So seriously, are those mothers who NEVER lose their cool and who always remain calm, reasonable and unflappable secretly snorting valium from the dashboard of their people carriers? Do they spend their spare time doing yoga, thai chi and meditation in order to chill out? Are they simply blessed with angelic children who never do anything worth getting riled about? I'm beginning to think so.
Today my children have taken my patience and hit it out of the park, scoring a home run on the driving their mother demeted scale. It's all part of the illness recovery period. Son 1 is still ill (officially). He had a slight temperature this morning and still wasn't eating so I felt it was best that he stayed off school. Son 2 is on the mend but irritable and used to getting his own way. This morning I told son 1 that he wasn't going to go to school, but could stay at home and watch TV and eat snacks. I would have thought any normal kid would have been jumping through hoops to get this. But no, not our contrary fairy.
He immediately began to wail loudly about wanting to go to school. At the exact same time, son 2 started wailing that he didn't want to go to pre-school, he wanted to stay at home and have what his big brother was being offered. I tried to calmly explain to both why they had to stay home/go to school. This immediately prompted son 2 into pulling out all he'd learned in his master drama classes as he attempted to cough up a lung in a bid to prove he was still unwell. Son 1 just kept yelling in ever increasing decibels.
This went on for some time. I tried to get son 1 to put his jumper and slippers on so that he could get in the car for his brother's drop off. He refused (read: flung slippers and jumper around the room and flailed about yelling on the sofa). Meanwhile, son 2 had decided to take matters into his own hands and had removed all of his clothes and was insisting on getting his Jarmers put back on.
In case you haven't tried, it's very, very hard to to pin down two small boys at once. You just manage to get one to hold still and the other scarpers off. You get one dressed and the other has pulled their shoes off. And this was them both supposedly weak and feeble and recovering from ailments. God help me when they're both at full fighting fitness.
Eventually, after a brief but well deserved smack to both backsides (apologies to the anti smacking brigade, I'm with you in principal, but failing in reality) which did little to change their minds other than to increase the volume of their yelling, I could feel myself wavering. Do I give up the fight? Do I call their father and tell him to get off his train and return home to deal with them? Or do I soldier on ignoring all protestations?
I opted for the latter. I grabbed son 2 in all his naked glory and carried him outside into the freezing air to the car. The shock of the cold actually took his breath away giving momentary respite from the yelling. Before he regained it and continued screaming only this time howling: Get me dressed. Which I duly did in the car, strapped him in and left him yelling angrily. I then had to frog march son 1 into the car clutching his jumper before strapping him in.
Now you might be reading this thinking I'm a cruel and vile mother for treating two ailing young children in this way. It did cross my mind that I shouldn't take a child whose just spent a week with a raging temperature outdoors with no clothes on. And it did cross my mind that a sick child really isn't themself and need to be given some leeway. But honestly, I am at a loss as to what else I could do. How far do you give in to the so called sick-bed shenanigans? How much leeway is too much? When are they being a bit difficult vs say completely taking the piss?
I'm afraid my placenta didn't come fully loaded with a manual on how to deal with the small baby that had been attached to it for nine months. A design flaw I feel. And so I continue to stumble on through the child-rearing battlefield hoping that I don't run out of ammunition before the enemy strikes back.
Perhaps it's time for me to get the razor blade and valium tabs stashed into the car cubbyhole. Or perhaps I should just order a jumbo size bottle of rescue remedy. Or perhaps I should just hire a nanny. Whatever the solution, for the sake of my sanity, I need wellness to return to this house. Pronto.
Tuesday, 11 November 2008
Sunday, 9 November 2008
My big reveal
For Katyboo's viewing pleasure, here is a picture of me in my 60s gogo girl finery. Husband cut the boots off in the shot. But you'll get the idea.
Party was fab. Going to bed at 3am was less funny this morning. Dancing all night to Abba and other dance floor classic was superb. Note to self: must dress up like a fool and dance like a loon more often. Now I know how I can spend the evenings when husband is abroad on business trips. Dress up, clear the living room floor, put on some toe tapping tunes and shake my groove thing, baby yeah. It's the most exercise I'm likely to get anyway!
Must now go rest (and feed children).
Saturday, 8 November 2008
Gutted
As parents of two young children, going out on a Saturday night is a rarity. In fact going out any night is a rarity. Going out to a party where you get to dress up in ridiculous 60s Austin Powers outfits with all your good friends therefore is something to get wildly excited about. And I have been for months. I've spent hours scouring the web for costumes that make us look ridiculous yet gorgeous at the same time. I booked the childminder months ago. Everything is sitting waiting in a state of excited anticipation for this evening's festivities.
Then this morning son 1 woke up with son 2's illness of the last week. His temperature hovered around the 40C mark. Despite this I still donned my optimistic 'he'll be fine by this evening' face and cracked on. I was just wondering how I was going to break it to my childminder that she was going to be looking after one seriously ill child and one recovering child when she called. To say that her father is being rushed to hospital and isn't looking good at all. So she won't be able to watch the boys after all.
This seemed to be karma's way of saying: yeah well, you shouldn't have been a bad mother and even thought of leaving them when they are ill. My husband kindly said that he would stay at home and look after the children and I could go to the party. He was being kind but he also knows that I am a woman on the edge having spent a week couped up with a sick child and a week before that travelling abroad on my own with the two of them while he lounged on the sofa watching football and eating curry. So had he suggested anything he else he'd have received a stab through the heart with a platform boot.
This sucks. It's one thing dressing up like a twat when you have a twat partner going with you. Arriving at a party looking like a twat all on your own is different. Less funny somehow. And I now have to do the hour long drive to the party on my own in my dress that is so short you can admire my tummy constraining knickers with ease. Should I break down on the side of the road I fear that my long blonde wig, fake eyelashes and white patent leather platform boots might send the wrong message to lorry drivers stopping to help.
Worst of all I don't get to see my husband dressed up in psychadelic pink flares with a long hippy wig. I'm going to force him to get dressed at home just so that I can get a picture of him and take it with me to the party as my date.
Sigh.
I may or may not be brave enough to post a picture of me in my finery on this blog. Wait and see. Must go practice my gogo girl dance moves now.
Then this morning son 1 woke up with son 2's illness of the last week. His temperature hovered around the 40C mark. Despite this I still donned my optimistic 'he'll be fine by this evening' face and cracked on. I was just wondering how I was going to break it to my childminder that she was going to be looking after one seriously ill child and one recovering child when she called. To say that her father is being rushed to hospital and isn't looking good at all. So she won't be able to watch the boys after all.
This seemed to be karma's way of saying: yeah well, you shouldn't have been a bad mother and even thought of leaving them when they are ill. My husband kindly said that he would stay at home and look after the children and I could go to the party. He was being kind but he also knows that I am a woman on the edge having spent a week couped up with a sick child and a week before that travelling abroad on my own with the two of them while he lounged on the sofa watching football and eating curry. So had he suggested anything he else he'd have received a stab through the heart with a platform boot.
This sucks. It's one thing dressing up like a twat when you have a twat partner going with you. Arriving at a party looking like a twat all on your own is different. Less funny somehow. And I now have to do the hour long drive to the party on my own in my dress that is so short you can admire my tummy constraining knickers with ease. Should I break down on the side of the road I fear that my long blonde wig, fake eyelashes and white patent leather platform boots might send the wrong message to lorry drivers stopping to help.
Worst of all I don't get to see my husband dressed up in psychadelic pink flares with a long hippy wig. I'm going to force him to get dressed at home just so that I can get a picture of him and take it with me to the party as my date.
Sigh.
I may or may not be brave enough to post a picture of me in my finery on this blog. Wait and see. Must go practice my gogo girl dance moves now.
Friday, 7 November 2008
Little boys and their willies
Being one of three girls we never really had a problem with toilet seats being left up or pee on the floor. People did mention these things to me when I had two boys in that 'poor you' type of way but I was convinced that I could train my boys to pee on target and to put the toilet seat down.
What I hadn't factored in is the errant nature of willies. Having never had one myself I have failed to grasp the mechanics of these strange things. For a start, little boys, from the earliest age tend to wake up with willies that have woken up five minutes before the rest of their bodies do. Let me spell that out for you in case it isn't clear. They wake aroused, angry, erect, with stiffies. You get the picture. It's obscene really but you learn to avert your eyes. However, they tend to need to wee the minute they wake up which means you can quite regularly have wee carving a brave arc towards the ceiling before landing anywhere but the toilet.
The same thing happens when they have a poo. Not always. But with enough regularity to lead me to believe that boys genuinely find having a poo an orgasmic experience. It might explain their lifetime affinity to toilet humour and their desire to sit there for hours with the paper. If their tackle isn't correctly tucked in during the evacutation procedure, you're going to end up with a puddle on the floor.
Which leads me swiftly onto the 'Tucking In Procedure' or TIP as I like to call it. Unlike girls who can simply plonk themselves on the loo and pee at will, boys need to sit and tuck. This means they have to be scooched far enough back on the toilet/potty to allow space at the front for their willy to be tucked inside the rim. If not, get your dettol wipes out. This is a learning experience for mothers and sons. We don't have to tuck anything in when we pee. It's like the blind leading the blind.
And once they've grown tall enough to not sit on the toilet and they see other kids at school or daddy standing to pee, all of a sudden you're in a whole new world of nastiness. Boys, like men, are not able to do more than one thing at a time. So if you make the mistake of, say, calling your son's name while he's standing and peeing, he will turn his entire body to answer you, spraying the floor, walls and anything else unlucky enought to be in his firing line. Then there's the ol' target practice game in which they see if they can aim all along the rim, skirting the edge in a death-defying stunt, except missing and pissing on the floor. And let's not forget the tandem pee. The one in which both boys need to pee with equal urgency and so decide to pee together which quickly turns into a battle of pee against your enemy. Their respective wee flows criss cross and do battle resulting in full blown carnage, a change of clothes and bleach for the entire room.
My dreams of having little boys who neatly pee, return the toilet seat to it's rightful position, flush, wash hands and leave has indeed been flushed away. I've achieved none of the above. What's worse, is that I tend to discover my failings in a very tactile way. Like any mother, I delay having a pee until it's beyond putting off any longer. I then dash to the nearest convenience before the next fight over who has the most cars breaks out, and plonk myself down breathless, only to discover a wet stickiness all over the toilet seat...and floor...and walls. I then have to dettol wipe myself before heading out and reading them the riot act. Again.
But I can't really blame them. I mean girls can only aim down. Boys have a multitude of options open to them. Their willies are small missiles which they can pivot and aim at will. (Will. Willies. Hmmm. Maybe that's why they are so called??) Let's face it girls - if you could, you would, wouldn't you?
What I hadn't factored in is the errant nature of willies. Having never had one myself I have failed to grasp the mechanics of these strange things. For a start, little boys, from the earliest age tend to wake up with willies that have woken up five minutes before the rest of their bodies do. Let me spell that out for you in case it isn't clear. They wake aroused, angry, erect, with stiffies. You get the picture. It's obscene really but you learn to avert your eyes. However, they tend to need to wee the minute they wake up which means you can quite regularly have wee carving a brave arc towards the ceiling before landing anywhere but the toilet.
The same thing happens when they have a poo. Not always. But with enough regularity to lead me to believe that boys genuinely find having a poo an orgasmic experience. It might explain their lifetime affinity to toilet humour and their desire to sit there for hours with the paper. If their tackle isn't correctly tucked in during the evacutation procedure, you're going to end up with a puddle on the floor.
Which leads me swiftly onto the 'Tucking In Procedure' or TIP as I like to call it. Unlike girls who can simply plonk themselves on the loo and pee at will, boys need to sit and tuck. This means they have to be scooched far enough back on the toilet/potty to allow space at the front for their willy to be tucked inside the rim. If not, get your dettol wipes out. This is a learning experience for mothers and sons. We don't have to tuck anything in when we pee. It's like the blind leading the blind.
And once they've grown tall enough to not sit on the toilet and they see other kids at school or daddy standing to pee, all of a sudden you're in a whole new world of nastiness. Boys, like men, are not able to do more than one thing at a time. So if you make the mistake of, say, calling your son's name while he's standing and peeing, he will turn his entire body to answer you, spraying the floor, walls and anything else unlucky enought to be in his firing line. Then there's the ol' target practice game in which they see if they can aim all along the rim, skirting the edge in a death-defying stunt, except missing and pissing on the floor. And let's not forget the tandem pee. The one in which both boys need to pee with equal urgency and so decide to pee together which quickly turns into a battle of pee against your enemy. Their respective wee flows criss cross and do battle resulting in full blown carnage, a change of clothes and bleach for the entire room.
My dreams of having little boys who neatly pee, return the toilet seat to it's rightful position, flush, wash hands and leave has indeed been flushed away. I've achieved none of the above. What's worse, is that I tend to discover my failings in a very tactile way. Like any mother, I delay having a pee until it's beyond putting off any longer. I then dash to the nearest convenience before the next fight over who has the most cars breaks out, and plonk myself down breathless, only to discover a wet stickiness all over the toilet seat...and floor...and walls. I then have to dettol wipe myself before heading out and reading them the riot act. Again.
But I can't really blame them. I mean girls can only aim down. Boys have a multitude of options open to them. Their willies are small missiles which they can pivot and aim at will. (Will. Willies. Hmmm. Maybe that's why they are so called??) Let's face it girls - if you could, you would, wouldn't you?
Thursday, 6 November 2008
The problem with having a far flung family
Here's some background. My father, stepmother and two half brothers live in South Africa. One of my sisters lives in Ireland, the other lives in New Zealand along with my mother and stepfather. I live in the UK. Let's just say that we don't often have family get togethers. Asking my children's grandparents to babysit isn't an option. And I always need to look at the last posting days for Christmas cards well in advance as it's some point in October.
In an attempt to let my children see their grandmother and auntie for about the second time in their lives, I have been looking into going to New Zealand, a place I've yet to visit despite the fact that my sister has lived there long enough to sound like a local. There have always been good reasons why I haven't yet gone.
First I was young and poor and starting to climb the career ladder. Then I moved to the USA. Then I got married so my finances were stretched for some time. Then we moved to the UK and started a new job/found new house etc. Then I got pregnant. Had baby 1. Ten months later I was pregnant again. I had two under twos. I had little sleep and even less sanity and there was no way I would have survived a 30 hour flight with them. Then we moved house again. Then we were flooded. And now here we are.
Now I have a 4.5 year old who will be 5 by the time I plan on going. And a 3 year old. Both with the inability to sit still for a nano second (unless they're poorly in which case they just vomit on people). The thought of the 30 hour flight still makes me want to grab a large meat skewer and plunge it into my wrists. The adjustment of the billion time zone differences with two boys who don't sleep at the best of times makes me exhausted just thinking about it. And even if we have the best, most relaxing holiday in the whole world ever (which it probably won't be as there won't be hot and cold running slaves waving palm fronds over me while someone entertains my children), any feelings of calm will evaporate the minute we board for the return flight home.
But ignoring all of that. Assuming that I want to put myself through a catastrophic amount of stress, the bottom line is that the cost of four airline tickets to New Zealand could buy you a nice small car. And that's flying DodgyAsianairline.com or Quantas which seems to have planes falling out of the sky on a daily basis. The flight prices themselves look reasonable. It's the sodding taxes. They're the same price as the flights. All well and good for protecting the environment blah blah but what's the point of having a nice environment if you can never get there to see it??
My computer screen image is burned onto my retinas such is the amount time I've spent surfing travel websites, flicking between airlines, resorts, tour operators and tripadvisor, with the latter normally sending me back to stage 1. I give up. I despair. I don't know how we will ever get to New Zealand unless someone invents one of those Star Trek 'beam me up' machines or some very strong tugboats tow New Zealand and the UK closer to each other. I wouldn't mind if they towed the UK further South. In fact they could tow it somewhere between Mauritius and the Seychelles. They could pull NZ to just below the Maldives. Everyone would be happy.
I'll take your suggestions on a post it note as to how to resolve this dilemma. Just so you know, I've already ticked off:
- let them come to us. Done
- win the lottery. Tried and failed
- meet halfway. A possibility but still doesn't get around me not ever having been there.
- stuff the children into suitcases to save on ticket costs and on-board stress. Tempting, but I think the NSPCC might have something to say about it.
In an attempt to let my children see their grandmother and auntie for about the second time in their lives, I have been looking into going to New Zealand, a place I've yet to visit despite the fact that my sister has lived there long enough to sound like a local. There have always been good reasons why I haven't yet gone.
First I was young and poor and starting to climb the career ladder. Then I moved to the USA. Then I got married so my finances were stretched for some time. Then we moved to the UK and started a new job/found new house etc. Then I got pregnant. Had baby 1. Ten months later I was pregnant again. I had two under twos. I had little sleep and even less sanity and there was no way I would have survived a 30 hour flight with them. Then we moved house again. Then we were flooded. And now here we are.
Now I have a 4.5 year old who will be 5 by the time I plan on going. And a 3 year old. Both with the inability to sit still for a nano second (unless they're poorly in which case they just vomit on people). The thought of the 30 hour flight still makes me want to grab a large meat skewer and plunge it into my wrists. The adjustment of the billion time zone differences with two boys who don't sleep at the best of times makes me exhausted just thinking about it. And even if we have the best, most relaxing holiday in the whole world ever (which it probably won't be as there won't be hot and cold running slaves waving palm fronds over me while someone entertains my children), any feelings of calm will evaporate the minute we board for the return flight home.
But ignoring all of that. Assuming that I want to put myself through a catastrophic amount of stress, the bottom line is that the cost of four airline tickets to New Zealand could buy you a nice small car. And that's flying DodgyAsianairline.com or Quantas which seems to have planes falling out of the sky on a daily basis. The flight prices themselves look reasonable. It's the sodding taxes. They're the same price as the flights. All well and good for protecting the environment blah blah but what's the point of having a nice environment if you can never get there to see it??
My computer screen image is burned onto my retinas such is the amount time I've spent surfing travel websites, flicking between airlines, resorts, tour operators and tripadvisor, with the latter normally sending me back to stage 1. I give up. I despair. I don't know how we will ever get to New Zealand unless someone invents one of those Star Trek 'beam me up' machines or some very strong tugboats tow New Zealand and the UK closer to each other. I wouldn't mind if they towed the UK further South. In fact they could tow it somewhere between Mauritius and the Seychelles. They could pull NZ to just below the Maldives. Everyone would be happy.
I'll take your suggestions on a post it note as to how to resolve this dilemma. Just so you know, I've already ticked off:
- let them come to us. Done
- win the lottery. Tried and failed
- meet halfway. A possibility but still doesn't get around me not ever having been there.
- stuff the children into suitcases to save on ticket costs and on-board stress. Tempting, but I think the NSPCC might have something to say about it.
The delights of sick children
The joys of having a sick child. I'm not sure which bit I like least really:
a) The genuine concern that this might be something more than just a passing bug and that perhaps we really ought to go to the doctor/A&E/call NHS direct but have been down that route so many times and it always ends the same: just wait it out.
b) Knowing that the cheque is in the post. It's only a matter of time really until my other child gets this bug followed by me getting it. Husband probably won't as he's barely here but if he does that will be the end of my sanity as it will instantly morph into man-flu of the worst sort. He will expect sympathy and days of bedrest while I'll have to just crack on and vom/wipe my nose when I get a spare minute.
c) Knowing that the aforementioned cheque is likely to arrive this weekend which happens to coincide with a friend's 40th birthday party that's been the talk of the town all year. We have fabulous 60s style Austin Powers outfits which we can't wait to wear but they won't go well with a violent hacking cough. And besides, if the children are deathly ill, we can't abandon them to a childminder for an over night stay.
d) Several nights of no sleep thanks to a having a small furnace sleeping next to me, coughing violently all over me, asking for 'brinks' every three minutes and me bolting upright everytime a pre-vom sounding whimper is emitted, frantically feeling my way in the dark for the sick bowl.
e) Not being able to work because even when the sick one is sleeping, I am so tired and lethargic that I can't get my brain to operate.
f) The semi recovery phase where the child is still too poorly to do anything but well enough to have a bad attitude, demanding peeled oranges but insisting that not a single piece of 'white stuff' is allowed to be left on or demanding peanut butter on crumpets before flinging the lot on the sofa proclaiming that it's not spread on properly.
g) Having to watch endless rounds of cbeebies. Or reading Cock-a-doodle-do, Farmyard Hullabaloo a gazillion times.
h) Trying to keep older brother entertained at the same time as looking after younger sick brother. This borders on the impossible.
I am so tired I can barely keep my eyes open and the bags underneath them are a delightful shade of deep purple. It's amazing how my child's illness can make me feel so unwell. I will write again when we are no longer a plague house. Pray that the gods of good health visit us soon.
a) The genuine concern that this might be something more than just a passing bug and that perhaps we really ought to go to the doctor/A&E/call NHS direct but have been down that route so many times and it always ends the same: just wait it out.
b) Knowing that the cheque is in the post. It's only a matter of time really until my other child gets this bug followed by me getting it. Husband probably won't as he's barely here but if he does that will be the end of my sanity as it will instantly morph into man-flu of the worst sort. He will expect sympathy and days of bedrest while I'll have to just crack on and vom/wipe my nose when I get a spare minute.
c) Knowing that the aforementioned cheque is likely to arrive this weekend which happens to coincide with a friend's 40th birthday party that's been the talk of the town all year. We have fabulous 60s style Austin Powers outfits which we can't wait to wear but they won't go well with a violent hacking cough. And besides, if the children are deathly ill, we can't abandon them to a childminder for an over night stay.
d) Several nights of no sleep thanks to a having a small furnace sleeping next to me, coughing violently all over me, asking for 'brinks' every three minutes and me bolting upright everytime a pre-vom sounding whimper is emitted, frantically feeling my way in the dark for the sick bowl.
e) Not being able to work because even when the sick one is sleeping, I am so tired and lethargic that I can't get my brain to operate.
f) The semi recovery phase where the child is still too poorly to do anything but well enough to have a bad attitude, demanding peeled oranges but insisting that not a single piece of 'white stuff' is allowed to be left on or demanding peanut butter on crumpets before flinging the lot on the sofa proclaiming that it's not spread on properly.
g) Having to watch endless rounds of cbeebies. Or reading Cock-a-doodle-do, Farmyard Hullabaloo a gazillion times.
h) Trying to keep older brother entertained at the same time as looking after younger sick brother. This borders on the impossible.
I am so tired I can barely keep my eyes open and the bags underneath them are a delightful shade of deep purple. It's amazing how my child's illness can make me feel so unwell. I will write again when we are no longer a plague house. Pray that the gods of good health visit us soon.
Wednesday, 5 November 2008
Momentous decisions (interspersed with the odd bit of vom)
I am back from my brief blogging holiday. Much has happened since I was last here. In fact I have a surfeit of blogging material which is almost worse than having nothing to blog about. What makes it worse still is that I'm trying to blog to the background strains of the Shiny Show (Give yourself a shiny!) because son 2 is poorly. This means hot and cold running television for him, and lots of being a slave to his whims for me.
So let's start with the aforementioned poorliness. Son 2 woke up yesterday a with a horrible cold and cough. By late afternoon this had morphed into a delightful vomiting thing. In fact yesterday ranked up there with my top favourite parenting days. Those occasions where you really wish there was more than one version of yourself or that you have several sets of long elasticated arms. Son 1 was bored, bored, bored and wanted to be entertained because he is apparently incapable of entertaining himself. Son 2 was poorly and wanted to be held. I had chores to do. It all reached a delightful crescendo at around 4.45pm where son 1 was yelling loudly that he was hungry while son 2 wanted to be held. I tried to make dinner while running back and forth to comfort sick child.
It quickly became apparent why he wanted comforting when he suddenly yelled: "Sick! Sick!" and did a gigantic projectile vom all over the rug. In a less than loving way, I pushed him so that he could continue to spew on the wooden floor instead. I asked son 1 to run and fetch a cloth from the kitchen. On his way to the kitchen he hit his elbow on something. I then had two screaming children, puke dripping off every surface in sight, stir fry burning and rice sticking to the bottom of a pan. It became a war zone triage scene. Attend to the most pressing things first. I raced to the cooker, hauled the pans offs, turned the plates off, grabbed armfuls of towels to mop up the vom, rubbed son 1's elbow on the way past, wiped up small sick child, mopped up floor, grabbed a bowl to catch further sick and sprayed liberally with dettol spray to avoid the rest of us getting sick.
I eventually managed to feed son 1 and get him into bed, I lay with son 2 catching vom for most of the evening and spent a sleepless night next to a small boy wanting a 'brink' (i.e. a drink) every few minutes. This morning he has managed toast, juice and medised and kept it all down. Hurrah. Meanwhile I've returned son 1 back to school and the all powerful lure of gogos has returned.
We spent the half term in Ireland. Thanks to my sister for having us. Ireland was sunny, windy and very, very cold. My children did their best to destroy my sister's house and we enjoyed several days on the beach bundled up in a billion layers of clothes. I used to find going to the beach wearing all of your wardrobe quite bemusing. Now I think I'd find a beach in which you wear only a swimsuit an incredible shock - and indeed revealing all of my copious volumes of flesh would be a shock for everyone else on the beach. So it's a good thing that we live in this less than tropical climate.
Two important things came out of our brief sojourn to Ireland. a) It has confirmed that I need to go on a diet and do more exercise. My sister who is part human, part stick insect makes anorexics look large so I looked like a small woolly mammoth in her company. And the fact that my trousers really don't do up anymore was the incentive I need to de-lard myself before the re-larding of Christmas begins. But this led to the second important thing b) I need to spend less time working and more time living (which includes having the time to exercise).
This is a biggie. And it might get all deep and introspective-like, but I need to get this down for posterity so that when I start to get sucked back into the work vortex, I can revisit this blog post and remind myself of what I'm really on this planet for.
You see since setting up my business, I've been trying to grow it. That's normal. That's how businesses become successful. But I've now asked myself, why am I working? What's it for? Part of the reason is because staying at home with small screaming children didn't hold masses of appeal and I wanted to do something other than wipe bottoms. And I wanted to make a bit of extra cash to spend on the occasional Emma Bridgewater teapot. But doing a good job on a few clients would give me that. Why do I have this feeling that I need to do more? I posted recently that I feel like a failure unless I'm pushing harder to achieve the next big thing. That's because I've been judging the successfulness of my life on how well my business is doing, rather than how well my life is going.
The things that are important to me are my children, my husband, my family, my community, cooking, writing, having time to exercise (even just stomping across the fields behind our house) and seeing friends. Running a global PR empire has never been a goal of mine. I'll readily admit that when I see other entrepreneurs featured in papers I feel pang of envy mingled with the inspiration to be like them. But I now know what it takes to be like that and it means sacrificing lots of the things that are important to me.
It's going to be hard to realign my brain so that I don't continually feel that I need to do more, and instead, do the things I want to do without feeling guilty about it. But I'm going to give it a shot. I'm going to continue to work - and hopefully do a great job for my clients - but I'm not going to take on too much. I'm not going for global domination anymore. I'm going to attempt to reclaim my life. And that's quite a big goal for a grey Wednesday morning.
I only have one other thing to add to this convoluted blog post. Hooray for the American people finally getting it right! I've had my children glued to BBC News 24 (in between snatches of Cbeebies) as the US Presidential Election has run it's course, trying to explain to them the importance of Barack Obama being elected as the first black president of the USA. I've never explained the concept of race to my children. It's quite a tricky thing to do as children don't seem to see different races. People are just people to them. Which is lovely. And I feel awful for even making them aware of the differences. But one day they will be able to say that they watched as the first black man came to lead America. OR perhaps they won't remember it anymore than they will the delights of the Shiny Show. But at least I can tell them that they did.
So let's start with the aforementioned poorliness. Son 2 woke up yesterday a with a horrible cold and cough. By late afternoon this had morphed into a delightful vomiting thing. In fact yesterday ranked up there with my top favourite parenting days. Those occasions where you really wish there was more than one version of yourself or that you have several sets of long elasticated arms. Son 1 was bored, bored, bored and wanted to be entertained because he is apparently incapable of entertaining himself. Son 2 was poorly and wanted to be held. I had chores to do. It all reached a delightful crescendo at around 4.45pm where son 1 was yelling loudly that he was hungry while son 2 wanted to be held. I tried to make dinner while running back and forth to comfort sick child.
It quickly became apparent why he wanted comforting when he suddenly yelled: "Sick! Sick!" and did a gigantic projectile vom all over the rug. In a less than loving way, I pushed him so that he could continue to spew on the wooden floor instead. I asked son 1 to run and fetch a cloth from the kitchen. On his way to the kitchen he hit his elbow on something. I then had two screaming children, puke dripping off every surface in sight, stir fry burning and rice sticking to the bottom of a pan. It became a war zone triage scene. Attend to the most pressing things first. I raced to the cooker, hauled the pans offs, turned the plates off, grabbed armfuls of towels to mop up the vom, rubbed son 1's elbow on the way past, wiped up small sick child, mopped up floor, grabbed a bowl to catch further sick and sprayed liberally with dettol spray to avoid the rest of us getting sick.
I eventually managed to feed son 1 and get him into bed, I lay with son 2 catching vom for most of the evening and spent a sleepless night next to a small boy wanting a 'brink' (i.e. a drink) every few minutes. This morning he has managed toast, juice and medised and kept it all down. Hurrah. Meanwhile I've returned son 1 back to school and the all powerful lure of gogos has returned.
We spent the half term in Ireland. Thanks to my sister for having us. Ireland was sunny, windy and very, very cold. My children did their best to destroy my sister's house and we enjoyed several days on the beach bundled up in a billion layers of clothes. I used to find going to the beach wearing all of your wardrobe quite bemusing. Now I think I'd find a beach in which you wear only a swimsuit an incredible shock - and indeed revealing all of my copious volumes of flesh would be a shock for everyone else on the beach. So it's a good thing that we live in this less than tropical climate.
Two important things came out of our brief sojourn to Ireland. a) It has confirmed that I need to go on a diet and do more exercise. My sister who is part human, part stick insect makes anorexics look large so I looked like a small woolly mammoth in her company. And the fact that my trousers really don't do up anymore was the incentive I need to de-lard myself before the re-larding of Christmas begins. But this led to the second important thing b) I need to spend less time working and more time living (which includes having the time to exercise).
This is a biggie. And it might get all deep and introspective-like, but I need to get this down for posterity so that when I start to get sucked back into the work vortex, I can revisit this blog post and remind myself of what I'm really on this planet for.
You see since setting up my business, I've been trying to grow it. That's normal. That's how businesses become successful. But I've now asked myself, why am I working? What's it for? Part of the reason is because staying at home with small screaming children didn't hold masses of appeal and I wanted to do something other than wipe bottoms. And I wanted to make a bit of extra cash to spend on the occasional Emma Bridgewater teapot. But doing a good job on a few clients would give me that. Why do I have this feeling that I need to do more? I posted recently that I feel like a failure unless I'm pushing harder to achieve the next big thing. That's because I've been judging the successfulness of my life on how well my business is doing, rather than how well my life is going.
The things that are important to me are my children, my husband, my family, my community, cooking, writing, having time to exercise (even just stomping across the fields behind our house) and seeing friends. Running a global PR empire has never been a goal of mine. I'll readily admit that when I see other entrepreneurs featured in papers I feel pang of envy mingled with the inspiration to be like them. But I now know what it takes to be like that and it means sacrificing lots of the things that are important to me.
It's going to be hard to realign my brain so that I don't continually feel that I need to do more, and instead, do the things I want to do without feeling guilty about it. But I'm going to give it a shot. I'm going to continue to work - and hopefully do a great job for my clients - but I'm not going to take on too much. I'm not going for global domination anymore. I'm going to attempt to reclaim my life. And that's quite a big goal for a grey Wednesday morning.
I only have one other thing to add to this convoluted blog post. Hooray for the American people finally getting it right! I've had my children glued to BBC News 24 (in between snatches of Cbeebies) as the US Presidential Election has run it's course, trying to explain to them the importance of Barack Obama being elected as the first black president of the USA. I've never explained the concept of race to my children. It's quite a tricky thing to do as children don't seem to see different races. People are just people to them. Which is lovely. And I feel awful for even making them aware of the differences. But one day they will be able to say that they watched as the first black man came to lead America. OR perhaps they won't remember it anymore than they will the delights of the Shiny Show. But at least I can tell them that they did.
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