Thank you

I am without doubt my own worst critic. There isn't a single person out there who could say something horrible to me that I won't have already come up with myself.

I've spent a lot of time over the past week questioning whether or not there is something wrong with me. Seriously how was this guy not making me happy? He could go down in the record books as the most perfect boyfriend ever - how was this not enough for me?

I went away this past weekend, we've both been living in the flat since last Tuesday, which has been uncomfortable to say the least.

It was only while I was away that I realised how not happy I have been. Things weren't terrible with the boyfriend at all and I certainly wasn't unhappy, there was just that niggle. This weekend that niggle was set free and I remembered what it was like to be me again. I hadn't noticed I wasn't being me, I think it had been so gradual, but I could feel me slowly returning and now that that niggle has gone it's actually quite relieving.

Mainly however I've been feeling incredibly guilty about my decision to end things. If ever there was a person who didn't deserve to have their heart broken, it was him.

I spoke to my brother on the phone on Sunday afternoon. I told him that I felt really guilty for doing this to him. He said I shouldn't feel guilty - I was just doing what felt right and then he said something which kind of shocked me. He said he was proud of me.

It's not what you expect to hear when you're pretty sure everyone's in agreement that you fail at life.

But he persisted. He has a failed marriage behind him and he said he wished he'dd been brave enough to leave, rather than hanging on and hoping that things would get better when he knew deep down that nothing was going to change.

The conversation left me feeling much better, maybe I shouldn't keep beating myself up?

And then along came you lovely people and all of you said the same thing. It made me ridiculously emotional (which isn't hard at the moment admittedly but still). When my brother said it I thought it was just a sibling love kind of thing, but there you all were, echoing his sentiments. (And I'm assuming he didn't tell you all to say that stuff to me.)

Reading all your comments, I felt my confidence slowly beginning to be restored. I did make the right decision and, you know what? I was brave, it did take a lot of courage to stand up and say "This isn't right", something my boyfriend knew, but wasn't prepared to face.

Yes I do still feel guilty, it's hard not to. I don't' want to hurt people, I want to amke them happy and it's a horrible feeling knowing you've broken someone's heart. But I also recognise that I have to be happy too and sacrificing your own happiness to serve someone else's is not they way to go.

So thank you bloggy people. Thank you from the bottom of my little black withered heart :)

Just close your eyes and jump

When I was a young thing Mum and Dad decided to send me to go and have swimming lessons.
For the most part I liked them. I took to it pretty well and enjoyed splashing about and learning to swim my first width and the like. I just had one small problem...

...I was terrified of jumping in.

One morning the teacher got us all out of the pool and asked us to line up on the side. My knees were already knocking together, I just didn’t want to do it. And then I came up with a cunning plan. I would do the tiniest jump ever, just a little bit away from the side and then the side of the pool would still be close to me and everything would be ok.

I watched the other children leaping off the side of the pool. There were a couple of helpers who were in the water with us and some little girls and boys were aiming for their arms and flying off the side of the pool. Not for me. I had a plan.

I was last in line. The teacher tapped me on the shoulder and I put the plan into action. Just one teeny tiny weeny jump. I jumped...

And landed smack on my backside on the pool’s edge. I can still remember the pain that shot up my spine. My Dad, who was sitting along the side watching at the time, told me later that his first thought was “My god, she’s paralysed herself.” The pain was unbelievable. And I made sure everyone knew how much it hurt. I screamed like a bitch.

I was helped up from the side of the pool. It hurt to even walk and they let me hobble into the changing rooms and told me to sit down. I sat and I sobbed. A few minutes later my teacher came in.

“Come on. Lets get back in the pool” he said to me. I was absolutely horrified and protested but he insisted. He was very wise and knew that the best thing for me to do was get back on the horse, or in the pool, whatever, basically I had to do it straight away or my phobia of jumping in would get worse.

Reluctantly I agreed to go back to the pool. I got there and sat down on the edge, ready to ease myself in. The teacher tapped me on my shoulder.

“What are you doing?” he asked
“Getting back in the pool” came my reply
“No no no. You’re going to jump back in the pool”
“But what if I do it wrong again?”
“You won’t. You’re going to jump into the pool this time.”
“But what if my head goes under?”
“Then you’ll come back up again. Just close your eyes and jump. Everything will be alright.”

Simple. But true. And so I followed his advice, jumped properly this time and yes my head did go under the water and yes I came back up again, but most importantly I managed to overcome my fear. It became a standing joke amongst everyone there about my failed jump into the pool, a joke that continued to the point 6/7 years later when my swimming teacher was teaching me to be swimming teacher. No-one would let me forget it. If anyone mentioned jumping or diving in to water, a little wink would be thrown my way.

And I’m glad they did because I thought about this story a lot in the past few weeks. Especially what Paul said to me.

“Then you’ll come back up again.”

And so. On Tuesday. I closed my eyes and I jumped.

And ended my relationship.

I haven’t been happy for months now and I’ve tried to make things better but I can’t. Something just isn’t right and I think that the boyfriend deserves more. He deserves someone who is happy and fully appreciates him. Maybe I’ve been stupid and will forever go down in the annals of time as The Girl Who Gave Away The Perfect Boyfriend, because he really was. But sometimes perfect isn’t enough. There needs to be something more and that something, whatever it is, is missing.

I could stay. Nothing was drastically wrong, we didn’t argue, he adored me and would have done anything for me. But I wasn’t happy. And I can’t stay in a relationship where I’m not happy. Yes stability is great and wonderful and yes I have given away my shot at marriage, babies and houses, but I can’t settle.

Maybe one day I will settle, maybe I’m being unrealistic (although I don’t think I am). But the fact remains that at 27 I can’t make a life with someone if I’m not really happy. Imagine a lifetime of being ok but never really being happy, always knowing in the pit of your stomach that something is wrong...I just can’t do it.

I hope you won’t judge me too harshly, although I fear that some of you will. It’s hard to properly convey things in a blog. Especially when you don’t know the people involved. I’ve tried my hardest to explain in the above two paragraphs but I’ve done my best.

And although I’ve gone down, I know that I’ll come back up again.

The thorny issue of weight loss

Once upon a time a girl went out on a date.

She’d met the guy in a bar on a drunken night out, and in a moment of madness given him her number. He asked her out for a date and she hesitated but thought “Why not?”

On the date she asked him what he did for his job and he gave her possibly the worst answer she could have heard...

“I work in a gym.”

Her blood ran cold. How had she managed to end up on a date with Mr Fit?! There hadn’t been any warning signs, he’d looked completely normal in her vodka-induced haze. She was a girl who didn’t do gyms. There had been gym literally outside her flat for 2 years and she could barely muster the effort to go there twice a week. She was a size 16 and fairly happy with it. Yeah she could be slimmer, yeah her muscles could be tighter, but she did ok in life.

She wondered if they could ever really be compatible. If his life was so focused on being fit and healthy and hers really wasn’t, could the two of them ever get along? She didn’t like to think that it could get in the way so she decided it would probably be fine.

She went out with him for a long year and half.

She wanted to be thinner, he said he would help her. He wrote her gym programmes and she went to the gym like a good little gym bunny. She almost got to the point where she enjoyed going.

The problem was the food. She just pure and simple straight up loved it. Any kind of food. All kinds of food. What greater pleasure is there than eating a good meal?

However when the girl was with Mr Fit she constantly found herself feeling guilty. Feeling guilty for eating a big bag of Sensations all to herself. Feeling guilty for ordering the ‘bad thing’ on the menu. Feeling the judgement when she ate something loaded with fat and calories.

She was in short, miserable. Thinner. But less happy.

And then he left her for someone else anyway.

The lesson she learned was that if someone is that focused on that kind of lifestyle and the other person isn’t then the two just won’t work together. She wasn’t prepared to ever be made to feel guilty for enjoying herself when it was doing no harm to anyone else.

Fast forward two years later...

The girl weighs more than she ever has done. She lives with a boy now and understand that that’s the price you pay for being a good little girlfriend and making all the meals and wanting to don a pinny and bake cakes.

But she knows she’s too fat. She knows that even though she’s nearly 5’10” and can secrete the weight about herself much more easily than someone who is 5’5”, that there’s nowhere for the weight to hide anymore.

She’s signed up to the gym but hates going. Now that there isn’t the constant pressure of going out with Mr Fit it’s hard to find the energy to go.

People say to her “You have to lose weight for you” but she doesn’t really know what that means. How do you know when you’re losing weight for you? Are you losing weight to feel more attractive? What is it that makes you think that you are unattractive – is that you want people to admire you? Surely that means that you’re losing weight for other people? Isn’t it their problem if they don’t fancy you? Are you losing weight because it’s a nightmare finding clothes that fit you? Doesn’t that mean you’re losing weight to conform to what Topshop says you should be wearing?

It’s as if society can’t conceive of the notion that you might be happy being a tubster.
Will she become a different person if she loses a few stone? Will that radically change her personality? She hopes not because she thinks she’s a pretty ok person as she is and what faults she does have don’t have anything to do with her thunder thighs.

Will you love her more if she’s a size 12? (She’s realistic, to be any less she’d have to live on licking on celery stalk once a day and miraculously alter her bone structure.) If so then she doesn’t really need you as part of her life thanks.

Do you hang around with her because she’s a nice person and fun to be around or because she can wear skinny jeans?

Will she be a better daughter/sister/cousin/niece/auntie if she has a lower BMI?

It’s all a little confusing.

And then someone says the words she dreads even more than “I work in a gym”. Someone asks her if she wants to join Weightwatchers with them. This girl is Weightwatcher-phobic. She knows that everyone that does it thinks it’s amazing but she also knows a lot of people that have done it and become world class bores, recounting in great detail how many points there are in that slice of carrot cake you’re eating and extolling the virtues of WW’s like brain-washed converts.

She hates the thought of counting points and keeping a track of what she’s eating, it would make food the centre of her life and not in a good way. It makes food an ‘issue’ and not something just to be enjoyed. She has friends that have fallen down the slippery slope of eating disorders and one who still hasn’t made it back up. She’s all too aware of the dangers that come with obsessing about food. Her friend says that she became anorexic because she wanted to gain control in her life, but surely isn’t the disease and the concept of food controlling her? How far of a hop, skip and a jump away is it from counting points? One day you’re counting up to your allowance, the next you’re thinking to yourself, “Hell what if I just took another point off, surely I’d lose more weight? And what about another and another?”

But the girl figures she might as well give it a go.

If nothing else she’ll probably get fuel for some blog posts out of it.



PS For the record. The boyfriend loves me just the way I am. He knows I have issues with my weight and when I mentioned WW he said that if it made me happy then he was all for it.


PPS And another disclaimer. I'm not dissing Weightwatchers here, it's more a general outpouring of thoughts and feelings regarding the whole subject of dieting and weight loss. I am walking into WW with a positive attitude. Really!

Chinese Whispers - A drama in 2 parts. Part 2

...I switched my phone on again at lunchtime. It immediately started buzzing with text messages.

My cousin had text me to say that she'd spoken to Auntie M about it and told her how pissed off she was with her.

Auntie M had text me to say that she was really sorry about the misunderstanding and she didn't realise and she didn't know what else to say.

Then my Mum had text me asking how my back was today and how word was.

Erm......

Something wasn't quite right.

So I phoned Mum;

Mum: Oh hi, how's your back [bad actually, I need to fill you on that as well. There really is so much to tell you]
Me: It's pretty bad but not awful
Mum: Right so I'll bring the cats round tonight at about 5pm [GOD I haven't even told you about that have I? Worst. blogger. ever.]
Me: Okaaaaaay.....so.....what happened with Auntie M last night?
Mum: What do you mean?
Me: Well, Sister rang me saying that Auntie M had called you saying The Boyfriend and I were all but over.
Mum: No she didn't. We were on the phone anyway and I told her that you were having problems with The Boyfriend and she said that yes she'd heard and was really sorry about it.
Me: Right. Yeah. Sister kind of made out like it was a really big deal. Said she had to practically talk you down off the roof and gave me a lecture about relationships this morning.
Mum: Oh god no. It wasn't anything like that.

Brilliant.

Thanks so much Sister.

So I then had to text my cousin back and tell her to stop self-flagellating and text my Auntie M back (who by the way is incredibly sensitive and prone to suicide attempts) telling her not to worry, that everything's got a bit out of hand and blown out of proportion.

So basically I had to fix something that I didn't start.

And I end up feeling bad because it's as if I've over-reacted and been awful to everyone.

And I had to go through all this drama and yet not be able to tell The Boyfriend about any of it because I didn't think he'd appreciate knowing that my entire family was talking about our relationship troubles.

And none of this would have happened if I'd followed my normal policy of shut up and keep it to myself.

Lesson learned.

So having witnessed how quickly things spiralled out of control with my family and taking onboard some of your comments about my relationship issues at the moment I feel I need to probably issue a clarification about the state of play.

A clarification

I have been unhappy for a while in my relationship. Nothing major, just one of those nagging feelings in the pit of your stomach or the back of your mind that something isn't right. You know the ones I mean? Not a big deal, you don't feel like you want to jump off a bridge, just...an unsettling feeling.

This unsettled feeling was brought to the fore with the revelation that I was still most likely, kind of, probably in love with an ex - as demonstrated in the Head vs Heart post (who by the way didn't cheat on me, I'm not sure where that's come from, I don't think the post was incredibly clear, probably because my head wasn't.)

To. be. clear.

I am not;

a) Leaving the boyfriend for the ex. Bad at relationships I might be but I've most definitely had enough of my fill to know a bad idea when I see one.

b) Starting up any kind of relationship with the ex at the moment. If I break up with the boyfriend I'm not going to be moving on to anything else.

c) Rushing into any major decisions. I realise that this could be the proverbial 'rocky patch' and everything will right itself and in a year's time I will look back on this and laugh. (Well. Probably not, but you know what I mean.)

So I hope that makes things a little clearer for everybody. Maybe I need to post this round to my family so everybody has the same story and can stop gossiping behind my back.

And now that I've done that I can move on to other things because quite frankly I am sick of hearing myself talking about it and you must be sick of hearing about it.

Done and done.

Chinese Whispers. A drama in 2 parts. Part One

Whilst I was down south staying with my cousin I told her about the relationship woes I’m having at the moment. I didn’t go in to great detail, just said that I wasn’t happy at the moment, I wasn’t sure what was making me unhappy and I didn’t really know how things were going to pan out long term.

I figured that she’d tell her Mum, my Auntie S, because they’re like that. They are kind of gossipy and prone to dramatics, and this would be right up their street. I also guessed that Auntie S would tell her sister, Auntie M, because....well, that’s just what they do.

(A quick note: Auntie M and Auntie S are my Dad’s sisters but they are still very good friends with my Mum.)

Last night I get a call from my sister, something which never happens.

Sister: I need to talk to you when The Boyfriend isn’t there? Can you do that?
Me: Erm, not really seeing as it’s 9pm and, you know, he lives here. I can go in the bedroom, will that do?
Sister: I’ve just spoken to Mum and she’s had Auntie M on the phone telling her that she’s really sorry to hear about you and The Boyfriend and that you’re all but over.
Me: What?! Ugh. Cousin must have told them but it’ll have got exaggerated, you know what they’re like
Sister: Well I’ve practically had to talk Mum off the roof, I’ve persuaded her not to ring you and have a bath instead.
Me: I really can’t talk about this now, I’ll call you tomorrow morning.

I immediately texted my cousin to ask her what the hell she’d told Auntie M because she’d phoned my Mum who was now freaking out. She replied that she’d told her Mum but had told her to keep it quiet.

I spent the rest of the night with my stomach churning. I didn’t understand where things had gone so wrong and hated the thought that my Mum was upset about something. But I couldn’t for the life of me figure out what it was. Mum knows what I’m thinking, she has that incredibly annoying Mother knack of knowing when something isn’t right and had badgered me to the point where it was just easier to tell her, but I had downplayed the whole situation knowing that she would worry.

So this morning I call my sister:

Me: Right. So. What happened?
Sister: Well Auntie M phoned Mum and said she was really sorry to hear about you and The Boyfriend and that it was all but over.
Me: Yeah well, you know what they’re like. They exaggerate stuff, plus it’s gone from cousin to Auntie S, to Auntie M, to Mum so it’ll have morphed into this massive deal. I don’t understand why Mum’s freaking out so much, she knows all of this anyway.
Sister: Well she cares about you doesn’t she?!
Me: Yeah I know that but....
Sister: So what it is that’s wrong with you?
Me: Well I don’t know. I’m just not happy...
Sister: Well is it because everything’s up in the air at the moment and you’re going to be moving and you’re looking for a job [yeah I need to tell you all about that don’t I?!] and things like that?
Me:...Well yeah...maybe...I’m not sure...
Sister: Because you have to work at relationships you know. God knows I’ve been through enough stuff with _____ and sometimes things get a bit rough.
Me: Yeah. I know...
Sister: I mean and people just care, I mean Mum cares, I care.
Me: Ok. Stop. I know you all care. But this really isn’t that big a deal. I don’t even know what’s going to happen in the future, maybe everything will be ok, maybe it won’t. Even if the boyfriend and I do split up, the world isn’t going to spin off its axis, everything will be ok. And I appreciate that you care but it really isn’t that big a deal.

This is not a conversation I wanted to have at 7.30am.

I do not need a lecture about the fact that sometimes relationships get tough. I’m not a moron. I especially do not need a lecture from someone who most definitely should have left her husband about 10 years ago (but that’s a whole other story).

As soon as I put the phone down I felt a rush of claustrophobia like I’ve never felt before. I ended up having to open the window and stick my head out of it, gulping the air down. I wanted to scream. I was crying. It was such a massive rush of emotions it took me by surprise.

It was just extra pressure that I didn’t need. I am well aware that people will worry about me which is why I tend to not tell them about these things. I’ve actually surprised myself with how many people I have told, I’d normally just think things over myself and then act. I don’t need to know that everyone else is wondering what I’m thinking, I’m the only person that needs to know what I’m thinking at the moment. I don’t even think the boyfriend needs to know what I’m thinking because I don’t know what I’m thinking.

I needed space. If I had the money I’d have got on my jet plane and speeded off somewhere. I feel like everyone’s crowding me sometimes.

I know that they’re just concerned and they want to be supportive but now all I’m conscious of is that they’re wondering what’s going on in my head. So instead of concentrating on working through the contents of my incredibly scrambled brain I’m instead focusing on how everyone else is feeling.

This is why I don’t tell people my business, because of the gossip and rumours that start to spread. I don’t want to be thinking about what Auntie M and Auntie S and my cousin are saying about my situation and I definitely don’t want them talking to my Mum about it.

After the phone call with my sister I switched my phone off. I didn’t want to deal with it anymore. Plus I have, you know, a job to go to and turning up looking and feeling like a mental patient wasn’t what I wanted to do today.

I especially didn’t want to know was what was going to happen when I switched my phone on again in the afternoon...

Running away to the south

There were a few purposes to this weekend;

1. See my cousin and reconnect after a ridiculously long time apart
2. See some old friends
3. Have fun
4. Running away

All 4 outcomes were successfully achieved. If they were written on a list I would have ticked them all off and I’d be feeling a warm glow of satisfaction. (I kind of now wish I had actually written a list. Is it ok to write and list post-event?)

I know running away doesn’t solve anything and you have to face your problems sooner or later but sometimes you can over-think issues and I am most definitely bordering on that at the moment. Sometimes you have to just remove yourself completely from a situation just to give your brain a rest and that was most definitely accomplished.

It would be boring to recount the whole weekend’s activities and there aren’t many photos I can show you. I mean there were plenty of photos taken but very few blog appropriate ones :)

At times like this you need a list to briefly and snappily run through things so here we go:

Friday
- Picked up from train station by cousin, made lovely meal, sit down to have nice civilised meal with cousin, one of her housemates and other friend. A polite game of Cranium is mentioned.
- Someone else mentions going to the pub down the road for a couple of drinks
- 4 bottles of wine at the pub later we roll back down to the house, causing minor disruption to the incredibly sleepy village of Coombeinteignhead. (Apologies to any residents who may come across this blog in the future. Especially the guy whose Landrover the other girls tried to climb on whilst I took photos.)
- Somehow end up with the 19 year old barman back at the house (who clearly thought his luck was in with 4 drunk older women. You have to admire him for trying.)
- Break table, trying to dance on it
- Kick barman out after having made him strip down to his boxers (don’t ask why)
- Get to bed about 4.30/5.00am

Saturday
- Wake up at 8.30 feeling surprisingly chipper, get up and get changed, feeling full of the joys of spring
- Retrace steps back to the pub to try and find my phone which had mysteriously disappeared
- Realise that I was still drunk and slowly sink into the hangover from hell in front of Saturday Kitchen.
- Have cup of tea and feel spirits rallying
- Find phone behind cushion. Have no idea why I wouldn’t have looked there in the first place, a clear indication of the effects of excessive alcohol on the brain.
- Discover that we somehow managed to get through 10 bottles of wine amongst the 4 of us.
- Ponder why we aren’t all in acute liver failure.
- Get ourselves to Paignton Zoo at lunchtime, looking and behaving like two Witches of Eastwick, hissing at all children who made too much noise or got in our way (we’re normally very nice girls)
- Laugh at the lemurs, stroke some goats and decide that the baboons are our favourites.

- Powernap back at home
- Dinner at Coombe Cellars which was so beautiful I couldn’t even capture it properly in a photograph, although I kept trying.

Sunday
- Back to Coombe Cellars to meet up with an old friend of mine plus husband, plus child.
- Lament the fact that we only have an hour before I have to catch my stupid train back home.
- Laugh and coo over friend’s child (see, told you I was a nice girl normally, just not with a hangover)
- Dash to Newton Abbot train station to begin epic journey back to Hull involving 3 trains and a bus. Ridiculous.
- Realise I’ve got a grand total of about 8 hours sleep over the weekend and will most likely die at work on Monday.

So in summary:

Laughing so much you choke + many bottles of wine + zoo + good friends = Quality Weekend

Did reality hit me like a sucker punch to the gut when I came home? It certainly did. But with this many things to reminisce about I can put off thinking about things for a while longer yet.

What's been said cannot be unsaid

He asked me why I hadn’t said something sooner.

I wished I’d kept my mouth shut. I was determined to not say anything until all my thoughts were in order and I knew what I wanted to say, instead of blurting them out like some kind of idiot.

I said that I hadn’t said anything before because I didn’t know how to put it. I didn’t know how to say how I was feeling. I didn’t really know what I was feeling.

He said he was sorry that he’d been miserable lately, that it was a horrible atmosphere at work because of the impending move and he didn’t realise he was bringing it home with him.

I said I didn’t even know if that was what the problem was.

He said that I meant the world to him and that he just wants me to be happy.

I said that I knew that.

He asked me if I wanted space. He could go and stay at his parent’s house for a couple of days because they’re away at the moment. No-one would need to know.

I said no. I didn’t think it was fair for him to have to leave for a few days when it was me that had the problem.

There was silence for a long time.

I asked him what he was thinking.

He said he’d never have asked me if I was ok if he knew what I was going to say.

He said that there were a couple of options. We break up now or we wait and see if things improve.

I didn’t know what to say. He was taking it so calmly. He didn’t seem overly upset and he didn’t seem angry. He didn’t ask why. He didn’t ask if there was someone else. He was eerily quiet.

He said he would try and stop being stressed about work and bringing it home with him.

I said, again, that I didn’t even know if that was what the problem was. Because I don’t know what the problem is. I said I just had a feeling that things weren’t right. Something wasn’t fitting into place.

I said “What are we supposed to do now?” Were we supposed to just ignore what I’d just said and carry on with some false sense of gaiety and pretend that everything was ok? If someone says they’re not happy and they’re not sure why then what more else is there to say?

He said, “Well for a start I can go and put on the tea.”

...

...

And today was the first morning in over a year that he didn’t say goodbye when he left for work.

Head vs Heart

My love life has been characterised by a distinct inability to listen to what my head’s telling me. I’m a follow your heart kind of girl, the last of the romantics and no matter how hard I try and listen to the little voice in my head, it gets drowned out by the twanging of my heartstrings.

Take for instance my very first relationship at the tender age of 16. I had a fairly unpleasant boyfriend who manipulated me in the only way a 17 year old with low self esteem could. He told me that I was ugly and that everyone in his year was laughing at him for going out with me and no one could understand what he saw in me, along with other similar pleasantries. My head suspected that something wasn’t quite right and told me to "Get out immediately" but my tender little heart, experiencing love for the first time and witnessing my parent’s marriage break down, told me that this was my one and only chance and I needed to stick in there.

You think I would have realised at that point in time that my heart doesn’t know anything.

But I continued to be led around by it and a merry dance indeed it has led me. From relationship to relationship – throwing itself in headfirst while the little voice has stood in the background shaking its head slowly and going “What are you doing you moron, listen to me!”

The little voice told me that Dave* wasn’t quite right for me. He was just a little bit too quiet and serious and all in favour of the easy life. I was dramatic and, quite frankly, a little bit crazy but my heart told me that I must have got it right this time, I was, after all, the incredibly knowledgable age of 21 when I knew everything there was to know. But I ignored the voice, even when Dave told me that he wasn’t looking to settle down any time soon and wanted to go off travelling and explore the world, and I hung on, until my heart realised that it wasn’t getting what it was needing back and led me to someone else.

The heart continued to pound, no matter how many knocks it got, and it never beat faster than the time when I was going out with The One. Perfectly matched, I’d already known him for years, and everything was going swimmingly until the heart decided that I should absolutely definitely tell him that I thought he was The One. The little voice said “Nooooooooooooo what are you doing?!” but the heart was confident this wouldn’t backfire.

Except it kind of did backfire. The trouble was that although The One was, you know, The One. He wasn’t The One At That Moment. He was in a strange old place, not behaving at all like the person I fell in love in with. And the little voice told me that I should leave but the heart refused to let him go. It knew, it absolutely knew that this was the one. And it held on and it held on because it knew that it was strong enough to fix everything that was wrong with him and that if it just stayed in there, he would realise that it knew best.

Until one day it could take no more and it had to go. It was stretched to breaking point and ready to crack in two and it realised that it wasn’t enough. Sometimes love isn’t enough. And for probably the only time in my life, the little voice and the heart said as one, “Time to let go”.

But the heart never really let go. It understood that it wasn’t enough at the moment but that it might be in the future and it still remained certain that it belonged to The One and no one else.

But over time this got lost and occasionally the heart would flare up and say “Hey, wait I love The One, not this other person” and the little voice would say “Oh no you don’t. Don’t start with this again, that’s only going to lead you down a rocky road. Please listen to me, you have to bury that love deep inside and don’t even think about it”

And the heart said a very sheepish “Ok” and seeing as it had been so wrong about so many other relationships it guessed the little voice was probably right.

But soon it was back to its old tricks...

I ignored the little voice when it told me that Steve* wasn’t right for me. Why in my right mind would a slovenly glutton like me be a perfect match for the ultimate gym machine? And when the little voice told me that something wasn’t quite right about this ‘friend’ of his I knew I should have listened to it. But the heart believed the lies and believed he loved it back right up until out of the blue he decided he didn’t love it anymore.

And then a few weeks later I met The Boyfriend.

And the heart said “YES! Finally a nice boy who would never ever hurt me and will look after me and make sure I don’t get broken.”

But the voice?

It said “It’s too soon. You have to wait and give the heart time to mend, it’s not quite itself, it’s still in extreme need of repair”

And the heart replied “NONSENSE. I. Am. Fine. Too soon, too schmoon. Shut up little voice.”

And then 22 months later, the heart had some kind of volcanic explosion and remembered that it loved The One and that things were different now, he was out of the strange old place and back to the person it had fallen for in the first place.

Except I’m older now (did I tell you it was just my birthday? Yes?) and I can’t let the heart have its own way again. It’s been wrong so many times. It’s the Weakest Link. It’s Britain’s Biggest Loser. If we were picking teams for netball, my heart would be the one wearing a patch over one eye who couldn't catch if its life depended on it.

So I turn to the little voice for some help and for the first time ever it’s decided to shut its trap. Or it’s talking so quietly that I can’t hear it. Or I don’t really like what it’s saying so I’m not really listening to it.

So until I can decipher what the little voice is saying I’m in the worst position imaginable – this close to everything I dreamed of and this close away from smashing it all to pieces in favour of, once again, going with the heart.

Although sometimes I don’t even think the heart knows what it wants. And sometimes I think it's a sneaky little devil and pretends to be the little voice to try and trick me.

Any of my other organs fancy helping me out here? Liver? Got anything to say? Pancreas? Fancy pitching in? Kidneys? Fancy a break from all the filtering?

(It’s always better to make a little joke than face reality I find)

*The names have been changed. Just because....you never know. Also I like the DRAMA of changing people's names.

This time last year...

...after much huffing and puffing and lifting and shoving and wondering why we had decided to move somewhere without a lift, I officially moved in with a boy.

One whole year living with a real life boy.

I was pretty panicked before moving in with the boyfriend, I was worried about anything and everything.

If I knew then what I know now I would have told the panicked me to stop stressing. I'd tell her the following things I have learnt over the past year:

- You can solve arguments over quilt stealing by getting a king-size quilt for your double bed.

- 2 toilets should be mandatory in all houses.

- He is allergic to empting the bin and will just keep piling in rubbish until the lid doesn't close and you will want to kill him but...

- ...when you empty the bin he will take it all the way downstairs to put it in the wheelie bin.

- Don't worry about losing your independence. You'll keep it but be too embarassed to admit that sometimes you'd rather stay at home.

- You'll get bored of keeping your legs constantly shaved after about 3 weeks.

- Repeatedly asking "What's wrong with you?" is not the way to get him to tell you what's wrong with him.

- His standard response to "How does this look?" will be "You look beautiful." Very sweet but not entirely honest. Well. He may genuinely think you look beautiful in anything you wear - everyone else thinks you have a fat arse.

- Monday to Friday you will take care of the dinner. Saturday and Sunday it's his job. One of those evenings will almost always be a takeaway.

- You will gain about a bazillion stone in weight. And that's definitely something you need to work on in year 2 of living together.

- It's actually not that hard living with a boy.

The longest day

So on Saturday night the boyfriend and I were out for a friend's birthday (see I do take him out sometimes!) and he gets a call from one of his sisters to say that his grandmother had taken a turn for the worse. We knew this was coming soon, she had been getting weaker and more frail since January, when terminal cancer was diagnosed.

We arrived at his parent's house for the most awkward of all social situations - a bedside vigil.

(Is a vigil a social situation? I'm classing it as one because there is a group of people there.)

Unfortunately we all know how I deal with difficult situations. Badly.

'Surreal' doesn't even cover it. There we all were, grandmother in bed, death rattle in full flow, the boyfriend's parents, his sisters, the dog, boyfriend and me. Oh and I was fantastically dressed up, having decided to wear a fancy new dress out for the birthday. It felt a little bizarre to say the least.

Luckily the boyfriend's family is as inappropriate as I am and at one point we were all sat around the bed, drinking pink fizz, laughing and joking and talking about all kinds of things under the sun. His grandmother wouldn't have minded, she'd have been joining in with us a month or so ago.

Eventually it became clear that Saturday night wasn't going to be the night so at 1am we all decided to go to bed, I borrowed something to wear from one of his sisters and we collapsed into the boyfriend's old bed for a very fitful night of sleep.

Sunday morning dawned along with the realisation that the only clothes I had to wear were either a fancy dress or men's pyjama bottoms complete with inappropriate flap. Cue quick trip home in what was possibly the most hilarious walk of shame outfit ever - Hooters t-shirt, men's pj bottoms, 4 inch pink heels and the boyfriend's coat, carrying dress and last night's tights in a bundle in my arms. Just call me classy.

We were soon back to begin one of the longest days ever.

It's actually quite boring waiting for someone to die you know.

I felt a little awkward because of my position, I was the only non-family member there so I tried to do useful things while the family took it turns to sit upstairs.

When it got to about 9pm we decided we would make tracks and head back to the flat. The boyfriend got his coat on and headed upstairs to say goodbye.

Next thing I knew we were all upstairs. The time had come. And we were all stood around the bed as she passed away. I've heard horror stories of people's last moments and I was pretty afraid but actually you'd never have known, if it wasn't for the fact that I could no longer hear the rattle, I wouldn't have been sure she'd gone.

We opened the windows and brought up all the flowers in the house and sat around the bed for a while longer. I began to get a bit itchy at this point, I was very conscious that we ere sat with a dead body in the room and I wasn't particularly enjoying it. Especially when the boyfriend's Dad leaned on the remote control for the bed and for a moment it looked like she was sitting up - my worst nightmare realised. It did dispel the tension a bit.

Like I say, I was unsure of whether I should be there or not, I didn't know if this was a moment just for family and if I'm honest I would rather not have been there, I don't enjoy seeing dead people, it makes it harder to remember them when they were alive and that's the image I would rather have, but I just wanted to stick beside the boyfriend and make sure he was ok.

And actually I was glad I was there. I didn't get the chance to say goodbye to my grandma and for the past year and a half I've had a replacement who I saw more of than my own. Maybe the tears were a delayed expression of emotion for my own flesh and blood.

Or maybe they were just for a wonderful lady who was so incredibly full of life. It sounds trite to say that and I always feel a little inward roll of the eyes when I hear it but I swear it really was true. Last summer she was with all of us in France and in November she had a super fancy party for her 90th birthday. She loved nothing more than a glass of sherry (why do old people like sherry?) and watching the cricket.

And this is what we say to make ourselves feel bettter. "Oh she had a good life.", "Oh she had a long life", "Oh at least she's not suffering anymore". But beneath all that we still feel it's unfair and still think she was taken too soon.

See you later Mutti.

Worst girlfriend ever?

So I have this group of girl friends and we’ve been friends for a few years now and everything’s great and I get on with them all really well, there’s just one small thing that really irritates me and on Saturday night it raised its ugly head yet again.

They have this thing where all of the boyfriends get invited out to our nights out. And worse than that, when the girls go out, the boys are encouraged to all get together and have a boys night as well.

I find it completely bizarre to tell you the truth.

You know how in America they have that whole, what is it, separation of church and state? I have separation of friends and boyfriends.

I don’t actively keep them away from each other but I’m not going to go out of my way for all of them to become the best of friends.

The boyfriend and I had been going out for nearly a year before he was properly introduced to this group of friends and before that they’d say “We haven’t met the boyfriend yet?” and I’d think, “Erm....and?” Am I looking for your approval of my boyfriend? No. Do you need to be friends with him to be friends with me? No.

I just feel like it’s irrelevant whether they know him or not. I mean I became friends with these girls long before the boyfriend ever appeared, my friendship with them has nothing to do with my relationship with him.

I feel the same way about their boyfriends. If I meet them, that’s great. If I don’t meet them I won’t be sitting at home wondering what they’re like, I doubt I’ll consider them at all. As far as I’m concerned, as long as the person my friend is going out with makes them happy then that’s all I need to know.

In fact it can get more awkward if you meet the boyfriend and don’t like him. Which is the case with one of these girls. I think her boyfriend’s a complete fool. I just want to slap him every time I see him and hear the latest inanity to come out of his mouth. But it doesn’t make any difference that I think that does it? Am I going to say with her “Your boyfriend’s a twat”? (Oh how I wish I could.) No I’m not because me thinking that isn’t going to make them split it up, it’s just going to make things awkward for us.

Also I like my independence. I like that I have my own friends and that’s my thing and they belong to me and the boyfriend isn’t overly involved in that area of my life. Like I say, I don’t go to great lengths to keep them apart but I equally am not going to invite him to every girl’s night out that we have. And as for him becoming friends with the boyfriends? If that happens naturally, of its own accord then that’s great. What I’m not going to do is force him into a situation where there’s a group of men that everyone thinks should get on, just because their girlfriends do. The logic doesn’t follow for me.

So on Saturday I went out for one of these nights. We were going for a meal for someone’s birthday and they’d said boys were welcome to come and I thought to myself “That’s nice” and left it at that. I did ask the boyfriend if he wanted to come and I could see by his face that he didn’t really want to so I said that was fine by me, he could have a date night with his one true love, the X-box.

I get to the restaurant and realise immediately. I am the only person here sans partner. And it makes me sigh on the inside because I know what’s coming next...

“So where’s the boyfriend tonight then?”

“Erm.....he’s at home.”

SILENCE.

It's like they can’t conceive that he wouldn’t want to come out for a meal with all my friends.

And then you have the incredibly boring meal where everyone’s sat in their couples talking away and I’m wanting to stab myself in the eyes with my chopsticks because it’s just all so bloody boring.

The thing is it makes me question myself. They seem so surprised and shocked that he isn’t out that I start thinking that I’ve obviously got this all wrong. Should I be insisting that he comes out? Should I be having other couples round for sophisticated dinner parties?

And I thought to myself, my god, I’m a really horrible boyfriend, I’m making him stay at home with crisp-stealing cats whilst I’m out having a laugh.

I got back home and apologised to the boyfriend.

“Sorry if I’m rubbish”

“How are you rubbish?”

“For making you stay at home and not encouraging you to come out for the meal.”

“Whose birthday was it again?”

(I tell him)

“Yeah I would have come out but to be honest I can be doing without her and her boyfriend.”

And I sit back and think, maybe I’m not so bad after all.

Until the next ‘girls’ night out...

The V Word

There are an awful lot of hearts around at the moment you know.

I’m not really one to go all out on Valentine’s Day. Have never done the exchanging of gifts, I’ll send a card, maybe go for a meal out but that’s it really.

I don’t have anything against it as a day, I’m not one of those people who start foaming at the mouth and saying “You shouldn’t need a day to be romantic”. I agree, it shouldn’t be the only day that you are romantic, but if there’s chance for a little bit more and a day to take a little time out and be especially nauseating then why not take it?!

At the same time, I’m not going to line the pockets of some savvy businessmen who have latched on and want me to buy The Greatest Love Songs Ever of The Decade Ever and Ever Part II as a declaration of my love.

I’ll just make a card for the boyfriend and maybe we’ll go out somewhere and maybe we’ll stay in. Who knows?

Ah yes, “make a card”.

This is when living together becomes an irritation. Last year was easy peasy, I was living with Mum, plenty of time to get my needle and thread out. This year? He’s there ALL THE TIME.

Luckily I’ve had Stitch and Bitch on a Thursday evening to do some stitching, (although when we picked me up last week and asked me what I’d done I had to give the rather lame answer of “Oh nothing, I just couldn’t be bothered”) and in the evenings before he’s come home I’ve got my stitch on, and I have encouraged him to take lots of nice, long, relaxing baths, but it was looking like it wasn’t going to get finished.

My salvation came in a rather painful way though.

I have done my back in.

I would love to say that it was flying through the air on a trapeze, or skiing down a mountain, but I just slept a bit funny. And I woke up and it hurt. Then the next day it hurt a bit more. Then the next day a bit more. Then the next day a bit more. Then the next day I cried. Then I got a taxi home from work because I couldn’t walk, sit, stand or generally concentrate and I spent that day and the next lying on the floor at home.

It was irritating and incredibly annoying. I felt absolutely fine. I was at home, I could be doing things!

But my back wouldn’t let me.

“NO” it said when I asked it if it would mind me just sitting on the sofa with my legs out. “NO” it said when I asked it if it would mind if I laid my full length on the sofa. “YOU MUST LIE FLAT ON THE FLOOR.” It demanded.

I tried to reason with it. “But it’s annoying lying flat on the floor, can’t I just lie on my side?”

“NO. ROLL OVER BEETHOVEN. GET. FLAT.”

You can’t do anything! I thought I would spend lots of time piddling about on the internet, but I had to balance the laptop to do so and I figured that at some point I was going to get a broken nose when it fell on me. I figured I’d pick up my cross stitching but that too was annoying. My arms got tired from holding it in the air and because I was following a pattern I kept having to stop and put down the aida, pick up the pattern, see where I was and do the next line.

In one word.

FRUSTRATING.

But I am pig-headed. And I persevered because I knew that this was my silver lining. Yes I was in pain and probably overdosing on ibuprofen but here was the perfect time to get the boyfriend’s Valentine’s Day card made.

(Sometimes you have to look really hard for positives)

So hurray for me, it is done and I can relax for the next week or so.

On the floor.

(The pattern for the card came from The World of Cross Stitching magazine and was part of a Love Token sampler)

(My back is on the mend now, and has felt much better today. I am receiving some treatment in the form of acupuncture - probably more on that in a later post!)

The Undercurrent

There has been a bit of an undercurrent in my life since Christmas and New Year which has been somewhat overshadowed by general festive activities and new year and The Americans trip over.

Because to be honest, 2010 didn’t get off to the greatest of starts for the boyfriend. And in turn, that means my 2010 didn’t get off to the greatest of starts because I guess when you live together his problems = your problems.

It all started at the end of last year when there began to be rumblings at the boyfriend’s firm (he’s a big bad solicitor) about the future of the branch that he currently works for. We kind of put them to one side and tried not to think about them over Christmas and New Year but on his return to work it became clear that things were potentially pretty serious and that come April, he may not have a job.

He’s had his CV out there in the mix for a few weeks now when another opportunity presented itself. The chance for most of his department to be moved, en masse, to another firm in Manchester. Normally this would make me dance around like a loon because I love the Manchester. But unfortunately it doesn’t come at a great time for me in my job. I can’t leave just yet because I’m on the verge of getting my name on a real-life publication and yet at the same time I don’t particularly want to stay because I’m not really a happy bunny. And it’s not fair to ask the boyfriend to commute 4 hours every day; I feel guilty enough that he goes back and forth from Sheffield at the moment.

So everything’s a little up in the air. It could be that he takes the job but doesn’t have to leave for a few months, then he’s happy to do a few months commuting while I get things wrapped up at work and then we move to the city of dreams. No idea what I’ll do there, that’s a whole other bridge I can’t even think about crossing just yet.

Then add to this the fact that we found out just after New Year that his Grandma has terminal cancer. She’s had a great life, she just celebrated her 90th birthday and she actually fought off cancer once before about 20 years ago, but this time there’s nothing to be done and even though she has had a long fulfilling life, it’s horrible to even think about. We’re basically in a situation where everybody is just waiting for her to die.

At the same time as all this exploded, the boyfriend had just gone cold turkey and come off the cigarettes. He wasn’t a chain smoker, probably about 5/6 a day but there’s been a definite change in his mood since coming off them.

Job uncertainty + relative dying + nicotine withdrawal = tense times.

And I’m at a bit of a loss to be honest. I don’t really know what I can do to make things better or make things easier at least. I’m not great in situations where there’s pressure involved, it tends to make me run away. And I’ve mentioned before that I’m rubbish at saying the right thing or expressing real emotions so I don’t think that I’ve been the best partner at the moment.

Luckily the nicotine withdrawal has now subsided and his mood is definitely better, which is a relief. My lovely, even-tempered, laid-back boyfriend turned into a moody git that I wanted to punch in the face so badly that at one point I told him to start smoking again because I couldn’t be dealing with it.

But there are still times when he is quiet and obviously contemplative and it’s those times that I struggle with. Apart from asking him if he’s ok (which he clearly isn’t) and telling him that he can, and indeed has to, talk to me about anything then I can’t see what else I can do. When he’s quiet should I be quiet too? Or should I prattle on like a demented woman, desperate to lift the mood?

These are the times that aren’t so much fun when you’re living together. If we weren’t I could leave him to it and return back to my Mum’s house and escape from the feelings of inadequacy but right now I have to stick with it. Don’t get me wrong, things aren’t all bad, we’ve been smiling and having fun and there have been plenty of happy moments but, like I said at the start of this epic post, there is an undercurrent which occasionally surfaces, before dipping back down below. I guess I just have to ride it out until it submerges itself for good.

When compromise goes bad

When the boyfriend and I moved in together there was one thing preying on my mind. What was going to happen come Christmas? (Actually there were two things preying on my mind but the other one was to do with toilet habits so I won’t go into that one. Yet.)

You see in the past I’ve had boyfriends at Christmas but most of them have lived in different cities (the annoyance of getting with someone when you’re at university) so it was never really an issue, I would stay with my Mum and they would stay with their family and we’d meet up on Boxing Day or the day after or whatever.

And even last year when we were together and both living in the same city and I started to worry about it a bit, everything was sorted because Mum and I went to my sister’s house for Christmas and the boyfriend stayed home.

Christmas has been playing on my mind for a long while. Who would we go to? Should we have people here? (A notion quickly ruled out when I realised that my stress levels could in no way handle people over for my very first Christmas, making 6 cupcakes causes enough mess never mind a turkey.) Should we stay in the flat by ourselves? Should we go to one family one day and the other on Boxing Day? And if so which family would we go to on which day? The possibilities were endless and maths was never my strong point.

Coupled in to this mix is the fact that both the boyfriend and I are wusses when it comes to our mothers. Actually I’ll rephrase that. The boyfriend is a wuss when it comes to his mother, he just can’t say no to her! I am a little bit of a wuss but I also feel my situation is slightly different, my Mum is on her own whereas the boyfriend’s Mum has husband and daughter living with her and another daughter just down the road.

In the end we hit on the perfect compromise. We would open our presents to each other in the flat in the morning (very exciting and also strange, I’ve never had Christmas Day without my Mum before, who will tell me what to do?!), head over to my Mum’s mid-morning/early afternoon and spend some time with her and her friend, who’s staying with her over Christmas, and then head late-afternoon to the boyfriend’s family and stay there the night so the boyfriend can engage in some Christmas tipples.

Perfect. I really believe we were quite smug about the whole thing. We got time with just each other and would be spending time with both families on Christmas Day, everyone’s a winner.

But.

We didn’t think about the Christmas Dinner factor.

Turns out that Mum plans to eat about 1pm and the boyfriend’s family won’t be eating until about 6pm.

That’s right.

This Christmas Day the boyfriend and I will be eating TWO Christmas dinners.

(I’ve been having repeats of the Vicar of Dibley running round in my head ever since)

Whenever I think about it I can actually feel my stomach filling up. I mean I can eat like the best of them and sometimes I wonder if the food is just falling out of the back of my head, rather than going to my stomach because I never seem to be full, but two Christmas dinners? Two?!

You see? No good can come out of compromising.

But also.

No good can come out of potentially offending two Celtic mothers.

Spare me and my stomach a thought on Christmas Day won’t you?

The Secret Blog

Once upon a time a girl had a blog. In fact it was one of those MSN Spaces – remember them?

At first she didn’t really understand what blogging was all about but she was a student and anything that provided a distraction from the serious business of getting a MSc was welcomed.

She didn’t know what to blog about so it was just about random things. So random that she can’t really remember what it was all about. But she made some bloggy friends and discovered a rather marvellous feeling known as “Comment Glow”. She would log on and see that someone had commented and it was good.

But MSN Spaces was not very private and the girl was not very smart and internet savvy. She made the mistake of mentioning the name of the place she worked in a post one day. What the girl didn’t know is that one of her bosses had a gadgety gizmo piece of internet wizardry which highlighted things on the internet that mentioned the company’s name and he found the girl’s blog. But rather than tell her that he’d found the blog, he would creepily read it and then casually mention things that were in the blog in conversation with the girl. It took her a while to cotton on but when she did she felt a little queasy.

So she made it private. But that was rubbish. She quite liked her musings being open to the world but not if people actually knew they were her musings.

Blog number one – closed down.

Then she found somewhere else and started blogging again.

Anything and everything went in there – posts about cats, annoyances about work (being careful to leave out company name references), general musings about life. She had learned her lesson though and it was anonymous. No names, no faces, just that she was a girl and was from Hull. But no-one ever really read it and sometimes she wondered why on earth she was bothering.

The girl’s boyfriend asked if he could read the blog. “Of course” she said “but I should warn you that sometimes I’ll put stuff up on there about us.” Nothing terrible, but if he’d annoyed her a little rant might appear from time to time. “That’s fine” said the boyfriend.

But then she kind of regretted her decision. Because once she knew he was reading it, it automatically altered the way she wrote and the things she wanted to write about. Even though it was anonymous and no-one would know who she was talking about, she just felt a little uncomfortable.

And then the comments started.

They’d only appear on comments that concerned the boyfriend and they were ‘anonymous’ but I was pretty sure who was behind them.

Not the boyfriend, but the woman who wanted him.

He had ‘shared’ my blog with this person and they didn’t have the guts to put their name on their comments.

And in the end, the other woman won.

So the girl used the blog to talk about the breakup. It was the first time she had had her heart broken and her friends weren’t as great as they could have been. Being the only single girl in a group of very coupley couples was tough. She needed an outlet.

So the pain and the hurt came out.

But the comments continued.

And then the e-mails came from the now ex-boyfriend saying that the girl was publicly humiliating him.
a) She wasn’t, she was recounting how he broke her heart,
b) how many times do you have to explain what ‘anonymous’ means, he was the only one who knew it was him, and,
c) why on earth were they sat together reading the blog of his ex-girlfriend?

It made the girl feel horrible inside. The thought that they were sitting there, reading about her life. She didn’t want them to know anything about her life.

Blog number two – closed down.

But the girl missed blogging. She was too lazy to write a real-life diary for a start, typing was much easier. But more than that she missed the idea of writing something which was then ‘out there’ in the blogosphere. Any maybe, one day, someone might read it and think “I know what she’s talking about.”

And she had a fairly momentous occasion coming up. She was moving in with a boy for the first time. If ever there was a time when someone needed an outlet of some description, this was it.

She told her new boyfriend she was starting a blog and said that she wanted to keep it private from him and she explained why and asked him if he minded.

And he didn’t because he was marvellous and wonderful and understanding (and had lovely eyes. But that might be irrelevant.).

So she started blogging about living with a boy. Except sometimes there wasn’t that much to blog about living with a boy because it actually went far smoother than she could ever have imagined. So it started being about other things. Like cats. And trees.

And at the beginning she wondered why she was bothering again. No-one ever came and visited.

And then one person did.

And then the girl realised she’d been doing it all wrong. Sometimes she can be a little selfish (she blames this on being the youngest child and sort of an only child because her siblings were much older than her, it’s probably not the best of combinations) and she was also an idiot. You can’t just expect people to read your blog can you? You have to invest, you have to put the time in (perhaps a little too much time) and start looking about for other peoples’ blogs and commenting on them and introducing yourself. You can’t just stand in the corner of a party and expect everyone to come over and talk to you.

Very slowly the girl found more bloggy friends and would get very excited if she ever got a ‘follower’ and would tell the boyfriend “ARGH! Someone likes me!” And the boyfriend would smile and say “That’s brilliant honey.” Probably thinking inside, “This girlfriend of mine has mental problems.”

She soon found herself immersed in the lives of total strangers and wanting to share more of her life with people she had never met. And sometimes she would tell the boyfriend what she was writing about and sometimes she would even show him certain posts (usually those concerning the visitors), but would be very careful to keep everything about the blog hidden so he couldn’t find it.

And it’s not because she doesn’t trust him. It’s because she likes having something that’s all her own.

Also if she wants to blog about how it annoys her that he doesn’t clean properly, she doesn’t want him to read it and take it heart because he’s nice like that and it’s only for fun. To be honest if he really wanted to find it I'm sure he could and if he does then that's fine, I just don't need to know that he knows about it.

Sometimes she thinks she should reveal herself and whack a photo up there. After all, her bloggy friends still wouldn’t know who she was, she’d just be a face instead of a picture of a sunrise.

But she’s still a little bit afraid. Maybe in time she’ll grow in confidence and have more courage to put a face to the words.

But for now let’s hope that the third blog’s a charm.

(And to those of you that read my wafflings, thank you so much. Thank you for being interested in my life and allowing me to hear about yours. I still get the “Comment Glow” whenever I check my e-mails and see that one of you has responded to a post of mine, and you do all feel like friends, although I feel a little silly saying that.)

Would you like a side of child with that?

A while ago I vowed to become a better family member and staying true to my word I arranged to go and see my brother. I was duly booked in to the diary for a month in advance. How privileged I felt. (Stop it, you're supposed to be nice person!) Anyway off the boyfriend and I went to York this weekend to see my brother and his family, including my youngest nephew, who's about 18 months old.

Now I’ve been an Auntie since I was 13 years old which is good because it’s been fun being a young aunt but has also meant that I’ve had the best natural contraceptive you could ever get. Seeing my sister pregnant and dealing with my nephews was all I ever needed to see to bring it screaming home to me that kids. are. hard. work.

Now , from time to time, my mind turns to the babies. I have friends that now have them and when my brother and sister were my age they both had children. Maybe I’m getting ready?

Nope.

My brother and his wife are shadows of their former selves. They’re having a nightmare with my littlest nephew who is currently refusing to sleep through the night, having the most horrendous temper tantrums over the smallest things and just generally being a pain in the backside. They admitted that at the moment they can’t go out anywhere because they couldn’t inflict him on anyone to look after. And if they do go out they can’t drink and have a bit of a laugh because dealing with him plus a hangover is a no-go.

This all rang bells with me. Last week as I lay dying on the settee wanting to peel my skin off because I felt so bad it did actually cross my mind. What would you do if you had a child right now? How would you cope? The answer is not very well, considering that a trip to Asda on that day nearly led me to have a nervous breakdown.

I’m also not sure that I’m ready to become one of those parents. You know the ones I mean. The ones who can only talk about their child and believe that you are as fascinated by their bowel movements as they are. The boyfriend and I sat through what felt like 4 hours of holiday footage at my brother’s which consisted of my youngest nephew eating ice cream, dancing to a song, sitting about....now I love him to bits but that’s a little bit too much for me. And you run out of encouraging noises to make after the first 20 minutes.

Add those feelings together and I think I have my answer really don’t I?

Not. Ready.

Also how could I ever think I could be ready to pro-create when I have trouble managing these two furry people?! They’re actually kind of similar, I have enough trouble with them keeping me up at night, and wrecking the flat generally – if this is a simulation I think I’ve failed!

(But then I could probably bore people senseless with videos and pictures of these two....)

How to cure a hangover.

You might have guessed from my last post that I was the tiniest bit hungover on Saturday this weekend. I should have known it was going to happen, my last words to the boyfriend as I left to go to the pub was "I won't be late".

I mean it really all depends on your definition of late. In between finishing my undergraduate degree and starting my Masters degree I spent a year back in Hull, working to fund the upcoming degree. I did work all the time but I also went out all the time and 'late' by my definition meant about 4am.

2am was just a regular old coming in time. But whatever...

I have tried and tested many hangover remedies in my time. I think I hit on some quite good ones this weekend.

1. The crisp method

A very good tried and tested method of old. I rely heavily on this remedy, to the extent that I will make sure that I have crisps in the house before I go out. I'm pretty sure there is a medical explanation that backs me up on this one. Something about salt. Although I thought that a hangover is caused by dehydration and I thought salt dehydrated you....anyway I'm no Dr but I know I felt rough and half way down a big bag of bacon rashers I felt a hell of a lot better.

2. The good boyfriend method

He did his job well this weekend. No berating or laughing at me for the state that I was in. He supplied me with bacon in the morning, bacon rashers mid-morning, left me to sleep in the afternoon, sorted out dinner in the evening, put in (and unloaded) two rounds of washing and was generally wonderful.

3. The something to keep you occupied method

I felt too tired for reading, I didn't think I'd be able to concentrate on what was going on. So I decided for my fall-back 'keeping me occupied habit'. Cross stitch. The stitch of cross. And it did keep me occupied. Oh and by the way, Christmas has already begun in this household...

4. The baking method

Definitely one to try only if you're not feeling queasy. Luckily the hangover was not on the borderline of vomiting so late afternoon I decided that it was time to get in the kitchen. I needed to feel as if I'd been productive and hadn't wasted an entire day. Also Autumn is most definitely in the air and I needed something comforting to keep me feeling warm. However I was well aware that I wasn't up for a grand design so I went for the easiest thing I can do - a bit of apple crumble.

Add all those together and you will have your hangover cured.

(you could possibly need the help of some paracetemol during the day)

How clean is your house?

My name is The Girl and I'm a clean freak.

Phew.

Glad I got that off my chest.

I really do like things clean and I know that there is more to life than having a clean house (don't worry, I'm not so bad that I would cancel a night out to clean the toilet) but dirt and mess just stresses me out.

I think it's mess that bothers me more than actual dirt - as long as there isn't crap lying about everywhere I'm happy to leave the hoovering for another week.

Most of our spats usually happen over cleaning though. And it's probably not what you think - it's not that he doesn't do any cleaning, it's that he does and either a) gets in the way or b) does it wrong.

The thing is I'm really happy to clean. I like it. It gives me the greatest sense of satisfaction to sit down in a nicely hoovered and dusted room or walk into a sparkly kitchen. It makes me feel calm and serene. The boyfriend however is not really a great cleaner - I remember his room before we moved in together, actually I have nightmares about it. It was were dust and piles of clothes came to die.

However he's not so bad in the flat, mainly because he knows what I'm like so he does try to do his bit. He does need to be prompted - usually I just need to start cleaning and it won't be long before he appears and starts waving a duster around.

I do appreciate his attempts to help but sometimes it would be better if he just left me to it, mainly because I usually end up going round after him and doing the bits he missed.

For example...

The boyfriend took charge of dusting the living room one day. Excellent. A couple of hours later I happened to be stood by the window and looked closely at the TV.

"Erm. Did you dust the screen?"

"Oh....erm....no I didn't do that bit."

Okaaay. TV. Fairly large dominant item in the room. Not dusted. I cast my eyes nervously over to the shelves containing all our DVDs and books.

"And did you dust all the shelves?"

"Erm...."

To this day I'm unsure of what he did in the room. Maybe he just showed the duster to the living room and expected the dust to jump on it?

No. I know I shouldn't complain. I should simply bask in the fact that I have a boyfriend that is willing to help me with the household chores. But....you know.....I'm ok with it. I don't mind being a 50s stepford wife in this case.

Now where did I put that cream cleaner?....

Come dine with me

I do most of the cooking in our little household of two. It's not that we're being terribly traditional or anything it's convenience more than anything. The boyfriend's actually a great cook and really enjoys doing it but he doesn't get home until nearly 7pm and if we waited for him to cook, we'd be eating way too late for my stomach.

I'm kind of getting into it but it's a bit of a pain to be honest. Just having to come up with something new to cook every evening. I'm trying to get better and I being a little more inventive, but life was much easier at uni, when I lived by myself. I didn't mind having salad and a baked potato 5 days in a row. But I'm trying to mix it up a little.

However I do a little private dance for joy on the nights that I don't have to cook. Last night was one such night as I was off to the cinema and was gone before the boyfriend got home.

"You'll have to look after yourself!!" I trilled to him the evening before.

The boyfriend's version of "Looking after himself" is to go to the nearest takeaway (and when I say nearest it's literally across the road) and get something horrific. Last night was no exception - I opened the bin in the kitchen to see the tell-tale polystyrene tray lying there, the poor excuse of salad that came with the donner meat, rejected and poking out of the side.

I do wish he would look after himself a little better. It's bad enough that he smokes (yes I know! But only about 6 a day and I'm working on him) but he drinks too much coffee and doesn't eat food which is bursting with nutritional value.

"But you can cook so why don't you just cook for yourself when you get in?"

"I can't be bothered when I get in"

I inwardly sighed and then decided to try another tack. Logic. It never fails.

"Well what you do if you lived on your own?" I said. Aha. The smug levels were high, he'd have to be realistic and answer this one I thought to myself.

"Well I'd be lonely" he said with a pretty mischievious smile on his face.

Smart move Counsellor.

Case closed.

Ding! Ding! Next round

So the next big stage in the relationship is coming up....

THE HOLIDAY

We've conquered living together (well apart from a few issues around cleaning, watching tv, tidying up....yeah quite a few issues actually...) so now it's time for the holiday together.

To be honest it's easy peasy to live with someone because it's not like we see each other all the time, he's out of the house just after 6am and doesn't come back until nearly 7pm and then there's the computer to play games on, televisions to watch, pictures to cross stitch, blogs to write so even when we're both home we're not in each other's pockets. And there always seems to be something going on on a weekend (which is why there are still things that need doing in the flat) so we don't actually spend that much quality alone alone time together.

Well I'm about to get all the alone time I want with 7 whole days coming up in each other's company.

And not just each other's company...

All his family's company as well...13 of them to be precise.

Yep I'm being serious. All it takes is 3 siblings to have boyfriends, girlfriends, husbands and children, throw in a couple of half siblings and a couple of grandparents and you have the recipe for a possibly very chaotic holiday.

Whlist I'm looking forward to getting away, really looking forward to it in fact, I'd be lying if I said there wasn't a certain amount of trepidation that I'm feeling. I get on with everyone in his family really well but I don't know how well I can get on with them for a week. Non-stop. 24-7.

They're great they're just....very....fussy. I'm from a non-fussy family. Everyone does their own thing and gets on with it and there's no great pressure to do anything, everything will just work out. My boyfriend's family are pretty much the complete opposite - everything's a drama and there's a lot of "Well you can do this but you don't have to do it. You don't have to do it at all." (Meaning that if you don't do it you can be almost guaranteed a sulk) This is compounded by the fact that my boyfriend is pretty much a wuss when it comes to his mother. He can stand up in front of judge and jury and argue a case but he absolutely cannot say no to Mummy. It's infuriating. I can't be the one that says no - that'll make me the horrible witch who's stolen her son!

My hope is that in a crowd of 14 people, no-one's going to miss 2 of them if they sneak away for a little bit...