Thoughts | Sleep is for the Weak

New Dawn

Posted by Josie on Dec 21, 2009 in Uncategorized | 16 comments

This morning, I put on half my wardrobe and went out while it was still dark to watch the Solstice sun rise. I left the boys safe and warm and wandered, alone but with a head full of thoughts for company, to my quiet nature sanctuary.

There was a spring in my step as I walked on pavements, glittering with quartz, avoiding frozen puddles and leaving deep footprints in the hard frost. Because last night, on the longest night, I got MY longest night for 18 months.

Kai slept. At last. He slept. And so did I.

Waking up briefly at 10pm, he settled holding my hand and then I didn’t hear from him again until 6am. When I went in to him, all tousled and wrinkled from his long sleep, he smiled me a smile that told me he knew he’d done an important thing. And with a excited hug and a frantic tug towards our bedroom he was eager to snuggle up with me and his dad and have his first, long and happy feed since before he’d gone to bed. By Jove, I think he’s got it.

It may not be repeated tonight, in fact I expect not, but that’s ok. We’ve turned a corner here, I can feel it. And the hope for better nights, and finally some refreshing sleep, has never been stronger.

And so, with the energy that comes only from a decent stretch of sleep, I walked this morning. For over an hour I sought out the sun from its hiding place and watched as it rose, glowing and golden from the horizon. I watched the light change, touching the icy marshes, and the world transform.

I thought a lot. About the last 18 months, about the next year ahead. About my hopes and my anxieties and my confusion sometimes about why on earth I am here and what the hell I’m supposed to be doing. I didn’t find answers, but as the geese flew across the grapefruit sky in a perfect V, I too found some peace.

A new day has dawned.

Happy Yule everyone x

Circles of Trust

Posted by Josie on Dec 5, 2009 in Me | 52 comments

Something has been playing on my mind a little lately.

You see, for me, the internet has always been about making connections. I’ve gravitated towards social networking sites, like Facebook and Twitter; towards forums and chatrooms. It’s been about finding information, yes, but mostly about making friends. I’m not a overly sociable person by nature, something I’ve talked about on here before, tending to feel shy and clumsy in front of people, and the ability to type rather than talk, to have to time to think about what to say, has always made me feel more confident, witty, and articulate than I feel in real life. I suspect many of you with a similar love for the online world feel the same.

Often I feel too tired for the effort of social interaction in my real life. I don’t get most people, or feel that they get me. I’m not very good at opening up to people, feeling like I have to pretend to be someone ‘acceptable’ the whole time, nor am particularly good at social niceties. I get irritated and bored easily, feel easily overwhelmed, and am very self concious. There are very few people I feel comfortable being truly myself with – my family, Ant and my best friend are the only people I’m not embarrassed to be ‘me’ with.

Online though it is different. I can choose to walk away from a social situation at any time. I can choose what information I reveal and what I choose to keep hidden, what points of view I’d like to share and those discussions I’d rather avoid. I can choose to spend time with the people I connect with, and politely ignore those that I don’t. I get to make the rules, and I love that.

I wonder sometimes what most of you would think of me if you met me in real life. Would you be disappointed? Surprised?

Generally I think I’ve been very honest on here, in fact I find it almost impossible not to be. I’ve revealed things I never would if I met you in real life, the safety of hiding behind my computer screen making me brave and allowing me to open up in a way I usually struggle with. I feel like I always give you an accurate picture of the ‘real’ me, although maybe it is not the me that would be obviously apparent if you were to meet me. In short though, I have been truthful. Always.

I tend to make the automatic assumption that the people I come across on the internet are the same. I assume that when they talk about themselves, they too are being honest and truthful, giving a fair representation of their lives and of themselves. I mean, why would I doubt them? I do believe that the vast majority of the people that use the internet for social networking are genuine, honest people looking, like me, for a little connection. Perhaps, like me, their online persona is more comfortable for them then their real life one but at the end of the day, the people I ‘meet’ are the people that they are.

Generally my experiences have backed this up. I have, in the past, made friendships so strong online that they have carried over into real life too. I have met a number of people that I have previously only known by nicknames, or through an online presence, and meeting them has been an amazing and positive experience – I may have never met these people but I did know them, some of them better than the vast majority of my real life friends. I feel my life is vastly enriched by these online friendships, both those in my past that are now real life friends too, and new friends that I’ve made recently through Twitter and the blog, some of whom I already feel very close to.

However.

Sometimes I do wonder if that is a little naive. There was once an incident in which I person I had befriended wasn’t who she said she was, or at least, the evidence seemed to point that way. I was deeply shocked and hurt, and for a time did become more wary about who I chose to trust. But I don’t like being suspicious of people, more predisposed to trust than I am to mistrust, and once again find myself placing a great amount of confidence in my online world, that it is exactly as it appears to be.

I’m really interested to know what you think about this.

SHOULD we trust the people we meet online? Should we exercise some caution? And how can you do that with out being cagey, paranoid and cynical? How do we protect ourselves yet still allow ourselves to be open enough to really connect with people? Have you generally found people to be truthful? Or have you been let down by people who weren’t who they said they were?

Bah Humbug – A Christmas Rant

Posted by Josie on Dec 1, 2009 in Uncategorized | 41 comments

Gah what is it with all you people and your determination to make Christmas last as long as possible?!

Not only have I had to suffer Christmas hitting our high street before Halloween this year, now December 1st has rolled round I’m suddenly met with endless accounts of people with their tree up, presents bought and wrapped, and Christmas cards written.

Now don’t get me wrong, I love Christmas. But I just start to think about it on the 1st, using the whole advent period to gently warm up to the idea. I put up Kai’s advent calendar last night and got my first little Christmas tingle filling it with various disproportionately sized plastic animals for him to find each day. By the weekend I might just start thinking about doing some Christmas shopping. In another couple of week’s we’ll put the tree up and try a think of a way that we can ensure it survives three weeks of toddler attention. I probably won’t even eat a mince pie for at least another fortnight. This way my excitement builds slowly up to an uncontrollable hysteria on Christmas Eve (where my brother will come and we will play board games and eat our body weight in buffet food), a night lying awake wondering if that sound I just heard really was Santa, not daring to move and thinking that all those unbelievers are going to feel such eejits when they don’t get a Canon SLR under their tree, and then be up at the crack of dawn for a few days of festivities and more food and mulled wine than should probably be legal.

If I started with it all too soon, my excitement would have peaked and waned by the time we gotten half way through advent and I’d be bored and disinterested with the whole thing by the time the big day rolled round. Now fair enough if you personally have the energy to maintain your Christmas Spirit for endless weeks at a time, I just don’t have it in me.

And, for me, having Christmas last a whole month, or even longer, kind of throws out my whole rhythm for the year. Christmas is a specific day, or a few days at most, which is proceeded by ADVENT. Which, if you’re of the non-religious persuasion as I am, means a time of getting ready. If you’ve already got ready then what the frick is the point? You’ve lost all the build-up, all the magic – all you’ve got to look forward to is three weeks of novelty chocolates which I swear are made up of the ground up cardboard of last year’s advent calendars.

*sigh*

I’ll stop ranting now. I don’t mean to wee on your Yule log or anything like that.

I’m just saying, let’s all calm down a bit shall we. We’ve got 24 days people, let’s enjoy them.

Screw you structured play and learning stuff! I’m doing just fine…

Posted by Josie on Nov 20, 2009 in Uncategorized | 17 comments

Do you know the most wonderful thing about blogging? (’cause blogging’s a wonderful thing…)

It is the fact that yesterday I can post one of my usual ‘worrying I’m not doing enough‘ posts and in 24 hours can receive back an overwhelming number of comments of solidarity, reassurance, encouragement and affirmation, and at a time when I most need to hear it too. I’m said it before and I’ll say it again. You guys are AMAZING.

Turns out all of you could relate, or remember feeling the same when your kids were Kai’s ages, or thought I was talking the biggest pile of twaddle you have ever read and kindly left me advice to show me the error of my ways. I felt so much better by all your fantastic advice that I actually went on last night and amended my post, which I’m reproducing here so you can see it:

Amendment:

I have loved the comments on this post. Especially as they come from some of the mum’s I have THE most respect for. You tell me that I’m doing fine and I believe you. Thank you.

So I take it back. I am not shit. Because turns out I am just like you and I think you are AWESOME. So I guess that makes me? Well, not shit anyway.

Thanks. Thanks again. And thanks some more.

Is it stupid that I genuinely feel a huge deal better? Cause I really, really do.

And because the comments are THAT GOOD! and because so many of you seem to secretly feel the same, people like Emma, Sharni, Andrea, Theresa, Dotty, Solveig, I am going to reproduce some of them here: to stand as a testament against insanely irritating structured play and that feeling that you’re failing because you’re not very good at it. Here we go… (it’s also a good way of introducing you to some of my lovely readers!)

Kat from Slugs on the Refridgerator tells me:

“In my personal view, kids do not need to be entertained all the time, in fact they should not be. I don’t know where on earth society came up with the stupid idea that SAHM need to educationally stimulate their kids all the time (though my bet would be on Toys R Us). For the vast majority of human history, kids were just along for the ride. They helped adults do their work or played happily alongside. Kids these days (and parents) have much too high expectations about cramming all this learning and activity into a day, when in fact children’s job is just to play… As for learning, children will learn what they need to learn when they need to learn it.”

Brits in Bosnia said:

“I have a theory that lots of children are over stimulated today anyway; too much time doing structured play with adults and not enough time developing their own abilities to create their own worlds and games. Children need to be bored sometimes as they need to learn how they can entertain themselves and develop their own imaginations.”

The Madhouse (who is probably QUEEN of creative activities in my book!) suggests that:

“…they learn by copying and watching. We have never had structured play at all. It always amazes me when people ask if I taught the boys their numbers and things, no way. I just have fun with them.”

Victoria from It’s a Small World After All is my idol for dreaming up exciting trips with her children so I was very reassured to have her tell me:

“They need to learn to entertain themselves… I’ve always called it benign neglect. I play with my children a bit, but I also expect them to get on with it by themselves. My eldest has the most incredible imagination. And it’s not just me being a proud parent, her teachers always comment on it. I’m sure it’s to do with making up her own games and I feel like it’s something I’ve done really right (unlike most of the things I feel like I’ve done wrong). It’s a gift that will hopefully stand her in good stead. Personally, I’d far rather they were able to turn a bunk bed into a pirate ship than most other things.

And as for ‘teaching’ them their colours, numbers etc, I can tell you that after 3 children, the effort you put into these things in no way reflect the outcome. I spent ages trying to teach the eldest colours etc and she learnt them at exactly the same age as the middle one, who I didn’t bother teaching them to….”

Muddling Along Mummy wisely points out:

“…giving them space to explore and develop on their own is a great gift – better that than being one of those horrid helicopter mums who interfere continually in their child’s life”

Amber, who I admire enormously as a FAB mum admits:

“You know what? I take every little bit of independent play that my kids will give me. It’s actually very enriching for them to go and do their own thing, in their own way. They don’t really need us to give them structure to their play, or make sure they’re reaching their optimal potential, or anything. They can mostly figure it out for themselves.”

And my very lovely friend Mwa (who is always right about everything) popped on late last night to tell me:

“You are fine. And structured play is completely unnecessary. As long as you interact with each other, and do things together, he will be fine. I think in fact that it’s unnatural to have all this structured play with an adult. If it doesn’t feel right, there’s probably some evolutionary reason… Don’t try to do what you’re bad at all the time. Just do what you love and are good at. I’m sure you’ll end up teaching him plenty.

Oh, and while I’m hijacking your blog anyway, I just read that structured learning before about age six is not only unnecessary, it may actually do more harm than good. Just trust Kai’s learning instincts. He will get there his own way, whatever you do.”

So there you go. I am officially LETTING THIS ONE GO! I am doing fine. I may not always have the patience or the energy for lots of structured play and formal learning, but I am NEVER too busy or too tired for a cuddle or a giggle or a game of hide and seek when Kai wants them.

I am also off now to order the book The Idle Parent that some of you recommended, to read whenever I feel under pressure to get the flash cards out.

Thanks again folks. And thanks to Linda, Kelly, Leah, Eileen, Nicola, Weston-Super-Mum, Spiragirl, Heather, Tasha, Erica, Emily, Kathryn, and Kath for al your equally wonderful comments.