To begin then, me. I am Vicky Crouch, a woman, mother, wife, daughter, sister, member of a lovely big family, friend, Physiotherapist, School Governor and 43 (not in any particular order). At this precise time in my life I am feeling rather rejuvenated and very, very excited! I have left the safeness of employment and am about to embark on an independent career.
I am also very fortunate to be a happy person. My thoughts about 'luck' are a little complicated and I will go into them at another time, but simply put I don't ascribe my happiness to luck but to taking opportunities that have come my way. As far as I'm concerned life is what you make it and we are responsible (mainly) for our own happiness. I digress (I do that), back to my career; Physiotherapy. I qualified in 1993 (!!!) and have worked ever since then in all sorts of settings. Physio is huge and covers pretty much all aspects of health. In a nutshell it concerns the movement and function of the human body. Over the years I gravitated towards neurology, paediatrics and aquatic physiotherapy, but took in a spot of research (and was published), intermediate care, elderly care and some private work along the way. Now I want to put my years of experience together, shake it up a bit and offer a physio package thats all about what I do best.
My first new assignment is great as it is in a school I have previously worked in. Myself and my friend and mentor Jac (aquatic physio guru) will be working for the next 6 weeks or so with the school staff and pupils to maximise the benefits for the students of being in a hydrotherapy pool. I arrived last wednesday to an overwhelmingly warm welcome, it was just brilliant to be back there. I had a huge smile on my face all week which, I'm sure will remain in place all the while I'm there.
Other areas of work I would like to pursue include teaching, getting involved in PE curriculum planning, offering individual aquatic physio sessions and see if I can develop aquatic physio in schools with pools. And I have a few courses to attend to ensure my CPD is good and I'd love to do the Masters in Space Physiology at some point!
So just a few things to do. This week I will be;
- finding a pool to work in! My current options are going to be challenging in terms of temperature control and balancing the chemicals...
and I think we'll end up looking like this
- to finalize a proposal for a bit of teaching
- and to improve my blogging skills.
On a personal note I would like to thank my family and friends for all their love, support and best wishes and I hope you have enjoyed reading this.
Have a good week
Vicky x