In case you were curious...

Presentation month was a total flop. Just too vague and, for me, not something I am interested enough in, at least not at the moment.

So June? June is Central American and Caribbean month. I haven't really made a start on this but have been told I get points for having had some Caribbean people at the table who liked the food I made. But it wasn't Caribbean food. Or Central American. Hoping to make a proper start for date night tomorrow... We shall see...

Talking about the good times

Something that doesn't come naturally to me is blowing my own trumpet. A has always commented on job applications or similar that I just don't sell myself. I write the facts as simply and unobtrusively as possible, which isn't always ideal. (Not that he was ever advocating barefaced lying on CVs, just pointing out the positives rather more than I tended to.)

One of the things I have found hardest since becoming a parent is how to enjoy the good times, and talk about them with friends, without them becoming "aren't I the best parent ever and don't I have the most amazing kids on the planet?" sessions which don't sit well with me or the poor person listening to them. So I mostly try not to talk about the good times. Or to pick extremely innocuous good times. I get it wrong sometimes and have those moments of extreme discomfort when I realise the thing that I take most for granted about my kids (typically related to language development or eating habits as those have been (in the past - don't get my started on the fussy three year old currently living under my roof) the easiest and most fun part of parenting round here) are exactly the things that the person I am talking to beats themselves up over day after day and sees no end in sight to their perceived failure... But not talking about the good things isn't very good for me, or for any of us.

As I have mentioned, I now have a sort of diary where I write the best thing G did and the best thing E did every day. It is definitely a good thing and already I have pages and pages of little notes to look back on (though they don't always make sense a few weeks down the line!) but I think I (we?) need more than that. I think we need to have permission to meet up and not complain about things (though heaven knows we need to keep the permission to complain firmly in place to!). I need to say, without worrying about what it might seem like, that actually, I have had a great few days with my kids. They have driven me crazy once or twice but only within the acceptable spectrum. They have done funny things, sweet things, kind things. They have learnt things, tried things, seen new things. They have, in short, been my absolute most favourite people on the planet (sometimes there is still room in there for A!).

There. I've said it.

Losing Things

And no, I'm not talking about keys. Or shoes. Or children...

Something A and I have been realising recently is what goes missing when things like anxiety or Sadness come to play in your house. There are the fairly obvious ones like "enjoyment" or "get up and go" but the one we have come to notice the most in the past few weeks is creativity.

I have barely picked up any knitting or crochet in about six months. Six months of cold weather at that (having a six month break from cuddling wool during a long hot summer (let me dream) is less surprising).

I don't constantly have something or other ticking away in my mind that I want to be writing, be it blog post, novel, poem, prayer, sermon...whatever.

I don't have the random moments of lunacy where I believe that overnight I have developed incredible artistic skills and can suddenly draw/paint/create beautiful things with ease and serenity.

I have been baking but only as a way of getting the maximum amount of chocolate into my system as possible...

Cooking has been similarly (mostly) just about getting fed.

I am having little teeny tiny wishes with some of these areas now and that is likely to be what has made us notice how lacking they have been. I don't think it is a change I can really force myself but I will be keeping my eyes open for any signs of life.

I'm A Myth

Sorry for the absence, I have tried to write on a number of occasions but never made it past a few sentences for one reason or another. Let's see if this time is any different...

Something I have come to realise ever more strongly over the past few months is that I need to stop believing in "Me". Not as in I need to have no self belief but as in I need to stop thinking things like "I wish I could be myself again" or "the real me would love to do that but at the moment I just can't do it..."

I don't exist, not the Me that I keep thinking I want to return to. When I am honest, I have to admit several things. First, anxiety has been with me in one shape or another for a long, long time now. Not always, but a lot. For example, the summer when I was fourteen, I stopped sleeping. I couldn't sleep until it got light, so around 4am. It was the school holidays so it didn't really matter, I could lie in, and anyway, I was 14 so I could do with quite a small amount of sleep if needed, so it went largely unnoticed by me or anyone else. When I was around 17, I had a spell of stress related headaches that were swept away again. And so it goes on, little pockets, sometimes blamed on something else, sometimes ignored, sometimes acknowledged.

Categorically, the carefree Me who didn't worry about anything, was always free to have fun and only considered consequences as they affected others Does Not Exist. (And probably never, ever did.) Trying to get back to this fictional person (there is more to her than just not worrying, some of it did exist, some never did, you get the idea) is not helpful. It is an unnecessary pressure that is unproductive and down right stupid, too. For a start, I learnt quite some years ago that one of the many benefits of the less nice (!) things we go through in life is the ability to understand others in a similar position. Shortly after one of my early bouts of anxiety I met someone who was struggling with self harm, caused by anxiety and a lack of self worth. Our end points were different but our starting points were similar and so I "got" her more than I might otherwise have done.

I am aware that although I would have chosen a different teacher than anxiety, it has had some good effects. I have considered everything I spend my time on and I have slowed down. I give away time less lightly and so what I do give is more valuable. I spend a lot of time lying on the sofa with my kids climbing all over me (we call it snot and dribble...I won't say any more...) because when it comes down to it, that is what they love to do. They love other things too, but they love it when I have the time to be so unbusy with them that we can have a nice long snot and dribble session.

I can't be my teenage or early twenties self again. Life is different, I am different, and rose tinted glasses just get silly after a while. The more I enjoy being me as I am, the less I try to chase after this particular myth.

No Supermaket Month...

I'll get straight to the point. Had our aim of No Supermarket Month been to actually not set foot in anything related to a supermarket for the whole month, it would have been an epic fail. Even with our rather relaxed "we'll get milk from our local Sainsbury's, and not be too worried if we have to grab a few other things a few times in the month" version of "no" supermarkets, it was still a bit of a fail, technically speaking.

I went to our local Sainsbury's or Co-op (where do they fall on the supermarket spectrum anyway?) quite a few times. On one particular day, I even bought  fruit and veg and bread. Almost all the fails were caused by one bout of ill health or another. Sometimes we needed easy food, sometimes we needed fast shopping before keeling over and at one point a large amount of experimenting with a certain type of product that I had recently become allergic to. So, yes, under the title, big fail.

But.

I did not drive to the supermarket at all. I did not do a mega shop at all. And I did not buy any supermarket meat or fish and very little supermarket fruit and veg.

My conclusions on the month go a like this:

• There things that is simply not worth trying to buy outside the supermarket in this day and age. You pay more for less good quality products. 
• Meat, we could really taste the difference. Our local butcher's sausages are amazing. I am sure there will be times when I grab a pack of mince from Sainsbury's for convenience but we are trying to build a regular trip to the butcher into our routine. It seems worth it.
• We sampled eggs from a range of local sources. There is a farm that we pass once a week that sells its own eggs. The butcher sells eggs. The greengrocer sells eggs. We couldn't taste the difference really. But they were all cheaper and all more local than the supermarkets so we'll be sticking with them whenever possible.
• Fruit and veg is a complex one. Our greengrocer has pretty much everything we want. It balances out at close to the cost of the supermarket, with some thing significantly cheaper and some things more expensive. The challenge thrown down by using a greengrocer is to shop in season more as then it will be a cheaper method. The butcher actually helps with this as they provide regular seasonal recipes! The one main exception to trying to use the greengrocer will be bananas. They are more expensive at the greengrocer by a significant margin and they are not fairly traded. It seems bizarre to pay more for not fairly traded goods. So they will be coming from Sainsbury's. 

So, on the face of it a fail, but rather like our "giving up TV for lent except once a week, except the Six Nations and except cbeebies", we have actually managed to not use the supermarket in a way that we can keep up. The butcher is in, the greengrocer is in, the poncy deli in the village...is mainly out! (They clearly do not like noisy children in their shop...I clearly, therefore, will not be spending much time or money with them!)

May? Presentation Month. Lord, help us!

Smoothly does it

For the past week or so, when anyone has asked me how I am, I have been saying that I have reached a kind of plateau. I am not longer in the realm of panic attacks or major meltdowns, I just feel nervous all the time. Sort of an improvement, sort of not. I have been here before and the trouble with it is, it is perfectly liveable with. I can get by like this. It doesn't stop me doing much and it doesn't have too much negative effect on those around me. But it is very tiring and it does make everything take rather longer than it should.

Take leaving the house to get G to nursery school on time. He's been to the loo, I've been to the loo, E's nappy is ok. Shoes on, coats on. So far so good. Then...I go to the loo, I check the oven, the hob, the fridge door, the front door, the freezer, loo again, check again, right, now is the last possible minute to leave and still be on time so Go Go Go! Instead of a leisurely walk, with G walking and having time to pick up sticks/pebbles/leaves, comment on the various vehicles we pass or the numbers and letters he spots along the way, he is on the buggy board and I'm making myself feel sick with the tension of getting there on time...

It isn't always like that, sometimes better, sometimes worse, but you get the idea. It just makes everything a bit harder and wastes that bit more energy. And longer term, it starts to impact my physical health as all the nervousness starts to take its toll on my systems. Which then makes me more nervous... I need to not accept this plateau long term, a little rest might be acceptable but I can't stop here for long, I have done that before and it was a major error. Fortunately, A and I have both recognised the dangers this time which will go a long way to keeping me moving.

But underneath all that, I am happy at the moment. There have been a few significant things lately, some conversations, some reading, some praying and I have a clarity, ease with myself and general sense of enjoyment that has been hiding for a quite a while. Pretty cool.

An administrative post...

Ok, so a number of you have told me you have tried to comment on posts but not been able to. I have no idea why. But I have been through now and reset all my settings etc. if you have tried to comment in the past and it hasn't worked, please could you try commenting on this post (one word will do!) and we can see if it works yet... Apologies if you have a hair pulling out time trying.