My friend Simon and I have given up interacting on social media for Lent. You can read our first post about it here. Before I went to bed last night, I put a status on my personal page, and the page for this blog, explaining what I was doing and Read more…
S is one month away from turning two… and she’s reached the “Terrible Twos” already. Her behaviour of late has certainly been challenging, and I’ve found myself having to go into another room and take a few deep breaths more than once. I know a lot of people use the Read more…
Early Monday morning, I received a text from a friend: “I’m giving up Twitter and Facebook for Lent. I think you should too…” I thought he was joking, but he has this really irritating way of persuading me of things. By lunch time, we had agreed to both give up Read more…
S and I have had a lovely weekend. We’ve not had fancy days out; we’ve barely left the house.We’ve not spent loads of money; I think the grand total of our spending for the weekend was £6.60 and that included my buying a couple of candles yesterday morning. S ended Read more…
One of the best ways I’ve heard for explaining meditation is to think of your mind as a big lake. It’s something I’ve read in Deepak Chopra but also various other places. If you think of your mind as a big lake, your thoughts are creating ripples on the surface Read more…
S has been up three times this evening; I’m not even sure if she went to sleep in between times. Eventually I gave in, and put The Snowman on for her. It’s all music with no words, so usually encourages her to drop off to sleep. An hour later as Read more…
There is a rich tradition in my family of making excuses. Excuses for not helping each other; excuses for not going places; excuses for not doing things; excuses for not working. Our favourite thing to say is I can’t because… when what we usually really mean is I don’t want to. Read more…
As some of you may know, I’ve recently become self employed. One of my clients is Anandi, otherwise known as the Sleep Guru. She helps people to overcome insomnia and sleep problems with holistic solutions – no sleeping pills! If you ever have trouble sleeping, I’d check out her site Read more…
When I was pregnant, I came off the medication I had been on since my breakdown. My GP wanted me to go back onto it once I’d reached 12 weeks, but I refused. (I still refuse). As a compromise, she suggested I see a counsellor instead. I had been through Read more…
I am forever searching for something I give S for breakfast that’s reasonably healthy, but not too messy. I hit the jackpot when I came up with these apple, oat and raisin pancakes; they taste good, they’re tasty and they’re easy to make. This batter makes around 12 small pancakes. Read more…
This is the latest in a series of posts about a breakdown I had in 2010. The first post is here. I have no idea how to live my life. I feel like the last couple of months I’ve been in some sort of weird stasis; whole days and Read more…
I have actually published the full version of this as a book, which will be available to buy soon. April 2010. Summer seems to be coming early this year; it’s bright and warm in April. I love the sun; it always seems to make things better. Except this year, it Read more…
Being a single mother, in the situation I am in, I seem to hear the same lines over and over again. Here is a list of the ones I’d really rather you didn’t allow to escape from your pie-holes. (yes, I am a grumpy bitch; what of it?) I Read more…
Over the past couple of weeks, I’ve written a series of posts about my experience with S’s birth and first few weeks of life. Many people have commented about my ex partner’s behaviour. There were some clear signs that he was an abusive person, attempting to intimidate and control me. Read more…
This is the latest in a series of posts about my experiences of early motherhood. The story begins here. The next morning, a Friday, I woke up and found the ex’s message from the night before. I replied that he knew very well I had not used him for material Read more…
This is one of a series of posts about S’s birth and my first few weeks of motherhood. The first post in the series is here. The morning after I had looked after the ex’s children overnight, I was exhausted and miserable. I could not see a way this was Read more…