growing pains

One day last month I woke up and it was "that time of the month".

(please insert whatever nicety you wish, my favourite is when my best friend told me she'd "got her monkey!")

I was a bit sensitive, a bit weepy and needed a bit of love. I am 43
The night before I had put my eldest daughter to bed and she was still my beautiful Disney princess. She is nearly 11.
 In the night someone stole that version of her away and replaced it with a pre-teen, hormone raging, venom spitting monster. She was up and out of bed for less than five minutes before returning to her room with "I HATE YOU ALL!!!!" and a door slam.
He father and I looked at each other in horror, cups of tea / coffee hovering. The downstairs was a wreckage of her temper, I think one of her younger sisters was weeping, the other was hiding.
"Wwwwhat just happened?" I spluttered.
He gave me a wise nod - a man who has weathered my monthly mood changes for 21 years. "Hormones" he stated and swigged his beverage emphatically.
A moment to register this. My baby! Growing up! Growing pains! What should I do? Should I go to talk to her? Or just open the door and throw chocolate at her?

How could he be so calm and ...smug ! Oh yes, I know he thinks this is purely my territory and my responsibility doesn't he? Well he needed a jolt, obviously. I wrecked my brain for facts about "women stuff".

"Umm..." I said, " Aren't women supposed to synchronise their cycles? Y'know when I was at college we all had periods at the same time in our shared house" ( True story)

Behind the cup his face rearranged his expression as he took into account he lives with four women, even if three of them are still ten and under. I saw him mentally move himself, the cat ( male) and his guitar down to the shed.

An hour later, I fell into a chair in the office at work and announced "my eldest has hit puberty"
We held a minute's silence.
We drank more tea.
We had run out of chocolate.

vertigo and other Alfred Hitchcock related ailments

It could have been worse. When I realised these were proper dizzy spells that would just not go away I thought The doctor would diagnose Labrynthitis. Honestly, my husband does a very good David Bowie impression, my life would have been unbearable!

But no, it was just vertigo. No point in telling them I'm not afraid of Heights. The Physicians Assistant printed off some diagrams of the ear to help explain slowly and carefully to me in her whispered Eastern European accents ( lovely they are too) that er... something is unbalanced behind my ears. Yes , yes it could be connected to my infected tooth... or a virus or ... we don't know.

There was only one cure and it was exercise! She searched Google for them and found a diagram of a man closing his eyes. turning his head 45 degrees and lying down on his side, then up again and down on the other side. BRILLIANT! lying down! that's my kind of exercise. Got to do them 3 times a day? No problemo, I may even bring out an exercise DVD ( chortle, chortle...ohh dizzy spell etc.)

These exercises will make you feel worse, make you feel sick.
One thing, can I drive?
No you will be a dangerous driver.
Oh...
Another thing, I'm a drama teacher. That's ok right?
No you cannot be responsible for children.
I decide to refrain mentioning my own children and ask  can I have a doctor's note
No , The law of this country says you self certificate for a week, if you are still bad, come back. Also have three points of support. one, two ( bashes legs) three ( flourishes arm) If you are still dizzy and sick come back.

I don't go to look round ANY schools for their Open Evenings or Open days. Daddy becomes Taxi driver no1, Suddenly I can see that he thinks our Kids do TOO MUCH.

At the weekend my tooth flares up again, despite my having finished my antibiotics and not touched alcohol all week, because I thought they would be more effective. Monda,y I return to dentist for major antibiotics, she doesn't think the tooth has anything to do with my vertigo.

I ring the doctors' surgery to speak to the Physician's Assistant.
She's no longer with us.
What? When did that happen?

I am told to ring tomorrow morning and the doctor will call me back. I leave it til Weds, incase I get better. I don't. I call and have to insist someone call me back. The doctor rings me back about an hour and a half later and asks about it. I tell her I am doing the exercises.
We can prescribe you a course of tablets, 5 days. Don't drive. I'll give you a note for work for another week. Come back if you aren't better.

Better make the appointment now, I think , just in case. Why didn't I get tablets last week?

This week I did borrow a stick from my father in law. I had to explain to everyone that I hadn't hurt my foot AS WELL, but its just to stop me falling over.Now no longer have to use eldest child as a crutch. I think I may have started a new trend , all the mummies-at- the -gate will be using them next week.

Oh , one of my neighbours pointed out that a white van  keeps driving up and down our cul de sac. I dismissed him as the rag and bone man, but woke up today feeling paranoid about break ins. I will be perched up against The REAR WINDOW with binoculars for the rest of the day. ( one of the dangers of being off work sick and a bit bored )

bully boys

So on Saturday morning,  I am talking casually to middle child about what she will actually allow me to put into her school sandwich box, hoping she will slip up and express a preference for something other than dry bread.
One day this term I gave her boiled egg and she was teased by other boys but she put them straight with an indignant toss of her head ... or so I thought. But mentioning egg sandwich opened a whole other tub of worms.
Last January, I discovered my little girl was being picked on in the playground by a group of lads who had decided she had "the bogey touch" so no one else was allowed to touch her or go near her. I informed her teacher who dealt with it well, a couple of the boys cried. I had asked my little girl if everything was ok and she said yes it was. Life went on.
Only when all but one of the boys started to do it again nearly straight away she decided she was going to ignore it. They didn't stop. She didn't tell me, she didn't tell the teacher. The other children in her year who witnessed it didn't say anything either. Last week her elder sister complained because she kept trying to play with her on the Upper School side of the playground. Even then middle child didn't say why.
I strode in on Monday morning, the new head teacher was busy, I left a pre-penned letter and said I would be home all day. I waited. At lunchtime, I rang the school after Daddy badgered me. The receptionist was flustered, she had given the Head the letter but wasn't sure what had happened next. The Head would ring she said. At 3p.m. I rang again, got another receptionist who didn't know what I was on about, the Head was out at a meeting, but she left me on hold and came back saying the Head of Year wanted to speak to me at the gate. We did actually go into her classroom when I got there.
The upshot was that the the majority of the boys confessed. The two that denied were outed by witnesses. They had their play time taken off them for a day and were made to apologise. Their names have gone into the behaviour book. They have written letters of apology during lunch time, when my eldest happened to be passing through the room to hear one of the try to deny it again.
"Yes you did do it" she says ( I imagine with great contempt, hand on hip, surveying them with disdain) " You all bullied her" she said.
Apparently the TA over looking the process took my eldest to one side to try to persuade her it wasn't really bullying. My eldest didn't speak but she disagreed and thought the TA couldn't have known that it was going on from reception until now.
The school has not informed the parents again, as this is" another academic year "from the last incident.
I wasn't happy. I know three of the mum's, Have one of their mobile numbers in  my phone. Standing at the school gates and not saying anything is hard. If I was their parents I would want to know and not stand there unaware that another Mother is standing near by silently writhing with rage and ( yes I will say it) JUDGING.
 I know what they have done is petty, but not to my little girl. On the surface she may not appear bothered, but inside she feels sick and her anger boils over quickly at home. I know that they are only little boys, but its a good job none of them were in my kitchen last Saturday morning when she told me.

Work life balance

Work life balance?
Nope not a hope, not this week.
New working hours not conjusive to this. 3 days over four means I am working four days but being paid for three. Can I make one of my half days a whole day? " Only if you want to teach science." I am told.
I got a D for GCSE physics. My brain doesn't compute chemistry , I can't label all the bits of a plant and even after 3 kids I'm not completely sure I know the facts of life. Nobody wants me to teach their child science.
The ICT isn't working properly at work and this morning I had a melt down because my home printer had... Well a melt down actually.
My house is half in darkness as bulbs keep going and I haven't any spares. The oven has mercifully and miraculously come back to life. When I but some bulbs I will be able to see what I am cooking.
My middle child fell over running out of school and took all the skin off her knee. Child minder patched her up so when I nipped into chemist to buy new dressings I was unable to inform chemist any details of the wound as I hadn't actually seen it. ( probably good job. I would have fainted/ cried even when my brave child remained tearless )
My eldest has opted to play netball after school on Mondays then I realise I have missed an afterschool safeguarding session on her first practise date. Have to rally the troops and grandma steps into the breach.
Next month my mother comes to stay so we can attend the secondary school open evenings. It will be odd to be the other side of the desk again.
This weekend I plan to cook casseroles and bake cakes and pies so that my fridge and larder is full. I plan to get all school paperwork up to date and clean the house from top to bottom - or I may just forget it and have a glass  of wine and read a book!

holidays

We have had fun
We have fitted an awful lot of things into the six weeks.
It has rained on us and I have visited A LOT of toilets. Three little girls aged between 5-10 cannot synchronise their bladders and cannot be expected to go for more than 50 minutes without needing the loo. This may be why it took 7 hours to get to Devon at the start of August.
It may be why I have visited every toilet on the south bank between The Tate Modern and The Houses of Parliament ( sometimes doubling back to revisit!)
It is part and parcel of every summer holiday since having toilet trained kids - hunting for baby change facilities is now a distant memory.
So we have packed every bit of excitement we could, making sure that every day there was a plan for something to take place.
The first weekend grandparent had them as Mummy and daddy escaped to watch Monty Python at the O2, then the local church ran 4 days of holiday club, then they were whisked off to Granny's in outer Wales, followed by a trip to Harry Potter, which could have been blindingly expensive if i hadn't assured them before hand that I would not be buying ANYTHING from the gift shop. Also it was extremely hot that evening and the family room booked at nearby hotel was unbearable without air conditioning so a very polite and British criticism saw us with a full refund. This week also included trips to the library and art gallery.
The end of the week involved play dates followed by a weekend of packing as eldest was off on choir tour. Bereft of one child, I hijacked my Niece for a sleep over and day at soft play place. Then more packing for our epic trip to the toilet - I mean to Devon and a lovely caravan just as the weather turned not so hot.
We left a day early, having reunited with the eldest half way through our stay and drove through rainbows all the way home.
This was supposed to be the quiet week, just packing and unpacking, school shoe buying and washing and ironing, but I decided to enrol middle child into intensive swimming at a local baths. I had play date pencilled in mid week but Grandpa had a fall and we had emergency sprint to the hospital A & E two hours away from us.
We ended the final week on the  North Wales coast listening to commentators on the weather assure us that Autumn had come early - I packed fleeces, thermals and wellies to put over bikinis.
We came back on the sunniest day of the weekend. But we did not stop for the toilet - not once.

crying

Crying is a strange thing isn't it?
Its the only form of communication for tiny babies and as mums we tear our hair (which after the birth is already falling out) out to find out what it is the bundles of joy are trying to tell us - food, sleep, food, nappy, heat, food, boredom, food, temperature, food?????
Then as we get a bit bigger it can be a call for attention or a desire to be comforted, mother wipes away our tears and kisses our booboos.
A bit older still and the crying is angry and frustrated because mum wont let us to do whatever it is we want to do and all our friends mums let our friends do it cos they are so much , like way cooler than you mum.
There's homesick crying and feeling sorry for yourself crying, once we spread our wings and fly, even if its only during university term time and less than 100 miles away from mummy and daddy.
There's heartbroken crying when we fly back home to dad's egg and chips, the only meal that we can eat when we are heartbroken and the love of our life has left us for a Fresher.
There's the shared crying during the times when pregnancies have gone wrong, or there have been scary medical results or our babies are poorly.
There's the time we watched as the strongest man in our life cried huge, open mouthed , agonising, sobbing, wracking grief...but we wont talk about that, that is not our's to talk about.
There is the deranged, can't cope, can't sleep, can't function, early mother hood crying, when hormones are running amok and mastitis is making us sweat and ache.
There is happy crying too, but at the moment we can't quite remember what that feels like.

And now there's the time, when after weeks of rushing about and being pulled this way and that way, coping with changes, illnesses and unpleasant surprises, there is a small lull in the day, where we get out of the car and survey our house and wonder where we could sit , just for a minute to weep and not be heard by the neighbours or the postman, because finally there is time to stop and crying, we find, is the one thing that we need to do. What kind of crying is this? There is no one to kiss our tears away, no one to stroke our hair, no one to put a plaster on our knee.

There is the little voice inside our head reminding us that the cup is STILL half full. Others have it a lot, lot worse.

What kind of crying is this?

I don't know

But it is lonely and it is sad, but once it is over, we might feel a bit better...

missing out on stuff

On Friday, I found myself in the staff room with women around my age range and with kids. They were talking about someone senior who was trying to leave early to attend some function their kid's school was putting on. It meant someone having to cover a class and two cover supervisors were absent.
I walked in at the tail end of the conversation about that certain member of the staff - I'm still not sure who they were talking about to be honest, but I don't think they elicited much sympathy from the group. However the conversation developed into a "the things I have missed my kids do because I work ..."

I have had this conversation with others quite a few times recently, perhaps because the latter part of the summer term sees sports days and leaving assemblies and concerts. The junior school my two eldest go to put on an art exhibition on Monday a.m. ,  talent show final on Tuesday ( my kids didn't get through this year, don't get me started on that!), a sports day on Weds and a summer fayre on ...Saturday! I would rather my children go to a school where they do a lot of creative stuff, rather than do none, but it does add to mummy guilt and with everything else going on, I couldn't ask Nanny and Grandad to cover me this week.

I made it to sports day. I did a lot of cheering and I rescued my daughter from a big, hairy moth that decided to crawl up her t shirt. oh and I nearly got hit by the relay race baton.

I was allowed to watch another sports days two weeks ago, because year 11 left and freed up Thursday afternoons. I did not make youngest sport's day and I am still upset at missing her Mothers Day assembly because HMI decided to watch me teach year 10 instead. I was available to take eldest to her violin exam a few months ago and also took a couple of her friends because their parents were working. The headteacher arrived and urged me to leave the rest to her care. I was reluctant, one of the girls I'd taken is my daughter's best friend. Her mother knew I was with her, when I said I might go, she burst into tears. I cuddled her and she was fine. She got a distinction. Her mum had mummy guilt.

There is a concert a week on Wednesday for the eldest, her father will miss it because its his own school production. I may have to take her younger sisters, which means i will miss quite a bit of it! My friend is taking her to piano grade 1.( I hope she doesn't cry) Nanny is going to last day concert, as I will be going to reception last day concert.

I made it  to middle child's starring role as soldier 2 in their Moses play and I saw her valentine's class assembly. I went to play games with youngest's class, I will be able to go in and see her books in open day, I will miss the junior school open day its on a day I work.

Last Sunday my eldest was sulking because no one was going to see her art work, " no one ever comes..." she began. I stopped her and reminded her that it wasn't true, but I do hope when they get older, they remember me coming to stuff and trying my hardest to get them to the events and past times they have chosen to do. I'm not sure what I'm trying to say here. I would like to be able to get to everything, to be the one at the front, sitting bolt upright with charged up video camera, recording it in surround sound and 3D, with a big smile and a Pushy Mother Badge. Instead I sit for a few minutes in a staff room, competing with others over the stuff I am missing out on.