoyed it but my 'connection' with it only goes that far.

All of which is a very long winded way of saying that I have just finished reading her autobiographical book, 'I haven't been entirely honest with you', which the truly observant amongst you might have already gathered from the image at the start of this post. 

It is a book that tell the tale of her journey through an almost 30 year period of undiagnosed illness(es) and the profound effect it has had on her life. It is in Miranda's own words a book that starts off really grim, and if I am honest a bit frustrating, but one which she promises at the start does get much lighter, brighter and better as it progresses. And it did.

In it Miranda candidly bares all (no not like like) with regards her innumerable non and misdiagnosis over the years, as the medical establishment (and those not quite so established) failed to get to the bottom of what appeared to be an auto immmune like illness that left her so fatigued she was bed bound for weeks on end. It the end it transpires the most likely trigger was Lyme disease, a bacterial infection transferred via the bite of an infected tic, something she thinks happened whilst a teenager.  

As well as being autobiographical, the book is also a kind of self help manual of things, (Miranda calls them 'treasures') she herself learned over the years together with a combination of insights from scientists, psychologists, sociologists, therapists, interspersed with her own Miranda style musings.

These 10 treaures are the ability to share, surrender, feel, care for others, discover our 'why', play, pacing & presence, using setbacks and ultimately realising that it's all about love in the end. As she says herself none of it is rocket science but in the depths of illness and despair that can drag on for years if not decades, it can often feel as if one might need a rocket to actually get to any of these points of acceptance on the road to well being.

Not a laugh a minute book by any means but one that made me feel a whole lot better for having read it. You might like to give it a go.