Hello all,

Sorry this is a little later than normal – without the tight schedule of each day being planned out for me, I lost track of time.

Being home has been quite nice – especially the amount of sleep I’ve been getting every night! But I miss almost everything about being on base. I miss the food, the classes, the 13 other girls I shared a room with and also all the boys’ downstairs, even when they were singing at the top of their voices till gone midnight on most nights.

My flight were learning all the rifles drills last week and I have had occasional messages from them saying that it’s really difficult, and that the corporals have stepped up this week and are expecting a lot more from them! I still feel so connected to the group that when I heard they had a bad inspection I felt really low with them! Thankfully, they have the weekend off to go home and rest before next week begins – they have just over 2 weeks left!

I had a slightly less exciting week, although I did get a chance to go into The Royal Star & Garter Home on Tuesday, which was really so lovely. Everyone has heard about my injury and are all being very supportive. It was also lovely to get a chance to speak with some of the residents again and especially my grandmother, who was relieved to see me up and about. My back was feeling okay that morning, but felt slightly worse by the end of the day.

I have also been able to catch up with one of my oldest friends this week. She was doing a year studying abroad as part of her degree, so has been in Australia for the past 11 months. She got back from ‘down under’ the day I started basic training, so I missed her then, but it’s been lovely to see her now – we spent the day as we used to when we were younger – baking!

I also had a follow-up hospital appointment on Thursday, so had to pop back up to base afterwards to speak with the on-base doctor. Everything is fine and I’m recovering as they would expect. It was very strange being back at Halton, but it gave me a chance to organise my locker in my new barrack block – so all the photos of my dog are nicely blue tacked up ready for when I can finally go back!

The positivity of the comments and messages that were left for me on this blog after my last posting were so great and really helped me think things through in a better light. The injury may have put me back quite a bit, but I just have to go with the flow and I know I’ll definitely learn so much from this experience.

I’d love to hear from more of you if you have any stories of similar setbacks and how you have been able to move on from them.

Hope you all have a lovely week,

Alex