Sunday, 1 January
Euuurrrgh. Today has been, to say the least, painful. I was woken up by the small boys thundering downstairs at 7 a.m., and realising that since I had other people’s children in the house, someone should probably put in an appearance and pretend to be a responsible adult. I gave Simon a kick.
‘Mmmophhhh!’ mumbled Simon, rolling over and pulling a pillow over his head.
‘The boys are up,’ I hissed. ‘You should go and make them breakfast.’
‘Nophoff!’ came the groan from his side of the bed, which I think meant, ‘No, fuck off!’
As Simon is blessed with that male ability to sleep soundly even when his beloved offspring are roaming below, potentially stabbing themselves/each other/the postman, and I, being but a weak and feeble woman, am jolted into consciousness at every squeak, squawk or squeal that might possibly have come from said offspring, I sighed, and heaved myself out of bed.
Vertical was bad. Vertical was very, very bad. Coffee tequila was most certainly no longer my friend. I couldn’t quite believe I had been insane enough to book myself into something hideous called a ‘Boot Camp Fitness’ class this morning, feeling that I was now a grown-up and healthy person. There was no way I could go to such a thing. I could barely stand up straight without vomiting, let alone contemplate burpees! I tottered down the landing and met Hannah coming out of the spare room, looking nearly as bad as I felt. Behind her, a fully dressed Charlie snored loudly, sprawled on top of the bedcovers. We regarded ourselves in the mirror at the top of the stairs with some dismay.
‘FML!’ whispered Hannah. ‘If I was a dog that felt this bad, someone would put me out of my misery!’
Downstairs, Sam was snoring equally loudly on the sofa. Someone had thoughtfully placed a blanket over him. I had a vague flashback that it might have been me, as I recalled being very confused by trying to entirely cover Sam with the blanket because when I pulled it up to his shoulder, his feet were sticking out, but if I pulled it over his feet, his shoulders were uncovered, and I had spent some time trying to work out a solution to this baffling problem, before hitting on the genius plan of if only I could whisk the blanket into place fast enough, then I would have solved the dilemma. I hadn’t, obviously.
I prodded Sam. He made a very unattractive noise and stretched out a supplicating hand.
‘Coffee!’ he rasped. ‘For the love of God, a cup of coffee!’
‘Get up,’ I said unsympathetically. ‘This was your damn coffee tequila that did this in the first place!’
In the kitchen, the boys had distributed what looked like the best part of an entire packet of Coco Pops (family size) in equal quantities between three bowls, every worktop in the kitchen, and the floor, and were now engaged in carefully slopping milk onto any surface that had not received its full quota of Coco Pops.
I attempted to lift the kettle to make healing tea, while Hannah and Sam huddled at the table, whimpering in pain.
Jane and the other girls appeared in the kitchen and looked around in disgust.
‘Why do you all look so awful?’ Jane demanded.
‘I think maybe I’m coming down with a bug,’ I whispered bravely.
‘I think you’re hungover,’ said Jane unkindly. ‘Really, Mother! You are not a good example to us, you know.’
‘No,’ winced Sam. ‘But hopefully we will at least stand as a terrible warning.’
Later, the pain still showing no sign of subsiding, but having managed to dispatch all my houseguests, both expected and unexpected, I rallied the remains of my strength to make a New Year’s Day roast dinner for Daddy and Natalia, as I had invited them over in a fit of weakness and guilt about going to Mum’s for Christmas and abandoning them.
I felt rather less guilty when they turned up both looking sickeningly tanned after spending Christmas in Antigua (‘Well, darling, with both you and Jessica with your mother, there didn’t seem much point in us sitting round here waiting for you to get back,’ said Daddy. ‘You should try it, Ellen. It’s amazing the difference even just a few days of sun in the middle of winter can make,’ purred Natalia. Bastards. Both of them. I wasn’t at all envious of their sunshine break, as opposed to my own festive season attempting to catch the Spawn of Sarah while they quaffed cocktails by the pool, and now I was stuck trying not to puke in the Yorkshire puddings with the WORST HANGOVER OF MY LIFE, all because I had felt bad about not spending Christmas with them).
Never had I been so grateful for Peter’s overriding dedication to food, as he busied himself with trying to see how much trifle he could fit in his mouth at once, while Natalia watched in fascinated horror.
‘Is he always like this?’ she breathed nervously.
‘Yes,’ I said despairingly.
‘It’s just one of the reasons why having a brother is RUBBISH,’ said Jane. ‘No one should have to have a brother. Brothers are disgusting. I wish I was an only child.’
Peter screamed, ‘No one should have to have a sister. Sisters are horrible. I HATE having a sister! I want to SELL her but no one will let me. Sisters are much worse than brothers, and Jane is the meanest bumhead poopants I HAVE EVER MET!’
Simon, slumped at the end of the table, lost in his own world of coffee tequila-induced pain, opened one bloodshot eye and said, ‘What? What’s going on? Why is everyone shouting? Oh, my poor head!’
Finally, once Peter and Jane had been separated, still spitting and hissing at each other like angry cats, and the dog had quietly finished up the remains of the trifle when no one was looking and then vomited it over Natalia’s suede boot, and I had apologised all over again (while wondering why the fuck she keeps wearing such swanky stuff here. Surely she has realised that my house is a living example of Why We Can’t Have Nice Things), and some semblance of order had been restored, and I had hidden in the larder for a quiet lie down for five minutes, resting my head on the cool, soothing tiles of the floor, it was finally time to wave them off.
‘Why do you think she married him?’ I asked Simon afterwards. ‘Jessica thinks she wants a baby.’
‘Oh God, I feel ill. I wonder if a beer would help?’ groaned Simon.
‘But what about Natalia and a baby?’
‘Why not?’
‘Oh fuck, this beer is not helping at all. I wonder if I’m going to be sick. Well, not everyone wants babies, do they? And she’s not exactly a spring chicken, is she?’
‘She could still have a baby. I could still have a baby, come to that!’
Simon turned pale, an impressive feat given he was already ashen with his hangover. ‘You don’t want another baby, do you?’ he said in dismay. ‘All that business with Sarah hasn’t made you broody, has it? Is that why you’re suddenly obsessed with Natalia having a baby? Because really, it’s you who wants one?’
I turned equally pale. ‘Oh dear God, NO! Christ on a fucking bike, even had I been broody, which I most certainly am not, witnessing Sarah giving birth would have been enough to put anyone off. Peter and Jane are almost becoming civilised (admittedly only by their own idiosyncratic standards). I can’t think of anything worse! In fact, after all that with Sarah, I was going to suggest we book you in for the snip. We don’t have time for each other or the children we have, let alone a baby!’
Simon, although breathing a sigh of relief, immediately looked mutinous and started muttering that no one was putting a knife anywhere near his knob.
Friday, 13 January
Despite failing to attend the New Year’s Boot Camp, I have been attempting to stick to a healthy-eating kick. I wouldn’t go so far as to say I LIKE kale and quinoa, but I have eaten worse things. At least, I’m sure I must have. There was an unfortunate episode when I was misguided enough to eat something appalling in the form of a Brussels sprout salad for lunch, which led to me farting like a dray horse all afternoon, and obviously denying it, to the point where Lydia was insisting that we needed to get the maintenance team in to check there wasn’t a dead rat in the ventilation system, while I staunchly denied being able to smell anything and insisted they were all imagining it (it was pretty bad. Worse than some of Peter’s, and his arse is septic).
The Big Project is finished, hurrah, and so we went out and got absolutely shitfaced last Friday, and at one point in the night Alan sidled up to me to ask if he had sent me any photos at New Year, as he had apparently sent some ‘unfortunate ones’ before dropping his phone down the bog and killing it. By ‘unfortunate photos’ I assume he meant dick pics, as he looked profoundly relieved when I showed him the photo of him trying to put a party popper up his nose. I am not sure if I am pleased Alan respects me enough not to send me dick pics, or cross that he thinks me too old and haggard to bother sending dick pics to. I’m convincing myself it is the former. As a reward for finishing the Big Project on time, we have been given an even Bigger and more Important Project, since we managed not to fuck the last one up. So, no pressure.
Talking of no pressure, I don’t know how much longer I can keep working these hours. The last push to get things done was tough, and reduced Simon to a snarling weasel of fury at having to pick up the kids more than he perceived as ‘his’ share. Since he is already in a foul mood with me, I decided in for a penny, in for a pound, and announced I was going out with Hannah and Sam tonight, while he complained about babysitting, and I reminded him once again that you can’t actually babysit your own children. It’s called parenting.
‘I think this is the first time you’ve ever managed to stick to a health-and-fitness kick, Ellen,’ said Hannah in surprise. ‘You’ve literally been doing this every year since you were fifteen and you’ve never lasted more than two days, EVER!’
‘I just wish there was a diet where you could live on pies and get thin!’ I said sadly, sipping unenthusiastically at my vodka, soda and fresh lime, instead of delicious wine. ‘I mean, imagine the fortune the person who came up with that diet could make. The Pie Yourself Thin Diet! Maybe this is my calling. Maybe this is how I will become rich and famous. Fuck off, Joe Wicks! Ellen Russell and the Pie Diet is the latest hot new trend. I can just see my cookbooks in the supermarkets now. Me on the cover, showing off my abs, holding a big, delicious pork pie. Maybe Greggs would sponsor it.’
‘Or maybe it’s never actually going to happen,’ scoffed Sam. ‘What with a) you have no nutritional training at all and b) it not being possible to lose weight while stuffing your face with pies.’
‘And chips …’ I added dreamily. ‘Anyway, I do know quite a lot about nutrition from when Peter and Jane were babies. I read ALL the books when trying to be the perfect mummy and feeding them properly.’
‘And did any of them contain recommendations on how to Pie Yourself Thin?’
‘Well, no, but that’s the point, isn’t it? That’s why I would become rich and famous for my revolutionary pie diet, like Dr Atkins when he said you could get skinny by eating lard. Same principle!’
‘It’s not quite the same …’ said Hannah dubiously.
‘Oh, whatever!’ I said crossly. ‘Oh, ye of little faith. What were your resolutions, then?’
‘I didn’t make any,’ said Hannah smugly. ‘I’m more interested in planning my wedding to Charlie.’
‘And have you decided to appoint me wedding-planner-in-chief yet?’ I demanded.
‘No!’ said Hannah. ‘Because it’s my wedding, not yours, and I have already had to tell you I am not going to consider a French-themed wedding, a Jane Austen-themed wedding or a Peaky Blinders-themed wedding (which, by the way, was most inappropriate) –’
‘I just thought the suits and caps would be quite dapper,’ I interrupted.
‘So I will be planning my own wedding!’
‘Can I come to wedding shows?’ I wheedled.
‘No. Because I’m not going to any wedding shows. I keep telling you, I’ve done all of that. Charlie’s done all of that. We both just want something really simple that’s about us committing to each other, not about fucking vintage gramophones or any other ‘quirky’ props or flowers or frocks or fancy fucking furbelows.’
‘You’re no fun,’ I grumbled. ‘What is even the point of one’s friends filling one’s hearts with joy by having second marriages when all hope of weddings had been abandoned due to everyone being married off, if you won’t even do it properly?’
‘Sometimes, Ellen,’ said Hannah severely, ‘it’s lucky I’ve known you as long as I have, and can’t stop being friends with you because it will take me till I’m eighty-five now to have a friend I have known longer, because sometimes you’re very annoying. I want a marriage, not a wedding. Ellen, are you even listening to me? Are you on Pinterest again, looking for wedding tat?’
‘Sorry, sorry, I was checking my emails. I missed one on the way home – why does everything always go tits up at about 6 p.m. on a Friday? Anyway, I was just trying to help with the wedding. I won’t make any more suggestions. What about you then, Sam? What are you hoping the New Year brings for you?’
Sam perked up and said, ‘Well, actually, I have decided this is the year I am going to be proactive about meeting someone.’
‘WHO?’ we shrieked. ‘OOOOOH, WHO? Tell all!’
‘Well, I haven’t met them yet, have I? That’s the point. I’ve had an epiphany!’
‘You’re a week late!’ I sniggered, very pleased with my own wit.
‘Shut up, Ellen,’ said Sam, ‘I am having a moment, here. Where was I? Yes, an epiphany. I can’t be the only normal, single man out there, looking for another normal, single man, can I? I mean, it’s just not possible. But at my age, I fear the numbers of us are dwindling and the chances of me finding someone through chance or fate or serendipity or call it what you will are becoming increasingly slim, and time is running out. I want to meet someone while I still have a chance of making them at least slightly quiver with lust for me, before my arse sags and my paunch expands. There are only so many squats a man can do! So, I have decided to take matters into my own hands, and fuck the universe’s plans for me and all the rest of it, and thus I have joined some dating sites. And Tinder.’
Hannah looked dubious. ‘Are you sure about this? I mean, I tried some dating sites before I met Charlie, and I didn’t find they were really for me.’
‘No, sweetie, but you got freaked out because someone sent you a dick pic within the first week, and the second site you tried was that “Shag My Pal” website, and you got Ellen to write your advert for you and her copy wasn’t exactly inspiring, was it? I am braced for dick pics. In fact, I may start rating them out of ten. I may even start a website for them – ratemycock.com, or something – where I share the worst ones. Or, you never know, I may even send some of my own! And I will write my own blurb for it all, and make myself sound much better than I really am. So I’ll lure them in one way or another!’
‘Are you really on Tinder?’ I breathed. ‘Is that the one that bings your phone when there’s someone nearby who wants a bit of casual sex?’
‘No, darling, that’s Grindr,’ said Sam kindly. ‘Though I think some people use Tinder for similar purposes, but it’s the one where you swipe left or right depending on whether you fancy them.’
‘Oooh!’ I said in excitement. ‘I’ve always wanted to have a nosy at that. Aren’t you worried someone will murder you?’
‘Ellen, for someone who earns their living as a software developer, your fear of modern technology is quite remarkable,’ said Sam loftily. ‘The chances of being murdered by a Tinder date are very slim, no greater than being murdered by any other date. Even Beardy Coffee Man may have had his dark side lurking somewhere, though I doubt it. His murder weapon of choice would probably be boring people to death while he drones on about why Nespresso machines are ruining the true art of making coffee!’
‘It’s not the technology that scares me, it’s the people that use it,’ I pointed out indignantly.
‘And what about you, Ellen?’ said Hannah. ‘What are your resolutions?’
‘Oh God, I don’t know! I’m constantly failing on everything. I was going to be a better mother, a better wife, a better employee, give everything 110 per cent, but there’s just no time for anything. I keep being late to pick up the kids from After-School Club because I can’t get out of work on time, and I don’t think Simon and I have managed to hold a civil conversation since before Christmas. I don’t know what to do. I love my job, I can’t face going backwards, especially not with the kids getting older all the time, but all joking apart, I think I need a wife.’
‘What about an au pair?’ said Sam.
‘An au pair? Aren’t they for posh people with kids called Cressida and Jeremy?’
‘Don’t be ridiculous, Ellen. Look how many of the mums at school have nannies or au pairs,’ pointed out Sam. ‘Your kids are maybe too old for a nanny, but an au pair would take the pressure off in the mornings and evenings, and then maybe you and Simon wouldn’t be so stressed, AND you might finally manage your lifelong ambition of learning another language.’
An au pair. What a thoroughly excellent idea.
‘Do you think I could get an au pair to do the PTA stuff for me too?’ I said wonderingly.
‘Probably not,’ said Sam. ‘I think that might be frowned upon, unless you got a really crafty one. You could enquire of an agency if they had a very bossy, craft-obsessed au pair, but they might be suspicious of your motives.’
‘You never know! Such people must exist. Anyway, enough about me. Give us a squizz at your Tinder, then,’ I demanded. ‘Inculcate us in the dark arts of internet sex!’
‘Tinder isn’t just about sex,’ sighed Sam as we shrieked, ‘Swipe left, swipe left, OMG, look at that one, oooh, he seems nice, nooooonooooonooooo, swipe, swipe, he used “you’re” instead of “your” AND “too” instead of “to”! What about him? God, no, swipe, SWIPE!’
It was tremendous fun but mildly addictive, and makes me think it is probably best that I am safely married and have been brainwashed by Simon into believing that everyone on the internet wants to kill me!
Thursday, 19 January
I appear to have become Sarah’s Official Parenting Guru. After my (admittedly Very Fucking Splendid) performance during the arrival of little Orla Ellen (according to Simon, there is no need to use her full name every time I mention her, but then how will I remind people that she is named after me because of my Heroic Mercy Dash through the blizzard? – also, on the subject of names, I still think Isolde would have been much better and am rather regretting my noble gesture in giving up the chance to name the baby), Sarah has clearly decided that I am some sort of Oracle of Motherhood and has taken to ringing me up at least once a day to consult me about my wisdom and knowledge. At first this was extremely flattering, but the fact remains that the baby is only three weeks old and already this is getting a bit stressful. What if I have to endure another eighteen years of it?
Today’s enquiry was about whether or not I would advise co-sleeping. What should I do? Do I tell Sarah to be a cold-hearted bitch and put her baby in a cot so she can at least enjoy a brief moment each night without another person hanging off her, touching her, clawing her and pawing her (apart from Piers)? But what if that makes Sarah and Orla have attachment issues and Orla grows up feeling unloved and unwanted, all stemming from her perceived rejection by her own mother when she was only a few weeks old? Or do I tell Sarah that of course she should co-sleep, it will provide a most wonderful opportunity to bond with her baby, and the oxytocin or whatever it is will make her feel marvellous and she will regret it forever if she doesn’t – and then she rolls over and smothers the baby in her sleep?
I mean, what I am supposed to say? For me, co-sleeping sounded like the most hideous thing I’d ever heard of. In an ideal world I wouldn’t share a bed with anybody, not even Simon – we would occupy separate bedrooms like respectable Victorians, and he could pay conjugal visits. I wouldn’t even need him to warm my feet, as my dog does that quite effectively (obviously, my beloved terrier is exempt from my dislike of sharing my bed – when Simon snores, I want to stab him; when my ickle Woofingtons snores, it is adorable! But anyway, I digress). So the idea of having to give over yet more of my precious bed space to the snorting, snuffling, frequently malodorous and often damp Bundle of Joy that I had been hefting about with me all day filled me with nothing but cold, dark dread. Other people, however, absolutely swear by co-sleeping as the best thing they have ever done, so what do I know?
I mumbled something to that effect at Sarah, vaguely suggesting that she should just ‘trust her instincts’ and do ‘what feels right’.
‘But I don’t know what my instincts are saying!’ wailed Sarah. ‘I mean, the Health Visitor says I mustn’t co-sleep ever because Orla will be crushed like a grape beneath my whale-like bulk –’
‘Did she really say that? That seems a little harsh.’
‘Well, no, I’m paraphrasing, obviously, though I still feel vast. I thought my tummy would go once the baby was out, but I still look bloody pregnant. I had Orla strapped to me in a sling the other day and some fucking bitch still stopped me and asked when I was due! But the Health Visitor says co-sleeping is a Very Bad Thing, but everyone at my NCT classes told me it was the only way to go and I just don’t know what I am meant to be doing.’
Poor Sarah. Do any of us really know what we are meant to be doing? I mean, obviously, yes, there are some terrifically maternal women out there who were literally born to be mothers and just seem to always know the right thing to do, but for most of us, especially with our first babies, that first year of motherhood seems largely to consist of just trying to keep the baby alive, while wondering what IDIOT thought you were a responsible enough person to have a WHOLE OTHER HUMAN BEING’S LIFE in your hands.
And everyone has an opinion. Get your tits out./Cover yourself up, love!/Get them in a routine. Feed them on demand./Bathe them nightly, it’s comforting and reminds them of the womb./Bathe them weekly or their skin will get too dry./Babble at them in baby talk, it stimulates their development./NEVER use baby talk, it stunts their development./Co-sleep every night./Put them in the shed so they learn independence/Use a dummy./Have children when you’re young./OMG, why did you ruin your life? You have no prospects now! Wait till your career is established./Ha ha ha, good luck with procreating now, you selfish barren witch!/Annabel Karmel organic purees./Baby-led weaning. What car seat, what pram, what sling, what cot, what fucking sheets for the bastarding cot, does this toy over stimulate them, is this toy too boring, am I reading to them enough, am I spoiling them by pandering too much to their needs, what baby gym, what potty, am I creating a post-apocalyptic landscape for them to inherit because I just don’t have the strength to use cloth nappies, am I off-setting that with their organic cotton baby-gros, what percentile is the best to be in, are they too big, are they too small, is that woman’s baby’s percentile better than mine, should they have more teeth, less teeth, more hair, less hair, should they shit that much, should they shit more, should their shit be FUCKING GREEN? SHOULD IT?
Everywhere you turn there is conflicting advice and some bastard who wants to tell you their views on the subject. From the moment your bump first starts showing and COMPLETE FUCKING STRANGERS think it is OK to come up and start TOUCHING you, and then telling you that you are having a boy or a girl because of how you are carrying it, or are you sure it isn’t twins, dear, because you’re very big for sixteen weeks, aren’t you, or launching into unasked-for tales of their cousin’s auntie’s brother’s wife whose baby nearly died because she did that, you know, to the people who feel obliged to come up to you when your baby cries in public and firmly inform you that clearly your child is in distress because they are too hot/too cold/hungry/want a cuddle, because OBVIOUSLY some RANDOM STRANGER has a far better idea of what YOUR BABY needs than you do, there is always someone who feels it is OK to put their tuppence worth in and make you feel like shit, like you are doing it all wrong and that you have no fucking clue. Which you probably don’t, but even so!
And that’s before the vast rafts of ‘professional’ advice out there. Gina Ford, Supernanny, books on attachment parenting, websites on how to let your baby ‘cry it out’. Advice from health visitors and GPs and NCT leaders and La Leche consultants, and JUST when you think that you might have got the hang of things, they decide that, actually, all that advice was wrong and they are going to change the guidelines. You would think that was enough, wouldn’t you, for new mothers to be bombarded with, but as well as all that, every D-list celebrity who has ever squeezed a human head through their flaps is in on the act now as well, ‘sharing’ their ‘tips’ on how to be a perfect fucking mother, just like them, with a perfect fucking body and an all-white colour palette in their tastefully decorated homes.
In most ways we are incredibly lucky to become First World parents in this day and age, when we can choose how and when we become pregnant and give birth, when we can access excellent health care that means we are not expected to have ten children in the hope that a couple of them might live to grow up, when we don’t watch our babies dying of entirely preventable diseases or starvation, and all the problems I listed are obviously First World problems. But undoubtedly, this whole parenting industry that has sprung up is a massive headfuck for parents, especially mothers.
Once upon a time we’d have had a village, a tribe, a community to help us bring up our children, and we would not have known of any other way to do it, other than how our mothers, sisters, cousins and aunts had done it (unless we wanted to be stoned as a witch), but now, with our fractured families and frenetic twenty-first-century lives, the village is gone, and in its place is Modern Parenting, with all its judgement and conflicting advice.
It doesn’t even really get any easier as they get older, either. Obviously one worries less about breaking them, and agonises less over their poo (although Peter does seem to poo an exceptional amount for a child of his size – where does it come from? Where? How can such a small child produce such mountains of shit on a daily basis?), but there are new worries – about school, bullies, the internet, screen time, vegetables, boundaries, lack of boundaries. That’s the really scary thing about children – every one is unique and you only get one go at getting it right. There are no second chances. If you get it wrong, that’s it, that was your one shot, and there is no going back. There must come a point when you can stop worrying, surely, when can you sit back and take stock and say, ‘I think I did OK’ (either that or, ‘Well, I fucked THAT up epically, didn’t I?’). But when?
Anyway, obviously I didn’t say any of this to Sarah, and just suggested that as long as Orla is fed, warm and loved, none of the other stuff really matters, but if she is that concerned, maybe she should do some more research and see which option she felt more comfortable with …
God, it is so much easier to give advice about other people’s lives, especially when you can dispense it from a distance from a nice, clean office, far from sicky muslins and stickiness!