I live in a small town in Bedfordshire called Ampthill. I’m probably biased, but I think it’s an incredible little place. According to a recent survey, it has the best high street in the country for independent retailers, and frankly, it must hold some sort of record for the ratio of pubs and coffee shops […]
Tag: money
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Whilst some things in life are inevitable – death, taxes, and Oldest Son sleeping until 3pm on a Saturday – others are far less likely – things like winning the lottery, Youngest Daughter agreeing with me, or Boris Johnson saying “Ahhh, fuck this, the EU’s amazing actually”. After months of non-communication, I’d long since filed […]
Limbo
One of my favourite Shakespeare plays is Titus Andronicus. It’s a blood soaked, slightly traumatic, play full of decapitated heads and lopped-off hands, and at its centre is Titus’ daughter Lavinia. Raped and then deprived of her hands and her tongue so that she can’t tell anyone who abused her (it takes until the end […]
Crunch
Well, I knew it was coming. It was inevitable. I’ve watched in despair as I got deeper and deeper into debt just to pay the mortgage, the bills and buy food, but the end of June, is officially crunch point – the moment when I touch the bottom of my overdraft and the point where […]
Victim
“You will never get the truth out of a Narcissist. The closest you will ever come is a story that either makes them the victim or the hero, but never the villain” Shannon L Alder I’ve lost count of the number of times the term ‘narcissist’ has been offered up to me as an explanation […]
Envy
I’ve never been an envious or jealous person. In fact, I often wonder if I had been a bit more jealous and possessive if E might have realised he was with someone who loved and valued him and been less tempted to have affairs. Don’t get me wrong, I wouldn’t change myself for anything, but […]
CMS
As E’s refusal to pay any child maintenance until legally forced to do so continues into its seventh month, I am finding myself swinging between two emotional extremes. I have whole days where I feel unnaturally calm – I have an assurance that in the end everything will be ok, that this too will pass […]
Home
My stay in hospital ended up taking two days and two nights and involved two blood transfusions and an iron infusion all of which took hours to seep into my bloodstream. I’d only ever experienced a hospital stay when my children were born, and back then I was so in love with my tiny new […]
Ill
I think it’s probably testament to how stressful my life has become recently that one of my pet fantasies had become having to spend a couple of days in hospital. Not, obviously, for anything serious but for something like a minor op, something that would force me to stay in bed, not deal with day-to-day […]
Thursday
The Thursday before Easter dawned bright and warm. I’d taken the day off and I was hoping to spend the day relaxing and getting the house back into shape. One and a half weeks of the kids being home all day during the school holidays had meant that everything was in a total fucking mess. […]
He-total: Life without Ex 