I am dedicating this post to my fantastic Sister Sharon Porter.
She has been my rock during a challenging time. I cannot put into words how much I appreciate her love and caring support throughout my convalescence.
This year has been unbelievable, and it ticks every single box in the English vocabulary to describe my emotions over the past twelve months. From absolute happiness to devastating sadness, from calm to distraught, from complete confidence to overwhelming fear, and above all from naivety to wisdom.
Before I begin the story of my last adventure, I also need to express my full appreciation firstly to Nathalie Stobich, who was with me when I suddenly fell ill and lost consciousness. I do not know what I would have done without her. She took full control of everything, even down to packing my bags and accompanying me to the hospital. When I said, I wanted to leave the hospital; she convinced me to stay and possibly saved my life. After a couple of days, I decided that I needed to return to Thailand, to find out exactly what had caused the sudden blackout.
I would also like to say an enormous thank you to "Air Asia". They gave me full assistance from the Tan Son Nhat International airport in Ho Chi Minh city Vietnam, right through onto the plane and accompanied me on arrival at Don Muang airport even to the door of my hotel room in Bangkok. I cannot speak highly enough of them. They were incredible, and their kindness surpasses anything I have ever known in the western world.
After a couple of days, I managed to get to the "Bumrungrad Hospital' in Bangkok, where over the years, I have had full health check-ups. As always, they were incredible, and after twelve hours with loads of tests and a full MRI scan, they told me that I had had what they call in Thailand a "Silent stroke" what for us is better known as a Mild stroke! Within the realms, I was fortunate in as much as that I didn't have any severe repercussions. No paralysis or speech problems, just sporadic difficulty with balance, but it's slowly getting better.
What have I learnt for this experience?
That I'm not nonperishable, I have always believed that I would live to over a hundred, but now I am not so sure.
That my strength comes in the direst situations, and it comes from within me.
In this time of need, I discovered who truly cares and who doesn't.
Travel is my life and that whatever happens, I will continue to travel and inspire others to do the same.
This beautiful quote by Audrey Hepburn says it all.
"The most important thing is to enjoy your life-to be happy-it's all that matters."
