No words, just pictures.....

Awards please.....

I am an actress extraordinaire. I fake no humility, I am out to take all recognition for my exceptional ability to appear totally calm to the point of disinterest when faced with heart stopping moments.
Like Sophie telling me she has an appointment with the doctor at 10 am to get a prescription for the pill.

"YEGADS!!!!" My head says "WHOA BABY! " ( this is what comes of saying in a chummy way." Sophie why don't we tackle your room together?" it opens the door for conversations you would pay not to have but feel honoured to be treated to) DON'T BE GROWN UP....SAVE YOURSELF.....New Barbie? Peel off nail polish? Plastic lipstick? Is there anything I can buy you that will turn you into a 5 year old again?

WHERE THE HELL IS JANDY WHEN I NEED HIM? Jandy was one of Sophie's imaginary friends, we liked Jandy, hated Billy...Billy painted the walls with anything he could get his hands on and Jandy would eat the dinner when Sophie was full. Billy was housebound and absolutely forbidden to come on any day trips because he would tell Sophie to run the minute my back was turned, empty bottles of shampoo by the dozen, try to drown the cat, tell Sophie to climb out of bedroom windows ( oh it's not that high!) Jandy would tell Sophie it was bedtime, tell her she would have a daddy one day, try and stop Billy from cutting Sophie's hair ( darn it Billy-- I wish you'd listened that time. I hated that haircut....8 inches off her beautiful long blond hair and the fringe down to the scalp) So Jandy....where are you now I'd like to know, typical male running off when the going gets tough!
For all her mouth and blustering Sophie is deliciously naive, fantasticaly open.I love it that her whole life she has been incapable of NOT telling me everything ( exhausting, but touching and incredibly reassuring) but there are times when it would be quite nice ( or at least easy) to live in blissful ignorance and believe her to be at a friends house painting each others nails and giggling about pop stars ( what happened to just doing that? Kids these days just miss out on SO much!I had a blast at Alison's house listening to Bony M, washing our hair and spending hours trying to make my corkscrew curly stuff straight and her poker straight stuff curly. We laughed about Ivor with the tattoos and imagined what our lives would be like when we were grown up and had everything worked out and we ate madeira cake with clotted cream.)

Why do they have to just skip the good stuff and feel they have to jump right in to the stuff that they are nowhere near capable of dealing with? Sex and tattoos, piercing everything in sight ( and out of sight heaven, help us.) Do you kids have any idea how it feels to have spent nine months making your perfect bodies, endless years filling them with wholesome foods and avoiding as much junk as possible, almost worshipping every dimple and crease only to have to stand back and allow you to deface them, put holes in them? Just wait til you're a mother...then you'll know!

That's the tough bit about being a mother, giving life and accepting that you don't actually have the right to live that life.You may well be right, perhaps we are stupid, we may NOT know everything or remember how it feels but we NEVER forget seeing you for the first time and we ALWAYS know we want the best for you and we will NEVER forget that we love you and and hurt for you when you have to learn the hard way, can't you just sometimes learn by listening and trusting?



It is SO hard not to just leap in and shake her, try and make her see that this is a HUGE step and she will be so sad if she makes a mistake when if she waits and does all the fun stuff first she could be happy. And safe.

I'm glad she tells me and I'm glad I get the time to think and talk to her the right way.

Actually, I thank God. Really, I do. Left to my own devices I would make a hash of it all.......I am convinced that there are moments when my mouth is literally stopped, then I am able to think, pray and somehow do the right thing, say the right thing.....please don't let me down this time God; she's a baby, admittedly in a woman's body butI want her to be happy, I want her experiences to be great ones and not ones she has to learn lifelong, regrettable lessons from. So, PLEASE? Tell me what to say to this child of mine. Thankyou. Amen.

true love

Is the way Gramma and Papa love this little boy. He is 16th out of 17 grandchildren and he is totally and utterly adored. He spends one day a week with gramma, papa and the beloved and somewhat idolised auntie 'Yeah' ( Leah) we see them most days and yet when he walks in through the door it is as if he hasn't been seen for a year. This look of adoration isn't for the sake of the camera it is a fact of life. He knows it, he expects it and he gets it. The Elijah Henry fan club....fantastic.

Ho hum......

Is it a sin , do you suppose, to be bored?
Probably,most everything else is, although everything else that's a sin is usually fun too.
I am just so BORED ..yes, capitol letters because I could just whine with boredom...my ageing mind and middle aged body craves a bit of excitement and whilst I should be gleeful that life isn't throwing any hideous mind shakers at me ( and that's NOT an invitation to hurl any at me life, bugger off and find someone else to throw it at) Off on a tangent here, my blog, I can do what I like.
DO you have a list of stuff in your head that only happens to other people? I used to and darn me if they haven't almost all gone and happened to me, superstition won't allow me to list the scary ones that haven't but listen here, you life fairies, or whoever you are, how come I get to have the crapola stuff that only happens to other people happen to me but I haven't won the lottery? Huh? HUH? Go on, throw that at me and see if I can come through the other side and be a better person.

Anyhoo, back to the original train of thought on boredom. In a TV show last week a comedy character said to his somewhat frustrated girlfriend " Oh...I simply cannot be expected to perform every SINGLE fortnight" Oh how we laughed........rather hysterically on my part of truth be known...I'M SO BORED!
If I wasn't so dog tired I think I would be a bit wicked, maybe my boys get their naughtiness from me, they sucked all the dare devil out of me when I was carrying them and selfish stinkers are jolly well using it all up and not letting me have ANY of it! ( although I do get to clean up after them!)

I took pictures of them today, wanted some splendid shots of their completely perfect faces, had some idea that they would look all kind of sultry and gorgeous and actually, they DO look gorgeous but they also look very cheeky and very naughty and you can get a really good idea what they put me through every day....





See what I mean..is it simply oozing out of them or what?
I WANT some of that back... I'm weary of being sensible...but what to do?
I shall ponder on what wickedness I could enjoy and get back to you but if you have any ideas in the meantime do let me in on them......I'm bored you see.

Where does it come from?

I'm pondering depression.
Why are some people so affected and others not touched at all by the demon of depression?
Easy to understand the misery that follows some trauma or life shattering event, although in my case the depression is very different from the initial shock and horror of the events that turned my mind and heart inside out. Initial feelings following my traumas have been raw emotions, real and sharp and terrifying. The later feelings are much more damaging, deep unshakable misery and a feeling of such helplessness and lack of hope that it is possible to feel completely and utterly bleak.
To wake up and feel immediate regret at waking up, the first emotion or thought being a low down moan of misery at the prospect of facing another day.....then the voluntary thoughts begin, the battling, fighting, resentful 'how dare you' thoughts where my conscoius mind takes umbridge at being so punished and a determination that the misery won't win today.
I am incredibly intolerant of depression and shamelessly harsh on people who allow this devil to take over and affect the lives of those NOT battling it, my head, and at times my heart, wants nothing more than to sit and stare at a wall. There are times when it would be a sheer delight to not move, to stay curled up and not face that daily task of putting on a cheery face.Then I think of how I will feel when the demon has lost, has given up and understood that in my heart he didn't win, in my mind he found no place to rot and fester and he goes away so my joy can take the whole space and explode in uninterrupted bliss. What guilt would I feel at such wasted time now?
There is SUCH joy inside me, such incredible feelings of gratefulness and an awareness of the immeasurable blessings that are mine.
I think often of the Hymn " count your blessings" ( which actually is a glorious one to sing as it's so rousing!)
Count your blessings name them one by one, count your blessings see what God has done....

I would bore you to tears if I named them one by one but they are plentiful and they are HUGE.Which is why I'll be damned is I'm going to give in and sink when the misery tries to get me.
Actually a side effect of eating well has been that the depression is lifting, how bloody marvellous is that? How good is it to see that what I eat affects who I am ( oh shut up with the trite 'you are what you eat' quotes, let me pretend I have discovered this all on my own!)
Of course there is the knowledge that in taking time to prepare mouth watering shrimp salad and baking salmon in lemon juice I am indeed treating myself as if I am of enormous worth which can only make me feel of worth. Having a section of the fridge that is MINE and woe betide any trim youngster who feels they might help themselves, has to make me feel as if perhaps I am a bit special and worthy of treats ....much better than shovelling in left over crisps and half eaten chocolate bars dumped by unappreciative children, while no-one is looking as if all I am worth is the leftovers eaten in shame.
When tempted this week to eat the food of the lowly, I have been able to scoff and tell myself that THIS body is deserving of the very best, it has captured, housed, grown and delivered six of the most perfect and divine children, with barely a hiccup or thought.
Despite being so ill treated it continues to work and perform every act asked of it with the minimum of groans or creaks ( and don't forget those legendary pelvic floor muscles that still allow me to cough without peeing, although I'm almost sure I couldn't jump and say the same).....nearly 43 years of doing what it was made for without complaint. Does it not then, deserve a bit of kindness? Should I then treat it as a car coming up to its vintage years and use the finest oil instead of the cheap and cheerful dollar store stuff? I think so.
I am hoping that with a bit of kindness and some special treatment, with some supergrade oil and some gentle ministrations it will feel a desire for some fine tuning and I will feel that exercise would be the ultimate treat for myself.......but miracles don't come too easily and we're not holding out for one just yet!
My dreams for the future are simple enough, to have a picture taken of myself with my children....20 years a mother and no pictures to show it. If anything were to happen to me my children would be justified in thinking they came from under a goosberry bush as there is no photographic evidence that they came from or were nurtered by me!!
If I were really brave I would take a picture now so that if I ever achieve the goal of looking half way decent I could compare the two...just not brave enough and I know I'll regret it later!
I long to wear a t-shirt that is tight because it was made to fit not because it is too small, one that isn't as long as it's wide to cover the colossal backside that I am lucky enough to be in front of and not forced to view. One that shows the contour of my glorious ski slope, plastic surgery lifted and reduced breasts at their absolute best rather than showing them off like pimples on an elephants arse because they have stayed a petite B cup while the rest of me has ballooned to enormous proportions.
I want to go to the park and actually play on the slide with my children and not visualise myself getting stuck halfway down and being the object of abject humiliation that would result.
I REALLY want to know that I can meet my little boys from school and have people not notice me or to have people astounded that I am mother not only to 3 little boys but also to three grown people, if I were to feel younger I know I would look younger and feeling hot, uncomfortable, embarrassed and ashamed does nothing to encourage feelings of youth or liveliness!
So, I am enjoying this new found feeling of being important, of allowing myself to treat my body the way it deserves to be treated and being nice to it. I will wake up each day and feel excitement that today I have the chance to do it all over again.
It's pretty good to wake up and feel a glimmer of positivity that here is another day when I am in charge of who I am and what I do. It isn't up to another soul how I feel, no-one else's job to make me feel happy or worthy or even just good. I can do it for myself and the ripple effect of that is that the people around me can bask in the reflection of light instead of cower in the eminated misery.......ugh damned depression, surely the tool of the devil, well this week I can say "get thou behind me satan." Actually, he can stand by my feet and I'll stamp on him because he's not winning in this heart, not this week.



In true Bridget Jones style. 7lbs lost 77 to go. ( shall I record every saturday to give myself encouragement? Maybe so.....although weight loss is a huge bonus, not the only reason for my newfound approach on life)

It worked.

For a week I have been kind to myself, eaten great food, drunk water and avoided the stuff that makes me feel so rotten. I feel good, I like this feeling and an added bonus has been a loss of 7lbs......I hope that tomorrow I can still be nice to me.

I wonder.....

Have you ever wondered what it would be like to be inside someone else's mind? Perhaps a new born baby with that inexplicabe look of deep wisdom in it's eyes? Maybe a rambling old lady who mutters of long ago memories or even the mind of a child so disabled she can't see, hear or even even eat...but manages the widest grin out of the blue?
One of my most favourite pastimes is to try and see into the minds of other people.


My Isaac is my subject lately....what is he thinking and feeling and wondering? His mind is so complex and his emotions are so clear it is impossible for me NOT to try and think what he is thinking, feel what he is feeling. This dear little boy is by far one of the gentlest and kindest boys, if he sees or hears any kind of distress in his little world he will rush and find his beloved 'Lello Ba' ( yellow blanket) and share it with whoever may be sad.
He screamed from the momeny he was bron, endless screaming for no reason that I, mother then to 5, could fathom, up to 18 hours a day of relentless screaming. Suddenly, at 5 months he stopped....then he became the sweetest most delightful boy. Not a bit of trouble, undemanding to the point of worry...he was happy to sit and watch and take a back seat to the unstoppable Seth. At 20 months he began to dislike new people, hiding from his beloved gramma, no more day trips with gramma or Auntie Leah, terror and hiding and ...well..nothing. He became mine and daddy's, happy without any added company. His world was mummy, daddy, Isaac and lello ba. Seth is in his world too but sometimes Seth is too much, too loud and bossy for gentl eIsaac although he does love to watch and is in often in awe of this big brother who would appear to be his exact opposite, I wonder if he sees Seth talk and interact with so many people and wishes he could do the same? I know when he is with Seth he is much braver, much more relaxed and able to join in so many more activities. Maybe he feels a bit lost without his brother, smaller framed and lighter although older than him, albeit it by only 11 months. Seth can talk the hind leg off a donkey, he is exhausting with his demands for attention and knowledge and answers to his questions...for so long Isaac got by simply by waiting for the right moment and saying " me too" which would result in him getting a drink, sweets, attention, cuddles...anything Seth had requested.

So afraid of things most of us hardly notice, Isaac will recoil and shake at the sight of a painting apron or candy floss but allow a silky adult python to curl around his neck.

To look at or speak to anyone unknown is ( it would seem) physically impossible for Isaac, beyond shy, he is literally unable to look at these new people, once known and trusted he will allow them to speak to him and not hide or cower but still it takes a very very long time until those enormous and delicious brown eyes of his can return a look, he will answer with his back to whoever is talking to him.
What an honour to be the mummy of this boy, to be one of a mere handful of people who are treated to the eye to eye contact with him, there is depth and understanding behind those eyes that I am incapable of describing. To be so obviously loved and trusted by someone so sparing with his attention is truly a gift not to be taken lightly.



Frustrating,however, is the word for Isaac's fears and eccentricities, every morning begins with a ritual of discussing and debating and screaming and begging about his clothes....." no shor mummy, no shor.....out-tie cool aday..no shor mummy.....foo-bore ti mummy.....me no shor. " Terrified of shorts apart from his football kit, he feels safest in long jeans, t-shirt and long sleeved shirt on top, anything else means at least an hour of screaming, breath holding, more screaming. every day. Every single day.Nothing cheers him more than to look outside and see rain or wind, this means he will be able to wear his 'safe' clothes and won't be forced to wear clothes he can be cool in.
I wonder how it must feel to be so afraid of the world that rituals and 'sameness' mean safety, where new things, new places, new places are just so daunting they are best not encountered?
We are so close to our appointment with Isaac's future.......will he be diagnosed with Autism? I think so. I find half of me longing to hear the words so we can plan and ensure he gets all the help he needs to make sure he is able to be the very best Isaac imaginable, all the help to encourage his sharp mind, photographic memory, logical thinking, brilliance....whilst also trying to help him see the joy in the world that is his for the taking, if he can only battle with his fears.
The other half of me dreads hearing it, hates the thought that it will actually be REAL, a lifelong onslaught against himself just to be able to be 'in' the world.
I don't want my Isaac changed a bit, I want him only to learn the things he needs to be happy, not important to me whether he is the centre of attention and life and soul of every party. To me, it will mean success if my Isaac finds a career he loves, a partner that he loves who loves him too....eccentricities and all. I want him to laugh the way he laughs now, freely and irresitably, guffawing great belly laughs at little things and know the joy of others laughing with him. I think that's not asking too much, is it?

Nothing seems so bad.....

.....when the sun shines does it? I am a secret ( actually not very secret) sun worshipper, I strongly suspect that given the time I would be one of those lovely leathery ladies who look conker brown and a bit scary because they pooh-pooh any idea of sunscreen and slather on coconut oil and do nothing but sit in the sun and frazzle.
I simply love it....I had a brief affair with sunbathing just before I met H. the 3 kids were older and walking to school on their own and my sister Jane and I would screech through the unavoidable housework and sit out in my garden with cold drinks, magazines and music ( Wailing Whitney and Celine Dion if I remember correctly....wail wail, warble a bit, wail wail shriek.......I am getting old, my ear drums panic at the very memory of such music now )
These days I feel obliged to actually being doing something whilst out in the sun but the worshipping is still there in it's own sweet way.
It's a bit ironic that now I am so substantial and far too frightening to wear a swimsuit I go brown at the drop of a hat....when I think of the futile hours of my youth spent in an effort to be bronzed when I would have looked a bit drop dead gorgeous in a bikini and would only occassionally manage a light beige colour! Now I walk around like a farmer's wife with no effort at all! ( perhaps it because the sun can't avoid me as I take up so much space and the coming up for menopause sweating must surely have a hand in it too!!) anyway, I am thankful for small blessings as brown fat is so much more attractive than white fat and I shall worry about wrinkles later.
Anyway when the sun shines I am lifted into a happy place, to have windows open and the boys running out in the garden, eating outside, the very smell of summer and of course my garden, life is infinitely improved....even if nothing else has actually changed.

A good father.

Fathers' day. I wonder why I haven't given to much thought to whether it ought to be a great day before. I somehow have always felt that fathers' day exists purely because there is a mothers' day..not because we ought to think particularly about Fathers but today I find I am thinking.
I have a really, really GOOD father, he is a good man and he is a great father. I am told that he and mum consciously decided that for them, family and children would be their treasure and they would forego financial and material wealth in order to obtain eternal and lasting wealth in a family.
My dad is incredibly clever, he knows Math, he doesn't know how to teach it because for him it just IS. He looks at any math problem and knows what the answer is, he and his dad used to ( for fun) list rows and rows and figures in £'s shillings and pence and then race to see who would win in adding them up. No carrying numbers over in columns and then converting the pence into shillings and then into pounds for these 2, just whizzing down the page doing it in their heads. ( oooh fun!)
He can fix stuff and make stuff and would ( given the chance) organise all of our finances so that we never had a moments worry ( or fun perhaps, but that all comes with being so clever I have noticed)
He is probably the most loyal and loving man I have known and we 5 children grew up without even knowing that men could be philanderers or abusers, we hadn't a clue that some men went to pubs or gambled.( I wonder if it wasn't coincidence that all 3 of his girls married men so unlike him and were all stunned and sad to discover the hard way that not all men are good ones? Lesson learned, all 3 of us are now married to men very like him in many ways! ) Dad's were workers and they came home for dinner and were there. Whenever he was needed, he was there.
I went away with my dad when I was 7, I wore green slacks and a handknitted jumper and wore slightly worn pumps. We had a veritable treat store of mint yo-yo biscuits and bananas and I slept in the cab of the truck while he drove it from Newton abbot to Wales to deliver someone's furniture. It never occurred to me that a bank assistant manager wouldn't normally be delivering furniture, he was doing it to earn money for his treasure I suppose.
There was enormous jealously on the part of my siblings that I was to go on this adventure but to my dad I was the only one who could accompany him. As I grew up he used to do audits for the church, travel around our part of the country tallying up funds etc every sunday morning and he would leave at the crack of dawn. I so adored my daddy that the thought of him doing this on his own every week was intolerable, I was a worrier when I was little too and I somehow imagined that he would come to some kind of horrible accident and he would be all on his own, so every week I crawled out of my bed and went with him. I wonder if the other kids knew that on saturday dad would buy and hide sweets ( blackcurrant liquorice mmmmmm) in the glove box and he and I would eat them and we never shared them with anyone who preferred staying in bed to travelling with us. So, it was, of course, going to be me who went on the big adventure to Wales and to this day, 38 years later I can still recall the smallest of details on that trip and can feel that feeling of both exilleration and absolute love with my dad.
My dad isn't a demonstrative man and hugging, I think, is painful to him, partly, I imagine, due to being raised in a home where it was thought nonsense and perhaps boarding school didn't help. He doesn't talk about his childhood at all, I can't think much about anything much he has told us, his mum was older when she married her beloved Wilfred and she had her first son Barry, followed by my dad and I have no idea how or why my dad is as great as he is but hooray for the unexplained in this case.
It is said that the greatest thing a man can do for his children is to love their mother. How true this is......no memories of grand presents at christmas or designer clothes as we grew up could ever have come close to the memories of my dad writing " I love Peg" on the steamed up kitchen window and the friday night ritual of him bringing home a fish and chip supper on friday nights while other men were at the pub.
You can't beat a good Father...and mine is a gloriously grumpy, blissfully brusk, hug enduring man of such integrity that it would be hard to find a better one. Happy fathers day dad. I love you and I know you love me. Helen.

Turned out nice again.

It is, I have to say one of those days that promise nothing will go wrong. The sun is truly un- English in it's strength and determination and we have done a plethora of saturday activities.
Car boot sales this morning and we truly quenched our thirst for bargains and rooting through other peoples' junk.
Marvellous.
I filled the boot of the car with plants and beautiful things grown and loved by other people. I'm sure that plants bought having been grown by other plant lovers in their greenhouses and potting sheds grow happily and more plentiful than poor specimens bought at 'bring 'em on, chuck 'em out, sell them for as much as you can get' garden centres.
( I think when I am breeding dogs, I will probably sing to my plants too)

This afternoon was the school summer fete, something to dream about for weeks and rarely a disappointment. Scorching hot, smelling of hot dogs and burgers, folk dancing by year 4 at 2.45pm. We went in fire engines and ambulances, bought warm cola ( the english are great, it never occurs to us that it really might actually be hot, so of course who would think of ice buckets? No-one ever seems to mind - except H, raised in California and known to root through soda fridges muttering than none are cold enough.)
We bought candy floss, I wish I'd had my camera .... Imagine Seth and Isaac as they are offered this treat....both with hands up in true terror..."Oh nooooooooooo. oh nooooooo!" wicked, wicked mummy trying to get them to eat this stuff, we poked it, sniffed it, licked it, watched gramma, auntie Julie, auntie Leah and her friend Heather eat some and then like terrified little mice they tried it! Very good.......and we threw it away so they could go on the bouncy castle.

Dinner was baked salmon with avocado salad out in the garden with some ice cold fizzy water. Life is good, so far today,to top it all we have a Jethro video to guffaw at this evening. Hooray for the nice days.

Time.

Never enough of it.
I used to tut and raise my eyes skyward when I was a teen and heard this uttered from every pair of lips over the age of 40. Amazing how a day seemed to be more than long enough then, in fact I can remember too many afternoons in the summer holidays hanging over the arm of the couch bemoaning the nothing to do and boredom of it all.
These days I am in a whole new world and probably resemble an over fed hamster ( is there a 'p' in that?!) on a wheel, scurrying and getting nowhere.
I have a whole new set of priorities and thanks to having had 2 sets of children cleaning in the daytime isn't one of them, when I think back to my days of being so obsessed with sparkling surfaces and everything being just where it should be now that I understand what IMPORTANT things I could have been doing, I am bereft at the opportunities missed to really have lived.
How many people in our lives do we meet that ponder on their childhood and whisper fondly about how clean their bathrooms always were? Have you ever called home just to tell your mum how great it was that your socks were always in pairs and the mugs all matched? I suspect not. My son calls home and remembers the days we went to " wherever we ended up" we would make a picnic ( sometimes just jam sandwiches and some juice) we'd get in the car and go down roads we'd never been down before.

This morning I saw a familiar sight courtsey of Elijah Henry.....yet another unravelled toilet paper roll, rather tastefully unravelled I must say and I actually stood and looked at it for considerably longer that it deserved because when he gets bored of that delicious activity it will never happen for me again.......how sad is that? I wish I could get so whimsical about the pond on the bathroom floor every night at bathtime but I know that particular joy will be here til they all move out in probability, as Jordan is the worst offender.

I just feel that my days are whistling by and I'm not FILLING the time with great things, there is so much to do out there and so many memories to make and by the time I have shopped, picked up, cooked, dropped off, picked up, fed, washed and tidied another day is gone. I think I am a commune hippy at heart and wish I could live planting vegetables and looking at caterpillars.

I had a sudden insight yesterday into my old age and I think I will breed dogs...a bizarre thought because I haven't ever liked dogs, but I shall be a fat old lady in a baggy cardigan calling my dogs my babies and doing them christmas stockings. I will give that saying a helping hand and breed those delightful dogs that have bags of excess skin and flesh and look very crumpled. Then we shall walk, my dogs and I, along country roads and people will pass and proclaim how like me my 'babies' are.

Hit and Miss.

Six kids. SIX. 6. I am mother to them all, oldest 19 years 10 months, youngest 22 months 3 weeks. Have you ANY idea what a huge and daunting thing this is? I honestly don't think I did til I had 6 children. ( God's sense of humour creeping in agan I shouldn't wonder) I think I didn't give too much thought to how much I would spend on shoes for six children, call me Mrs Bargain finder of the year, if there is a splendid bargain to be had, I'll sniff it out and snap it up, the result is 6 children who pretty much do and have always looked fantabulous, not always clean but snappily and rather fancily dressed at all times.
Also call me Mrs feed 'em and not weep. I can make a culinary delight with a larder that looks like Mother Hubbard was responsible for the supermarket run. Great food ( ever heard the saying 'never trust a skinny cook? well, eat your heart out baby, I'll even make a gravy to go with it!) Never a moment's thought about feeding or clothing my children.
I scoffed at conversations I heard or read about family planning, had a few bashes at birth control but never really understood the need for lists, plans and savings accounts.
July 26th 2003, 45 minutes of labour, 12 minutes of pushing and low and behold there was my sixth baby....the most divine dark haired, brown eyed, dark skinned boy. I was immediately smitten and recognised him. I loved this boy, not for a second did I have to get to know him, meeting him and seeing him was like welcoming a dear friend I had been waiting for my whole life.

I knew that now Elijah was here my heart was full, there wasn't even a sliver of space that would need filling.

When I imagined having a family I almost pictured it all, all those things I hoped for in being a mother, some monumental like the bond I imagined ( ha! as if, nothing will ever explain that feeling until you have it) to ridiculous things like a desperate and probably irrational need for a baby that sucked it's thumb. When Eli arrived he completed every thing I imagined or dreamed of ( he even sucks his thumb and even after 22 months my heart somersaults every time I see it)
Between these six people that I have given birth too there isn't one dream left unrealised.

OH MY GOODNESS WHAT DID I DO?????

How will I ever be all I need to be for these people? What do they need? ( I know what they DON'T need ) They all need such different things and what if I get it wrong?

I am 100 positive that I didn't understand that this whole mothering thing would be so HUGE. I know I hadn't a clue that it would be so huge for so long! I think my naive head imagined a sweet baby, cute clothes, funny moments and suddenly a grown up person who would adore me and send me mothers' day gifts from their own home with their own money and write messages about how perfectly I had raised them.

IT'S NOT LIKE THAT! Dear Lord help me.

How is my brain coping with the overload of realisations pumelling their way through it? I know MY mum is completely wise and so right. I have no qualms or worries that should I ask her advice she will get it right, know what to say, know what to do.

You can SO wing it with a toddler, bluff, make it up, make it better. That stops when they get bigger. ( you can enter any swear word you like right here...whichever one you choose will pretty much work)

I am supposed to know everything, truly EVERYTHING. I am meant to be able to say, do, know exactly the right thing. I don't, I am forgetting the things I thought I knew as each day passes. I can actually SEE the look on my big kids' faces, I can HEAR the sound in their voices telling me that they trust me and they know I can help. I must have been really, really good at winging it this far because somehow these young adults look at me the way I looked at MY mum, only she honestly does know it.

The good thing is, they don't seem to grow out of wanting to show you their world, of needing to show you what they do. It's SO great to see your child grow and still know that you matter, that they want you there.
Dan works in a great restaurant, he is relief manager and head waiter in a posh place about 200 miles away. He has booked a table for us there on my birthday. Not a place to take little boys who make noise and mess and who appear to be unable to eat sitting down with cutlery and plates. Just me, H and Dan are having dinner. I hope I can stop myself cutting H's food up for him or spit washing Dan's face half way through dinner. I hope H can resist the urge to sneak a 6 inch pile of napkins into his pocket incase my nose runs on the wya home. It's too long since I had a grown up date to look forward to!

Will I ever be able to relax again do you think?

Most of my friends have children that have grown up already, no second batch of babies for them, they are now official members of the new conservatory and foreign holidays for 2 brigade.
H and I will be in our 60's when the boys are in their 20's. We will go from raising children to nursing home in one fell swoop, from wiping dribble off their chins to dribbling dribble down our own.
I like to think that inconti-pads will never be a part of my life, I hate to mention my pelvic floor too often but it IS a bit remarkable. I can't promise control of gas emmissions though, we're on shaky ground there already, Ugh... I remember working in the hospital with so many old ladies and being impressed with their apparant indifference to the fact that they farted with every other frame assisted step, now I realise it was actually a case of living with what you have. I can, unfortunately, imagine myself in the future pop pop popping and pardon me-ing my way through life as if I hadn't a care in the world. Why, just the other day whilst in my beloved garden, I bent down to pick up a plant pot, stepped back a bit and stumbled, with every staggering step I let rip a parp or two, nothing I could have done to hold that in, have you tried clenching your buttocks and staggering backwards down a rockery? Can't be done. Not at 42 after 6 kids anyway. How long til a gentle step up is enough to make me lose my dignity?

OH MY GOODNESS WHAT DID I DO?


oh, yeah.....that's what I did!

A picture paints a thousand words......

When I came home from the school run yesterday I saw something that told me a whole story.




When I saw this I knew without being told that Elijah had woken from his nap and so H had stopped what he was doing to get his baby....sure enough when I got inside there was my baby with his cheeks still red from his nap snuggled up on his daddy's lap. Priceless.

Mindless humming.

HUGELY underated. I can't tell you how mindless humming has taken me through some situations where gratuitous violence would be the other choice. I must stress that it can't be the humming of any known tune, simply hmmm hm hmmmmmm hm hm hm hm HMMHMMMMMMMMM HM HM HM HM HMMMMMM loudly, in order to drown out the noise of the moment, usually some blasted child hell bent on reminding me that not one military organisation has yet found the secret that kids have the ideal torture, guaranteed to crack the hardest enemy. I swear 15 minutes of Sophie 'making me understand' would have Saddam Hussein spilling any beans there might be to be spilt and if there weren't any, I know without doubt he would make some up, anything to just get her to shut the hell UP!
20 minutes with a 4 year old whining about something that isn't going to change,would have had Hitler surrendering immediately.
You can of course make up your own words to the tuneless sanity saver, however, on no account may they be sung aloud, humming with mentally thought words ( singing them outloud might cause your immediate incarceration, as if like my words, they have acts of violence as the main theme, albeit usually a plea for me not to follow through.
For example "Please make her shut her trap, before I break and give her a slap" or " Dear Lord please hear my ernest prayer or I might just rip out her hair" you see? not very appealing said aloud but incredibly satisfying when thought, as somehow it really does stop you acting it out whilst at the same time feeling you have vented your wrath)
When calm and pondering these moments of dire weakness and red hazed rage, I am utterly astonished that I can be brought to such a point by such trivia. Today I hummed til my ear drums rattled because Sophie was relentless in her endeavours to make me snap, she locked me out of the front room, yelled at me to get out of her face, told me not to speak to her ( which written down seems almost polite but when accompanied by that hideous Jerry Springer'ish head waggling and showing me the palm of her hand is anything BUT polite.) The cause of this behaviour? being told that having been so disruptive and unhelpful when asked to do one simple chore I didn't see any reason why she should be allowed computer time. I was then evil enough to simply turn the thing off despite the fact that it disconnected her from downloading yet more music that I will tell her she can't listen to ( pardon me for feeling that music yelling at me about mother f****** something or others isn't the sort of music I want in my home)
Ok, so, perhaps playing the Wurzels " Blackbird song" on continuous play to the delight of all three little boys who dance, jig and clap until they get the chance to yell " AWIGHT" when asked " Ow's ye father?" was rubbing salt in her wounds somewhat, but it saved me having to mindlessly hum, nothing like bellowing along to "Where be that blackbird to?" and then proclaiming that "Jiggered if I don't get 'un" ( should be 'buggered' actually but for heaven's sake I'm singing with under 5's here, so, Jiggered it is in our house) and then "with a gert big stick I'll knock 'un down" I can ( if I choose) replace the blackbird with an imagined figure all of my own and Bob's your uncle, I no longer want to beat the very beejeebers out of the one and only girl child that sprang from my loins.


Ahhhh my childhas arrived home, safe in the bosom of her family again, I'm off to hummmmmmm for a while, just long enough for her to see that I'm not up for a fight and am infinitely grateful for the fact that she is very loudly ignoring me!!

Oh sweet joy, she has made my day! just as I go to hit the 'publish post' button, I discover absolute proof that she IS my child...I swear this is true, I couldn't have made this bit up if I had had a sudden flash of inspiration......SHE'S HUMMING!!!!!!!

A definition of bliss.

Today, after dinner while I was taking some washing down from the line, Elijah escaped and having just had his bath ran out into the garden totally naked, he made a beeline for the trampoline and jumped squealing " Yay!!!!"
I couldn't help but feel that life probably can't get very much better than that can it?

I really don't 'get ' teens.

They are revolting, honestly there is very little redeeming about teenagers even the almost normal ones. They are a whole new species.
It is possible to reason with a 3 year old, even an autistic one in my experience. A toddler is perhaps less reasonable but nothing comes close to the total self centeredness of a teenager.
It would seem that to extract a polite answer from a teenager you must transplant it into the home of a friend and then disappear, at home it is a veritable treat and notabel experience to be treated to a grunt, a grunt with a smile...nope, not going to happen in the home environment ( unless you of course are not present and copious amounts of friends of the opposite sex are present.)

Phone calls are an experience not to missed, or listening into phone calls between teenagers anyway, I am astounded by the fact that teenage boys can talk to each other without actually saying anything and understand each other with perfect ease.
Ring Ring ( yes I know, teenagers phones don't ring they play stupid tunes that eat away at the brain until you find yourself humming them whilst hanging out laundry)
"UH?"
"Oh...uh"
"Nah"
"Huh?"
"right"
"yeah, bye"
Fascinating!

Listening in to girls conversations is less appealing, far too much squealing, yeah righting and cackling for my liking, everyone hates everyone and promises not to talk to anyone until they get off the phone and call everyone to make sure they aren't talking to anyone got it?

Tantrums...now, unlike the toddler variety these are really and truly not funny. They are as unpredictable as a toddler's, infinitely louder than a toddler's and cannot be calmed by the promise of a cheese string and an episode of Dora the Explorer.
Teenage tantrums last for a very long time.They bore me.
I am so unimpressed with them that I could puke, which of course means that they go on for even longer than a toddler's because unlike the cute 2 year old's tantrum they aren't about attention, if you ignore a teenagers tantrum they get louder and longer. The answer, you would think, would be to immediately ask what the problem is...nope, wrong....you're supposed to know what the problem is and immediately understand how important it is and fix it, buy it, say it....DO IT!
When none of these options are possible because as a parent you just can't find it in you to say 'yes' to an all night party, buy a hoochie mama outfit, tell them look adorable in it and then drive them to the party....you of course are the very devil itself, the only parent who is stupid and mean and the worst in the very world...my job is done for another day.
Oh and boy teens just smell, either sweaty or of too much cologne, but they don't do tantrums ( except door slamming), they just sleep and eat a lot and give an almost smile when they find the clean socks.

I really 'get' toddlers.

I am in awe of toddlers. I am endlessly fascinated by their total ability to let the whole world know how they feel. The ease with which they transform from smiley human beings into huge open mouthed foghorn monsters is a complete joy to me. I absolutely love that frog faced bellow they do over the tiniest offence...." mama....cockert" ( Chocolate) " no, dinner is ready" "WAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!" face down on the floor and every ounce of rage and disappointment got out right there are then, fabulous, I love it, I am not being sarcastic here I truly LOVE IT!
Of course being met with a delighted mother and a comment of " how MARVELLOUS, that was a great one" rather takes the wind out of their sails and on the rare occassion when ( perhaps in a supermarket) I have been known to say " Oh that's pathetic you can do it MUCH louder than that" they stop mid scream and my delight is short lived, darn it.
On many occassion I have absolutely longed to get down there and join them, when struggling with a wonkey wheeled trolly in Tesco's, listening to an endless whining monologue of " I wants" oh.... let's not forget those people, who I swear only go to tesco to rub my nose in it, a little basket over one arm and all the time in the world and standing right smack bang in the middle of the aisle reading every word on the back of a pack of organic penne noodles. There is nothing I would like more than to hurl myself down on the floor, open my mouth and just let 'em have it.
I had a friend do this once, right in the middle of the street, her 3 year old had refused to go in his stroller saying he was a big boy and had to walk, didn't matter how far we were going he flat out refused to be subjected to riding the buggy, of course within 200 yards of his home he started the walk whine " I tired, my yegs hurt, I go a buggy now...I tiiiiiiiiiiiiyerrrrrred" 25 minutes we walked and he threw himself to the floor every 17 steps saying his yegs hurted and he didn't want to walk anymore....just as we reached the precinct he flung himself down for the 73rd time and she looked at him for a split second and went right down there with him, if someone had fired a rifle and yelled " freeze" she couldn't have done a better job of that drop....and then she screamed " ME TOOOOOOOOOOOO I TIRED, I WANNA GO HOME AND HAVE A CUP OF TEA!!!!!!!!!" through my tears of absolute mirth, complete appreciation and envy I saw the look on this 3 year old's face , the screaming had stopped and in place of the frog gob was a look of such admiration I was almost speechless, he stood up, held her hand and said " It's OK mummy, I help you" and was a sweet little walking companion for the rest of the shopping trip.
I wonder how many of our children would be as impressed and indeed sympathetic is they saw us behave how they do, I honestly saw this little boy understand just how his mummy was feeling when she did what he understood..maybe we should all give it a go!

Food glorious food.

I love food, really love it. I love buying it, cooking it, giving it to people and of course eating it.
I know some people who have had their stomach stapled, some who have had bands put around their stomachs and then have the band tightened when they stop losing weight ...they have had this done because they hated being fat. I understand that, honestly I do, but I really, really can't understand why anyone would think that having become seriously overweight because they eat too much, because they get immeasurable pleasure or comfort or something from food, having something so barbaric as stomach stapling or banding that then will physically prevent them having the comfort or joy they have obviously needed for some reason...they will somehow be miraculously happy and problem free.
Hmmmmmm, if I were to wake up tomorrow and be a size 10 ( skinny in the UK not sure what it would mean in the states as I read about people being size 4/6... over here that would be considered dangerous anywhere near drains or even cracked pavements!) I would be so excited to grab a pair of jeans and a nice t-shirt and tuck it in ( have I told you how easily pleased I am?!) but as nothing else in my life will have changed I suspect that I would shovel as much food down my gullet as I do now and tell myself that it won't hurt because obviously I am able to eat whatever I like and be a size 10!
My wish would be that some kind of medical or dietician type person, with a psychology degree, would find me the most ideal candidate for an overhawl, drag me away from everything and work on me, body and soul.....every now and then I get in the mind frame where I see how unkind I am to myself, and I do something about it, it is always successful and I am always very very happy, the weight falls off and I feel so bloody FABULOUS. Like I can breathe. Like I am invinsible because I am in charge of ME at last and then every single time something happens, usually right before I actually reach an ideal weight for me....and I panic and the eating begins again.
What is it in me that stops me being kind to myself?
I know I am intelligent, I know absolutely that eating great food makes me feel great and eating crap makes me feel like crap, I know exactly what to eat and how to cook it. I am clever enough to make delicious and irresistable food with healthy and affordable ingredients so what IS it about being fat, miserable and uncomfortable that I need so much? I know it's not the food that makes me this way, I like the good food SO much more than the junk, I even eat food that I hate if I am angry enough about something.
There has to be someone or something that can tell me and help me to just be nice to ME.
I know that somewhere, there is an answer that will mentally staple my stomach and stop me eating in such a destructive way, but I think the problem is more likely to be that something in my heart needs fixing.
I wonder if, tomorrow, I just quietly told myself that today is a good day for being gentle with ME, no promises to stop eating,no goals to lose such a terrifying amount of weight that it seems insurmountable, just to be kind and do something for me and to have a day where I can sit down in the evening and feel good about myself. I wonder, would it work?

Bloggers block!

Not a thing in my head for 2 days......apart from geraniums and trailing lobelia....I am at one with nature and potting, planting and watering and I have not a care in the world. I see myself in years to come with a raggedy old straw hat and dirt under my nails and gardeners knee ( would that be akin to tennis elbow do you think?) I find myself opening my front door to see if my fuscias have blossomed in the last half hour and look forward to 6pm when I can wander my garden with hose in hand and water my new babies.
I had to get new babies because my old one has learned to climb out of his cot.
Oh bloody old hecksters. Little fart, he's got a great big tall cot and he leaps out of it in seconds lowering himself down with the ease of a cat burgler. So, he's not a baby anymore he's a threat to sanity and a veritable thug.
My puppy eyed brown baby is now a hooligan with freedom and not an ounce of conscience, he kept the other two awake til 9pm tonight....yes my sweet bubbity brown eyed boy who would snuggle down and slumber at 5.30 every evening has discovered the joy of staying awake.
He is part monkey I swear it, I have never seen such a little bloke swing from anything horizontal the way he does, accompanied of course by his own sweet voice bellowing " DET DOWN!" Sophie has a high sleeper, and he flies up the ladder and swings from the bars without a thought for my age or his father's heart condition

..bunk beds are his speciality, whooooooiiiiiieeeeeeee can this kid swing it?! He leaps and jumps and crashes down and off he goes again, his other loves in life are to put things on his head or round his neck
...saved to the last this boy, with deep brown droopy eyes, goofy teethed grin and the most wicked laugh you will ever hear he throws himself through each day with an army of doting admirers.

So, my plants are my new babies, they don't pooh, they don't climb unless I plan for them to and they smell so SWEET! They add peace and tranquility to my day and are the perfect balance to life........how has it taken me so long to discover this joy? I shall hang on to it as long as I possibly can but somehow I don't think my new babies will ever quite be as fabulous as my other babies, no matter how quiet and pretty they are.

Bum and blanket.

A bum and blanket....glorious isn't it?

Phew.....I have a confession of sorts to make, quite a revelation to me too I have to say.
When we went away I forgot to take my antidepressant the last night we were there and then left the tablets behind, so for 3 days I missed my medicine, no kidding ( I'm sure you never noticed ) I crashed in the worst way. Now I have the good old chemicals back in my system I feel like a human being again instead of a raging lunatic. Scary to know that I am so reliant on these things but the past few days have certainly shown me that I am far from ready to battle life without that help!
Honestly, I never imagine H and I being such rattling druggies! He has a veritable chemists supply of post myocardial infarction, life supporting meds and I have my trusty mind calmers and some anti hystamines that calm my urticara ridden skin ( and so much of it I tell you, it's no mean feat scratching as much welt covered skin as I have if I'm not dosed up to the eyeballs!)
My beloved and I ( yes he IS beloved again now the meds are kicking in!) stand in front of our bulging medicine cabinet chucking back the various teeny pills to bullets and nothing cheers us more than a newly filled prescription or 12 showing us that as long as we stick to the regime all will be well in our world.
We have "Gaviscon moments" you know, very often we can be found having mutual burning in our gullets and smile lovingly as we pass the liquid gold that is our nightly tipple. It is with fondness that I remember that glorious day when he looked at me and said " Ahh look , I've got THREE bottles". Security indeed.
I bought H a nifty pill counter and it's his weekly treat to sit and fill those 28 little compartments so that through the next week he can keep track of his tablet consumption....never let it be said that WE don't know how to live it up!
I think we both have a sort of fantasy about when the boys are grown and we can have all our tablets lined up on a shelf in full view-- or better yet, on a doily with pride of place in the front room, so visitors can see just how fragile we are with our array of bottles and jars with clicky lids which we will have to call our grown children to open because by then we will surely have arthritic fingers to add to our illness resume.
Wish I had some wind-eze though, I have a feeling that without it H might be in for a rough night sharing a bed with me tonight.

POP!

The boil burst! Last night it began to weep and this morning it burst and I rid my insides of that horrendous pus that was making me so ill.
I think actually, that Sophie and her date were perhaps the needle that lanced it and my absolute rage on her behalf for any wrong or injustice that MIGHT befall her was just enough to give me the impetus to stand up for ME too.
I am aware that a lot of the things that pain me so much are actually a residual effect of the Ex....if you are told for many years that you are actually nothing, chances are great that you''ll believe it, even if your heart is begging you not too, even if your childhood has given you a good old store of confidence with memories of being told you're somewhat bloody marvellous and couldn't be more so if your arse was decked in diamonds, if someone you have promised yourself to and loved has told you that your arse would only be worth decking in cubic zirconium, no forget that, plastic beads and with an arse the size of yours it would look hideous anyway, I can tell you that the childhood memories fade so fast you think you made them up in a dilussional moment.
If you are consitantly reminded ( when you ex has walked out on you ) that you won't ever meet anyone that will love you because it just isn't possible, he didn't want to be mean of course, was just telling me so I wouldn't build my hopes up. I might meet someone who thought he liked me but I was assured for years that should someone profess to love me it would be a sure thing that the very minute he knew the real me, as soon as he knew me well, he would leave, because lets face it, really it isn't possible to love me, having children has ruined me inside and out and I could diet but what about the inside? Can't change that can I ? stretched beyond repair and no satisfaction for any man will ever be had from MY body, so why bother? Why even try to salvage anything from the wreck that is me? Especially as even if a modern day miracle were to occur and my body were to become even tolerable what about the very essence of me? that's so revolting and useless and unworthy of loving that if I were to blind a man temporarily with the outside he wouldn't be fooled by the person that is me would he?
See? Even all these years down the road I still remember it, every mean and wicked word is branded on my mind and heart for eternity......so, even though I have H and even though he is here and loving me, I don't think he is loving me enough, the pathetic little weeping mass inside me is actually longing for him to smother me in promises to stay with me no matter how hideous I am. I crave being told just how gorgeous I am and how he couldn't imagine a moment without me but I'll be buggered if I can tell him that or ask him to say nice things ( because then he would be saying them because I asked him too not because he means them)...how bloody sod's lawish is it that I married a man so battling with his inability to be emotional? trust ME to love someone with aspergers!! Trust ME to meet and marry a man who will remember what time the binmen come and what days the milk is delivered but forget to say I smell good. Ha de sodding HA! ( ooh wouldn't the F word fit well in there?!)
H's proclaimation of love ( sharp smack on the bum) tells me, supposedly, that he loves me....in the style of Homer J. Simpson who taught H most of what he knows about marriage. What it actually tells me is that one smack can cause my bum to wobble and shake for a good 15 seconds and a particularly loving one can send shock waves shooting up my fat back, reminding me that the first husband was kind enough to tell me for so long how repulsive I am. Love declaration from 2nd husband cancelled very cleverly and completely by first. Damn him.
As for the work issue I actually after all these years asked H what he could do about it, pointed out that children learn from example, I told him about Sophie and her date and how she came home as giddy as she ought to have been and told me how absolutely terrified she was when he put his arm around her saying " I'm not used to that kind of thing, am I?" 16 years old and has never been hugged or shown physical affection by a man. How sad is that? I have done everything in my power to be everything to my girl and it hasn't been enough has it? There is a plan set out by God and all it asks is that a child have the right to be raised by a mother and father for the very simple reason that children NEED both, not necessarily the natural parents but one of each pretty much covers what a kid needs.
Here I am with a husband and a father for my children and these little boys AREN'T learning what they should be learning from us as parents. Slate me if you will for my old fashioned values and expectations but I want my sons to see that despite difficulties they can and should still be strong enough to do what is necessary to provide for their families, if they are adjusted well enough to get past any problems their autism has encumbered them with enough to marry and have children then I believe they can work and provide for that family. Seems reasonable enough doesn't it?
I was able to point this out rationally to H and also remind him that he did weeks of work for the UKIP without pay, he is capable of finding work that he loves, that he is great at, that will pay him to provide for us. I asked him what HE thought a father should be seen to do by his sons...and that got through...he actually said that was a fair question and he knows it is true that children learn by example. I told him that while he is here I am stripped of my role, the very thing that I am so good at, that gives me pride and high self esteem is taken from me and I am left feeling useless and hopeless. If there is a gap where self esteem should be there is room for the nagging rot left by the ex. Loads of echo-ing space for every mean and demeaning quote to come back and bounce around taking me right back to where I was all those years ago with an added whisper of " SEE? Right wasn't I? He can't even bring you to say the words, he'll just slap your fat arse and laugh at how repulsive you are"
"Who said sticks and stones may break my bones but words will never hurt me?" what a Crock!

Where did THAT come from?!

I am in shock to discover I have a raging tigress within me.... I have always been so sure that I will be the coolest mother alive and an even cooler mother in Law, my childrens' partners were absolutely and positively going to sing my unintrusive prasies and hail my name for being so fabulously fabulous.
WRONG! Sophie has,today, gone out on her frist date, with 17 year old Matt who works in Mac Donalds ( or is it McDonalds?) anyhoo......she likes him, he likes her, they text and call and in the most divine and fondly remembered way she tells me that everytime her phone rings her stomach flips and she longs for it to be him ( oh long may my girl feel this way) So, today, at last, he asked her to meet him after work and they will do something together...here's where the tigress begins to bare her teeth...what will he do with her? It seems that I am absolutely to be eaten away with the need for my daughter to know what it is to be cherished, she MUST know the feeling of being so important that nothing is too great for her, I am desperate for her to be wined ( or apple juiced) and dined, to get flowers and presents and feel so important she could burst with the joy of it.
She was divine, she paced and fussed and said more than once that she sort of wished that she still wasn't 16 because then she could just say she wasn't allowed to go out and what if she couldn't think of anything to say? ( Sophie? struck DUMB? oh, but that I should be witness to that!!) Imagine this gobby, feisty, contrary girl being so obedient that she DID wait until she was 16 before having her first date. She asked my opinion on what to wear and miracle of miracles she took my advice and she looked beautiful and sweet and I longed for her to be 5 again.
I will be the mother in law from Hell....I know it, just let one man ever treat my girl as if she is anything but the most precious thing he has ever been entrusted with. Just let her once confide in me that he has made her feel like crap or as if she wishes she were anywhere but right where she is and I will let rip like never before...every ounce of anger that I don't feel justified feeling for myself because some stupid dumbass man has convinced me that I'm worthy of nothing but the dregs he can't be bothered to give anyone else, will get punched in the face of anyone who dares to even try and make my child feel so worthless.
I know why the Lord gave me 5 sons and just one girl, so that I can teach just 5 men how their supposed loved ones should be treated and teach my one daughter her true worth, may she never ever feel as if she is trapped in such misery that she can't escape, may she never lose the fight and the knowledge that she is of infinite worth. And one day, may I remember that my mother told me the same thing and I allowed it to be squeezed out of me.

Hooray for Blogs.

So, one day on and all is picking up! I am the proverbial bouncing something or other and although certainly cabable of quite spectacular tantrums am almost always fine as ninepence very quickly.
I did talk with H last night and did manage to voice many concerns, always a great healer and never a mistake in my book!
I watched a programme last night about autistic teenagers.....of course with all the hullaballoo about Seth and Isaac I am fascinated by anything that might explain further some of what may be going on in their heads. Most interesting is the idea that actually these little apples haven't fallen far from the tree and H is almost certainly the root of all things aspergers in our home.
Of course I have always known that H is far from mainstream and a huge part of his appeal to me is the eccentricities that perhaps have scared the very beejeebers out of any other woman.....to have a reason for the quirks that make my husband who and what he is was at first a relief but actually as time goes by I find myself becoming more and more cross about it! Probably because maybe it means that things won't change!
How can I describe this man ? I could just cut and paste the adults with aspergers notes....it reads like a personality description of H!
The main deal with aspergers is a strange inability to empathise or even understand emotions and other peoples' feelings. I asked H once if he liked my hair, having been married for 2 years with the same dull old barnet I took some considerable effort to change it and look beautiful for him, his reply was " how do you usually have it?" Hmmmm.
He has an Irrational ( to me) hatred of saying " I love you" he doesn't like saying it himself and really cringes when anyone says it to him.....in our first heady days of being in love I remember telling him that I knew I would be more in love with him as time goes by " Oh great, more smothering to look forward to" He says he likes to SEE people love him and if he can see if they don't need to say it, if he can't see it and they say it he becomes aggitated that they should use such a term so flippantly!
I asked him once if he was excited about a trip we were making and he said " what does that mean?" He truly does not understand emotions....one of the kids last night was talking about the fact that he was told a girl he liked actually liked another boy...he asked "grrrrr what is that feeling called when your eyes are going to cry and you hate it? I think that's happening to me" How scarey to feel emotion but not understand it and be totally baff;ed when you see it in someone else.
H is fanatical about clothes, he likes particualr clothes and for example, wears only Wilson socks, white ones, unless he is dressing up and then dress socks are OK. His socks are folded and put in a definate position in the right drawer. He insists that he has only 2 pairs of jeans and 2 pairs of casual trousers, 2 pairs of shorts, yesterday I bought him some shorts. That was what started my tirade yesterday. He can't say " oh thankyou" and then just not wear them, he panics and he is rude....he tutted and sighed and then he began the " why do you think you can dress me" thing, the ranting about how he HAS shorts, he doesn't NEED shorts ....those buggers were in the bin within seconds and then I was just so weary of having to be one step ahead of not only Seth and Isaac's bizarrities ( it's my blog, I can make up words) but also having to think about H as well, even though he is a grown man just exhausts me and lately I am imagining myself 10 years down the line with this houseful of weird people all with specific obsessions and me........bloody hell mabel isn't it enough to just wither the soul? Of course there is the marvellous possibility that in fact I shall in fact be so fabulously mad by then that we'll be wuite the local attraction.
Picture fat old me in whatever clothes happen to be at hand being dareingly haphazard in my choice of dress to somehow counteract the precision with which my men folk attire themselves, Seth in his trousers that mustn't touch his lower legs, shirt tucked in and socks pulled up, Howard in his rotated 2 pairs of whatever, with his Wilson socks and gaudy shirts, My Isaac in his long trousers, long sleeves ( never mind the weather) and almost certainly a blue shirt unbuttoned over the long sleeved shirt .
I wonder what we will be doing? Eating, often I shouldn't be suprised, Seth with his plethora of different plates with his one item of food on each, H with his white rice ( cooked the phillipino way thankyou) and meat, My Isaac with his plate of just whatever is given to him God bless the boy...I shan't have to worry about the dishes though because H does them, always, because he gets sick with worry if he doesn't, using fairy liquid washing up liquid of course. Dessert will be at 8pm because that's when dessert should be eaten and if it's 5 TO 8 then it's too early and all is not well and I suspect the sky will fall in.
I think, maybe that people wonder why I am still here...I wonder it myself more often than I should but if I actually get to the point of imagining NOT being here, well, I am beyond empty....as frustrating and as infuriating as it is at times, this is my world, these are my people and for every maddening moment there are a couple of happy ones. I am so easily pleased and can forget a whole week of crap with just one moment of joy. Just one glimpse of the little boy who holds his breath if I hand him the 'wrong' shirt, who will run and scream and hide in terror at the mention of having his hair washed, sleeping with his book , read in bed every night, an old copy of Hans Christian Anderson's fairy tales. Just one minute of watching him breathe and dream of not being afraid will make the whole days frustrations disappear in an instant.
My blog is doing it's job, it is allowing me to rant and rave and whine and then laugh while the world continues to be secure and safe for these people that are my family. Hooray for blogs.

Life's a funny old game isn't it?

I'm here, back from that great british tradition that is actually not in the least bit great in my experience. It is said that holidays, like Christmas can be true eye openers when it comes to how your life truly is.
BINGO!
These few days away have been a metaphorical smack in the face for me and have made me see a few things in a light I have to say haven't cheered or inspired me a jot.
My husband has some good qualities and a couple of admirable ones, he unfortunately cannot claim being fun or spontaneous as either belonging to him. I can rely on him 100% for making sure that we are never without baby wipes or filled juice cups, I never for a moment have to worry about if the boys are due a nap or if we will have something handy to wipe a string of candle wick snot on. If someone falls over ( even if we were in outer Mogolia I bet you) he would produce a tube of anti bacterial cream to stop those nasty germs from scarring or hurting the precious knees of his boys. However, it would seem that to be spontaneous, to simply up and go and have some ( hold on, scary word coming up) FUN is beyond painful to him.
My idea of a holiday, break away from it all is to do anything and everything that is non typical.....eat out ( oh no, why? food is SO much more enjoyable when bought, prepared and cooked ourselves, meaning by me) get dirty ( ewwwww wipe that mud off, clean that sand out, fold those clothes ) stay up late ( argh........what about ROUTINE?!?!? ) see a sign for a fun place and bugger the expense lets go ( hmmm what if it's NOT fun, what if we DON'T enjoy it? what should that money really go on?)
Oh dear Lord.....we were showered and ready for bed by 7pm every evening....I should have had an idea that a holiday wasn't going to be quite as I hoped when I noticed that H's idea of a relaxing read to bring along was the penguin guide to punctuation. I'm not kidding, oh but that I were.....I have never known him read anything but factual guide books......my warped sense of humour did however get an airing when I was ranting about how crap it all was and packing for us all ( of course, I packed, loaded, unloaded, unpacked and packed it all up again) and the boys were running riot and tipping delicious but sticky melon and apple soda all over the clean laundry, I noticed that H was reading a book called "raising boys"... here were 3 little boys itching to be raised but seemingly they can cause absolute and total mayhem while daddy reads all about how to do it! ( I might sneak a look later to see if there isn't more than a paragraph on making memories with little boys being more important than having clean noses and being in bed at the right time every blasted day of their lives!!)
Can you tell that I am still not quite gushingly in love with H following our monumental disagreement? I am still reeling actually and now have a headful of new misery heaped on top of it all. I am in the midst of having to make some truly life altering adjustments to my life. I have come to realise that in order to stay sane I have to accept that I have no-on to have fun with. I crave just a modicum of laughter, how sad to come to a realisation that if I am to have that, it is going to have to be on my own or at least without H.
I find it sad now but think that perhaps it might be just what we both need. HE likes being at home, all the time, he likes routine ( yawn) he likes security. ( as long as it is provided by someone else, naturally!)
I am weary of snatching joy from the veritable scrap heap of my life...having to rummage and scrape in order to come up with a scrap of something to feel proud of or happy about ( my children aside of course, it comes with the terrirtory that if you have little people they bring with them joy by the bucketload)
I am beyond ashamed and embarrassed by H's inability or reluctance to work and provide for us as a family, I have such a rage in me about this that I find myself totally unable to speak about it. The very fact that he grasps and boasts such an undeserved male ego /pride when failing to do the very most basic of male / paternal resposibilities is so outrageous to me that I am immobilised by it.
I am, however, on the very brink of voicing this anger.
I took myself off today and bought myself a few girlie treats, has lunch on my own in a very nice restaurant, bought some gossipy magazines and read them whilst eating chocolate in glorious silence......and stoked up some strength and courage to face my demons and say what is on my mind when the boys are in bed this evening.
Today, H told me to watch my mouth in front of the boys, he never misses a chance to correct me, to point out my every flaw, he notices every single weakness I have and makes up a good few too. Given the chance he would have me wearing gingham blouses and A-line skirts, canning peaches and speaking in whispers. He would love me to simper and praise him and I would love to do it if he would get off his pious self righteous arse and give me something worthwhile to praise.
If he were to come home tomorrow and tell me he was going to be scrubbing the toilets in Mc Donalds for minimum wage I would kiss his feet. If he were to stagger in the door after a 10 hour shift in a God awful factory I would wear gingham and sing "the hills are alive".
If I had 8 hours a day to be a housewife and mother I would feel the world was my oyster but it won't happen, he will be here, 24 hours a day noticing what I am doing wrong til one of us drops dead...so I have to work out what I can do about that. I didn't know this was how it was to be and I don't like it. What I have to do now is decide where to go and what to do about it. Needless to say it will me ME who has to decide and ME who has to do something about it.
I want to wax lyrical and tell you about our few days in gramma's caravan and I will, just not today ...ha...I left my medicine at the caravan, my relied upon anti depressants ( can you tell) I am pretty sure that I am not the only woman on this planet who takes anti depressants because her husband is a miserable shit...life's a funny old game isn't it?