Yesterday a friend asked me if I was now able to learn to drive, to which I responded – “no, I’m not allowed to legally yet, but I don’t think I ever will learn to drive. Also, my best friend has categorically told me she will NEVER get in a car if I am driving”. This morning I had a reminder of why that was the case…

When I woke up I was very twitchy, for those who don’t know my epilepsy terminology that means that I was having quite regular involuntary movements. I took one of my emergency tablets, and I am absolutely fine now. It turns out, when I went to bed last night I may, possibly, have forgotten to take my medication. (I know that I am now going to get numerous texts from family, and friends, telling me off). Yes, I have not had a grand mal (full blown unconscious, shaky, injury making) seizure for 9 months, and before that over a year, but that is because my epilepsy is controlled. I still regularly have absences (where people think I’m not paying attention to a conversation, daydreaming, or losing track of what I’m saying), and occasionally I have petit mal (twitchy) seizures. I rely on my medication, to keep my seizures under control.

There have been a few occasions in my life, recently, where the term ‘rely’ has been used in a negative sense. The definition, is “depend on with full trust or confidence.” – I can’t see that as a bad thing. The control of my epilepsy relies on my medication (and obviously me remembering to take it). My pupils rely on me teaching them the correct stuff. I rely on colleagues to be there to support when and where necessary. I rely on my family and friends to be there to give me a hug; give me an ear to listen to what’s going on; to support when things are tough.

Going back to the medication thing, (this is going to lead to even more texts), the forgetting of medication may have happened a few times over the last 6 months. I’ve got no idea why, but I think there may be a subconscious thing of, the epilepsy is controlled it’s not a necessity anymore. AND THEN… my brain well and truly reminds me that it is a necessity.

When things are going well, we can fool ourselves into thinking that we can do it all on our own. But we never can, we need to be able to rely on things, and other people. We may not need them to fulfil the same roles every day, but we need to know that we can rely on them when we need to.

On the news this morning, there was an article about the rising number of men over 60 who get depression, and that a strong contributing factor to this was because they didn’t have relationships/friendships. They then showed a group who met twice a week to play football, and have a cuppa afterwards. To know that they had that time, to get to know others, spend time with others, meant the world to those men. They relied on that group meeting.

Don’t get me wrong, I recognise that reliance can be unhealthy. There was a post on FB recently which said something along the lines of “before you ask someone out, put them in front of a really slow computer and see how they cope”. How frustrated do we get, when our technology isn’t working, or isn’t working as well as we would hope. I recognise that some relationships can be incredibly unhealthy, due to reliance.

But reliance cannot be a bad thing, if we accept responsibility for ourselves, and if we are also people able to be relied upon as well.

Whilst writing this I was reminded of my teenage days where I had two wrist bands WWJD (What Would Jesus Do?) And FROG (Fully Rely On God). The idea that we do not have to rely on our own strength, and there will be times when we cannot.

I am proud to say I am reliant  on things/friends/God, I also hope that people feel they can rely on me!