I haven’t been this excited about random developments for ages. I don’t think I’ve actually EVER been this excited about developments relating to fitness-type stuff. But I’ve just climbed off the shiny new exercise bike sat not 3 feet from this screen and I feel fantastic – this biking lark seems like it might just be the key to breaking the back of this fitness-malarky.

It’s such a bizarre feeling to sit on the bike and be doing real, proper exercise but not to feel completely breathless and deflated by the whole thing – to find a type of fitness which is enjoyable and beneficial without being a real battle of will power to push through the pain/breathlessness barrier.

It appears that the slower slope of desaturisation that I was talking about yesterday is much more significant than I’d first thought and that I can actually go a lot longer on the bike than I’d hoped without gasping for air or feeling like I’m going to keel off it. Rather, I can actually get to a stage where I can really feel the muscles in my legs being worked hard and doing some stretching and improving of their own.

It’s indescribable to feel that I’ve found something which can make the “working” parts of my body feel included in the day-to-day running of life – like their being paid at least a cursory bit of attention rather than being glossed over in the fight to keep the lungs ticking over.

I keep having all sorts of qualifiers about the relation of current treatment/steroids etc to the improvement in my chest and exercise tolerance and everything else swirling around my head at the moment, but right now I feel so good, so happy, that I don’t want to sit here and qualify things.

It’s not often these days that I get a chance to just sit and be excited about something going well. And I know that “not-so-good” may be just around the corner – as it is for all of us – so I’m blowed if I’m going to sit here and not let myself enjoy this feeling for tonight.

I’ve found something I can do physically that doesn’t make me 2nd best to a 3-year-old child and much as you may laugh, that’s a really, really big thing for me. Tonight, even if it’s “for one night only”, I’m enjoying it.

Big smiles and hugs to all!