First Aid

I did not feel good tonight.
And you knew it didn’t you?
My little guy.

Slumped on sofa,
eyes low, glazed,
body tired, crumpled
in defeat.

I gave you all today.
I gave the world all.
There was nothing left.

Small hands push firmly.
Lay your mama down
till head meets waiting rest.
And thinking face, thinks
before purposefully pirouetting,
fetching the cold hot water bottle
from the toy-strewn floor.

Tucked under me
with a kiss
a pat
a gentle stroke of my hair,
before turning away.

Back to business.

My boy.
Of 19 months wise.

You are just fine.
You are perfect
in fact.

Thank you.

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*I wrote this the other night. Actually feeling an awful lot better. Thanks to all of you that have been so kind in taking the time to get in contact. I am very lucky to have such lovely friends*

Reclaiming

Yesterday I wrote a post about Mental Illness and worries about the anonymity of the internet when it comes to situations where people may be in genuine need of emergency intervention.

I have now taken that post down.

I took pains to try and keep the identity of person’s affected private but I seem to have done the opposite of what I intended and just drawn more attention to her and her family. I am deeply sad about that and apologise if I have caused any further upset.

I want, what was supposed to be my main point but seemed to get lost somewhere, to still stand though.

There is no shame in mental illness and the dark sides of depression and anxiety. It affects the best of us and many people whom I hold very dear.

Linda Jone’s Mental Health project blog stands as a shining example of the importance of lifting the stigma of mental illness and providing avenues for people who are struggling to be met with compassion, respect and empathy.

It is important to me.

Because the irony? I’m not in such a good place right now. If I had been stronger right now I would have felt OK with talking about my post yesterday, discussing points and debating the issue – I am usually good at that. But I can’t do that at the moment. It was silly of me to write something I had no strength to defend or manage but there we go. I genuinely had no idea it would snowball as it has done.

I received a few nasty, anonymous messages yesterday, as well as many, many more supportive ones and comments from people raising valid, constructive points on a debatable topic. All have completely overwhelmed me at a time when I am least able to deal with it.

So I’m sorry. I know this is a cop-out. But I need to reclaim this blog for what it is for, or should be – a place that makes me feel better, not worse.

Thank you for listening.

Woe Woe Woe

I have just sat down to try and put together some writing prompts for the week but then I thought, sod it. I think we better have a week off.

I’m typing from bed, as I seem to have caught some horrible flu bug (probably from the hospital I’m guessing – nothing like a stay on a children’s ward to expose you to lots of contagious nasties!) and in the last three days have managed to crawl out of bed for only a couple of hours at a time before crawling back with lots of accompanying groans and ‘woe woe’s.

I feel like poo frankly, hurt all over with a fever that leaves me hot and cold and shaky, and a horrible slightly nauseous feeling the whole time. All this, on the back of our horrendous week with Kai last week, and I am now seriously fed up.

Thankfully Kai himself is better, still a little fragile and getting bad tummy ache and yucky nappies, but he’s getting his energy back slowly and beginning to eat little bits here and there.

Lovely Ant has been a super-star too and taken the day off today so I can crash.

So here I go… to crash….bleugh.

I’m sorry this blog has been such a relentless bombardment of woe and misery lately. Why you are all still here is a complete mystery to me.

I promise to try and bounce back soon and put a bit more effort in.

P.S. The good news is that my new camera has come. Haven’t been well enough to have a proper look at it yet but it’s boooootiful. So that means lots of photoblogging and writing to come. And possibly a blog make-over too…. Watch this space! <<— Oooh look! I think that may have been a little bit of bouncing!!!

Writing Workshop… well, kind of…

Welcome back to the Writing Workshop link-up! At the bottom of this post you’ll find the widget to post the link to your workshop posts.

I’m so sorry this week has been a bit of a disaster but I thought I’d get a bare-bones workshop up just so you can at least share all your lovely posts that I know you’ve been busy working on.

As most of you know, Kai’s been in hospital with the awful Rota Virus and poor poppet has been very poorly indeed. After two days horrendous vomiting and then diarrhoea, Kai finally started to perk up a little yesterday afternoon so they’ve let us home for him to recover. Still having to change the most disgusting, toxic, chicken korma sauce nappies but they’re slowing down a bit thank goodness. He’s sleeping and feeding round the clock – it’s like having a newborn again! So mummy here is pretty knackered too but relieved to be home and to see Kai a bit more alert (and grumpy! much more his usual self…)

Hopefully next week will be a bit easier and I’ll be back in bloggy business. But until then, here’s your chance to share your workshop posts of the last week.

Many thanks for taking part, and for the overwhelming number of messages and texts this week. We love you guys x

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So now it’s your turn!

1. What’s made you feel a little old lately?
- Inspired byVery Bored in Catalunya’s post ‘The passing hands of time…’

2. Tell me about a time you contracted a bad case of foot IN mouth syndrome and committed an embarrassing faux pas.
- Inspired by Gappy’s ‘The Art of Putting Ones Foot in Ones Mouth. By Me.’

3. Write a post on the theme of ’soul mates’. Do you believe in them? Have you found or lost yours? Or are you still looking?
- Inspired by Crystal Jigsaw’s beautiful and touching post about her husband.

4. Which public figure or famous person inspires you and why?
- Inspired by Raising My Boy Chick’s impending announcement of the Lesbian/Bisexual Woman of the Decade

5. Tell me about a time when you ‘felt the fear and did it anyway’ – when you overcame a fear to make an important change.
- Inspired by ME! and my impending scary re-location

Leave your name and the URL to your post in the MckLinky below (the URL should be to your post not just to your blog) andleave me a comment to let me know you’ve taken part. If you have the time it would be great if you could try and read and comment on at least two other entries. And be kind! It’s supposed to be a bit of fun – we’re not looking for the next Booker Prize winner here!

If you haven’t had chance to respond yet, then you’ve still got today! Or just wait till next week, when there’ll be five brand new prompts to get you thinking.

This Writing Workshop is brought to you in association with Mama Kat’s Losin’ It – who’s lovely author came up with the concept and runs her own workshop over in the U.S.

Vom-tastic

Apologies to every one with a post ready for the Workshop but I’m going to have to postpone it till tomorrow.

So sorry – as most of you, I’m sure, saw on Twitter last night, Gastro has hit the George household for the first time. Kai is doing a astoundingly efficient job of demonstrating just how much sick one toddler can hold, and rapidly covering everything I own with, what my lovely friend the NDM , would describe on her Children’s Vomit Scale as variations of Type 1, 2 and 5.

I am currently holding him extremely still on my lap, surrounded by towels, and reckon I’ve just about got time to tell you about the important life lessons I have learnt in the last 16 hours:

- Baked beans, when regurgitated, are white and red and gross.

- The number that come out bares absolutely no relation to the number that seemingly went in.

- The image of a toddler hunched neatly over a sick bowl is a bit of a misnomer. Having never been sick before Kai is pretty freaked out, has somehow suddenly managed to develop an unholy fear of buckets, and has, as a result, managed to deposit sick down the neckline of pretty much everything I own in a very short space of time.

- Do not allow your sick toddler to bend over a pair of your favourite trainers.

- When short of a suitable receptacle, a Bob the Builder hat makes an excellent impromptu sick-catcher.

- You do not own enough bedding. Or towels. Or clothes. Or washing machines. Or extra pairs of hands.

- A brief stint as a care assistant in a high-dependency nursing home is essential training for anyone contemplating parenthood. The resulting densenstivity to poo and sick will serve you well when your husband is gagging in the corner.

- Despite thinking that you had already completely depleted your reserves of patience and energy, one look at you pale, wan toddler will revive you immediately and allow you to spend all night, quite cheerfully, holding his little hot body and allow you to wake up after only about 4 hours sleep ready to cuddle and clean up sick all day long. Motherhood is a bit weird like that.

And that is all.

Happy Thursday everyone. See you on the other side…

Workshop #12 – Feeling the fear… and your age!

Welcome to Monday’s Writing Workshop prompts! Don’t forget you’ve got an extra day this week with our workshop now being held on a Thursday. Funnily enough though, even with the extra day, I still left it till the last minute. Hmm… how about you?

For any  newbies (and it’s never to late to join in), here’s how it works… I’m going to give you 5 writing/blogging prompts. Pick one, pick two, or do them all if you’re really keen – it’s up to you. How you respond is your choice. You could share a real-life story, or make one up. You could write a poem or just free-write without thinking too hard and see what happens. It can be funny; it can be serious; it can be emotional. It can be whatever you want it to be. The only rule is to have fun with it!

Prompts each week will take their inspiration from blogs, current affairs, daily life, or just whatever everyone happened to be talking about that week. If you’d like to suggest a prompt then send me an email or catch me on Twitter – I would love to hear your ideas.

So here they are:

1. What’s made you feel a little old lately?
- Inspired byVery Bored in Catalunya’s post ‘The passing hands of time…’

2. Tell me about a time you contracted a bad case of foot IN mouth syndrome and committed an embarrassing faux pas.
- Inspired by Gappy’s ‘The Art of Putting Ones Foot in Ones Mouth. By Me.’

3. Write a post on the theme of ’soul mates’. Do you believe in them? Have you found or lost yours? Or are you still looking?
- Inspired by Crystal Jigsaw’s beautiful and touching post about her husband.

4. Which public figure or famous person inspires you and why?
- Inspired by Raising My Boy Chick’s impending announcement of the Lesbian/Bisexual Woman of the Decade

5. Tell me about a time when you ‘felt the fear and did it anyway’ – when you overcame a fear to make an important change.
- Inspired by ME! and my impending scary re-location

Now here’s what you have to do. Write your post and publish it on your blog between now and THURSDAY. On Thursday come back and use the widget that will be up to paste in the URL of your post to share. Then take some time to read some of the other entries and leave some comment love! We’re not here to critique – just to have fun and support each other in our writing experiments. So be kind please.

Anyone who would like to submit something via email, or even anonymously will be more than welcome to do so. I’ll post them on the site here and include the link in Thursday’s round-up.

Feel free to use the Workshop badge on your blog or as part of your post if you like. Code is here:

<a href=”http://sleepisfortheweak.org.uk”><img src=”http://i270.photobucket.com/albums/jj90/flowerfairy82/WritingWorkshopBadge.jpg”></a>

Note: I’m told Blogger does something a bit funny with the code so you’ll need to copy and paste it and then retype the quotation marks (“) as Blogger changes them for some reason.

See you Thursday then!

P.S. And if you fancy plugging this workshop on the social network of your choice? Then that would be fan-frigging-tastic.

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This Writing Workshop is brought to you in association with Mama Kat’s Losin’ It – who’s lovely author came up with the concept and runs her own workshop over in the U.S.

Pulling Up Stakes

I have lived in the same town now for 23 years.

We moved here in the winter, just before my fifth birthday. A winter of snow, I remember, thick and deep, much like this one. It’s funny really that I should start and end my time here with snow.

For we are moving.

The little terrace house that Ant and I have made our first home is rapidly getting a little tight around the waist, our collective bulge as a family of three leaving us all feeling uncomfortable and irritable and in need of stretchier accommodation. Something with room for an extra person perhaps, of the small and loud variety, and a washing machine that isn’t in a falling-down out-house in the garden, and a hall way and a drive way and kitchen that can fit more than one of you in at a time.

We could stay here, of course, in this town. Find something nearby, in a nicer neighbourhood (of which there are some), close to friends and family and everything we know. Ant would be happy with that, he likes it here.

But I just can’t do it. It seems I have reached absolute saturation point in my ability to appreciate or enjoy anything Stafford-y. Everything about here bores me: the same streets, the same views, the same endless lines of congested traffic. The small, isolated patches of green that seem fewer and farther between than I remember. There are more featureless housing estates and unfamiliar people than ever before. The high street is drowning in a sea of boarded up shops and windows, carbon-copy brand name stores. . We are stuck in a routine of going to the same places week in week out and Kai and I have read all the books in the library.

I need a change.

I REALLY need a change.

So yes, a move it is. To greener pastures. Or rather, not-quite-the-greener-pastures-we-would-like-as-turns-out-all-the-REALLY-nice places-cost-a-bomb-but-still-pretty-nice-which-will-have-to-do.

The schools are excellent. The estates we’re looking at back on to open fields with the beautiful expanse of forest, that breathes home to me and I’m not sure I could ever leave, only five minutes up the road. There is a beautiful new leisure centre and library a short bus drive away, and towns with good shops and rail links only a ten minute drive.

It’s not perfect. Not our DREAM town. But it’s close enough. And for potential first-time-buyers slowly realising the reality of house prices vs. what we can afford to borrow and maintain, we are realising that close enough may have to do.

We went yesterday. To look around the area, get a sense of where we would want to live. We will rent first, while we get a feel for the place and while my mums sell this house that they rent out to us. And we plan to move soon, by summer at the latest.

It’s not far away. 15 miles which means Ant won’t have to move jobs and we’re close enough to family to make popping over still easy. And yet it may as well be the other side of the world in terms of my experience of settling and living anywhere new.

I’m terrified.

Completely, genuinely, metaphorically sh*t-in-my-pants, scared.

What if I hate it? What if I don’t make any friends there and am horribly lonely? What if we buy a house that falls down around our ears and that leaves us even broker than we are already? What if I’m being horribly naive and swapping an ok-but-I’m-bored-of-it town for something much worse?

F*ck it.

I will never know if I never try.

Sometimes a change IS as good as a rest, and maybe new streets to pound and new places to go to are just what I need.

I am imagining taking a big, slow, breath in of that new air and that new life, and do you know what?

I think it feels good.

Right Now

You have all been so lovely the last few days. The comments on my post about the Health Visitor’s worries about Kai have been endlessly comforting and supporting and I am so grateful for you taking the time to respond so thoughtfully. Thank you.

I had a bit of bad day with it all yesterday. Actually, I had A LOT of a bad day. There were moments there were I could genuinely have opened the front door and run as fast as my legs could carry me.

I didn’t, obviously. Instead I wrestled the ferocious ball of frustration and bad-temper that is my son till bedtime, put him to bed without a bath and went downstairs and cried. And cried. And cried some more.

I doubted everything yesterday. EVERYTHING about myself, about Kai, about my abilities and suitability as a mother, about my perception of my life and how perhaps that differs from reality.

And do you know what scared me most? That maybe there is absolutely nothing wrong with him at all. That he is just spirited, and wilful and frustrated with the world  – no different from most other toddlers.

And weirdly, this made me feel like shit.

I convinced myself that every toddler is like Kai, that all mums have to manage behaviour like his, and as such, the fact that I’m struggling to cope with it so much means I am just weak, neurotic and failing miserably. You probably have three children like Kai. Ten. And you still manage to do normal things like brush your hair, and eat, and go out.

Everyone tells me he is delightful, and fun, and charming and he IS! Maybe what I endure behind closed doors I have blown vastly out of proportion.

Maybe I am just not cut out for all this at all.

No, don’t get me wrong. I don’t want there to be anything ‘wrong’ with Kai. It’s just that the thought that it is supposed to be like this, supposed to be so impossibly hard and feel so unmanageable ALL THE TIME just made me go cold.

Luckily, I have good friends. Good, kind, honest, supportive friends who listen (and I could list hundreds of you, thank you so much).

I have a husband who has been through it all with me and keeps me grounded.

And after being told an awful lot of sense, I realised this.

Do you know what? Kai is hard work. He is really, really hard work.

I’m not saying its some kind of competition about ‘who has it the hardest’, or that other parents don’t find it hard either,but the reality of life with Kai is incredibly challenging and I don’t think anyone could question that.

He’s always been hard work – early months of constant crying and refusal to be any where but attached to me, followed by endless battles getting him to cope with transitions and change and him resisting everything. The speech delay and the near-constant tantrums and the freak outs at the slightest thing are just a continuation of something that’s been going on from the beginning.

He can be lovely of course. He is obviously bright, and can be so much fun and entertaining. He charms everyone around him and can be fabulous company. He plays beautifully, when in the mood to, and if you get it right with him you get it SO right and it is wonderful.

But this is offset by the most rigid personality I have ever come across. It is offset by moods completely dependent on things being just how he wants them to be and endless frustration and tears and anger when they are not. And I can honestly say? The hard times far outweigh the good times right now.

I am not enjoying motherhood right now. It’s not much fun to be honest.

A vast proportion of my day is spent ‘coping’ with Kai, managing his moods and single-minded determination and enduring the frequent screaming, crying, hitting, pulling, outpouring of his emotions. Every single day involves a good deal of time listening to long bouts of crying. It’s incredibly draining, exhausting. And I defy anyone to not find it hard.

And the speech thing IS worrying. The constant, weird, babbled gobbledegook? The fact that has somehow ‘forgotten’ how to say the odd word he could say a few months back? That he makes NO attempt to imitate words yet will copy the sounds he hears himself making on recordings? Of course it’s worrying. I’m not saying it won’t right itself, I’m sure it will, but obviously it’s going to be a concern to me. What kind of mother would I be if it wasn’t?

Whether he fits some kind of ‘label’ or not, whether he is like other kids or not, whether I find it harder than you or anyone else? It doesn’t really matter. Deep down I know it will be fine. I know that he will be fine, that he will grow out of most stuff, and we will survive. I know that really I am very lucky, he is healthy, so am I. I know it could all be so much worse.

But it doesn’t change how hard it is right now. It doesn’t change how much I am struggling.

What matters is I love him. I love him so much it actually hurts me to think about it. I see so much positive in him, despite all the bad stuff, and I am so enormously proud of him, of his fierce strength and passion.

I know I am doing the best I can, I know I am doing a good job, even, because I care about all this stuff and I think about it and I want to make Kai happy.

I just want to be a better mother for him.

I want to figure out what is he needs that I seem to be missing.

Mostly, I just want to see him happy.

And I want to see me happy too.

Writing Workshop: What if?

Welcome back to the Writing Workshop link-up! At the bottom of this post you’ll find the widget to post the link to your workshop posts. It’s my turn first though, of course.

I’ve chosen a mixture of prompts of number 2 and 3. This is what the voices in my head assume. I guess some of them maybe right, but not as many as I think. I struggle with self-doubt like you wouldn’t believe. It pulls at me, twists me, undermines me, knocks me down. I wish I knew how to fight it but I haven’t figured out how yet. Until then it is a constant battle to not take that nagging voice too seriously. Not easy. Not easy at all…

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If I had more money, I would be happier.
If I lost 10lbs, I would be sexier.
If I lived close to nature I would be healthier.
If I gave up blogging, life would be simpler.

If I could travel more, I would be more interesting.
If I read more, I would be more impressive.
If I wrote more, I would be more successful.
If I slept more, I would be more productive.

If I learnt to spell and didn’t mix my words, people would respect me more.
If I were funnier, wittier, prettier, people would like me more.
If I published something, people would admire me more.
If I had a brand new wardrobe, people would notice me more.

If I owned my own house, I would feel more like a grown-up.
If I had another baby, maybe, I would feel more complete.
If people didn’t treat me like a child, I would feel more confident.
If I could learn to let go, I would feel more at peace.

If I don’t get an A, my parents would be disappointed.
If I don’t get to see my name in print, I will be laughed at.
If I don’t get a good job, people will think I am a loser.
If I don’t get a degree, I will always feel inferior.

If I had a new hoover, my house would gleam.
If I had expensive beauty products, I would be beautiful.
If I had a smart sophisticated hair-do, people would take me seriously.
If I had more time, I would be going places.

If I could beat my insecurities there would be no stopping me.

If I could get over myself nothing would stand in my way.

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So now it’s your turn!

1. Tell me about a time where you refused to compromise.
- Inspired by Jo at Slummy Single Mummy and her post: ‘The sacrifices you make as a parent – and the ones you won’t…’

2. What do people always wrongly assume about you?
- Inspired by Bare-Naked Mummy’s Welsh people are NOT posh!

3. What have the voices in your head been saying lately?
- Inspired by Manic Mummy’s blog post: ‘Is it me, or…’

4. Your prompt is ‘Together’. Share a scene or write something that encapsulates this feeling for you.
- Inspired by Noble Savage’s beautiful post: ‘Sunday Mothering’

5. What exciting job would you like to do for a day?
- Inspired by my poetical musings this week.

Leave your name and the URL to your post in the MckLinky below (the URL should be to your post not just to your blog) andleave me a comment to let me know you’ve taken part. If you have the time it would be great if you could try and read and comment on at least two other entries. And be kind! It’s supposed to be a bit of fun – we’re not looking for the next Booker Prize winner here!

If you haven’t had chance to respond yet, then you’ve still got today! Or just wait till next week, when there’ll be five brand new prompts to get you thinking.

This Writing Workshop is brought to you in association with Mama Kat’s Losin’ It – who’s lovely author came up with the concept and runs her own workshop over in the U.S.

Marshmallow Vlog Part 2: Ant Steps Up

I needed a bit of cheering up tonight, and, as always, my very fabulicious husband has stepped up to the plate. Following my rather pathetic attempt at beating Heather’s Marshmallow Challenge, Ant decided to have a go himself.

Watch this competitive marshmallow-face-stuffing wannabees. Watch this and weep at your relative inadequacy…