You Are Powerful!

You are powerful, yes you. You may not think it but you have more power than you realise.

This is power that doesn’t rely on muscle tone or physical ability, I’m talking about the power of conscience, the power that you have to make a difference to the life of  a child in trouble, a person in need a community in chaos and ultimately the whole damn world.

So how does this power manifest? Simply by finding your voice, by not turning a blind eye, by not ‘putting up’ with whatever situations you encounter on a daily basis that upset or depress you, it manifests as soon as you find your voice and speak out against injustice, against prejudice and against a society in trouble.

I have lately found my voice and I have made it heard. I have spoken out about child abuse and I have made my voice heard about the constant barrage of anti social behaviour I am subjected to day after day. My voice has made government departments listen and local authorities take action. My voice has impacted on the world immediately around me and most importantly my voice is causing change to happen.

This is not a call to arms to change the world. This is a call to all of you, those who see injustice, those who suffer within an anti social society. Find your voice and make it heard, step in where there is a need. Don’t sit at home feeling frustrated, or disgusted and appalled at what you have seen, heard or been subjected to, there are people out there paid to listen, waiting to take action on your behalf, and more importantly, somewhere there is a child desperately hoping that someone will find their voice and help them and change their world for the better.

Feeling Old

Well my ‘little girl’ reaches the ripe old age of 17 today. How does that make me feel? I feel old. I seem to have woken up this morning with more aches and pains than I had yesterday and I swear I can see another grey hair or two. I think I need to formulate a plan of action.

I was thinking I was doing well, getting my hair back to its natural colour, no trace of dye to be seen. I am quite proud of the fact that I have good skin and don’t need to trowel on a layer of foundation on a morning before I can face the world. Yet I feel like time is running through my fingers and blowing away like grains of sand.

I am told I don’t look my age, which is always nice to hear. I am also told that mediums tend to stay looking a little younger that their years, which is also encouraging. Then again I am also told that most mediums are ‘generously’ pear-shaped, but I think I can live with that as long as the wrinkles are deferred by a few years!

So what can I do? Other than keeping a positive outlook and my sense of humour – not a hell of a lot! Time after all isn’t a commodity we can buy more of, we have what we have and it is up to us to make the most of it. So maybe I can live with a few grey hairs. I may be ‘generously’ pear-shaped, but I’m not at the point where I need to book two seats on a plane.

Life is for living, for making discoveries about who you are, and for learning from your mistakes. At 17 my daughter is heading out to discover her own life lessons, I am quite happy in the knowledge that I have worked through many of mine and have grown as a person because of it.

Conspiracy Theory

For those of you out there of regularly check this blog, you will do doubt have noticed that there has been a distinct lack of posting. This is due to the fact that for the past week or so life seems to have ganged up on me and kneecapped me.

Well thats my theory and I’m sticking to it.

Since I last posted, I have regained some control over my sleeping, which I am so relieved that I did as I have needed more strength than ever to cope with this weeks events.

I have a little boy, Xander, and he is unique. I call him my ‘rainbow child’ as no matter how dark, gloomy and stormy you may be feeling, one smile from him and he radiates all the joy of a rainbow after the storm. He is also gifted with the ability to see spirit and perceive things that others may miss, which is a talent that I intend to nurture so that unlike me, he will keep the ability as he grows and not have the long period of emptiness during the transition from childhood into adulthood that I had until I regained my gifts.

Monday this week saw me rushing him to the doctor’s surgery and then rushing him into hospital, bypassing the A&E/Emergency Room and getting him straight onto a ward. Unsure of why he was screaming in pain there was talk of appendacitis, kidney stones a twisted bowl and heaven knows what else, there was so much information heading my way that I can’t remember it all.

Being a single mum through the week I felt so alone in having to make all of the necessary decisions and try to comfort and reassure him. Calls were made to his grandpa to collect pyjamas etc as the hospital were keeping him in, calls were made to his daddy to tell him he better pack his stuff and head home asap as his little boy needed him.

So while I sat in the hospital by his bedside awiting test results and watching ever more painful examinations, my father was collecting necessary items and getting upset at the thought of Xander in pain, and Xander’s daddy was making the 300 mile trip home to be by his bedside. I was trying hard not to let my emotions show and stay calm for Xan, whilst inside I was falling apart, especially when the doctor said he was going to call a surgeon!

Thankfully at the last minute, as the surgeon was heading up, more test results came back and we found the source of the acute pain. Now we knew why he was suffering but not the reason for the condition. Still they decided that due to this new information, he could come home, providing I was armed with enough medications to stock a pharmacy.

Thinking that this would now mean that everything was under control, later that evening we were discharged, Grandpa relieved and coming home from the hospital with us, daddy still heading up the motorway to be with us.

Tuesday however saw us rushing back into hospital. Xander started getting hotter and hotter, temperature rising up to 102.2′ and then he started shaking. This was new and scary to me, it all came on so quickly. The hospital was called and he was readmitted and the round of tests statred again.

He is back at home now (Friday), I have a schedule of medications, his daddy has returned to work, grandpa is calling us regularly to check we are ok, and I am watching him like a hawk. I am keeping him away from nursery schiool until I am sure he is stable and in control of himself and as for me I am running in mum/nurse mode, waking up at the slightest night time murmer and checking his temperature several times a day, just in case.

This has been one of those instances when I have been glad I work from home. He has had his mummy by his side all the way through his trauma, hopefully making him feel safe and reassured. Yes I may miss a couple of deadlines, or the store may miss an update etc, but I am where I am most needed and that is more important than anything else.

General Alert Sounded in Hartlepool

Well if there hasn’t been there should be. Why? Well its been a while but I am out ‘on the town’ there tonight!

It has been a long time since I have been on a traditional pub crawl, actually I can’t remember the last time as it was literally so long ago. Maybe I am old before my time, my partner says he is going to get me carbon dated just to check I haven’t lied about my age.

But, for a birthday celebration, a 40th birthday too I might add (not mine before you all go awww. I have a couple of years left before I hit the big four ‘O’). She wants to go dancing, dancing! I hope all of these trendy pubs and bars have got their floors reinforced and are well stocked ready for our arrival!

I have even decided to bare my legs for the event too, and so that all of the party goers don’t get blinded when a strobe light (do they still have them?) flashes onto my delicately ‘moon tanned’ legs I am going to attempt some ‘light’ fake tan – another first! It could be that I spray the bathroom a strange shade of orange during application, or I end up looking like I have been dipped in creosote – but I’m a woman on the edge and I’ll try anything once!

I shall report on the tanning success, night out etc when I come round/sober up or can see the keyboard again over the weekend. I may even post a photo or two so brace yourselves!

Why did I have kids?

Considering the hundreds of child rearing books out there on the shelves just waiting to be purchased by eager parents to be, I doubt that any of them can truly prepare you for parenthood, at least not for any of the events that have encountered.

As a mum of three and a step-mum to another four, both my partner and I have lost count of the amounts of times we have uttered ‘They don’t tell you that in those damn books!”

Until you have been sat in the emergency room trying to explain why your young son has one of his sister’s beads firmly lodged up his nose you haven’t truly lived. Nothing can prepare you for the looks you will receive from the hospital staff, from the receptionist to the triage nurse looks have ranged from disbelief to the; “Just what kind of a mother are you?” scathing type of look. I refuse to believe that I am the only mother who has turned up for help when all home based efforts of poking, squeezing and attempted nose blowing have failed? And yes, thank you, I know he is only two years old and yes I know these types of toys are inappropriate for his age group, no they are not his they belong to his older sister, yes they are normally out of his reach, yes I do think it was intentional his sister said she wanted to see how far up it would go.

Looking back I think perhaps that my daughter looked upon her younger brother as some kind of interactive toy. When he was around four years old I once found her pinning him to the ground, her knees on his arms so that he couldn’t move around, lipstick firmly grasped in her six year old hand and well, you can imagine the rest, he looked like a twisted little clown from someones nightmare.

Those two little horrors are now teenagers, and I am going through it all again with my four year old son, only this one is more vocal than the other two ever were.”Why has that man got no hair?” and “Why is that lady fat?” or the best one so far, whilst I was in the supermarket; “Are you a lady or a man because you have prickles on your face like my daddy but you are wearing a ladies dress?”

No matter how many times you wish for it, the ground never does open up beneath you and swallow you whole, neither do the comments go unnoticed, no matter how hard you wish for people to be deaf. Children will go on embarrassing their parents and creating events that will stretch you to your limits for as long as they are able, but isn’t that one of the things we love them for, their sheer unpredictability?

Ashes From My Past

Another little piece of me laid bare for all to read, sometimes I cannot help but let out the melancholy before it eats away at something much more valuable. So please forgive me my indulgance.

Ashes From my Past

The ash at my feet is now flaked grey and cold,

The flames are extinguished, the embers grown dull.

The whole of my life was ablaze in that pile,

Photographs, furniture, clothing all gone.

The breeze is now swirling the ash at my feet,

Forming patterns, revealing the debris beneath.

Its hard to identify what was once there,

As now its all colourless, lifeless and dead.

I should be distraught, at the loss I have suffered,

Yet I feel a renewed sense of freedom, release.

The breeze lifts the ash, in a moment its gone,

Stinging my eyes, making tears that are empty.