New Year, New Topics – To Tell or Not to Tell?

Ugh. I feel like I start every form of communication with other people with some variation of that noise now. I had planned to finish last year with some Christmas themed blogs and maybe some more book reviews, but between being a key worker and not being able to do anything remotely fun or enjoyable when I wasn’t at work (bloody Covid); I really found myself struggling to think of content which would be even remotely positive. Despite being a huge pessimist in my day-to-day life, I’ve always tried to make blog content positive, because who wants to read a load of negative waffle? We have the news for that. But then again, trying to find positivity in the current climate isn’t always the easiest, and so I let my blog fall into a state of neglect not dissimilar to Cair Paravel at the start of ‘Prince Caspian’ – forgotten for what feels like a thousand years. So, I’m going to try and breathe some new life into this site, and sometimes a change is as good as a rest, so I thought I’d give some new content a try. (Disclaimer, book reviews and all things literary will still continue as normal, I’m reading for another blog tour as we speak, so please don’t run away, little booklings – you can just skip past this crap if it’s not for you!)

Having said all of this, I now look like a total ungrateful so-and-so for saying I was struggling to think of positive things to talk about for three months, because whilst I was writing my last post I received the wonderful news that I’m pregnant! Not literally – I don’t generally blog on the loo. Not least of all because my laptop isn’t insured against water damage, but hopefully you get the point. The idea of a pregnancy blog seemed appealing initially, but then I became quite hesitant because, well, there are already so many of those out there that straying into more than one or two can feel like getting lost in a car dealership – so many technical terms that I don’t understand, everything looks basically the same and someone is always trying to sell me some inexplicable and confusing product which will allegedly change my life. And the further I looked into it, the more it seemed like you have to pick a side when it comes to pregnancy/mummy blogs. Essentially, you’re either a bit crap and proud of it (aka the ‘real’ mums), or you’re a Mary Poppins type who has a storage solution for everything, a perfectly tidy, middle-class home and can turn any household object into a wonderfully educational activity for the whole family (aka the ‘Instagram’ mums). What if we want to be a bit in the middle? Some days I eat in excess of my five a day and manage to save £70 on the must-have breast pump whilst out for a power walk (my proudest moment yet), and other days I eat cookie dough and Doritos instead of my evening meal. I swing between both ‘mummy’ camps, sometimes multiple times in one day, and if that’s not marketable, then that’s fine.

There are a lot of divisive topics in all things pregnancy and baby, so I’m going to try my very hardest not to fall into those controversial rabbit holes, and nor do I profess to be any kind of expert – I’m muddling through with remote midwife appointments and absolutely no face to face antenatal classes, so if anything the ‘class of 2021’ mums are going to be even less prepared than those who ventured before us. But, all I can offer is my own experience, and hopefully it doesn’t offend anyone.

The decision about who and when to tell about a pregnancy is something which I don’t think there is a right or wrong answer to. I’m now comfortably into my second trimester and only made the first reference to it on social media yesterday. I thought about keeping my pregnancy off social media entirely, and absolutely see the benefits of that, but ultimately it just felt like the right moment for me to address it, and I didn’t want to be ducking out of photos in months to come when things get a bit harder to hide (we’re still very much in big-jumper weather and just had Christmas, so I don’t think anyone had really questioned my slightly thicker middle yet!). I certainly wasn’t in a hurry to do a big showy announcement; not that there is anything wrong with celebrating your news in that way, but having spent a year feeling horribly bitter and resentful every time I saw yet another beaming couple holding the standard ultrasound photo and thinking ‘for f-‘s sake, they probably weren’t even trying!’ I felt a strange sense of loyalty to my past self and everyone who might still be experiencing those feelings. As if, somehow, by finally getting pregnant after that monthly vicious circle of hoping, allowing myself to wonder and then feeling a crushing disappointment, I’d sold out and abandoned all my previous loyalties, which, is utterly ridiculous.

So conflicted I was by this, that I really didn’t know how or when to tell my friends and family. Of course I told my husband straight away, possibly too soon actually, as he was just parking his van up at work and noticed a barrage of calls from me. He has since admitted that he spent the rest of that day unable to concentrate on anything at all! I actually saw two separate friends that same day and was so worried that I would end up blurting it out by accident; I was convinced that they could tell straight away, but I’ve since been assured that my poker face is better than I previously thought. There is a dominant school of thought that you should wait until after 12 weeks to tell people about a pregnancy, because of risks around miscarriage, which I was quite aware of but wasn’t sure if I could hold out quite that long. But, my husband and I agreed that there was some merit to waiting at least a few weeks “just in case”. I still don’t know what our “just in case” logic was really about, because I now know that there’s no way to really confirm an unborn baby’s health until you have a scan (usually at 12 weeks), but it seemed the sensible thing to do. Unfortunately, as 1 in 4 women sadly know, sometimes not telling people inadvertently makes things harder later down the line, for the exact same reason why many people choose not to tell anyone.

I have absolutely no desire to turn this into a cry for sympathy because, as horrible as that feeling was, I am fortunate enough to now be in my second trimester and in possession of several photos of a blurry, yet very active little baby. I have a lovely group of friends, but one in particular is my ‘in sickness and in health’ or, more accurately, ‘in my worst, most reckless decisions and in my sensible and proud ones’ go-to person. So, having woken up a few days after seeing that little blue + sign (and four other versions of it – we wanted to be properly sure), to what looked like a nose bleed but from an entirely different orifice, I knew there was only one person who could realistically calm me down and say something helpful. Of course I told my husband straight away, but it’s quite difficult for the person who is in that situation with you to really provide reassurance; because they’re just as clueless and panicked as you are. This particular friend is no longer phased by my ‘call me right now, something has happened’ messages, nor is she surprised by their totally random subject matter any more (that’s what eleven years of speaking daily does for a friendship), but having the ‘I think I’m losing the baby you had no idea I was having’ conversation frankly just added a totally unnecessary level of complexity and confusion to an already awful situation. Backtracking to explain when I had found out, and how far along I now was, although this was necessary to provide context, was an aspect of that conversation which anyone would naturally prefer to leave out.

Again, the last thing I want is to make this into a sob-story, because despite an agonising few days, an emergency scan with some absolutely wonderful and supportive NHS staff the following week all but erased this awful chapter from our story. But, I certainly would not have made it through those few days without having another person who was entirely separate to the situation to speak to. I spent the last evening before I was allowed to re-test at her house drinking tea in total silence, but I will never be able to thank her enough for that. My husband made the decision not to tell anyone in his circles about it until after our minds were put at rest, which I completely respect and understand – everyone is different after all and there is no right or wrong way to deal with such an awful situation. However, it would be a lie to say that his decision didn’t take a toll whilst he was in the midst of it.

I’ll never know what my next step would have been if things hadn’t had a happy ending for us; maybe I would never have discussed it with anyone, and my husband, friend and I may have taken it to our graves. Or, I might have told my nearest and dearest when the time was right. As of right now, I’m incredibly lucky that I didn’t have to make that decision this time, but all I would say to anyone in those early ‘to tell or not to tell’ weeks, is that having even just one person who was separate to the situation to share the load and distract me at the necessary moments, was probably the only thing which allowed me to put one foot in front of the other when I needed to walk into that emergency scan.

As a footnote, having just proof-read this post, it definitely reads more negative and doom and gloom than I had intended. I feel the need to again add that I am now well into my second trimester and experiencing a wonderful, healthy pregnancy. My first trimester was, despite this obvious setback, on the whole pretty straightforward and nowhere near as horrible as some people’s are. So I do feel very fortunate for all of this; and to those 1 in 4 women, you all deserve a medal at the very least. As awful as it was to have a scare and those few days of uncertainty, I still had hope in the back of my mind that nothing was certain. For those who aren’t so lucky, you all deserve the world and more, seriously.

https://www.tommys.org/get-involved/campaigns/tell-me-why

Tommys’ ‘Tell Me Why’ campaign has a great deal of support and advice available for anyone affected by pregnancy and baby loss.

Why Does Writing Make Me Feel Naked?

Obviously, writing is something that I generally enjoy; I wouldn’t have gone to the trouble of setting up a blog if I didn’t (although, as always, I’ve neglected it for the first two months of this year – we’ll come back to that). However, recently, writing has become like every relationship I had when I was a teenager in that it has swung like a pendulum between being the best thing in the world, the only thing I want to focus on for entire days and nights at a time, and simultaneously the worst thing ever and something which I deeply regret ever starting. I think that is probably something which everyone has experienced at some point in their life; we’ve all had that one hideously long job application form or academic project (I’m looking at you, dissertation which I still wince at the sight of), but frig me, creative writing is another beast entirely. I’ve probably said it before, but will most definitely be saying it again, full time writers do not get enough credit.

So, as you’ve probably now guessed, the main reason for having recently ghosted this blog is not because I didn’t feel like writing – quite the opposite. No, I’m not going to discuss it on here because said project which has consumed the last two months of my life is probably totally rubbish anyway and will never come to anything. But, in completing it, I had to put myself through the hideous experience of actually allowing other people to read something which I had written. Again, full time writers do not get enough credit. Unfortunately, reading and writing have a weird, dichotomous relationship. Much like the chicken and the egg, the existence of one implies the other, and so the completion of any writing project is, although satisfying, terrifying because it brings the inevitable necessity of having to let someone else read it. As an anxiety-riddled introvert, this is basically my nightmare.

Even though a significant portion of my ‘day job’ involves writing really long reports and recommendations which get scrutinised by lots of other people, anticipating feedback on any of those has never felt half as daunting as it did to allow someone to read something which I’d made up in my head without any prior instruction. Honestly, the whole thing had me feeling a bit exposed; every word of this project had existed somewhere in my subconscience and was transmitted onto paper (or Microsoft Word, this is 2020 after all) through the filters of my brain and personality, so allowing someone else to cast an opinion over it felt like I was about to appear on ‘Naked Attraction’. And, just when I was getting semi-comfortable with the idea of strangers reading it, I then found myself in the hideously awkward position of needing a close friend to fact check it and give feedback. Again, somehow it felt even more excruciatingly awkward having a friend see it rather than a total stranger; much like being on ‘Naked Attraction’. For the record, I have never been on that programme and have no intention of ever participating; I also don’t actively watch it except when it makes an appearance on ‘Gogglebox’ (which I watch religiously), but if I ever found myself in a stituation where I had to be naked in front of people where it wasn’t medically necessary, I think it would probably be easier to do so in the presence of total strangers whom I would likely never see again, rather than someone I already knew, which would most likely lead to a lifetime of uncomfortable eye contact and avoidance of each other at social gatherings.

Basically, writing on a blog is fairly painless, since I don’t usually know who has or hasn’t read it, and if people do, then they generally seem to keep their opinions to themselves, which is preferred; but writing something which needs to be seen by other people, is really scary and made me feel completely exposed. To make matters worse, I had to leave said project with my friend so that she has time to read it; cue at least a week of heightened anxiety through fretting over what she’s thinking as she reads it. I often say that I would love to be a full time writer, but if this experience is anything to go by, I might need a thicker skin before I attempt it, because the idea of something I wrote being readily available for other people (including my friends and family) to judge, has me feeling like I’m in that horrible dream where you turn up to school with no clothes on. Forget charging into burning buildings or fighting crime, introverted writers are the real brave ones; and I don’t know how any of you do it.

2019 in Review

Yet again, I’ve managed to take an accidental two months off from even looking at this blog. No, once again, I have no legitimate explanation as to why I keep doing this; all I can really say in my defence is that although I love the festive season, it’s a lot of bloomin’ work. I have almost a whole turkey, half a pecan pie and fifteen pigs in blankets in my fridge as proof of this. And as for the pine needles matted into my dog’s fur and sprinkled around the house like confetti, I’m now just pretending not to notice. Still, it’s only once a year, eh? (Low key wish I’d done a Christmas with the Kranks and skipped it all though; joking…a bit).

Anyway, it’s been a pretty big year for me; although a year is a very long time when you really think about it so it’s not actually that surprising that I managed to cram a lot in. Still, I’ve been doing some reflecting, as we all seem to do at this time of year (though it’s mostly fuelled by Buck’s Fizz and a lack of anything better to do in the absence of anything worth watching on TV), and have compiled a list of the main life lessons I’ve learned this year, to pass on to you as a gift of wisom because I’m just nice like that.

Wedding Planning is like Childbirth

Okay so I haven’t actually ever given birth, so I can’t confirm this with ny real certainty, but if we can accept the premise that childbirth is painful and horrible while it’s happening but produces something lovely at the end, which is so lovely that the mother forgets all the pain, then this analogy works. My struggle with planning my wedding this year has been well documented, and whilst I think it’s really important to acknowledge that it can be quite a lonely and really challenging time and never dismissed as “one of those things” we must endure, the one piece of advice I would give to anyone in that scenario is that all the horrible bits are quickly forgotten. I would say this is the one piece of advice which I wish I had been given, but every married person I know told me this at the time, yet I just chose to ignore it whilst I was in the midst of a stress akin to the level of pain during the ‘crowning’ phase of birth. I genuinely thought that the damage done to relationships between myself and various family members and friends during the hard parts was irreprable, but that was honestly forgotten by about three seconds into the vows, and I was having normal conversations with said individuals within forty eight hours of getting married; as if the last ten months of absolute warfare had not happened at all. Trust me, just wade through that mud because it does get easier and all is forgotten.

Pretty much everyone has mental health issues of some kind

Mental health is one of those things that we talk about all the time on social media to try and “break the stigma”, which is great, but unfortunately I think sometimes it’s like the polar opposite to your address and phone number; something we’re happy to discuss with strangers on the internet but not our own family and friends. For various reasons which I won’t bore you with, I found myself in a position this year of needing some extra support to feel ‘okay’ again, and each time I mustered up the courage to try and explain it to a friend, colleague or family member; every time I was met with some variation of “oh yeah that happened to me too” or “oh that’s nothing, when I was in that position I…”. It could just be that I’m lucky enough to be surrounded by people who are supportive, but even people I don’t know that well met this with the same response. Basically, if I’d known it was pretty much a normal, run of the mill thing to have those kinds of issues at some point in life, I wouldn’t have ignored it for so long and let it get worse; so don’t do that if you find yourself in that position at any point.

Smear tests are fine

I’m not even going to bother labouring that point. This year I hit the age bracket to be eligible for smear tests (when did the things you become eligible for on birthdays stop being fun? I’m guessing at 18). I wasn’t particularly nervous but honestly it was so uneventful in every single way that it’s barely worth mentioning, except to make the point that they’re not an issue at all and I don’t understand why some people turn it into one.

Eating healthily and exercising actually does work

Again, this sounds obvious, but like most people I’ve spent a lot of time over the years trying to instantly lose weight or tone up in some way through the next fad – I have a Nutribullet in the cupboard gathering dust to prove it. For various reasons, including a desire to not die at fifty if it can be helped, I started doing a mix of different exercise classes and eating a bit better on weekdays (weekends are junk food time; and that is a habit I will never be able to change); and quite unexpectedly became fitter and healthier. I don’t know when it exactly happened, I just sort of noticed one day that I could get up the stairs without stopping for breath and could fit into clothes a bit more easily. Whilst I realise that my variation of specific eating patterns and exercise routines would not be healthy or advisable for everyone, I’m just making the point that it is literally that simple. It takes a while yes, but there is no magic Joe Wicks-inspired, keto-ing or Nutribullet-ing formula; it’s pretty much just eating better and moving more. Who knew? Certainly not me.

If you’re not sure about eggs, put them in water

I’m not just mentioning this on account of my love of using prime numbers and therefore a desire to include five points, but also because this is a genuinely useful life hack I learned this year. My uncertainty about whether eggs are good to use always seems to occur on a Sunday before 10 a.m; specifically before the shops are open so I have no real other option than to use them. Well, unless I were to not have Sunday morning pancakes, which would be entirely ridiculous. But yes, fill a bowl with water and if the egg is off it will float to the top, if it’s fine it will stay at the bottom, and if it’s okay but not the freshest, it will stay at the bottom but stand up vertically. You’re welcome.

Bullet Journaling

“Mindfulness” is the buzz word at the moment. Actually it has been for a while, and I will happily raise my hands and confess to the fact that I am a sheep and follow the ‘mindfullness’ crowd by reposting motivational quotes about ‘making time for you’ and ‘being in the moment’ whenever I can; which is entirely hypocritical because my idea of savouring the moment is having a slightly slower walk back up the path after taking the bin out. Which, usually I just find tedious and an unnecessary waste of time after 0.5 seconds. I had an hour long, full body massage last week (not a typical Thursday afternoon for me, it was a post-wedding, mourning the loss of my Thomas Cook honeymoon treat), and even in a darkened room where the only sound is music specifically engineered to relax you, with someone physically relieving the tension in my body, I spent the hour thinking “am I relaxed enough yet?”. Ah, the perils of being an impatient, anxiety-ridden overthinker. However, despite being unable to achieve a state of even moderate relaxation without first receiving a general anaesthetic, I recently tried my hand at bullet journaling.

Bullet journals are something I have admired from afar for a while now, and by ‘afar’ I mean by looking at my Instagram feed and thinking “that’s too faffy and technical for me”, much like the satisfyingly organised homes and perfectly contoured make-up. I spent an embarrassingly long time researching which bullet journal to get before realising that they are all, essentially, just paper. Having said that, I’m not a monster so of course I spent money on a lovely smooth, pretty new notebook in which to do my bullet-journaling; along with some fun stickers because you’re never too old for stickers.

What I noticed about the more expensive, more technical bullet journals was that they were mostly segmented and had different prompts to help you think about what to write, but there are a lot of ways to manage this without spending a fortune. A lot of ‘fancier’ bullet journals are divided up by day, but that’s essentially just a desk planner or a weekly diary – readily available for less than a couple of quid if you look in the right place. I personally didn’t want to get into a weekly view, it felt too similar to planning my work schedule, and I like the idea of being able to close the page on each day – I haven’t re-read any of my previous entries, I just don’t find it beneficial or enjoyable. My journal came with some emjoi stickers (how very 2019), which I really liked, and prompted me to buy some specific ‘bullet journal stickers’ with little quotes and mantras on. To get the juices flowing, I start each day’s entry by choosing an emoji sticker and a quote which best fit that day, then using the written part to elaborate a bit on why. Even if my emoji for the day is the crying face because it’s been horrible, I’ll jot down a summary of why it was so horrible even if it’s just “busy day at work, am exhausted”. Something about putting it in that onto the paper and closing the page does, to my pleasant surprise, make me feel a bit lighter. It’s like that bit in Harry Potter when Dumbledore uses his wand to drag thoughts out of his head and put them in the water – who doesn’t love some de-cluttering?

The easiest counter-productivity traps to fall into with bullet journaling which would then put you off doing it again are to dwell too much on the negatives, and to write too much. I’ve managed to tackle both of those with some nifty tricks which were so useful I may have to consider copyright. First, although it’s perfectly fine and sometimes beneficial to write down negative things, for every negative point about my day I make myself write a “but”. For example, if I’ve had a difficult day at work I tend to follow it with “but, I did my best and that’s all that can be expected”. Ending on a positive definitely made me see the ‘point’ of bullet journaling, because writing a list of everything that was rubbish about your day is quite draining and just makes you feel worse. So, keep that little weighing scale of negatives and positives even.

Also, for someone like me who is a rambler (someone who talks a lot, not an old person who likes getting lost in the countryside), it’s very tempting to start writing War and Peace and listing every aspect and emotion of your day. To overcome that, I started being quite deliberate with the time slot I allocated for the journaling. While setting a timer seems like a nice idea, I personally would just stare at the timer and feel like I was taking an exam which would be totally counter-productive, but I’ve started using a limited time slot like waiting for the bath to run or for my dinner to cook – there’s a clear end point but it’s not a race against the clock. I did see someone else post online about how they like to see it as a challenge to write something that will summarise their day in thirty seconds, as if there was a trailer for the film version of that particular day in your life. That is also a fun and non-restrictive way to think about it; but sadly I’m from the North and talk really fast so could probably still get a feature length film out in thirty seconds.

So, after doing some research on bullet journaling, and from doing my own, I came to the conclusion that it is a genuinely useful and healthy habit to get into, but that it really needs to be bespoke to the person doing it. I’ve seen some journals online which have so many boxes, each demanding to be filled in with separate thoughts or ideas, or some which set targets for the week which, to me, just seems like a trap for self-induced guilt like New Year’s Resolutions. Although I started off by forcing myself to do this each day, it has quickly become a habit, and a useful one at that.

“Reader, I married him”

As now seems to be a ‘Clyde’s Corner’ tradition, I’ll begin with this month’s attempted justification for my lack of recent blogging activity. At least this time I have a legitimate excuse because….drum roll please….I got married last week! Yes, the ‘Bridezilla Diaries’ element of this blog will sadly be no more, so let’s make sure it has a good send off. Planning my wedding was, in many ways, the worst experience of my life – it plunged my mental health and relationship with my now-husband to depths so low they could only be seen by the Kraken in Pirates of the Caribbean. I came very close to falling out with pretty much everyone in my life at some stage or another, did not sleep for weeks at a time and seriously discussed cancelling the whole thing on at least four or five occasions that I can remember (probably more). People kept telling me “it’ll all be worth it in the end” and I just could not conceive of that actually being the case, especially since the majority of people providing this reassurance were either unmarried or had had much smaller weddings than mine. However, I can confirm, as a married person who recently had the experience of a wedding (they do say you forget trauma if you talk about it too long after it happened), I can confirm that, if done correctly, it is absolutely and utterly worth it (even if it is so windy that your veil hits the registrar directly in the face during the vows).

Like Christmas, there was so much anticipation and build-up to the day that, despite it being utterly amazing, I never really got ‘the feeling’ of it being my wedding day. Even whilst walking down the aisle with all my friends and family staring awkwardly at me, my heels sinking into the mud, veil blowing all over the place and my husband sobbing uncontrollably in the distance, it still didn’t feel like it was my wedding. That is one thing which I do wish other married people had told me – ultimately, it is just a day with your friends and family where you all have a party together, and that’s fine! That is still a great day, but if you’re waiting and waiting for it to ‘hit’ you that it’s your wedding, you’re probably going to be disappointed. I think I’m still in denial that it even happened and wasn’t all just a dream, because let’s face it, moshing out to Evanescence and My Chemical Romance in a gorgeous dress and sand-covered Converse is literally the dream. Or maybe it’s because marriage is too big a thing to really imagine; like outer space, it’s just too mind boggling to really think about so in the same way we describe infinite space as being “pretty big”, my wedding day was “pretty amazing”.

Having said that, it was a wedding, we have a big family and (let’s face it) this is me, so obvioiusly there was some drama. The night before, I remember sitting in my beautiful big room, finally able to enjoy some peace and quiet after spending all day and night with friends and family, and just sobbing uncontrollably. Every worry which I’d managed to suppress during the months leading up to it, every snide comment I’d faced and the overwhelming feeling that I was being a massive, selfish diva by having a wedding at all just came pouring out of my eyeballs like the lava at the end of Hunchback of Notre Dame. Through every conflict I’d kept reminding myself that it was ‘our day’ and ‘we should do it how we want’, but when the push came to shove I felt a horrible sense of guilt that the day ahead should be about other people, and that I was letting everyone else down. Inevitably, as is the case with most weddings, we did disappoint people in some ways – there is always something more that people want to do for you, or some other way they want to be involved and you do have to become comfortable saying “no”, which is really hard to do to family and friends.

However, despite the guilt, everyone who attended my wedding (even people who I never expected to admit it) made some reference to how amazing it was that me and my husband had had the day that we wanted, and how it had been ‘so us’. At the time I was obviously just so relieved and happy that everyone was enjoying the day as much as I was, and revelling in the fact that people finally understood why I’d made the decisions I had in the run-up; but now I’ve had time to come back down to Earth and reflect on the day, I do find it a bit sad that people had to say that at all. Of course the wedding is about the couple getting married – without them the day wouldn’t be happening at all! It’s 2019 and usually couples pay for their own wedding (or at least a large part of it), so where is the sense in dropping the average spend of £30,000 on a day that you’re not going to enjoy? It should be a total given that it’s the couple’s day, and I do genuinely find it sad that people were surprised by this – if people had accepted this a year ago I would have been saved from so much anguish.

Our day was made completely perfect by our wonderful venue and suppliers (in particular our amazing photographers who ensured we had free drinks in our hands at all times throughout the day), so I feel incredibly lucky to have made it through what is arguably the biggest, most stressful day of a person’s life, without a long list of regrets; but the one thing I would have absolutely done differently is how we managed the day before. Our wedding venue is an hour and a half drive away from our home, so a large chunk of the day before was spent packing our car and driving up the A1 with some family, and since a lot of our friends were staying locally we arranged to meet for dinner the night before to catch up. Although this was a lovely meal and a great time spent catching up with people and introducing everyone who hadn’t met before, I was totally knackered. Being tired before your wedding has even properly started is never a good thing, and I basically didn’t see my husband-to-be at all. We also had beautiful rooms booked and paid for, which we had no time to really enjoy. I remember settling into bed, later than I would’ve liked, dimming the lights and getting tucked under the covers with my book and thinking “I wish I had more than an hour to sit and enjoy this”. It’s a truth universally acknowledged that you see very little of your new spouse on the wedding day, and even though our venue were wonderful about ensuring we had enough time to enjoy each other’s company on the day, I do wish we’d had some quiet time together to relax and really take it all in the night before.

So, much like getting into the North Sea on a windy day, your wedding day really isn’t that bad once you get into it, and even though it can feel like you’ve royally pissed off every person you’ve ever met throughout the planning process, it is indeed worth it in the end; as long as you stick to your guns and blow everyone’s naive minds by ‘having the day you really want’. And if it all goes a bit pear shaped; photos can be edited, most people probably weren’t paying enough attention to notice the mistakes anyway, and you can always just get divorced.

Exhibit A of things going wrong, aka “we did not notice this cake has ribbon on each layer”

25 Lessons Learned in 25 Years

Now, obviously I’ve learned more than twenty five things in my twenty five years spent on this Earth; but I don’t think writing about how I learned to walk, drive or use a ‘big girl’ toilet would make very interesting reading. So, in honour of my twenty fifth journey around the sun, I decided to compile twenty five useful things which I have learned at some point in my life, in the hope that it might offer some assistance to your own. Although, if you’ve followed this blog for a while you will probably have gathered that my life is a hot mess and in no way an example of success or inner peace, so this may also serve as a useful guide of twenty five things to avoid doing, for fear of becoming like me.

Drink water.
It sounds obvious, but it makes a huge difference to everything; skin, waistline, staves off the dreaded cystitis, wakes you up, and it’s free – what’s not to love?
Take vitamins.
Obviously consult a doctor before taking anything you aren’t completely sure is safe for you, but I swear by Zinc for making a cold recover quickly and taking Vitamin D every day last Winter gave me a new lease of life.
Quality is more important than quantity when it comes to friends.
I have probably four or five friends, and that’s it. No wide circle of acquaintances, no huge group chats, I simply can’t be bothered. All of my friends know how often I pee, where I would go if I needed to go off grid after killing someone and who I would invite to my fantasy dinner party. It is far more beneficial to have one genuine friend who has your back than fifteen who don’t.
Have an exercise routine.
Whatever that means to you; whether it’s walking the dog each night, swimming, going to a gym or doing yoga in your pants on the living room floor. I’ve had a variety of routines with varying levels of effort in the last few years, but there has always been one consistent theme – I have felt better physically and mentally when I have had some sort of exercise habit, regardless of its intensity.
Good bras are worth investing in.
I rarely replace my bras. I buy about four sturdy bras and keep them for about two years. It is worth paying the money up front, rather than buying fifteen Primark bras a month. Especially so with sports bras, because back pain is not fun. Life is too short to spend it with your boobs hanging round your knees and breaking your shoulders.
Do the job which you enjoy the most, not that which pays the most.
I have wasted too large a proportion of my life and happiness on horrible jobs which were everything I wanted on paper, but made me loathe the thought of getting up in the morning. I was at my happiest when I left that job for a significant pay cut to work somewhere that made me smile every day.
Be with the partner who makes you laugh.
Obviously other qualities are important to overall compatibility, but looks change, interests change, life changes; and I’ve found that the best way to get through the tough bits is to have someone with you who is on your level of humour.
Read as often as you can.
Even if it’s just a magazine or the odd newspaper article, reading something printed on paper is good for the imagination and healthier than looking at a screen. Unplug yourself from the Matrix once in a while and exercise that brain.
Eat less meat.
I’ve been pescatarian for four years now. Do I miss meat sometimes? Yes. Did I enjoy meat? Absolutely yes. But, my blood pressure is down, metabolism is up and the planet and the animals are thankful for it.
Have a ‘treat yourself’ beauty splurge habit.
When we feel good on the inside, it shows on the outside, and I think this goes both ways. When we feel confident in our appearance it affects everything positively, so whether it’s having a quick face pack at home or something more indulgent like a spa day, have something in reserve that you know will always make you feel fabulous. I always feel like I can conquer the world with a fresh manicure.
Have a proper de-clutter at least once a year.
I usually do two big de-clutters a year. I don’t even plan it in, it just consumes me at certain points. I’m currently basking in the after-glow of a good clear out, and feel more relaxed and centred for it. Plus, donating things to charity and recycling things properly is good karma all round.
Invest time and money in making your home how you want it.
You spend too much time at home to not feel totally comfortable in it. I wasted years in crappy flats which I never bothered to improve in any way because they were “only temporary”, but your home is your castle and feels much better to come home to when it reflects your personality.
An extra spin and drain cycle on the washing machine makes an incredible difference to drying time.
I thought this was common knowledge until about a fortnight ago when a colleague complained her washing was taking ages to dry and steaming her house up. It takes ten minutes after a normal cycle but means my washing is dry overnight. Simple choice.
Use sun cream.
Skin cancer is not a joke, even if you think you don’t burn. Most daily moisturisers have an SPF in now anyway, so you don’t have to think about it as much.
Mental health is important.
It’s possibly more important than physical health. I have experienced physical health problems as a result of mental health issues, between which I never connected the dots. I don’t know a single person who hasn’t experienced some form of mental ill-health in their life; I learned the hard way that it’s better to deal with it early on and not bury your head in the sand, because that doesn’t actually fix it.
Look after your teeth.
Dentist bills are not fun, and fillings are not fun. Avoid both by flossing every day and using an electric toothbrush.
Don’t ever lie to fit in.
I wasted a lot of time and energy doing that as a teenager, it is exhausting and attracts the wrong type of friends. Real friends don’t care if you don’t go to clubs every week and prefer to watch Teen Mom in your pyjamas – find your tribe because they’ll sit next to you doing the exact same thing.
Before posting anything on social media, do the boss/grandma test.
“Would I care if my boss/grandma saw this?” If the answer is yes, probably best said privately or not at all. It’s far too easy to spy on other people’s content now, and some people like to ‘grass’ other people up as we say in Sunderland. Employing this has definitely saved me from some awkward situations.
Wash your hair as little as possible.
Nobody can actually tell if your hair has that slightly greasy, in-between-wash feeling. I have managed to get my hair washing down to twice a week and yes, the lie-ins are worth it. Plus, it’s good for your hair and the great Jonathan Van Ness swears by it so that’s good enough for me.
The world does not end if you go out without make up.
I used to put foundation on to take the wheelie bin out or go to the petrol station. Then I joined a gym which is next to a supermarket and often pop in on my way to or from a workout. Guess what? Nobody is even looking at you because this is Britain and we all look at our phones/the floor when in public. Make up is expensive and a faff to put on, don’t waste it on five minute trips to the shops.
It’s not a race.
I wasted a lot of opportunities for happiness by comparing myself to other people who were ‘further ahead’ than me in terms of careers and relationships. We’re not all playing the same game, it’s like entering a race but looking at the person throwing a javelin – it isn’t like for like, it’s you vs you.
End relationships which are not beneficial or productive.
It sounds harsh, but sometimes, through nobody’s fault, relationships break down or stop serving a purpose. It’s wasteful to both parties to continue flogging it if it’s faded, whether that’s a partner, friend or even a family member.
It’s okay to say no.
Whether it’s a work commitment, social event or even to that little voice in your head who is telling you to feel guilty if you don’t get x, y or z done. I’m a Brit, I’m used to people pleasing and then complaining about it behind their backs. It’s far easier to just say no from the outset.
Tampon applicators serve literally no purpose.
Other than polluting the planet and taking up extra space in your bag. I have never used one and do not see the point. It’s not a difficult target to miss, that’s all I’m saying.
Take photos.
We all hate that annoying friend who makes you stop and take photos every two seconds, but I have multiple photo albums which are ordered chronologically and I love looking back through them. I’m not saying take a photo every morning when you arrive at work, but when you spend quality time with loved ones, take a photo to commemorate it. I will always remember one specific occasion where I saw a group of close friends and we forgot to take any photos, I actually used the phrase “we’ll take some next time”, and one of those friends died a week later. Making memories is important, but it’s also important to capture them so you don’t forget when you look back.

The Bridezilla Diaries – Lessons Learned

It’s currently T-minus twelve weeks until I become a married woman. That is terrifying. In one way it feels like I’ve been planning this wedding for my whole life (probably because it’s aged me about fifteen years within ten months), but in other ways it’s flown over. With hindsight, like most things, I look back over it now and there are definitely things I could have done differently to make it easier for myself, and things that I wish I’d known before starting the process. So, like the generous person I am, I thought now is about the right time to pass on the wisdom from one bridezilla to the next cohort of bridezillas. It’s too late for me, but with the following suggestions it’s not too late to save yourselves!

People will be interested in your wedding.
It sounds obvious, but I definitely underestimated this. The only thing I find more boring than going to other people’s weddings is hearing about other people’s weddings (well, that and maybe Star Wars films). I have no interest in how much someone spent on a cake, what flowers they’ve chosen, or the difference between ivory and off-white (spoiler alert: they’re the same damn colour); because I am a normal person. Sadly, not everyone on this planet is normal, and some people feel a need to ask you about your wedding plans every time they see you. So, if you see a lot of people in a given day, that’s a lot of small talk. The best way to handle this is to not answer honestly. I made the mistake of providing an honest answer to “how much does your cake cost?” in the break room at work and got an uncomfortably long lecture about what else I could have bought with that money. My advice is to rehearse a set “yeah it’s ticking over nicely, it still doesn’t feel real though and I’m sure there’s something I’ve forgotten”, because you will be saying it approximately ten times a day for at least a year.

Give an early RSVP deadline.
Again, I am a normal person; so when someone invites me to an event which is a significant time away, I immediately provide confirmation as to whether I can or cannot attend, and write the date down. However, other people are not normal. Other people think that it is perfectly acceptable to spend ten months providing vague excuses about possibly going on holiday or possibly not having a babysitter; or confirm they are coming and then decide they have a better offer, and even decline but are then unable to find anything better to do and so backtrack and decide they are coming. I know, it’s stressful – there is a reason my hair started to fall out during this process. So, do not make the mistake of assuming that your extended family and friends are competent adults. I made the fatal error of giving people a nice long time to RSVP, which just allowed for people to change their minds and/or drag out the clearly very difficult task of ticking “yes” or “no” and putting a stamp on a piece of paper. I know, it’s a challenging task which clearly takes months. Make an early cut-off date and stick to it.

Enjoy the lull in the middle.
The start of planning your wedding is so fun. Bridal magazines, Pintrest boards, wedding fayres; just spending time soaking up ideas and enjoying having a ring on your finger is great. Also great is the last couple of months when everything falls into place and your venue show you how everything will run like a well-oiled machine on the day, so you can finally picture it all coming together. There is however a quiet interval between those two time periods, which I found incredibly unsettling. Going from constant shopping and reading endless reviews of various suppliers to having nothing to do but wait for RSVP’s (see above, that can take a long time if your family are inept), is unnerving if you’re a stress head like me. I had a constant fear that I should be doing something, and a paranoia that my wedding had been forgotten about – why was my planner not emailing me? Why were suppliers not checking in? Answer – because they have other things to do. Like the brief minutes of relief between contractions during labour, the down time is important to recharge for the challenge ahead. Do not make the mistake of wasting it by endless worrying about the wedding like I did – find a hobby or just take a long nap.

Look after yourself.
Easily the most important thing to remember, and the main thing that I wish someone had told me. I have never had so many colds in such a short space of time until I started planning my wedding. Stress makes my immune system crash and prevents me from being able to get a decent amount of sleep, so Olbas Oil and Vitamin C have been my friends for the last few months. Mental health is an important thing to keep an eye on too; this is something which has unfortunately always been a bit of a struggle for me, but the process of planning what has to become the happiest day of my life (no pressure) was so overwhelmingly stressful that I had to speak to a doctor about getting extra help to alleviate it and make it bearable. I thought I was bordering on insane, and that there was something wrong with me for not enjoying every second of planning the blissful union which other people would kill to have, but according to Google it’s not uncommon; and I wish someone had told me about that so I didn’t spend months crying silently in the bath so nobody would notice. Look after yourself, however that is best achieved for you: take breaks; delegate tasks to other people; have set times where all wedding talk is banned; do what you need to do to get through.

Don’t become too reliant on advice from others.
This is an easy mistake to make when planning your first wedding. Surely other people who have been married or have helped plan weddings in the past are the best people to assist you? To an extent, yes, but experience planning weddings is not an adequate substitute for knowing your own taste and comfort zone. There is definitely such a thing as too many cooks spoiling the broth, and everyone has strong opinions on weddings. At the end of the day, you and the person you are marrying know best what you like and what kind of celebration you are both comfortable having; and whether something is popular, quirky, expensive or “just what you have to do” should not come into it at all. Stick to your guns and have the day that you both want, even if people take the huff because, trust me, they soon snap out of it once you make it clear you’re having it your way.

Worst Bride Ever

Cynicism is part of who I am. I’m fairly sure I came out of the womb mid-eye roll. My sense of humour has earned me the prestigious title at work of “worst bride ever” due to my general pessimism towards my wedding day and utter lack of patience with the whole organisation process. Most of the time, it’s met with a (usually jovial) “at least you’re getting married” or “at least you’re not single” over the water cooler. Let me be clear on that one for a minute; I feel incredibly lucky to be getting married in the way I am. I am fortunate enough to be in a relationship which is healthy, stable and (for the most part), happy. I am fortunate enough to be legally allowed to marry the person I want to, doing so without any stigma attached to it, and I am so lucky to be financially stable enough to have the wedding that myself and my fiance want. This does not however, come with a God-given duty to be exponentially happy about it for every second of every day.

There’s a growing trend on social media amongst parents, particularly mums, in which they’re supporting each other and sharing the times when they don’t quite get it right or the moments when they panic and think they’re the worst parent in the world. Now, I’m not a parent, so I don’t profess to understand anything about being an “un-mumsy mum”, or why anyone would care whether your baby gets its milk from a boob or a bottle, but from what I’ve seen – surely it isn’t a bad thing to be honest about how you’re feeling. Giovanna Fletcher, an author I love, is a really big advocate of this and is always raising the point that just because she may have moments of struggle or self-doubt, it doesn’t nullify her feeling of being lucky to be a parent. Again, I’m not a parent and I don’t believe for a second that planning a big lavish party for yourself and your spouse is in any way as difficult or emotionally challenging as keeping an actual human being alive, but I do know it’s really effing stressful; and not something I should have to endure in silence because I “should be glad I’ve got the ring”.

The idea for this post came to me ages ago and I’ve gone back and forth over whether to write it, for fear of looking ungrateful about the fact that I’m planning this seemingly perfect wedding and marrying my school sweetheart. But, somewhere around one a.m. yesterday when I was fighting back tears and trying to slow my breathing down so I could get some sleep ahead of my busy day at work, and trying to switch off the video of the empty ceremony room which was playing on a loop in my head; it occurred to me that other people might feel like this, and might also be telling themselves “I have no right to feel overwhelmed by this because it’s what I’ve always dreamed of”. I realise that sounds completely dramatic, but unfortunately that’s where I was at that night, and not for the first time.

People judge weddings, that’s accepted as a fact. We all do it, women probably more so, and I’ve made the catastrophic error of following my photographer and venue on Instagram. So, every time there’s a new wedding of course I’m zooming in on every picture, critiquing every angle of the dress, how the flowers are arranged, the place settings, everything. I know, I need to get a life, and much like Googling your unusual symptoms, it’s a dangerous game which I realised the hard way last week when I fell completely in love with a particular bride. I’m not going to name her and come across as a weird stalker, but she was absolutely unreal. Her wedding was at my venue and, if I’m honest, I don’t think mine is going to top that; plus, after midnight on a school night, my rational faculties of “but everyone’s wedding is unique to that couple, all brides are beautiful” were off the clock. So what did I do? I did what any irrational, tired woman would do, and I stalked her Instagram. I made it as far back as her engagement party when the heart palpitations started. She looked unbelievably happy and sickeningly in love in every shot – not a hair out of place, glowing at her hen party, posting about how much she was enjoying the wedding planning with her beautiful, supportive friends and family, and here I was crying in the middle of the night about how my wedding is going to be a failure which upsets loads of people in the process and that I probably can’t actually afford, for the umpteenth time.

Instagram is a dangerous place and, when I’ve had enough sleep, I know that the vast majority of posts don’t show the whole truth. This bride almost certainly will have cried over her wedding. She will have had vicious rows with her own and her fiance’s families over the guest list, of course she will have worried about money and definitely will have experienced the lingering guilt in the pit of her stomach over not being able to include her great aunt’s cousin once removed, who her parents tell her is very upset and hurt at not getting an invite. I have enjoyed planning my wedding and I am extremely excited for the day itself, but it is absolutely peppered with guilt about spending my own money, asking other people to spend money, worry about who will talk to who and whether people will be comfortable, and total fear and blind panic about what people are going to think about it on the day and what’s being said behind my back. Hopefully other people feel like this too and this doesn’t turn into a viral post in which I’m labelled a ‘bridezilla’ like the woman who asked guests to pay an entry fee to come to the wedding (honestly, once you tot up the final bill – not a terrible idea). As I said at the start, this does not take away from my ability to enjoy other elements of the process, but a friendly word of advice to anyone who finds themselves in the presence of a bride or groom who is struggling with it, the helpful thing to do is to sympathise and/or offer to help; and absolutely does not include saying any of the following*:

“You’re spending HOW much? That’s obscene!”
“You should just elope”
“Divorce is even more expensive, you know.”
“I eloped, it was so much easier”
“I LOVED planning my wedding it was amazing from the second we got engaged”
“Well I don’t feel like I need a ring to justify my relationship but some people need the validation I suppose”
“It’s just an expensive piece of paper”
“Your family sound like a nightmare, I’m so glad mine aren’t like that”
“It’s just so hetero-normative getting married like that”
“I would never take my husband’s name, it’s so pointless, outdated and sexist”
“Do you know how many holidays that could pay for?”
“Couldn’t you do it later in the day? I’ll be so rushed getting ready for that time”
“I know I RSVP’d back in November, but something else has come up…”
*Returning an RSVP with additional names added who were not on the original invite*
“I’m just waiting for my invite in the post hahahaha!”
“I know it’s your day but can’t I just -”
“But you have to do it that way it’s tradition”
“You’re NOT getting married in a Church?”
*Not RSVP-ing at all*
“I don’t know why you’re bothering with chair covers, that’s a pointless expense”
“But I don’t like that song, you have to have music everyone likes”

*a non-exhaustive list of things which have been said, directly to my face.

Losing My Mojo

Disclaimer: this not an April Fool’s post.

I realised over the weekend that my last blog post was a month ago, now, I’m not egocentric enough to believe my followers are waiting with baited breath for my new posts, nor are they losing sleep over my welfare due to the recent lack of activity. However, I do feel a need to briefly apologise for my recent lack of attention to this blog, the reasons for which I will now go into – please have violins at the ready.

I’m just going to hold my hands up at this point and be honest in saying – I lost my mojo. I wasn’t actually going to write about this, I intended to just draw a veil over the last few weeks, pick up another book and review it like nothing had happened. But, I saw a tweet last week from Jill Mansell talking about how she lost her love of reading for about eight years and recently got it back. Anyone who’s even skim-read this blog will know that me losing my love of reading for eight years is extremely unlikely to happen, but, people responded to Jill with so many similar messages about losing their mojo for reading, as well as other things, and I was really quite surprised.

I am one of those people everyone hates, who seemingly crams 48 hours’ worth of activity into 24 – I work full time in a fairly demanding job, I’m planning my wedding, I read, I blog, I work out, I see all my friends and family, my house is always immaculate and I always have time to cook great meals from scratch. Sue me, I like to appear perfect, okay? Or so I did. Up until about three weeks ago I was spinning all of those plates perfectly; if anything, I was standing on one leg while spinning them all and making it look completely effortless. Like the proverbial duck, I was gliding along the water gracefully without anyone seeing the mad paddling of my legs underneath. But, like all people who attempt this and think they’re invincible, I made a mistake. I took my eye off one of the plates to focus more on another which was starting to drop. And what happened? Within about two days, they were all on the floor smashed to pieces, with me left standing like a lemon and feeling a bit sheepish. At that point, I didn’t want to pick any of them back up. I didn’t want to read, I didn’t want to blog, didn’t want to plan the wedding – for a few weeks it was a case of putting one foot in front of the other as best I could and trying not to cry in public (I failed at that, unsurprisingly).

Around that time, I saw someone on social media post that ridiculous Elizabeth Taylor quote which is always doing the rounds, about pouring a drink and putting lipstick on and acting like nothing is wrong. Well, I tried that, and even a large drink didn’t help. I know it absolutely wasn’t meant to be malicious, but seeing that quote just made me feel ten times worse. The plates were smashed so badly at that point that there was no way I could kick them under the sofa, put lipstick on and pretend like it never happened – all I could do was start gluing them back together and I just didn’t want to. So, what did I do? Nothing. I did nothing at all for about three weeks. I didn’t read, I didn’t write, I stopped bothering with the gym, I even sacked off wedding planning for a bit and I felt awful about it. I went to work obviously, I have a contractual obligation to do that, but I did little else. However, taking that time somehow allowed me to recharge and start formulating a plan to put the plates back together, and then once I’d managed to glue one back together, the others didn’t seem so bad.

So here I am, a month later, gluing the ‘writing’ plate back together. Thankfully this is the last plate to get back in the air, and it’s getting there. I have no reviews to post yet because I’m only just getting my reading mojo back, but, thanks to Jill Mansell, I know that’s alright. It’s slowly coming back, and eventually it will be back to where it was, and now I know that’s fine. Your patience is appreciated during this period of self pity.

International Women’s Day – Getting Over “The Fear”

I know most of you are here for my overly excitable book reviews, and this blog has become very literature-heavy of late, but I do on odd occasions have an opinion on something else. So, today I have decided to bestow upon my readers a piece of wisdom (I know, you’re so welcome for this); something which I thought about writing a while ago but never really got around to – and International Women’s Day felt like the perfect time to share this.

It’s a natural human instinct to be wary of other people. I think ever since we stopped needing to get together to tag team a woolly mammoth and cook it for a communal dinner in front of our caves, humans have been avoiding each other – at least in Britain anyway. Women in particular seem more programmed towards this. It’s drilled into us from a young age to be suspicious of other women. Mean Girls, Bridesmaids, even Sex and the City – popular culture warns us off other women like the road safety advert with the Hedgehogs from the 90’s. Other women are something to be feared and the culture of “I much prefer speaking to men, women bring too much drama” is drilled into teenage and even pre-teen girls; it’s definitely something to which I adhered during my school days, usually when I was on my third fight of the week with yet another ex best-friend.

Although I managed to maintain a solid group of female friends, I definitely carried this view into adulthood. ‘Other’ women are something to be viewed with fear and suspicion, this is a common value to which I adhered by pure avoidance of the enemy whenever possible, so when I moved to my current house and realised that the nearest affordable gym was a female-only, my heart sank. Gyms I’d used in the past were mixed and although women tended to stay together in the cardio section, safely avoiding the prying eyes of the sleeveless men on the weights bench on the rare occasions that they look up from their phones, I never felt there was any sense of unity in this. If anything it was the opposite, I was always very aware of the side eye glares between us all with undertones of “who is she trying to impress with those lashes?”; “is she really taking ANOTHER selfie” and “she is definitely judging my frayed, Primark leggings”. From the moment I joined this female-only hell, I would enter the building with my head down and earphones in, talk to no one and only looking up to ensure I didn’t accidentally walk near a complicated machine and feel an obligation to pretend to know how to operate it.

Eventually, when I realised my motivation was wearing out and I had no idea how to exercise effectively without proper supervision, I got up the confidence to sign up for a class. I reassured myself with the logic that classes are generally less busy than the communal gym since there’s a booking limit and I could hide in a back corner away from the scary women. After a few weeks of attending this class however, something weird started happening. Regular attendees started smiling at me. Eventually, they started talking to me. Scary muscly women at whom I’d previously spent my workout time glaring and thinking “I bet she’s so fit because she spends all her time at the gym due to having no friends and clearly thinks she’s fitter than everyone else”, would chat to me about the weather and joke about how confusing they found the class. And just like that, a penny dropped. Other women were probably just as scared of me as I was of them. Like my boyfriend always tries to say is true of spiders (even though it obviously isn’t because I would never feel confident enough to just chill in someone’s bath and give them the shock of their life when they tried to go in the shower).

So, having become woke to the fact that women aren’t actually that scary, I started going to more classes. Sometimes I even speak first now, and always chat to the newbies who come in and look at me with apprehension that suggests they believe I might literally bite them. Now, I will speak to women that I don’t know. I will ask for help in shops and chat more than the bare minimum that’s required, I chat to my neighbours, I compliment strangers in toilets (not in the actual cubicles, I haven’t gone full George Michael). What always surprises me when I do this is the look of genuine surprise on the recipient’s face. Why are we still so scared of each other? When women get together, wonderful things happen. Look at The Spice Girls, The Runaways, The Suffragettes. If we all stopped being so wary of each other just imagine what could happen. Not to be a total Pankurst about it but I definitely think this fear and suspicion between women comes from a seed planted by a man generations ago to protect themselves against total female world domination, because if we could get over this it would be like Girl Power x10000. We could lift each other’s confidence, we could take over, men would have no chance. And it would be amazing.