Hello walkers, what a lovely day to be enjoying the woodland. I wonder whether you have a dog or dogs with you, and what their names are. I wonder which route you’ll take today. I wonder whether we’ve chatted before.
This place was my favourite place to walk my dogs. Errol, a black miniature schnauzer and later came Ernie, a white miniature schnauzer who isn’t with us. I’ve been walking here since 2012. Have we met?
You wouldn’t have met me in the last three and a half years though, as I haven’t been able to walk there. You may have met my husband, my four year old son and Errol but I’m missing. I’m missing because I have got M.E. I was fit and healthy and walking the dogs was my favourite thing to do, but then I had a baby and life became a bit full.
Then Covid happened. I got a Covid infection in March 2020 which then became long Covid and then long Covid became M.E. It was as simple as that. One day mothering a ten month-old, the next bedbound and disabled.
I fortunately did manage a couple of walks here when my son was born. Our first walk happened when he was about three weeks old, and I cried because I was so happy that I had everything I’d ever dreamed of in that moment.
Some walkers went past us whilst I was crying and asked if I was okay and my husband replied “Yeah, it’s okay. We’ve just had a baby” and we all giggled and no more needed to be said. We all got it.
I had spent the previous seven years walking around the woodland dreaming about having children. Allowing nature to heal me with every heartbreak. Everything always seemed lighter after a couple of hours pacing through the forest. Pipe Hall farm became my happy place. A place to go and think, whilst also being a place to go and forget. I’ve cried there. I’ve laughed there, and everything in between.
We say we’re going to walk the dog or dogs but Surely we all get more out of this place than just exercising our precious pooches. There aren’t many periods throughout our busy days of silence, but a walk presents us with this gift. I’ve been here before and not bumped into a single soul. Of course, I liked being there and chatting to other walkers, but there’s something about sitting on the fallen tree trunk in the sunken forest, under the trees canopy in the centre of the farm, watching the squirrels dart about and listening to what sounds like hundreds of birds.
I say silence, but if you really listen, there are hundreds of different sounds. Today, I can’t stand any sound, even beautiful birdsong. With M.E. comes a myriad of symptoms, some you may have heard of, some which are just totally bizarre. I once wrote down all of my symptoms and there were 27. One of them is noise and light sensitivity. I spend 80% of my day in my bedroom, in the dark. Daylight physically hurts me. It’s the same with noise.
I have inflammation in my brain and it has made my nervous system hypervigilant. I can no longer listen to music, watch films, read books, drive a car. I have to wear earplugs around my now four year old, who has only ever known his mummy to be poorly.
I have sensitivities to all the senses and It often feels like being allergic to life. My brain is damaged and my mobility is poor. I’m 41. I used to walk for miles at Pipe Hall Farm and now I have a stair lift to get me up the stairs in my home.
I have a mobility scooter and would love for nothing more than to come to Pipe Hall and scoot about, but my scooter couldn’t handle the hilly bumpy terrain. It could just about manage the U-shaped bridle path that comes out of the car park, but I know how upset I would feel that I couldn’t go to the areas that are special to me.
I wonder if you have certain areas that are special to you? If you are at the beginning of your walk, I want you to do something for me. I want you to imagine that this is the last walk you’ll ever do here. It’s the last walk you’ll ever do anywhere. Really, really enjoy it. Listen to the birds and the sounds of the trees. Take it all in and be grateful for every footstep, because you never know when it could all fade away and be nothing more than a beautiful memory.
When you lose your health, you miss the little things just as much as you miss the big things. I’m grateful that I have many memories of walking at Pipe Hall Farm, but I wish I was there. I would be there if I could.
