Tag: parenting

The job is never done

We all seem to think that when we’ve done something, it’s done. It could be a simple short term thing like making a coffee, a medium term thing like paying a 6 monthly bill, or a long term thing like falling in love or teaching your children to cross the road.

But think about it. Nothing’s ever really ‘done’ is it?

You drink that lovely coffee and it meets it’s need for a while – takes away your thirst, gives you that caffeine shot, sharpens you up. And sooner or later, you feel thirsty again, feel fatigued and you…. well what do you do? Have another coffee? Trouble with that is that coffee doesn’t really slake your thirst as by it’s nature it makes you more thirsty, quicker. And the comedown from the caffeine high usually makes you feel lower than the initial fatigue that you tried to stave off. Maybe it’s time to try a different approach. Drink water to rehydrate your body (I also find it fills me up more and I eat less rubbish!) and get a bit of fresh air to sharpen you up. (Don’t have a smoke whilst you’re getting that fresh air….!)

Bills…. a nemesis to us all. Even as you pay, you know that sooner or later you’ll have to pay again. There’s a job that’s never done. Like an endless landscape of hungry hippos opening and shutting their mouths, gobbling up your hard earned cash with the odd unwelcome surprise expense like a new tyre for the car or yet another pair of shoes as your Batman or Wonderwoman grows at a seemingly inordinate and ever increasing rate.

Which then brings me onto long term things. I don’t know about you, but I have often made the mistake of thinking that once I’ve done or said something, it’s done and I can move on. Something simple like explaining to Batman that, once he’s finished his ice lolly after dinner, to take his plate to the kitchen and put it in the sink. There are two pitfalls here. Firstly, there are a million other more interesting things to be thinking about. Like going back to his Lego, watching Scooby Doo or poking his lolly stick up Baskerville’s bum. Secondly, he didn’t listen in the first place, no matter how carefully I calmly explained what to do and asked him if he understood, and saw him nod, so there’s no chance of him remembering tomorrow. I put adult logic to it – I can follow and remember simple instructions. Why doesn’t he? Of course I am forgetting that I was once his age and almost certainly did the same thing, and the times when I don’t hear Jenny’s voice through the white noise and don’t follow and remember her simple instructions. You should always remember that you are by no means anywhere near perfection yourself! (He said to himself.) So tomorrow, I will say it all again.

That, of course is long term Parenting, and has more of a bearing on Batman’s future than my own. But consider yourself, your relationship, how you look after yourself, and how you live your life in general.

We all have important aspects of the above and more that we should order and prioritise as we live. Try and keep focused and look at your priorities every day. It’s so very hard at times to keep those balls in the air. But take some time each day to treat yourself and those around you like plants. See if any water or feed is needed. Sometimes a bit of pruning, cutting and shaping will be required. It will hurt, perhaps, but it encourages new growth and more flowers to light up and fragrance your life.

When we hurt, we think it will stop hurting one day, that one day we’ll wake up and feel different. You hear of people who have suffered huge loss that wake up one morning and start their lives again. Ding. And off we go. But what went before never really leaves you. It’s always there and you mustn’t lose sight of it’s presence. Deal with it and face it – accept that it’s there and probably always will be.

A little bit every day will mean that a build up and backlog of ‘things’ and feelings is less likely. It all sounds like hard work, but if you kid yourself that doing one small thing will last forever, you will wake one day and feel snowed under – or continue to do so. That feeling will only grow and bring you down.

Don’t be afraid to ask for help.

Be real and truthful to yourself. As you do things to help life tick over, so over time, they do become easier. But keep your eyes open on the big picture. The job is never done.


It’s ok to take control

Following on from my ‘Head day’ post, another thing I think I’ve found is that I’ve lived my life in a sort of mental paralysis. If you’re told you’re not good enough, not worth anything, that you can’t do things, you get stuck in a place where you don’t feel you have the strength or ability to change situations, to alter course from impending disaster. You know that you have to do something, but you’re too used to being told what to do (but perversely, that you’re not actually capable of doing it) that you freeze, letting the bad stuff happen, wash over you. Because you’re used to feeling bad and responsible for bad things, and it becomes something you’re used to. You almost tend to like it, it’s familiar. It becomes a grim safe place to be. Like a kind of mental Stockholm Syndrome.

And because you don’t have a plan, a strategy for things when they’re manageable, they gather and grow so you end up paralysed and suffocated by many things that’re too big to contemplate dealing with.

I just got to the end of my tether last year, and had to start dealing with things. Xena has helped me deal with little bits at a time. That way you get tiny little small wins and just because you’ve achieved something, and the thing has become just a tiny bit smaller, you start to get movement, you start to get somewhere. Something is better than nothing. Gradually the landscape begins to change.

You will need to call on all the strength that you have, but were told that you didn’t have, but start the job. You’ll be surprised at who you are and what you have. You’re alright after all.

Upside Down Day

Tonight I am working my first night shift in 11 months. It was a real wrench to leave home, Wonderwoman was crying and didn’t want to sleep and I couldn’t get away. Nor did I want to. But Mrs Fog our childminder stepped in, and within seconds my little insomniac was snuggled into her bosom and completely serene. A lovely picture with which to throw myself together and leave the house.

I felt really low as I drove. Don’t get me wrong, I love my job, but the 9 months I have been away from it have given me the chance to consider other things in life.

I started work at 16 and swapped my awkward gangly lack of confidence and insecurity for the identity of ‘Railwayman’, which I maintained all the way until last April when I first took sick leave with Anxiety and Depression. I returned for 3 days in July, and then left for a family holiday abroad, where I promptly fell ill with a ruptured bowel and almost died. Well that gave me even more time to think.

It has felt along the way that my life has been building up towards a series of pivot points that have happened in quick succession this year.

I am no longer principally a Railwayman. I am me, a Husband and Father, with a dog who is my best friend, and my dream is to teach myself to make great cakes and coffee and for these last two (now three!) lines to be my cornerstone.

God it’s so scary. I lasted until I was 49 hiding that awkwardness, that lack of confidence, behind a uniform, behind function, behind my geeky obsession with railways. And now, with thanks to that comfortable and warm cloak that protected me all those years, I have cast it off and walk forward into myself, into an entirely new life. It’s fantastic, I feel lucky, and the journey is sometimes incredibly exhilarating. But sometimes, when I want to carry on my journey, I have to dip back into the past and I don’t want to do that any more. But the future needs to be paid for, so hey ho, 10 night shifts it is!

I put the radio on in the car, and this came on, as if to spur me on. I felt a lot better as I listened to it and wanted to share it with you, as we all plod along, or slide down the helter skelter, into our lives and dreams.

Shock

This morning, I have been considering the subject of Shock and the effect it has on our lives, from the very beginning. It comes in many shapes and sizes, some we bring upon ourselves, others visited upon us by others. Either way, by and large, it hurts.

Maybe Shock and Surprise are cousins. Surprise is the kinder cousin, you get to meet it first on a childhood birthday for example, when you open the most brilliant present ever and realise that the person who gave it to you had thought about you and by association, must love you a lot. Or at least thinks a great deal of you.

Shock is the darker, moodier, unpredictable cousin who you know, but does stuff you don’t expect and sometimes can be very hurtful, pretending to be surprise, but when you least expect it, slapping you in the face just after you’ve opened up that most brilliant present ever.

I guess all our lives start with Shock. A baby born into fresh air from it’s Mother’s womb cries. From that lovely liquid all enveloping warmth, the reality of fresh air shocks it to life. Crying at that point is seen as a good thing, as it’s the first indication that the baby has been born alive. And consider the environment the baby has been born into. A harsh cold hospital with lots of blue curtains and people in masks, or outside in the world, anywhere. Childbirth is traumatic on the mother, but actually equally traumatic on the child. (Yes, I know. I’m a bloke. What do I know?!)

During childhood, Parents use Shock to train their children. It could be ‘don’t run into the road or you will get run over and die’. It could be shouted: ‘I TOLD YOU NOT TO RUN INTO THE ROAD, YOU ALMOST GOT RUN OVER’. Or it could be a slap, or a thrashing, or a hiding, or whatever your Parents threatened or indeed visited upon you. Now in one way, and delivered properly, Shock is an effective tool. (It also gives rise to questions that you then have to dig deep to answer – “Daaaaaaad. What does ‘die’ mean”?! Good luck with that one!) But all too often, the Shock is delivered by it’s wicked Uncle Horror, with Shock looking particularly smarmy as it arrives. Horror and Shock are born out of lack of patience at best, or nastiness and evil at worst.

During adulthood, Shock’s method of delivery changes a bit, sometimes still accompanied by Uncle Horror, and is built upon the foundation dug in no small part by your Parents. The thing that makes you feel stupid, though, is that the choices you have made lead you to Shock. The job you choose, the person you choose to go out with. So when that Shock really gives you a kicking, it feels even worse because you also feel like a mug for bringing it upon yourself, walking into it with your eyes open.

When you make a decision, you make it based on the information you have at the time, and in no small part on what you want in the future…. lots of money, a good relationship, kids…. ad infinitum. When it all falls down, you are left in the initial cloud of dust, rubble all around you, gazing at the desolation of your 9/11, your 7/7. Shock.

I won’t flower this up. Give yourself a break, for goodness sake. You did what you thought was right at the time. Shock is the realisation of those times you got warning signs that things weren’t quite right, that you were heading down a wrong path. The worst thing is not that you misjudged, or made the mistake. It’s not learning from it. And seek comfort – not in the bosom of the same mistake again, but carefully consider what happened, seek help and gather good people around you that will help you move on. They are there. It’s not easy, but take one day, one hour, even one minute at a time.

Here’s a song about a moment of Shock. If you’re going to listen to it, stop. Find a nice quiet comfortable place and let Richard wash over you. Let it hug you and comfort you and start you moving on.

 

Never pass up an opportunity

So I’m here typing away with my sausage fingers and down comes Wonderwoman from upstairs, where a tired and flagging Jenny is trying to get her and Batman into bed. You might as well try cutting water with cutlery sometimes, it would be easier.

It turns out that, while I have forgotten the password I set up not 3 minutes ago for my G Suite email, Wonderwoman has a painful mouth ulcer. Patience time. I took her hand and we went upstairs whilst I gave her explicit instructions on how to sloosh out her mouth and not to drink the Corsodyl. She wanted a drink of water first from the tap, of which 90% went down her pyjama top. Then Batman arrived to see what was going on.

She slooshed and they wanted to be carried downstairs. Now they are 5 but they have taken after me height wise (I’m 193cm or 6’4″ in old money) and it’s getting harder to hold both of them at the same time. But I managed to totter downstairs like a pissed girl on stillettos and put them to bed. Whereupon Batman wanted me to sing ‘Long Black Train’ by Richard Hawley to him before he slept.

I was desperately trying to remember about DNS settings and long strings of passwords – and the happy helper was waiting for me on the other end of the chat. But I sung.

Because one day, all I will get at night, or in the morning for that matter, will be sullen silence, or if I’m lucky ‘Oh God Dad, you’re sooo embarrassing’.

And it felt like magic, and I felt like a King.

https://youtu.be/pau4pDf7_Ds

Just The Beginning

Well here we go. I have myriad things to say, share and postulate upon. Perhaps you’d like to join me. I am a 49 year old Dad of three, Zak 20 and twins Batman and Wonderwoman, 5. I am 2 1/2 times married: Jenny and I have done the Nikka in a Mosque and will do the Civil ceremony…. sometime soon. (She doesn’t know I have started this blog, so I won’t get in trouble for being vague.) We are not Religious, even though I just typed the word ‘Mosque’. I’ll type it again just to be edgy. Mosque. There you go.

I was diagnosed with Anxiety and Depression last year and am currently on Sertraline to even out my peaks and troughs, which generally works. I have been having counselling since last June, which has been really hard at times, but even though I feel (and probably smell) like I have been wading through shit and treacle for 9 months, it’s bloody brilliant and the journey is incredibly liberating.

All this (and more) has led me to a multi exit crossroads in life. There seem to be more than three exits, which would make the word ‘crossroads’ wrong. It’s more of a Cathedral full of doors, none of which are the right or wrong door to walk through.

So as this blog unfolds, and I open various doors and have a peak, you can come with me. I hope you will laugh, and if you need it, that it helps you along your journey too.