An appointment with the grindstone

I'm getting a wobbly tum and my thoughts are turning towards apprehension ... so I thought l'd blog it out! The thought of getting back into the groove, gives me palpitations not the virtual kind, real ones! LOL

I have only worked 6 days since 27th July as I take the bulk of my holiday allowance during the summer hols. I want to be home with the kids, they don't necessarily want me home at all, they are 16+ and 14 yrs old. I am probably in the way!


I like to make the most of this time, even though they usually are asleep, hunched over laptops or talking on the phone in their rooms. Just being home with them is the thing for me, of course they don't see it or even get it, it's probably not even on their radar! I've always been home with they go out to scool and there when they come in, untill this last year when I accepted more hours, we now overlap a bit, but they are older, so it's fine all round.

I didn't have my kids until my mid thirties, I lost early in my first pregnancy and then had ten years of fertility problems. We had been together 17 years and I had given up hope but suddenly conceived naturally, twice! So I guess I am a bit too protective and grateful, even scared I will miss something. I am already privately fretting about the empty nest thing, even though my daughter is only starting sixth form this week. I know how fast it all passes and another term is in part another term nearer to a new start for me, for them, for us?

So it's obvious I don't welcome change, but it is the only thing of which we can be sure, so l'm trying so hard to look at this in a 'glass half full' frame of mind.

I am so happy to watch their journeys from my role with a view, it is just tinged with a sadness that I find hard to express, it is so innate.

So tomorrow I return to work at the museum. I also return to Curves after a 6 week break and I shall pick up the healthy eating regime again, as all have lapsed in favour of toast with butter over muesli and fruit, sandwiches over pasta for lunch and practically anything over salad and meat for dinner. My jeans are too tight again.

I must regroup physically as well as mentally to have the stamina to cope with the juggling of house, home, kids, pets, garden and all the added slam dunk! mishaps and problems a mum deals with in the course of her day/week/month!

It is such hard work and I know l'm a much nicer person to live with when I don't have to juggle it all. Much of the juggling is, I have to say what I do to add to the pressure, the little extras and the standards we set ourselves.

In fact I would go as far to say, at the risk of having lots of fraught and vocal messages in my inbox tomorrow; If most of the women who juggle home and work, be it part time or full time, and they were offered the real non-judgemental, no recriminations, guilt free choice to either stay home and be paid a 'carer' like allowance in respect of the value of that role OR go to work and continue with this kind of fraught and yes even marginalised rol e... which do you think the majority would choose to do?

I'm just curious as to whether I am just a, 'very odd middle aged woman in some kind of crisis', or a 'normal middle aged woman in crisis'!

What's with the inches v pounds?

Bloody hell! It really is true! I never would have believed it, if l hadn't seen it for myself! Holy crap. I can put on weight and get thin! DOH!

Here's the gig, I had gained some weight over the last 10 years. I can't blame the gain on giving up smoking cos l did that in '90. I can't blame pregnancy and babies cos I did that in '91 and '94. It obviously wasn't the breast feeding, cos l did that from '91 through to '96, please don't groan so loudly, l heard that! LOL! SO I guess it the Galaxy and bigger portions.

Two years ago wanting to approach my 50's healtier and thinnier, I decided to take my self in hand, (if you'll pardon the expression) and l gently dropped 3olbs, down from a voluptuous size 18/20 to a curvy size 14. So bit by bit I chucked out ALL the old clothes and as I shrunk down over 6 months I replaced old sizes with new.

After 12 months I bought MORE clothes and shoes (yes, if you drop that much your FEET get smaller too!) and since I have acquired a few more items to hide at the back of the wardrobe , under the bed (and if desperate the boot of the car) and then I gradually intoduce them as, 'What this? Oh I've had this for ages, just haven't had the place/time/event or indeed imagination to invent another barefaced lie to tell you!'

Before as my weight fluctuated over the years, it wasnt a bother to me. SO what's this all about then, its all gone on in the same bloody place! A drum roll for the belly roll! In February I joined Curves, the ladies only gym, that recommends 30 minutes workout x 3 times a week (in fact its less than that, I'm usually there and back in 40 minutes) and I've dropped about 15 inches in total, but get this I'm about 10lbs heavier than I was when I joined.

I do feel fitter, I'm more or less the same dress size, but I feel bigger. Apparently it's a fact that muscle weighs than fat in the same space. Go figure!

Maybe it'll all settle down when I'm through the other end of this hot space they call menopause.

Sigh...