On being ripped off...

How can they be allowed to do this? I thought it was extortion to increase our energy payments to £100 per month. Now they have doubled them - £200 per month. Where do we find this extra money? We had no notification of this happening. No slight increase. Just wham! An extra £1200 a year please.

Shopping has increased. About 2 years ago, packs of ham were about £1.70 in Tesco's. Now they are £2. How? No one is getting a pay rise, unless they are a greedy fat cat *anker. How do they deserve their bonuses? What happens to those lower down the food chain? Teachers, nurses, dustmen? They are the ones that keep the world running on a day to day basis. They make peoples lives, save peoples lives and maintain peoples lives.

Gradually all the average people are being stretched further and further. More and more will soon lose a roof over their head. What will there be for the future generations? No jobs, more dereliction, more crime, more poverty.

Where are we heading? I don't know. I thought we were OK, but after this increase and no pay rise for hubby for the last 3 years who knows? Getting a paid job is looking closer than ever. Am I in a condition to get paid work? I don't know that either. Can I get a job that has the right hours? Unlikely. Can we afford to pay childcare? That I do know and the answer is no. Why should I pay someone full time childcare so I can work full time for the remainder of my salary, maybe £50?

Why is the world so unfair?

Anyone know of a job from 9:30 to 2:30 Mon -Fri term time only?????
Chance would be a fine thing.

Life comes from a seed

The seeds are sown

Deep in the earth

Allowed to rest and grow

Warmth and water

Love and care

See seeds grow into flowers

They grow through spring and into summer

When they bloom

and show their colour

A petal falls

In autumn time

Start of a midlife crisis?

As the flower wilts

and loses leaves

It heads back in the ground

To help the growth

of next years seeds

With its goodness and resolve.

As we enter

Our autumn years

We can sense what is to come.

As we were born

From just one seed

We return into the ground.

The countdown has begun

So we have managed to reach day 5 out of 47 and we are all still alive. I have reached a critical point though. I don't like being a referee. Thank heavens for the sun and the garden. At least there can be more distance between the boys.I had started to think that the rain would never leave and I would have to deal with them all summer fighting over the TV.

It is in excess of 80 degrees. I have one outside in the paddling pool and one in the dining room playing CBBC website. They are both bored. Neither will do what the other one wants. When one chooses a TV programme, the other gets upset. Depending on which way round this is, the older one will moan, whine and maybe even cry about it until I tell him to watch in the other room or play something else. If the younger one is losing out, then he will pinch, kick, punch and grab the older one until I step in and physically separate them.

We have had a couple of so called quiet days this week. Partly to relax after finishing school and also to build myself up for taking them out - alone. This quiet week will consist of a visit to the library, visiting Great Grandad, cinema, Pizza Hut, playing in the garden, 2 days of cricket and a sleepover at a friends house. I am finally sitting down for an afternoon -

if only this involved no interruptions. One will want a drink, so I ask the other if he would too. No is the response. Not 10 minutes later I get asked by the other one for a drink. Then it's food, clothes, toys, building a bug hotel, finding a Lego piece...

This morning I went back to school to collect the things left behind by older son on the last day of term. Neither wanted to go, but it was their fault.

The happy pills must be doing some good, because I don't think I would have reached this far into the holiday without them. 42 days to go and what joy will that bring I wonder? And how far will I get before I break?

SLEEPY (already)

On plucking up the guts...

I have never been good with medical things. I was never ill as a child and so never went to the doctors. My lasting memory of the doctors as a child is a smelly, old man sitting in a swivel leather chair in a cloud of cigarette smoke. Not the image you would expect to see today.
I stopped going to the dentist for 9 years when I was about 18. It took this long for me to get unbearable toothache. I had one filling and one removed. I thought that was a good trade off for 9 years without the biannual stress. However that's probably not what the dentist thought. Valium was prescribed and nurses were there to hold me down for the injections. I felt physically sick from the trauma of this and have been regularly ever since. However, I still have borderline hysteria before sitting in the chair - the sweats, shakes and tears.

When I was expecting my midwife refused to take my blood. It took my husband to have a day off work and take me to the hospital maternity department. There would be a nurse, midwife and blood specialist there as well as him to hold me down. This was not looking good for a birth plan. Up to 34 weeks everything looked fine. Then my midwife tells me the baby is now breach and that they want to try to turn him for a natural birth. The consultant and 10 onlooking students could not get him to turn so they booked me for a c-section. This was not good. More planned medical things were going to happen. I was shaking and sweating so much when they tried to do the epidural that it took at least 7 attempts to get the needle in.
After they had extended the cut to get my 9lb 5oz baby boys head out they put an extra drip in my ankle while I couldn't feel anything.
My second child was a natural birth and again my midwife skipped some blood tests to reduce the trauma for me and baby.

All of these were medical issues I couldn't escape from. However last week I finally plucked up the courage to contact the doctor about how I feel. I sent a letter in with a friend as I breakdown whenever I try to talk to a doctor. They made the appointment and I was pleasantly surprised. The doctor was fabulous. She was calm and reassuring, understanding and helpful. Two years ago when I went with similar things I was told that it would just go away. Now someone has finally taken me seriously and told me I'm stressed and depressed. It feels such a relief to know there is someone who wants to help. I've never felt like this about the medical profession before. I fear there is worse to come in blood tests and counselling, but the relief is immense.

DOPEY

On Getting Fit On A Budget

Ever since having my second child I have said I wanted to lose weight and get fitter. He is almost 7 and I have done nothing about it. I have never had strong will power and I don't like sport. This causes an even bigger problem when my favourite foods are chocolate and sweets.

So how could I get fit?
"Go jogging" someone bravely told me. I can't even run for the bus without being out of breath and a wreck until I reach my destination.
"Try a fitness DVD" came another helpful suggestion. My shelves are now overflowing with DVD's that I tried once or twice, some even lasted a whole week before that were relegated to the shelf. Now they just give the dust mites some exercise.
"Come to Zumba with me" another helpful friend suggested. An hour of intense dance and fitness in front of people who know what they are doing and can run for a bus could be the most demotivating thing I could do.
"Get a personal trainer" said a Mum at the boys' swimming class. She happens to be a personal trainer so no ulterior motive there then. Humouring her I asked how much it would cost me. Having paid the non-member rates for the sports club, it would cost me £9 each time I went to the gym there - plus the £35 initial consultation fee with her, then £35 per hour session with her (at least once a week, if not more of course) and then a review session every so often. By now my eye's are seeing £ signs as, I assume, are hers. Where exactly does this money come from to line someone else's pockets for them to watch me sweat and make a fool of myself with weights and a rowing machine?
"Come to weightwatchers with me?" Hmmm. Sounds good until you pay a registration fee, weekly attendance fee at the sessions - and what do you get for this? Someone who can weigh you on the scales and humiliate you in front of everyone else when you have a bad week, a diet sheet and lots of highly motivated people giving you "encouragement". If I wanted humiliation I could go jogging for free.

My bike has been sitting in the garage for nearly 20 years. I got it out last weekend. The tyre's needed pumping up. The tyre's that still have the original manufaturers moulding marks on them because it has been used so much. I even sat on it and rode it round the garden. Is it still functional? How numb does my bum get whilst on it? It seemed ok. Then I thought about where I could ride it. On the roads? Probably not as I wobble too much and have no confidence. On the pavements? Not supposed to do this apparently. Then I thought about the road I live on and the hill that I would have to ride up to get anywhere. Not a pleasant thought. The bike is back in the garage again.

I don't work and so have no income to allocate to such pastimes. All my hobbies involve voluntary work or study. None pay money or provide exercise in anyway. So how can you get fit without spending a fortune on gym fees, weightloss programmes, personal trainers or sports club costs?


I managed to lose weight once before. It was about 13 years ago. I had just started a new job. I was out to impress someone and decided to do a sponsored slim in aid of Cancer Research. I did lose over a stone in a few months. Maybe I need some form of incentive to overcome the psychological and physical barriers in my way. I watched some of the London Marathon last weekend. 35,000 people all running 26 miles. I am in awe of all of them. The dedication to their training, the will power and motivation they must have astound me.


SLEEPY

 

On How Do I Feel Today?

Why do I feel different every day? Some days I am really motivated and achieve lots of things I plan to do. Other days I hit rock bottom achieve nothing and just cry.What triggers a good day and a bad day?

Today is a bad day. I got my shopping this morning and did a bit of gardening. By lunchtime I'd had enough. It always seems to hit me about then. I sat down and ate my jacket potato. I then didn't want to get up or do anything. My motivation had gone. I was thinking. Always a bad sign when I stop and think. Nothing good ever comes of this.
Today I was thinking about Friday evening. I'm going out with other Mum's for a 40th birthday. That is not a good thought in itself. But why should this make me feel bad other than we're all getting older? I'll tell you why. I cannot go out in the evening without feeling ill.

It started a couple of years ago. I thought the first time that I'd had too much to drink, but it seems that isn't the case now. I then thought it was to do with eating out. But now that doesn't have to be the case either. The last time, I went to the cinema and was nowhere near food or alcohol. On one occasion I had to walk out of a restaurant leaving my husband eating his starter and main course on his own while I sat outside sobbing and feeling very sick.

It starts as a really hot feeling that works its way all over my body. I feel sick in my throat, yet I have never yet been sick. I can go lightheaded and need to sit down. I need water to drink and splash over me. I cannot work out what makes it happen. I have to loosen clothing. So now I wear the baggiest clothes I can to see if that helps. That looks really great when you want to dress up.
It has ruined two of my birthdays now. I haven't been out at New Year since it started. If I go to someones house I am fine. If I go out during the daytime I am fine.

So is it socialising, food, drink, or just going out in general? Is there a pressure on me to do something or be someone that I have only just started to experience? Am I now expecting to be ill and so becoming ill? Thinking about it certainly makes it worse. Or is it just that I am getting old and my body is falling apart?

What to expect next?

DOPEY

 

On Good Girls and Bad Men...

What makes good girls fall for bad men? What is the attraction? Is unreliability sexy? Or is there some kind of magnetic attraction where North attracts South and like poles repel?

My two closest friends have both done this in the past. Sarah went through a Gothic phase in her life when she went into the sixth form at another school. I didn't understand why she did it. We drifted apart but living opposite each other we still knew what we were up to through parental gossip. She started going out with a guy called Dan. From this point on I barely saw her again. She was round his place almost permanently. There would be nothing wrong with this, other than the fact he'd done time, was covered in tattoos and got into trouble on a frequent basis. One evening she came back to her parents place in tears as he was in hospital having been burnt on the arm by a petrol covered torch during a fight. And guess what, she went back to him. Why? Why would you go back into a situation like that? She moved in with him for a while before she left school completely.
A few years later, she moved into a lovely house with a guy called Adam. It was only round the corner from me so I got back in touch and went to visit. Adam seemed a really nice guy. They were happy together. Both had good jobs. Within a few months of catching up with her she was back at her mum's because she had been hospitalised by the violence he inflicted on her. This time she didn't go back to him. He moved his next victim in and she moved on.
The last man I'm aware of her seeing is the father of her two daughters. He always seemed slimy to me. He was a banker in the city, and a "merchant" one too if you ask me. He had to quit his job after getting so caught up in dealing drugs with his city mates and getting severely into debt that she ended up back at her mum's again, but this time with 2 daughters in tow.
She now lives in a council flat and has a good job in a school. Whether there have been any more men recently I don't know, but if there have I bet I can guess what they were like.

My other friend has been out with some really genuine people that she dumped before too long for someone more exciting. One was a drink driving loser who lost his job through being drunk at work. This happened to be the father of her child. They got married and bought a place together about an hour from her friends and family. After 4 years she got bored and started seeing someone else. I can't blame her though. The pub, gambling and his mates were far more of a draw than her and their son.
She moved back up to be near her friends and family. Unfortunately the adulterer moved in too. He was ok, but had previously tried it on with most of us at works do's. I think he was faithful, but yet again was a drinker and gambler with a lot of debt. They eventually moved out of the rented flat and into a place they part bought. Within a few years she was on her own again. He had done a runner to Europe with the cash from his shop and took a week to appear on the radar again.
Since then she has been through the 25 year old, the 56 year old, the married man, the moody, violent ex-marine and the stalker. She is now planning her wedding to someone who actually seems to be a genuine bloke with no baggage and cares for her.

What has made these friends of mine go for such obvious problems. They are both middle children of 3. Did they rebel with middle child syndrome? Were they just bored with their life and wanted excitement? Or were they just really bad judges of character?

DOC