The big change

Last week I heard that my firm was making some changes, and my mind started racing about whether it was time for me to make some changes too. Forty eight hours before I had been thinking about my future and sharing my thoughts on this blog. My Strategy Director job was a good role; creative, interesting, challenging, and I had loved it, been very proud of my work. But since the bombs, things had become different for me.

Now, here I was, absolutely hating the tube journey into work, stressed and frazzled and unhealthy from trying to do more than one job - my office job, and all the other, voluntary, unpaid stuff I do connected with 7/7 and PTSD - and I knew I was becoming desperate to slow down, and to write more. Writing is the thing that heals me and it is now what I enjoy most. I came late to it, but it has become increasingly important to me. It feels as if it is what I was made for. So it felt to me as if the timing was extraordinary, and my heart started pounding faster. Sometimes in life, you can just feel it - the fork in the road, the chance of change. The faint breeze of the brush of the wings against your cheek. Vertigo.

I took a deep breath, and I talked my boss if he could have a quick catch up with me, and I asked him to find out what would happen if I left the team.

I did the sums. I talked to J. I barely slept for a few nights, thinking about it, mind fizzing as the thoughts, worries and dreams crowded in, babbling at me. When it was light, I tried to quieten my mind and breathe steadily, to let the chemical reactions of the euphoria and the fear pass through my blood, ignored, and to go inwards. Drop a questioning coin into the well inside ( sorry about the flowery language, this is the meditative technique I use when I am 'sounding myself out').

Straight down, the penny dropped, a long way, and made a reassuring splash into sweet water.

The next day, I went in, and we talked about terms. Then I went out and got drunk with my boss and my account manager in a Soho restuarant. I took Friday off. I sat in, and thought instead. With a hangover. Trying on my new life for size. I went out to see a film. Thought some more. Managed to get hold of my family, who had been on holiday, and talk to them. They were delighted, excited for me.

And so here I am, telling you all, on a cool autumnal early morning. I look out of my study window and I can see the morning sun coming out from behind a cloud. A gentle wind moving the ivy in the yard. Light starting to stream into the raggedy garden.

A new start, and time to come out of the tunnel, at last. A gift, one that I am glad to grab with both of my hands.

I changed my blog profile. It doesn't read ''Strategy Director'' anymore; it now reads ''Writer''. (I need some new business cards.) I am still a little nervous, but I am happy.

Thank you, all of you, for helping me get this far. You'll be hearing a lot more from me.