It feels like a lifetime ago that I was pulling myself up the climbing walls – but it wasn’t, not really. Just last year, I was still at it. Though I was gasping like an asthmatic hamster, there was a buzz in knowing I could keep going, keep fighting through. It felt like a battle I hadn’t quite lost yet. But then things began to unravel, slowly enough that I could pretend I hadn’t noticed. Like when your favourite jumper starts to fray, and you think, ‘nah, it’ll hold together for one more wash’, only to find it falling apart in your hands.

Used to be I’d get sick, feel rough for a bit, then bounce back. Until, well, it wasn’t anymore. The infections started showing up like uninvited party guests. Each one stuck around a bit longer than the last, until ‘bouncing back’ sounded like a punchline to a bad joke. I tried keeping active – bit of climbing here, a few goes at skiing there (some quite decent at that) – but by April, everything hit the skids.

With the infections came the haemoptysis – the blood. Not like in the films where they cough up a dainty bit of red and then carry on saving the world. Oh no, it just kept coming – filling up the sink while I’m there thinking, ‘Well, this is a bit excessive.’ There’s nothing like watching your own blood swirling down the drain to remind you that your body’s got ideas of its own. That’s when the fear hit – the deep down, primal sort that tells you things are seriously off-kilter, that the body isn’t just sick, but breaking.

And as if that weren’t enough, the ever-constant shortness of breath arrived like a speeding train, leaving me not a moment to brace myself. Since then, breathing’s become a full-time job. Every infection knocks me down a rung. Now moving around the house leaves me out of puff, and I can’t shake the feeling that I’m teetering on the edge of something worse. There I was, climbing, skiing, having fun – and now I’m trapped in a body that can barely get through the day. It’s frustrating.

Most days, I’m hemmed in by these four walls, staring at them like they might hold some answer to where the hell the meaning went. It’s like life’s happening somewhere else, and I’m just the spectator. There used to be purpose in moving, in feeling my body push back against the pain – like I was still in the fight. Now, it feels like that part of me’s slipping away, and I’m left wondering what to do with the leftovers. Life’s shrinking – not just physically, but emotionally. It’s hard to feel connected to anything when you’re barely hanging on at all.

I keep waiting for a breakthrough, some moment where things shift, but the truth is, I’m starting to doubt that’s coming. At this rate, it’s just about pushing through the daily grind without losing the plot. It’s like life handed me this dodgy secondhand body, and I’m stuck figuring out how to make things work without an instruction manual. I find myself shaking my head, perhaps even cracking a smile if I’m having a good day, at the absurdity of it all. Like, really? This is what we’re doing now?

It’s often dark, but on the worst days it’s my mates keeping me beaming – who keep me updated on their daily dramas, the banter, where the snow is settling, or what mischief their kids are up to. Their stories remind me that life’s still happening out there, even if I’m boxed in here. They also take the piss, of course, but it’s exactly what I need – something to make me feel part of the world outside these four walls.

I suppose it’s either laugh or cry, and if I started crying, I might never stop. So here I am, hanging on by my fingernails, desperately trying to find rire jaune in the ridiculousness of it all – because if I can’t laugh at it (spoiler: right now I’m failing terribly), what’s the point? Maybe that’s the real meaning now: laughing at the mess, even when I’m knee-deep in it.

After all, life might be shrinking, but I’ll be damned if I let it take every last shred of my sense of humour with it.