A year of Soberistas

This time today (2013), I snuck into my room, my body aching (head, heart, kidneys), in a state of extreme fatigue, looking for a way out. I had been trying secretly to control my drinking for years, I had written diary upon diary about how I needed to change. Those nights when I walked the house alone, with insomnia, when I would sob myself to sleep as I couldn't do the one thing that I wanted to do - that I believed would make me better - to stop drinking.
So alone (as who would understand how I felt?) I googled various combinations problem drinking, wanting to stop alcohol, how to tell loved ones you want to stop drinking, I read - I watched videos and somehow I found myself at Lucy's blog, which in turn led me to Soberistas.
I started reading peoples life stories. I started picking up traits of myself in these people. Similar stories, the same pain. I started to understand that I wasn't the only person that felt as I did. I found hope.
Out there were people like me, people who for whatever reason needed to change.
We are all similar, yet profoundly individual. Each journey we have been on - the reasons why we made the choices we have made remain our own. Writing about this has been very therapeutic for me. I have learned so much about myself. I think the biggest lesson I have learnt is to give myself a break. I am person who has had a life, this life I know now is unique in its own way. This life is blessed by incredible friends and family and a lot of love, but this life has also suffered pain, this life also sometimes feels sad and that is a sadness I cannot control. This life is my own, but it deserves to be lived and I deserve to be looked after.
Through reading and sharing my thoughts over this year. It has helped me to reanalyze the person I am and the priorities I have.
Before my life resembled this - in order of importance:

•Escapism/ Self medication - Drinking, Pleasing others/friends - approval from others

•Work

•The children/chores/My husband

•Me

The first therapist I ever saw told me I needed to find 3 hours for myself a week, not only did I laugh in her face. I felt slightly offended how dare I look for time for myself? I didn't deserve that or feel that a mother should...
Now this is the model I am working to:

•The kids/Healthy living

•Me/My husband

•Friends/Family

•Work

I can't say that the balance is always perfect and it's very hard to always find time, but I am really trying. What I have learnt over this year is that I was looking for gratification in the wrong areas, I always have been - but however many times someone tells you that, its something you have to learn. Through other people and through work I believed that I would be 'approved of/and or loved' but where I knew the happiness should have been and would be is through me and my life.
Life throws some pretty hard bombs at us (why does it do that??) And I was beaten I had used all that I had left to try to please others, but I was the one that needed looking after.
I tried to numb the past and the present at the bottom of a bottle, but I needed to fix me.
I am now at the point of trying to unravel where depression starts and dependency ended, where the 'what happened' and the who I am link.
It's a fine tightrope and I have days when I wish I could just be 'normal' and wonder if this AF part of my life is another extreme incarnation of myself. Days where I feel I am looking in on my life and not living it. But this year and being part of Soberistas and now doing my own blog, really help me to understand the process and progress which I am making for myself.
I have learnt to believe that life should be a progression, with different stages and times you complete. You look back on your childhood, but you don't live your childhood now - you look back on youth but that is not the life of a parent. If there is no progression then you're not learning and if you are not learning - then how can you be expected to teach....
I was stuck in a half life between the past and life now, I do truly feel like now I am starting to live again.
Did I mention I'm gonna quit my job and we're going to go and live by the sea? ;-)
I hope that anyone starting out on this site, will benefit as much as I have from reading, interacting and writing x

Should Feminist's wear nail varnish?

Make-up, nail varnish and girlieness was not really something that I really grew up with.

I think this is due to two main reasons:

The main and most important reason is that my parents wanted me to grow up equal. They believed that instilling in me feminist ethics was very important. I can remember reciting the names of the Pankhurst sisters (Emmeline, Christabel and Sylvia) with my dad, and him buying me books about Boadecia and Joan of Arc. He also bought me the independent Women CD for my birthday :-) haha
They wanted me to be strong, to believe in my opinions and to fight to have the same opportunities as others. They wanted me to be happy as the person I was and the person that I am.

I am forever grateful for this - It didn't always serve me well,  and perhaps they were too extreme (?) I haven't always been everyone's cup of tea, perhaps TOO outspoken, perhaps not the most popular girl to date... But over the years I have learnt even from those boys that I SO desperately wanted to like me, that it wasn't because I wasn't pretty, It was because I wasn't easy - If they had dated me, it was a big deal... That they are so glad that they didn't as we have a true and solid friendship as equals (So that is a pretty good outcome to that teenage anguish!)

There is another reason why I didn't grow up a girlie girl and this is a lot to do with my wonderful, but sadly very unconfident Mum. What is SO wonderful in becoming an adult and a parent myself is to have that deeper understanding about your life, and to view your parents as people - not just parents. My Mum is quite cuddly and round and her way to deal with this is not to try and change - but to try and love herself as she is (Well done her!) My Mum is an only child and her Mum was very ill during her teenage life, so she missed that girlie moment... She didn't have many friends...
Perhaps more than that, she just doesn't want to care. She likes to look nice, she likes jewelry and clothes, but make up and hair and nails (preening can we call it???) That is not something we have ever shared.

Now this brings me to now, a mother with a daughter now 8, and I must say sometimes I feel a bit lost. Through the experience of quite an austere upbringing in terms of physical appearance and my learnt experience through friends and my life now in France that taking care of yourself and your appearance can be fun and can make you feel better... what message should I be sending my daughter?

She was given a 'make up set' for her birthday by her Aunt which I took an immediate dislike to - It was Disney, with various shades of red and pink lip gloss and nail varnish. M was very excited by this and kept on carrying it around and asking me if she could put it on. This brought up so much inner rage, every time I saw it, I just wanted to throw it out of the window - which made me realize that I clearly had to deal with some underlying issue, which I (not her) needed to deal with. What am I so worried about? That if she wears nail polish this is going to spiral into self loathing and anorexia? That this will put her looks before her brain and let people abuse her? Not take her seriously...
Of course I was overreacting. I think whenever I am faced with something new as a parent, something I cannot control or don't have an answer to - I tend to feel attacked - so I feel the need to defend myself with anger... (This is something I have learnt from CBT)

So I just rode it out, with the mantra, it's just nail polish - you wear nail polish, strong independent women can take care of themselves. You can do both - as long as it is for you and you are not hiding yourself behind an image... it's ok. Telling myself over and over what will be will be, she has to be her own person, she has to explore, she has to find her own personality.

So she put on nail varnish and after a day wanted to take it off as it had chipped and wasn't perfect. She put on lip gloss (as did my son) Then she decided that the box was perfect to pretend to be a school for her Sylvanian Families and emptied all the make up into a drawer and I don't think has touched it since...

Of course this is not the end and only the beginning of 'growing up' but it was quite an interesting outcome.

Yes I will still favor purple/blue clothes over pink for her, and yes I probably will also buy her books about amazing women, and teach her about Women's Suffrage... but in the end her being girlie has nothing to do with this - her 'image' is self expression and she will be who she wants to be and the less resistance I show the less she will (hopefully) show in return.

I think what I have to remember is that strong independent women do what the f*** they want without feeling the barriers of a male dominated world. So I should just hope she'll does that...

Am I suffering from depression?

I think this film really sums up living with depression, I love it and it makes me very sad too. Those of us who live with our black dog, know them - love and loathe them. Sometimes feel like they are our only friend and mostly feel that they're an unwelcome guest.
My dog doesn't come to visit very often anymore. The more you accept him the more he doesn't feel he has to hang around you.

I really hope anyone who has ever felt any of these feelings, seeks help, speaks out. It can get better. I have been in Cognitive Behavioral Therapy since September 2012 and have also been taking anti-depressants since then. I have nearly finished with the drugs and am slowly lowering my dose and should be done by January (WOOHOO Well done me!)
But please don't suffer or be afraid to take anti-depressants. My advice - make sure you trust your doctor 100% - ask about his/her long term strategy, how long will you take them for? What are they for? How will they affect you?
The side effect for me has been low blood pressure, and fatigue, but I really strongly believe that I wouldn't have made such progress is such a relatively short period time if I hadn't had the combination of drugs and therapy.

Whatever you're feeling is a real feeling, and you deserve help. Therapy doesn't have to be about dragging up the past, which is what I feared. CBT is very proactive, it's about the behavior you have now and trying to analyse why and where that behavior is coming from. When you can understand why you do things you can learn to move past them.

My doctor described anti-depressants as building a bridge across the descent into depression. It isn't the full solution, but can help you from going so low you can't find the strength to climb your way back up.
I love my doctor :-) He's a very wise man!

Should you really have a drink tonight?

In reading my story about my problem drinking, perhaps you saw some part of yourself in that post. Or perhaps not at all... Or perhaps you thought... hmmm maybe, but I am not that bad. I was not that bad for a long long time, and even when I was bad I would have times when I would be not be that bad either. The problem with problem drinking is it doesn't always pose itself as a problem...

So as I was thinking about my meeting tomorrow, a staff meeting with 85 colleagues, with a lot of strong characters and generally a lot of petty arguments which lasts far too long and for no good reason. As I coordinate the programme for students which is taught by 12 teachers, it means that I feel a fair amount of pressure and spotlight, none of which I enjoy particularly.

Now this leads me to remember this time last year, or the year before (which was even worse) and remember the state that I was in to face this situation. Knowing how horrible these meetings are - what would I do? Have ATLEAST half a bottle of wine, to take the edge off the anxiety the night before... Even though I knew that when I drink I don't sleep well, but the idea that a drink would help, was so much stronger than the idea of the consequences which would prevail.  You can always convince yourself that this time it would be different...
Dealing with this meeting hungover/sleep deprived - added to the stress and anxiety - lessened my effectiveness to deal with criticism and made me less patient... Yet I repeated this pattern over and over again.

I remembered this also at the weekend when we took the kids to Paris, I was pretty ill and miserable and premenstral, if I had drank the night before would my stress levels have been worse or better??? Without a doubt - Much worse!!

So should you drink:
The night before you go on holiday? NO 
The night before you have guests to stay? NO
The night before a kids party? ABSOLUTELY NOT
The night before Christmas? NO!!!!
The night before an exam? Nup
The night before you have to work the next day? Nope
The night before you want to have a nice day with your kids? NOT EITHER...
The night after the hellish day with the kids/husband/work/family - NO... It will only make the day after even worse!!!

So unless you never suffer from hangovers - unless you never ever feel tired after a night of drinking alcohol - unless you just drink one glass and that never induces massive amounts of will power to not drink another...
Then you should probably think about what alcohol means to you...
You're not an alcoholic - that is a BIG word, but perhaps you use alcohol in an inappropriate and unhelpful way.

Hangovers and good parenting NEVER mix

X

Feeling the love...

Apologies for my tardiness, I have been sick with the flu and I am just about feeling halfway human now.

So what love am I feeling? Just that little bit of Parenthood love - that sometimes just smacks you right in the chops and makes you just feel - sigh - this is all worth it.

As any parent will tell you, it's one of the hardest jobs in the world being a Mum/Dad. There are ALOT of hard days - thankless work, timeless arguments, battles and dramas (and it's only just begun).

I think when you have a moment to breathe and to face those challenges and analyse what they bring to you as a person. What they add to you, in your one life on this earth. It's pretty damn amazing. I know I am 100% a better person for being a parent. Your capacity to change, to adapt, to love and to be selfless is quite remarkable. The fact of being a parent stretches you and your being in so many different ways... You become a bigger person.

I have seen this with my husband, his childhood was not terrible, but it was fairly soulless there wasn't a lot of love floating about for the taking. Being a father has enabled him to develop his capacity to love... To build confidence, to impress - to be loved. It's really quite wonderful. This morning my highly emotional son raced down the stairs to see his dad, forgetting that he was away for work and it crushed him. The physical disappointment of the single most important man in his life not being there was evident... I sent my husband a text to tell him, so he wrote a wonderful loving message back, which made my son cry even more... So he phoned Papa and proceeded to lambast him down the phone, for leaving and not telling him before.
This crushed my husband, as he had forgotten to tell him he was going... ALL THESE EMOTIONS FROM THESE BIG STRONG BOYS.

Last night as I went to tuck my son in. Fast asleep he wrapped his arms around my neck and whispered I love you mummy.... My heart leapt!!!

I think it's important to write this down - so I will remember. What is the point if we only remember the bad stuff?? How I am trying to live my life for the better, is so I DO remember these moments.

My most fabulous daughter turned 8 last week. We took her up the Eiffel Tower at the weekend at night. She said one of her dreams had come true... Score!!! Top parenting!!

Yes there have been moments over the weekend I could have done better, explained better, enjoyed more, stressed less... But it is SO important to allow yourself some parental praise. Some parental joy. It's not bloody easy, you don't always make the right choices, but even the bad bits can have good sides if you grow from the experience because you have learned from it.

This song was on my ipod (I know old school!) this morning and it sums up the mood of this piece - ENJOY x

AM I TOO OLD FOR SPARKLY HOT PANTS?

If you're asking yourself this question, the answer is probably yes...

But what the hell I am going to wear them anyway!

I bought these little beauties on a whim yesterday, as I am going on a rare night out.

Nights out for a while there were a bit of a no no and I must say I am very excited... Maybe a 34 year old mum shouldn't wear these??? But one of the upsides of being Alcohol Free is I have lost a stone of weight - so why not I say... 

So how is going out drinking when not drinking? It's actually pretty good, I have a bit of a ritual in terms of what I drink. I start with a virgin mary and then switch between virgin mojitos and sparkling water. I do find that soft drinks get really boring really quickly. I might have a coke, but I can only drink the one.

The only other major difference is tiredness - there is a moment when conversations gets a tad too repetitive and that my energy just wains - but that's the best bit as then I say my goodbyes and head home as a rule of thumb it is after this moment when people won't remember anything the next morning anyway! (I certainly wouldn't have!)

So should women wear sparkly hot pants? From an age point of view perhaps this is a questionable decision - I am dressing them down with flat boots and a cardie ;-/

Part of me wonders if I am setting myself up for unwanted attention... Well you know what some men are like, clearly if I am wearing these I am sending them a signal that I want them to talk to me and to try to seduce me, I want them to make inappropriate comments. If I am wearing these I am gagging for it... (Plus as I am in my 30's - surely that means I am even more gagging for it)

This is an unfortunate situation, as I want to be silly and wear sparkly hot pants for no other reason than I think they are AMAZING!

So all I can say is long live impulse buys - bugger off annoying men and leave me and my pants to have fun with my friends! x

HAZING... The debate

Working in a University I cannot help worry about the students safety. I know that making mistakes is part of growing up, and by god I have made some. But is it all really a bit out of control??

Is it a necessary element in our evolution as individuals to test ourselves and our limitations? As parents, should we, can we protect our children from the stupidity that youth can bring?

I have been having a long running debate with my students about the 'integration' weekend or hazing event.

The Wiki definition for Hazing is  
'Hazing is the practice of rituals and other activities involving harassment, abuse or humiliation used as a way of initiating a person into a group. Hazing is seen in many different types of social groups, including gangs, sports teams, schools, military units, and fraternities and sororities. Hazing is often prohibited by law and may comprise either physical or psychological abuse. It may also include nudity and/or sexually based offenses.'

Now that doesn't sound like something you want your kids to be doing right?

Now the student's argument is that what they do is not that extreme - that it's harmless fun and it's what the students want, what they ask for...
I have had some questions for them
1. How can they ever trust the limits of people under the influence of alcohol?
2.  How can they justify humiliating each other, taunting each other? Bullying each other?
3. Why would they want to be part of this?

In response to this they try to distance themselves from the bad press of fraternities/sororities and the terrible stories that have come out recently...
I hit them with statistics such as Frat boys are 300% more likely to rape and 1 in 5 women is sexually assaulted in campus The Guardian - September 24th 
They respond again... This is not us (This argument is all too familiar - It wasn't me - It wasn't us.) or the recent report from the University of Virginia New York Times that's America - not Europe.

I then give them some concrete examples of schools in the City, where one boy last year died as he fell out of a window with his feet and his hands bound and HUGE amounts of alcohol in his system. Or a girl from our school who left because she felt so humiliated by what she had done at the integration weekend. The response - We know it's not perfect, but we're responding to a demand. The student's want to be hazed, they love it.

I guess this comes back to the root of the problem, what is going on with our society if this is what our kids want??? Should we as parent's or teacher's be trying to stop these practices?

For me the fundamental issue is this idea that to be part of the gang you have to prove yourself. You have to humiliate yourself to be integrated. This is what surely we should be teaching kids to avoid?
However 'light' the punishment is... for example at our school the students are not allowed to sleep for 24 hours, and if they do they have sheep hearts or dead octopuses smeared in their face - harmless fun :-/
They say that students don't have to go on the integration weekend it is their choice, but if you don't you're directly on the outside of the cool kids - If you go and don't join in - Again you're not included. (Plus they sold 1,000 tickets in under 1hour... so the demand is very high!)
It's not those who are strong and in charge that will suffer, it's those that are weak and vulnerable who will. 

They're away from home, they want to be accepted and liked, to me it seems completely logical that people will do things that they know are wrong, or dangerous or hurtful - Adding to that sleep deprivation and being plastered with alcohol - surely, surely it is a recipe for disaster?

When I asked them this question, were they really sure that there wasn't one person who felt uncomfortable? There wasn't one person who felt it went too far? There wasn't one person who felt pressurized to do something they didn't want to? None of them could convince me. They are extremely loyal to their school - Which is why so often these things are covered up. (University of Virginia...) But I could tell at least 4/5 students in each group agreed with me,  But why would they speak up against their peers??

To end this post I am still questioning my involvement in this debate. As a parent I know I cannot control what my kids do, and I shouldn't. I know through making mistakes and through hardship we learn and develop as people. I know I cannot shelter them from the world (really can't I? It so fun inside?? Yesterday we made pompoms - that's nice and safe...)

The worst part is that I know I was that insecure young person, who did stupid things to impress people, who put myself in dangerous places, who at times was bullied and bullied...
So what can I do so that my kids don't end up like me???

My daughter came home and said one of her 'friends' had said Tu es tetu - we had to look it up in the dictionary as neither of us knew what it meant. The dictionary translation was 'stubborn' or 'headstrong' I told her, you know what M - that isn't such a bad insult to have, better to be headstrong and stick to your beliefs, than to be a follower and just do as your friends tell you.

Phew RebuildingMum 1 - scary world/other kids 0

She's nearly 8 - I AM TERRIFIED of the teenage years...