It’s a beautiful day, the first properly hot day this year, and I’ve spent the morning enjoying it in the castle’s garden. A few years ago I wrote with sadness about being stuck indoors on a similar day because I was unable to get down the stairs from my old lair on my own. I was thinking about this today while I was pottering (crawling) around my garden tending to the plants.

Up until a few months ago the garden was just a paved yard with a couple of lonely pot plants. But Stuart, my colleague from work, is a gardener and he’s made five raised beds for me which he’s filled with a wide variety of plants and trees – and soon it’ll be transformed by greenery and flowers.

The raised beds mean I can reach everything easily while I’m sitting on the ground. I never thought I’d get into gardening but I really enjoyed pulling up weeds and watering the plants this morning. My support worker was nearby in case I needed help but I relished doing this for myself in my own time.

Because my old lair had been my home for a long time I tried hard to stay there even though it had got very difficult for me. Living at the castle is so much easier and I’m so much happier. I’d never have made the decision or been able to move here without the encouragement and support of my friends and family, and even though it’s three years since I moved I often think about how lucky I am to live where I do, and how easily things could have turned out very differently.