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Categorically selfish. 

20 Tuesday Sep 2016

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Anyone who has been in my company for more than 5 minutes this past week (even more so the past 2 days) knows that I’ve been a complete mess. On the verge of tears constantly and bad tempered to boot! 

From nearly the first time that I met my husband I’ve known that he wanted to be a doctor. He is one of those people; it’s not about a career for him. He is driven by a sense of wanting to be able to do his best to help people and despite volunteering and then training as an ambulance technician, he has always wanted to do more. 

Anyway, when we got together and decided to move in together it was important to me that he didn’t lose sight of that dream. He took on me, and my boys, and my ex husband, and all my family and it couldn’t, I wouldn’t let it,  be at the expense of his dream. And so last year we agreed that he would work part time to study and apply to study medicine. 

He (along with approximately 64,000 of the 71,000 other applicants) didn’t get a place in a UK medical school when he applied last year and so it looked like he would apply again for next year. And then we saw an opportunity to study medicine abroad and three weeks ago he applied and was accepted. So on Sunday he flew to Bulgaria and yesterday he registered. He is a medical student!!! Yay! I was kind of on a high all day. Yes I miss him, but he was enrolled. He was doing it. He was beginning to live his dream; I was excited by it, enthused by it. Happy. 

Then he called me to tell me he had rented a flat and got a new phone number and was generally doing all the things that we’d discussed in the previous week that he would do, and all of a sudden I just wanted to cry. Not because he was doing these things, but that he was doing them without me. In a moment I felt every single mile between us; and they felt eternal. 

I got off the phone and I had a little cry and messaged a friend who immediately rang me and I talked it out and with my brother, and with my colleague, until I realised that I was ok again. 

And it’s only been a few days, and I’ve spent longer than this away from him loads of times, but because it’s not a short trip, or a holiday away, the void feels huge. 

However, I can’t agree with people who say I’m brave to do this, to commit to making this work. I adore my husband. He truly makes me happy in a way I didn’t feel possible. 

And so I am doing this for me. I am doing it because I want him to feel as happy and fulfilled with our relationship as I do; and I know that if I stopped him from fulfilling his dreams, he might  never feel that. He might always resent me a little that he gave up his own dreams for me. So I’m not brave or good for supporting him in doing this. I am categorically selfish. I can’t bear to give him up forever, so I will give him up temporarily. And I will do everything to make this work. 


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Sometimes accidents happen.

01 Wednesday Jun 2016

Posted by in kids, Life, Motherhood, Uncategorized

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I know from the arguments and reprimands that I’ve had on social media today that this isn’t going to be a popular view, but whoa, I’m an honest person and so I’m going to just say it anyway; that kid who fell into the gorilla pit? It could just as easily have been mine. 

So go on start throwing your insults, but first let me explain: 

I am human. I am a mum of 3 and I am human.  This means that I only have two eyes, and I only have two hands. I’m already handicapped when it comes to having 3 children; there’s just not enough of me to go around. I can only physically be holding 2 of them at the same time. I can only see them all if (and this never happens) they are standing nicely together. Normally, I’ve deliberately got the youngest two as far away from where they can annoy each other as possible. This means I get to see those two one at a time. i.e. I have to take my eyes off one to look at the other. And let’s face it, even if I didn’t, I’m a self confessed haphazard parent. I get through my parenting life by the skin of my teeth and occasionally by the seat of my pants; I actually once nearly ended up in my Nana’s grave on top of her coffin due to a particularly difficult moment when my 18 month old decided to do that throwing himself backwards with the force of a baby elephant  thing just as I threw in my handful of mud and rose as we were burying her. It was only the quick thinking of my ex that stopped us both falling 8 ft into the ground and giving my Nana one last shock. These things happen, right? Accidents I think we call them…

All day I have seen on Facebook and Twitter that the mother should have been looking after him properly. That it was her fault. Was it though? Really? 

I wasn’t there, but I find it difficult to believe that this woman stood by and idly watched her 4 year old son climb a small fence with a 15 ft drop the other side. Surely it is more likely that one of her other children demanded her attention in some way, perhaps she was trying to stop that child from climbing the fence, or running away? Perhaps another one of her children needed a drink, or a tissue, or lifting so they could see the animals, and in those moments, when her back was turned, the 4 year old got away from her? 

And by the time she turned back it was too late; he was gone, or maybe he was about to go, and she couldn’t quite get her fingers to him in time to stop him. After all, I’m led to believe there were plenty of other zoo visitors also in the area at the time. Now call me nosey, but if I’d been at the zoo and seen a child, any child mine or a strangers, about to climb into a gorilla pit, I’d like to think I’d stop them. The fact that no one seemed to notice kind of makes me think that perhaps this was something that only took a split second. That, like my son nearly flipping us both into my Nana’s grave, wasn’t really foreseeable and unluckily for her, she had no quick thinking sidekick to stop the nightmare. 

Which leads me neatly on to an imbecilic statement that I saw posted to Facebook earlier; she should have taken additional help with her to supervise all 4 children all the time! Oh yeah, because all those of us who have more than one child shouldn’t go anywhere unless the child to adult ratio is 1:1. Hands up who else would never be able to leave the house?

There’s something fundamentally wrong with that, because even if the ratio is 1:1, guess what, at some point that adult will need to look away from the child!! It’s impossible (not to mention probably mentally unhealthy) to watch a child every second of every minute of the day. I mean what if you need to look at your watch, or scope out where the next animal enclosure is? Have you never needed to sneeze? There’s forced eyes off time right there! And do you know how long it takes a child to slip out of your grasp? Out of your sight? I’ll tell you: 0.00004 of a second, well that’s how it feels anyway!! I don’t know how they do it but mine can literally vanish near enough in front of my eyes!! 

Find me any parent who hasn’t had that moment of absolute panic, when they’ve glanced at their watch, or spoken to another child and turned back to find that the errant child is not where they had last seen them and reasonably expected them to be. I know I’ve done it a few times, per child!! It is terrifying and it is horrible, but I have been lucky enough that the said child was just hidden under a clothes rail (or decided to ditch me and walk back to the car (aged 3 and in a shopping centre!!)). 

What are we going to do? Chain our children to us? Take out two adults for every child so they never have a moment without adult supervision (Bill, I need to scratch my nose, eyes on Charlie for me) , or do we put in adequate safeguards and precautions and allow our kids to be kids? 

I would not expect that a 4 year old could easily climb into a gorilla enclosure, if I had been that parent I would likely have taken my eyes off the 4 year old for a moment. That seems a reasonable thing to do; perhaps the younger one cried, perhaps mum needed a tissue out of her bag, whatever, I’m pretty sure it never occurred to her or the other visitors that day that it would/could happen.

 Parents should look after their children, but there is only so much supervision it is reasonable to give. As sad as it is Harambe was killed it doesn’t make it anyone’s fault. Sometimes accidents just happen.


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The right pair of shoes. 

16 Monday May 2016

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The papers have been full of it lately; headlines screaming out in favour or against taking children out of school for holidays or funerals. The rhetoric (as well as the hefty fines) are intentionally designed to scare parents into compliance; just one week off school can apparently mean that the child can drop a whole exam grade. 

In a recent article I read,  a minister stated that grieving children should only be allowed one day off school; to attend the funeral of the loved one. Never mind that they may be paralysed with grief. Never mind that they may need to process the loss, no it’s back to school they are to go, to study for some useless test, that in 10 years time, in the world of work, will mean nothing; hell, I have a degree but no potential employer has ever asked me what classification, let alone cared that I failed my A levels miserably!  

Holidays, it is professed, when taken during school time, severely interrupt a child’s education. It seems odd then that my eldest, about to embark in his final year of GCSE’s, came home a few weeks ago with a letter for a school trip which will be two days off school. Yes, he will be learning Geography during this time, but he will also be missing 2 days of his other classes as well. He is also going on a 3 day History trip to Germany in September (at the extortionate price of £450, to stay in a youth hostel for 2 nights, but that’s another story). That is a total of 5 days (or a week) out of school. In this time he will have missed lessons in all the other subjects that he is undertaking GCSEs in, however, apparently, this is acceptable? So by their own reckoning he will be dropping a grade in all those other subjects? 

And don’t get me started on all those cases where children as young as 5 are sent home from or excluded from school due to some trivial reason such as having the wrong shoes, or hair cut, or some other minor uniform discrepancy. School attendance is so important that you can be fined for taking your child on holiday for a week where they might actually experience some form of culture, however they can refuse to let them attend for a week whilst their hair grows to a length deemed by some headteacher as being appropriate? Or until a parent can afford to buy appropriate shoes? Because obviously having the right hair style/colour/length really helps to improve their education doesn’t it?!? 

Surely if a child turns up willing and ready to learn it is our duty to teach? To provide them with an education, not deem them inappropriately dressed to learn. 

I’m not implying it’s right to take a child out of school for a holiday, but if it’s not ok for me to do something, surely that has to also apply to the school? Forgive me for appearing confrontational, but it really does seem to be one rule for us, and one rule for them? 

Divorce; doing it right 

02 Monday May 2016

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I’ve not got many things right in my life; fewer as a parent, however one thing I have got right, weirdly, is divorce. 

Readers of my blog will know that last year Paul and I decided to go our separate ways, after 10 years and get divorced. We didn’t hate each other, we’d just moved on, grown out of each other and realised that we could probably be a lot happier living separate lives. 

It was difficult at first, we had to find a new kind of normal. Develop a new relationship, set new rules, agree new boundaries. Especially when (pretty damn quickly) we both started dating again. We had to argue, but not as a couple, as two people who’s children were depending on them to do the right thing. 

We had to agree on childcare, money, and a whole lot of logistics such as who was getting what from the house. I’m not going to lie, it was tough. On occasions I wanted to kill him! Did he not realise how difficult this was? But in reality we were both struggling to come to terms with our new lives. 

I think a pivotal time for me was when we first disagreed over money and my Chris said to me “no amount of money is worth your children’s mental health.” And that really hit home. It was true. We could do a lot of damage arguing over stupid things, but at the end of the day what we would achieve apart from upset kids? We had to work out things and we had to do it in a way that was amicable. More important than anything else was that we had to remain friends, which when you think about it isn’t that difficult; I liked him enough to marry him, have two children, he’s actually a good guy. We used to be best friends. 

And so we have spent the last year doing just that; being friends. We have spent Christmas together with our respective new partners, clubbed together to buy the boys presents or school uniform. He has keys to our house, I have keys to his. If I needed someone in the middle of the night and I couldn’t get hold of Chris, I know I could call Paul and (after much bitching and moaning) he would be there for me. 

Last week was our middle sons birthday, and so my Mum and Stepdad along with Chris’s parents, Paul, Chris and I all went out for dinner with the boys to celebrate. It means so much to me that our boys don’t have to choose between us, or feel guilty about being with one or the other of us. 

Paul has come round for dinner because he can’t be arsed to cook and I am cooking, so he’s come to get the boys and had dinner with us before taking them back to his. 

Today I’m at work and Chris has the boys. He will be dropping them off with Paul this afternoon. They have spoken to each other to arrange it. You know, like adults do. Not arguing and hating each other, just getting on. 

Because we get on it makes all those family occasions that bit easier; he still gets an invite, he still bitches about having to go, he sometimes shows up (probably more often than he did when we were together) and all my family still talk to him. His sister, who I love has come to visit me, I’ve visited her. 

And the weird thing is that people seem to find us doing this odd!! I don’t really understand why, after all, we are still a family, linked together through our children, we can’t change that; in truth, I wouldn’t want to. 

If you’ve enjoyed this please read my other posts or find me on Facebook: Facebook.com/themadnessthatismylife or on Twitter @101madness

Sticking plasters

29 Monday Feb 2016

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I love the NHS. I pretty much live and breathe it. I work full time for the NHS and at weekends I work as a contractor for NHS Trusts on front line ambulances.  When I have a day off I am often to be found at the doctors or the dentists with one of the kids.  The NHS is awesome, always there when you need it.  Anyone who has been ill abroad will tell you that the NHS is something to be proud of.  If I am ill , I don’t have to think about whether I can afford to go to the hospital or the GP,  I can just go.  I might have to wait, the hospital or GP surgery may be a bit tired looking, but I know that I will be looked after. 
However good the NHS is though, it is not a lot of things; it isn’t social care, it isn’t a hotel and it most certainly isn’t a miracle worker.  Much as those who work in it would like to work miracles and cure each and every person who walks through the door. 

The NHS is stretched to breaking point everyday. There are a lot of reasons for this but some of them are easy to see. I’ve lost count of the number of times that I have been called to patients who aren’t really patients at all. They are desperately in need of help,  but not medical help. They need social care. Or social housing. They need their basic needs to be met,  but they do not really need an ambulance,  it’s just that there is no one else that they can call on a Sunday afternoon when they are at the end of their tether. When the loneliness hits hard and the prospect of not seeing a friendly face for another week is more than they can bear.  Or when caring for their loved one just becomes too heavy a burden to carry for another day, another night.  When they are desperate for a little bit of respite from the ceaseless pressure of responsibility for an old or dying loved one.

In the past this would have been dealt with, perhaps, by ringing another family member, or by a carer or a respite centre to give the family a break.  These days though, families are spread far apart and so with cuts to Local Authority budgets meaning that social care has been decimated,  there is no one to call. There is no relief, no respite in sight for a lot of these people; and so, in desperation, they call an ambulance.  And, in turn, because the ambulance crew can see that the family cannot cope, that it’s just too much,  we have no choice. We take them to hospital in the hope that given a few hours of space the family feel better, more able to continue in the thankless task of caring. We put a sticking plaster over society’s failure. 

And so there goes a hospital bed. A nurse,  a doctor, all of who’s time is taken up, instead of looking after the sick. And there goes that ‘protected’ NHS budget. The one that the government has pledged to increase. Only it’s not really an increase or protected at all, because now, instead of the money being spent on social care, and coming out of local authority budgets, it is coming out of the NHS one. The one that we hold so dear. And all the while the NHS covers up this deficit elsewhere, the worse it will get.

Then there are the lost souls. Those who drift, who sofa surf or sleep on park benches. Many of them mentally unwell but not acutely so; they don’t need a hospital, they just need somewhere to be warm; to be safe. Again there is no reason for them to be taken to hospital, but where else is there for them to go?  It takes a cold hearted person to leave a person on a park bench when you know they have nowhere else to go and it is minus 3 centigrade outside. And so yet again we, the ambulance crew, paid for by the NHS spend our time and your money phoning around charities, forgotten contacts in our patients phone, in the hope that we can find them a warm bed for the night. And if not, due to cuts in social housing, there being by no easy access hostels, we take them to the warm waiting room of the hospital.  And as we sit there sticking plasters on the plight of the homeless, another cardiac arrest call goes unanswered. Another person dies. 

Other patients are just too old; their bodies far too weak.  Sometimes it happens slowly, other times it is quick.  I recently went to a patient who was nearly 100 years old and barely lucid.  Struggling to even open his eyes; despite that, there was nothing significantly wrong with him; if I had to hazard a guess (and as I am helping to treat we have to do an educated one), I’d probably say it was just his time to go.  His body was just worn out.  He was nearly 100! But his daughter insisted he had been fine until he got pneumonia previously and was taken in hospital for a month.  Obviously the hospital had made him ill; before that he had been fine. Before that he had lived alone; was fine. There was no point telling her that maybe it was just his time to go.  That he had lived longer than most people, that the hospital that she was blaming by for the state of her father, probably was to blame, only not in the way that she thought; because years ago, her dad wouldn’t have been taken to hospital to be treated for the pneumonia, that nearly killed him. He would likely have just died. At home. Peacefully in his bed. Instead we dragged him off to A & E,  for more interventions. To prolong his life further such that it is.  And when he isn’t restored back to full health, no doubt his daughter will claim that the hospital killed him.  Because blame, it would seem is easier than the truth; that sometimes we just need to allow people to die.  Not play God and attempt miracles. We all have to die sometime. We all, as individuals and the NHS just need to learn to let them. 

The NHS cannot put a sticking plaster on the whole of society. As an ambulance crew friend once told me: if you just need a plaster, you don’t need us. 

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Crushed. 

21 Monday Dec 2015

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Crushed. I am crushed. 

The grief comes in waves, great big tsunamis that don’t just knock me over, they throw me off my feet with a staggering ferociousness, ripping chunks out of me. 

To the outsider perhaps, I have too much grief. Too many tears. But they just cannot understand the connection that we had. The shit that we went through.they don’t know the times that I just had a feeling that he needed me, and I tracked him down, sometimes just to check that he was actually alive. 

Then today, out of the blue, the ending I half knew was coming but fought at every opportunity materialised . And the finality is almost too much to bear. It’s not fair. How come so many get to live, hateful and cruel and yet you, you who loved so much despite all the reasons not to, weren’t given that chance. 

And I’m raging at the insanity of a world where evil lives and kindness dies. Where you don’t reap what you sow. The randomness of it all is baffling.

And it terrifies me, because there was never anything I could do.  And I tried. I honestly did. Me; who’s job it is to help save addicts, albeit not personally, but through my work; I couldn’t even save you. And if I can’t do that knowing how much I cared, I don’t know how I can help others. 

But I know I need to try. I know that you would want to give anyone the chance to be free of addiction. And if I can’t save you maybe I can help someone else. Maybe it will be their turn even though it was never yours. 

You told me so many times how proud you were of me, but I want you to know that I am proud of you too; for being you despite of all the pain. For living in the face of despair and continuing to love. 

Most of all I want you to know that no matter what happened I love you, in our own fucked up way we loved each other despite not being a couple. Despite everything I hope you know I still cared.  

Normal people. 

13 Saturday Jun 2015

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I’ve just read back over my last two blogs and I’ve noticed a theme arising; normal people. I’ve mentioned them a few times in a number of blogs and I’ve started to realise that I’m jealous. Or deluded. One of the two. Let me give you some examples:

I’m currently laying on my bed, having just got out of the bath. I am surrounded by piles of clothes that need ironing (see picture), and tonight is the only night I have available to do it.  I really cannot be bothered. Last week I got halfway through a massive pile and decided that actually I couldn’t be bothered to do it and who needs this many clothes anyway? So I put what was left into 2 bin bags and I took it all to the recycle point outside a local supermarket! I didn’t even look through it to see what I was throwing away! I didn’t care! Are these the actions of a normal person?  Even worse I’m considering doing the same tonight!!

 One reason I can’t be bothered to do the ironing, is that earlier today (in my unerring idiocy) I decided to finally take some time to clear out the kids room. Big mistake. I have got as far as creating a huge mess that started off as piles of things to keep, things to put away, and things to give away, and has ended up just becoming a mixture of random stuff that I can’t decide what to do with. Or I did decide but the piles have merged into one. I’ve just been toying with the idea to get the bin bags out and chuck it all. That will sort it!! However I can’t actually summon up the energy to even do that and now I have a pile of ironing and  whole room of crap sitting here waiting for me to do something! 

As I say I’ve just got out of the bath. Prior to getting in the bath I looked on the mirror and realised that it was domething I should probably have done much earlier on in the day; like before I set foot out of the house! Perhaps that way I might have noticed that I had forgotten to brush my hair since washing it last night, perhaps I’d even have noticed the bit of sellotape that was stuck firmly to my chin, I’ve no idea how long I have been walking around like that. I know I have a propensity to the dishevelled look but blimey, I’ve excelled even myself! I’ve even been shopping like this. 

Speaking of shopping, I joined the Cycle2work scheme at work this week, giving me £500 to spend on a nice shiny new bike. So, naive as I am, I thought I’d pop to Halfords to pick a pick, maybe a few shiny accessories, to make me look the part. Who knew that buying a bike could be so bloody difficult? So many decisions, about things I know nothing about. Do I want hydraulic brakes or cable ones? Mountain bike or road bike; actually perhaps a hybrid would suit me better? 20 inch frame or 18? Cross bar or no crossbar? Suspension or not? The questions came out of the salesmans mouth like he thought I might be a person who would know the answers to these questions, or at the very least understand what on earth he was saying! Seriously, had he not noticed my hair?! I spent half an hour doing both of our heads in before politely excusing myself and saying I would do more research online prior my return tomorrow with a decision!! Yeah right! Decision? That’s not going to happen. 

Today the kids are at their Dads. I am always saying how lovely it would be to have time alone and yet the minute I drove away from dropping them off, I came over feeling all desolate. Like I am alone.  Turns out I actually quite like having the little sproglets around. They make me feel complete, no matter how badly behaved and demanding they can be. The thing is I know that within 5 minutes of them returning tomorrow, I will be fed up of the bickering and moaning and wonder what it was I missed exactly whilst they were away! 

So, I ask you is it any wonder i appear to be obsessed with being normal? My life would surely be so much easier. No one else I know seems to struggle so much with the basics of being a grown up as I do! Surely at the ripe old age of 36 I should have mastered the art of brushing my hair and checking the mirror before I leave the house? I should be able to pick out a bike, or clear out a room? Shouldn’t I? 

Send help!!!

Open letter to an addict.

01 Monday Jun 2015

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letterI’ve been asked to write to you; to say something that will make you realise the error of your ways and to stop the madness, the craziness that is your world.

I can’t though. What they don’t realise is that there is nothing that I can say that will do that. There is nothing anyone can say, that in a moment will flip a switch to turn off the craving, the need for that drug or that drink. It doesn’t work like that. If only it did. If it did you would likely have stopped years ago. Perhaps you would never have started. Who knows.

What I do know is that the world of an addict is tumultuous. People, and by people I mean non addicts, those “normal people” we are supposed to strive to be,  would like to think it is one of misery and of desperation. There is no denying that is true, but it is also a world which is exciting and slightly or sometimes a lot, dangerous. A world where rules are there to be broken and adrenaline flows in abundance. There is a certain attraction in the lifestyle, in fitting in where many wouldn’t, you can be someone that you couldn’t be in the “normal” world; respected, strong. It is not always grey in the world of an addict and it is important to remember that. To deny it would be to deny the truth.
In a world that you’ve never completely felt at ease in, you have, as an addict, carved a niche, a place where expectations are few, or at least are ones that you can live up to. If you don’t live up to anyone’s expectations you have an excuse, a reason; what do they expect? They know you have problems don’t they? They shouldn’t expect so much from you.

So next let’s think about your children and your family. If you loved them you would stop. If you cared enough it would be easy. Every addict has been told it many many times. What they don’t realise is that in some way this is the only way you can be a parent. The only way you can get through the moments where you feel helpless and useless. That the drugs have nothing to do with you loving your children or otherwise, and much more to do with the fact that you need them to even function as a human let alone as a parent. The drugs or drink are what allow you do as much as you are doing. And you are doing your best aren’t you?

And the criminal acts? They are just necessities in the lifestyle of an addict. How the hell else are you going to earn the money you require to feed the hunger of your addiction? What do people expect from you? That constant ache that grumbles constantly lest you forget that soon it will need more fuel. It’s constant demanding to be fed. It’s like a constant voice in your ear, whispering at you incessantly, warning you of the consequences if you fail to fulfil it.

But I want to tell you this: it can be done; that switch is there, it’s just not possible for anyone else to flip it for you. You have to find it yourself. And right now that might feel like a fumble in the dark, but hopefully, you will find it. Actually, in some cases it is more like a dimmer switch that slowly turns off, gradually you will realise that there is another way to live. A way that is more than survival, and perhaps a little bit more like living.

And life can be exciting in different ways. You can get an adrenaline rush from the simple act of being able to lay still on your bed without the incessant chatter of your addiction whispering in your ear. You can wake up and realise that you didn’t think about drink or drugs all of yesterday and find yourself smiling that you went a day without thinking of it.

And you can learn a whole new side to your children. A side you never knew existed due to your previous unstable state. You can see the pleasure in their face when you lay in bed in the morning, snuggling up to them rather than making excuses to leave, so that you can feed the hunger of the addiction. You can get to know them again, on different, fairer terms. You can love them for the amazing people they are rather than just because they are your children.  And it may take a long time to build the bridges that you didn’t even realise you had burned, but it will be worth it. Every moment.

And perhaps one day you will know the pleasure of paying a bill with your own hard earned cash. Not stealing it, not begging for it or borrowing. The feeling of doing something so mundane and simple that you are surprised to realise that you are doing something that those “normal” people do. It may sound stupid to you right now, but maybe not, but it’s true, one day it will be an achievement.

The main thing I want you to know is that you can do it. You and only you can change the path of your life. It won’t be easy, and it will not be a straight path. More likely, it will be hilly, and rocky and the road will not be straight, but there are many routes along it that you can take, there is not just one road to follow, you can do it your way.  And you can make it. I know you can. Because if I can make it, the pathetic person that I had become, you can make it. Don’t expect it to be easy. Nothing worth it ever is; remember the things you’ve had to do to feed your addiction, it wasn’t always easy, but you did it anyway. All you need to do is put one foot in front of the other and grasp every helping hand on the way.

The Good Deed Feed. 

19 Tuesday May 2015

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A few months ago I took the decision to do something nice for someone everyday. It seemed like a big deal at the time, I mean, I’m not normally horrible to people, but having to do something nice everyday felt like a big task. Especially given that I have the worlds worst memory; how was I going to remember to do it? 

So I started out on this good deed journey a little daunted, thinking that possibly this was going to cost me a lot of money, because one of the easiest ways to be nice is to buy someone something, and I’m all for the easy route! 

Sometimes it does cost money, but not the bucket loads I was expecting.  In January I asked for 5 friends to let me know if they wanted a random gift from me at some point in the year. I signed them up, and I’m gradually going through them sending them small gifts that are not for any reason but that I was thinking of them. So that’s 5 days of the year sorted. 

There being another 360 days in the year to account for, I started to look out for more opportunities to do a good deed. Things like helping carry a buggy up the stairs at the train station, or going out of my way to open a door for someone struggling with bags etc. 

Some days no specific opportunity to do a good deed arises, or maybe I have just been tired, and can’t see for looking, so I have had to think of other ways in which I can do something nice and I soon realised that I don’t actually have to do a lot to be nice. For example I might just tell someone that they look lovely (only if they actually do), whereas maybe in the past I would have just thought it. I stopped to check that someone at the tube station was ok, when I noticed they were so drunk they couldn’t stand. He was fine, waiting for friends, but I was glad I’d checked. 

In our services we have Peer Mentors who work with others to help them achieve recovery from addiction. At a couple of meetings I’d seen and heard what a fantastic job one of them was doing, so when she told me that she was moving to another one of my establishments I told her that I would email them to tell her of the good work she was doing and that I’d love it if she could continue it after her move. I wrote a 10 line email to the service. It took me 30 seconds or less and I copied in her manager. The next day I received a lovely email thanking me for putting myself out to help her. That she was amazed I’d bothered and it meant a lot to her. It made me think about how the little things we do can have a ripple effect. 30 seconds of my time could mean the difference between her sinking or swimming in the move to another prison. It reaffirmed my commitment to being nice. 

This good deed feed has had unintended consequences too. I stopped to help someone broken down on the M25 and unbeknown to me it was an old friend I hadn’t seen for years, we had a quick catch up before I jumped his car and he went on his way. It did my soul good to see him alive and well. Another time I helped someone with some work and they helped me out when I desperately needed it. I like to think of it as a kind of karma. 

I’m no angel. Some days I go to bed thinking of all the harm that I’ve done by arguing, shouting or my other actions. I struggle to cope, I feel like crying; I’m sure that I am a terrible person. Poor C may think I’m actually a slight psychopath what with the neediness I portray. At times like those I cling onto doing a nice thing everyday, no matter what else I’ve done, hopefully I’ve made some one smile, or their day a bit easier, even if only, sometimes because of my complete stupidity. 

Papering the cracks. 

14 Tuesday Apr 2015

Posted by in Friends, kids, Life, Uncategorized

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Since my last blog about splitting up with P I’ve been amazed at 2 things:1) the number of people who took the time to connect with me, to check that I am ok, to let me know they are there (thank you all), and 2) the number of people who said they were stunned. That they thought that we were a perfect couple. 

It’s made me think about how social media can allow us to share the life that we want people to think we have rather than the life we actually have with our friends and colleagues. I mean, we have all probably done it; we have a day off, at home with the kids, it’s been a hell of a bad day, they have spent nearly all of it fighting or arguing over important things, such as who is going to get to sit next to Mummy or who broke who’s biscuit. You wonder how you could possibly have borne these Devils, You are just about ready to kill them, and so, in desperation you make them put on their shoes and take them to the park. 

The only reason you are taking them to the park is the hope that they might put 100 metres between you and their constant bickering. This is not about fun, this is survival! It works, you can finally see the arguing but not hear it, and if you don’t look up you can pretend not to see or hear the constant whines of “Muuuumm, he, pushed/hit/punched/licked/looked at me funny!” Ignorance is bliss and so you sit back and enjoy the peace. And then it happens; they stop arguing for 1.5 minutes, the sun pops out for 2.5 minutes, and so you seize the opportunity to take a few pictures of them, in the sun, playing together like angels. 

30 seconds later they are back to bickering and arguing and generally being little sods, what do you do? You retreat back to the park bench, you ignore the yelps and screams coming from the other end of the park and you upload those few rare peaceful moments to Facebook, or Twitter, or Instagram. Look at how perfect they are, look how nicely they play together (Yeah right!). 

The point is, I didn’t bother taking photos of them arguing, and I certainly didn’t post them to social media. Anyone who looked at my profile would probably assume that my kids and I had a whale of a time at the park, smiling and playing together. Which we did. I mean those perfect 1.5 minutes of not bickering or arguing, in the sun were indeed perfect. However I unconsciously edited my day/life down to those few small moments in an otherwise poxy day when I uploaded those pictures to Facebook. 

 Too many people accept that what people portray on social media is the reality of other people’s worlds. And that is quite a scary thought. If I was friends with someone who was depressed or not coping particularly well, they may well be under the illusion that I am coping perfectly, that I manage to be the perfect mother/wife/girlfriend/sister/employee/whatever. What they may fail to realise is that they are only seeing the highlights. The best bits. The parts that I want to show the world. They don’t see the me, snot hanging down my face, sobbing down the phone that I am a failure, that I can’t cope, that I am too tired, too sad to deal with this crap; because that’s not they way I want most people to know me. So those times get conveniently missed out from my Facebook feed and instead you see the times I’m winning at life, you see the good and I edit out the bad. To someone who is depressed or struggling to cope this can make them feel a failure, they may see everyone else’s lives through the rose tinted glasses of social media and this can make them feel worse. 

And that’s how people form the impression that everyone else’s life is better than theirs. That they must be doing something wrong. They don’t see the cracks in the lives of their friends, they only see the paper that their friends have covered over the cracks with. But nothing is perfect, everything has cracks, and so you know what? Those 1.5 minutes of perfection, in the park, sun shining and kids loving me were the closest to heaven I’ve been for a while. And so I’ll carry on sharing those moments, however perhaps we should all bear in mind that what we see is not always a reflection of our full time reality, it’s the reality we’d like.