Adapting

I had to chastise daughter last night. In her room I found a sheet of paper for booking visiting times for school parent's evening in the middle of November - a parent's evening I had no idea happened. She was apparently given the sheet on a day she was sent home sick and forgot to give it to me.

I was pretty angry but I think I kept my head. The main reason I was upset is that it appears to have coincided with one of her school reports which she was particularly disappointed about and I ended up attending an extra meeting with her head of year to find out how she was getting on with her second year at the school. I felt like I must have looked a bit foolish booking a meeting with her head of year after apparently missing her parent's evening for no apparent reason.

Anyway, I did my usual thing of not really thinking my actions through and went off on one a little. I didn't lose my temper but I don't think I handled it particularly well and I went on a bit too long, diluting my point.

I'm learning that I should take a few deep breaths and maybe rest on my thoughts a bit before confronting her with things which piss me off. When my emotions are high I tend to ramble and lose track of what I'm trying to achieve, and giving myself time to clarify that is important, especially when dealing with someone who's had to put up with an irrational and unpredictable mother. It's interesting watching her reaction when I get het up, and hopefully she takes it on board when I make it clear I'm not going to lose my temper or hit her.

It's obvious that we're adapting to each other's way of behaving. I've lived alone for almost three years and with other adults the rest of my life, only having daughter around every other weekend for access visits. Daughter's lived with her family until three years ago when her mum and stepdad split up, and since she's lived in various places and configurations of mother, brother, sister, stepdad and his new family, and me. It must be hard for her to keep having to learn how to act around all these adults with their foibles and nuances and varying personalities. She's doing incredibly well considering all the other early-teen stuff she's going through, and I'm proud of her for that.

It's a massive learning curve, and I'm sure we're still moving slowly along the steep beginnings.

Festivities

I'm back at work after three lovely, Christmassy days off. The big day passed without a hitch and it was lovely to have daughter with me from the morning and spend the day with my family. Some exciting and thoughtful gifts were exchanged and it we came home full and satisfied.

True to predictions, daughter's pre-planned seven-hour meeting with her mother got changed dramatically. Instead of meeting her at 10am, I got a text asking to put it back to midday as they were 'going to a friend's for lunch'. Daughter wasn't surprised at all. Then, instead of being back for 7pm, she arrived home at 2.30pm having spent two hours sat it a pub opening presents - 45 minutes of which her mum spent talking to one of her friends. Daughter was visibly pissed off by this and I'm sure that although she appreciated the small gifts she was given, it nowhere near makes up for being treated like just another human to manipulate.

This brings me on to something that's been bugging me since their last meeting. Daughter's been asked to go to London with her mum to buy stuff for 'their new flat' and has been told they can hopefully decorate daughter's room however she wants. I'm confused about this - does she honestly think she can take daughter back after everything that's happened? Does she not see what emotional turmoil she's put her daughter through with her selfish and thoughtless campaign of self-destruction? It's possible she's just thinking about her fortnightly access visits, but having known this woman for as long as I have I sincerely doubt it. It's most likely she's planning on trying to take daughter back full-time and have another go at trying to be a mum. The thing is, I think I've finally got to the point where I absolutely will not give her that chance for fear that she'd mess it all up again and take daughter down with her.

A number of us have worked hard to ensure Sophie is settled and balanced and has everything she needs to keep a level head. Her teachers, her counsellor, her friends, her grandmother and I have all tried to give her a path to teenagehood which is free of the stresses and strains she's been under for the past three years while her mum's bounced from boyfriend to house to friend to wherever and dragged three kids along behind her. We've given her emotional, social and financial support and while I know some of that would still be available if she were going back to her mum, I don't know if it'd be enough to balance all the crap that her mum appears to dole out.

So I've made the decision to stick to my original intention and try my hardest to take daughter on as her full-time, responsible parent. I know I have the capacity to give daughter the life she needs and the potential to follow the legal path to make that all official. The desire to make sure daughter is as stable and happy as she can be is stronger than ever and I hope she can see far enough into the future that it's clear to her this would be the best thing for her.

There is still a fear, however, that daughter doesn't want the stable, happy life and craves the instability and uncertainty that goes with living with her mum. In that situation, she's moved around a lot between houses and schools and localities and friends. She's commented before that she wants to move schools, not because she's having a bad time at this one but because she's bored with it. She wants something new and fun and exciting, to be the new kid again, the forging of new friendships and relationships. I can see the attraction of that, and considering it's all she's really known since she was six or seven it's not surprising that's what she desires. Unfortunately, there are many pitfalls associated with that life and it's obvious to all around her that she deserves a few years of stability while she goes through her exam years at school and develops into the person she'll be as an adult.

I'm determined to provide that for her. I've no idea what I'll do if she decides to rebel against me or follow this other path, but I know for sure it'll be fun and fulfilling finding out.

What a difference a day makes

Twenty-four little hours. I went from heavily emotional to cool as a cucumber in such a short period. Yesterday daughter and I got on famously, not just because I put in some extra effort to be bright and bubbly but because she really does seen genuinely settled in our little abode. We sat together and wrapped presents for family, we played on the Wii and laughed and joked. That's how I'd like things to be every time we hang out together, and I think it's so easy to lose that motivation for fun and energy for interaction when your child is living with you.

Brain thaw

Yesterday's emotional fluctuations were quite severe and I can mainly put it down to being overtired. At one point I was sat here in the office typing away at yesterday's post with tears in my eyes feeling really sorry for myself and letting my mind race off in search of negativity and failure, something I haven't done for a long time. It just reinforces the importance of good sleep routine and I've spent two of the past three nights in bed at eight and asleep by nine.

When I'm less tired, I'm much more capable of balancing my logical, pragmatic side with my crazy, depressive side. When I'm too tired, I'm prone to making bad judgements and being so unable to process rational thoughts I managed to tell my daughter to 'shut up' the other day, even though she was trying to be nice. Bad daddy! Of course, I apologised as I always will if I think I've done something wrong, but that's an extreme example of how lack of sleep can effect me.

Many of yesterday's fears were allayed when daughter came back from her meeting with her mum. As I said, it'd been adjusted from an afternoon Christmas shopping in the city to less than an hour wandering around our town before her mum found something more important to do. Daughter was quite disappointed that plans were changed but not surprised, because these plans always, always get changed. They're supposed to be meeting for nine hours on Boxing Day - I can guarantee that'll change in one way or another. It'll most likely be two hours, or it'll have to start later, or something... something will have to change. I often think she gets a kick out of changing plans at the last minute because it puts her in complete control of people's destinies. We'll see, anyway.

Daughter wasn't particularly complimentary after their meeting. I'm not blind to the fact that daughter occasionally tells me things she thinks will please me or shift my view somewhat, and I think yesterday was no exception. She said her mum kept referring to her 'new flat' as 'our flat' and 'perfect for us' and said that disturbed her a bit. She said she didn't want to upset her mum by telling her she's not coming back - the words she used were 'It's all going to go wrong again'. She was unsure whether she'd consider going back even if I'd let her, and didn't want to upset me by moving out. This might all be fantasy anyway, if I can muster the balls to follow through with my intention of obtaining full custody. She also said her mum kept telling her what she'd bought her for Christmas, which was seen as an attempt to score Brownie points. All in all, while daughter seemed to enjoy this brief meeting with her mum, it showed me that daughter sees things more clearly than I give her credit for and hopefully knows that I'm trying to do what's best for her.

I also learned that in times of severe overtiredness, I should avoid emotional issues and try to keep a rein on negative trains of thought, lest the trains leave their tracks.

Turmoil

In the past eight hours I've broken two of my never-before-defined Golden Rules for an Easy Life.

First, I stayed up much too late for my own good. I had some friends over for food and games and it went on far too long but it was absolutely worth it.

Second, I let my paranoia get the better of me and I read a few text messages on my daughter's phone. In the past, I promised her and myself that her phone would be private and I wouldn't snoop on her conversations, but I had my reasons and I hope to justify them here.

Last week, I received word that daughter's mother had finally been given her marching orders from her ex-boyfriends house and had skipped town. While this initially caused some confusion and threw her Boxing Day meeting with daughter into doubt, I wasn't surprised or particularly displeased by the news. There's been very little contact between mother and daughter for the past eight weeks since mother and boyfriend actually split up - maybe a couple of text messages in one day a few weeks ago, but otherwise nothing. Nothing, that is, until Sunday evening.

We were relaxing playing Wii and daughter sent out a chain text she'd got and within a few minutes she was exchanging messages with her mum. This bugged me a bit - more on this another time - but she was obviously pleased to hear from her and I love having a happy daughter so I left them to it. She asked permission to go shopping with her mum today at midday and I granted it without much thought.

On waking this morning I got an email from her mother's ex saying 'Urgent. I heard mother is taking daughter shopping tomorrow. I'm praying this isn't true. I'll call you tomorrow.' It sounded very ominous and I felt my stomach drop. Thoughts of abduction or coersion raced through my mind and the thought occured there might be more to this text conversation than daughter was letting on. It was here I decided to have a look at her phone to make sure nothing untoward was being planned.

I've only ever snooped on her phone once before in very similar circumstances, but that time I went too far and read messages which were outside of the scope of my investigation. I regretted doing it because a couple of tiny things I read exploded in my mind and caused me all kinds of internal anguish. I told myself then that I'd not do anything like that again and this time I stuck to that and only read the conversation between daughter and mother. I still feel guilty for doing so but I think having your child's best interests at heart is some justification.

Unfortunately, I read a couple of things which have caused me great discomfort. Apparently mother is back in town and has 'a nice flat in town perfect for us' which... well... hurts like fuck. Is she really going to try and take daughter back on? What the hell would I do if she does? Daughter will want to go back and I won't be able to stop her without being the villain. The fact that daughter even wants to go back disturbs me deeply - does she really want to go back to shouting and hitting and slave-driving and lies? I'm making it sound over-dramatic but this is the picture that's been painted over the past couple of years and yes, it does seem as if she wants to go back to that. It makes me feel absolutely awful, that I'm trying so hard to provide a stable home and parent for her but she seems to want to blindly follow the path of self-destruction. Even if she does make a home for her kids, or even just for daughter, I am absolutely sure she'll fuck it all up again. It makes me feel unappreciated and... I mean... what have I got to do to get some fucking stability in our life?

All this is based on a few text messages I shouldn't really have read this morning. I haven't got the full picture and I'm tired and emotional and haven't really got anyone to bitch at or clear my head, and I'm just spewing thoughts into my keypad.

Having had a call from mother's ex, he doesn't have any further information for me. I suspect he was pissed last night - his email was pretty scrappy - and had a kneejerk reaction to the news his ex was back in town. I'm reasonably assured her mother wouldn't try anything stupid, especially if she wants to stay on the right side of social services and the law. However, I can't shake the feeling that she's forging the spanner I've long suspected she'd throw into the works.

It's almost as if she sees daughter as a prize to be won. I've no idea if she's made arrangements to try and see her other two children, and she's made hardly any effort to stay in touch until now. I'm sure she loves her in her way, but I've always felt she'd never 'let me win' and she even told daughter she'd never allow me to have full custody. It seems she'll do anything to have daughter back living with her and that troubles me because it appears to be selfish, in her mother's interest and not daughter's. Almost like 'Look at me, I've got my life in order and my daughter lives with me again!'

I often chastise myself for wishing I never met this woman, mainly because I wouldn't have such a wonderful daughter if I hadn't. But honestly, I dream of a world where she doesn't have control over daughter and, ultimately, me.

Edit: daughter went into town to meet her mum who changed plans dramatically from an afternoon shopping in the city to half an hour wandering around town. She said "She keeps saying 'our house' and 'perfect for us' which makes me uncomfortable." Maybe I was way off the mark...

Evolution part 2

More reflection on how I've changed in two and a half years.

I feel more like myself than I have done in years
Looking back on those old posts, it's quite painful to contemplate the way I felt about myself and the world in general. It's actually scary to consider how dark my thoughts were, how overshadowed with gloom every waking moment was. I'm not sure I can - or even want to - put into words what it felt like, but I can try to describe the differences between then and now. As the title of this paragraph alludes to, I feel like me again after so many years of feeling like half a person. I got some fantastic psychodynamic counselling last year and the transformation has been incredible, from low, demotivated and self-destructive to happy, confident and self-aware in a year or two. I know this is still a work in progress and I have my ups and downs, but they're mainly ups and I'm certainly more 'me' than I have been for years.

I'm the single parent for a bright and happy twelve-year-old girl
Perhaps the biggest change after recovering from depression is the arrival of my daughter. Any parent will tell you that having a baby is a massively disruptive and terrifying experience, but they've never tried taking on an almost fully-grown girl with a fashionable wardrobe, periods, schooling and an entire library of books. Easter is supposed to be a time of renewal and new beginnings, although at Easter this year noone was sure things would end up as they are now. I'm a proud and capable single parent looking after a mature young lady and doing well with it. She's a happy kid and I'm a happy dad. Her recent progress at home, school and socially has been an inspiration. For someone to come through so much emotional turmoil and still have such a positive disposition could be described as a miracle, but I know I've had a hand in that and much of the stuff I've done to help has worked wonderfully. Not that I'd really planned it like this; I'm kind of playing this whole parenting thing by ear. I think that's what you're supposed to do, anyway.

My diet is better - not much better, but better
I take some comfort in the fact that I no longer fill myself with cider and crisps and completely rubbish food. I feel considerably better in my body, despite not actually losing any weight, although I know that will come next year when I pick up the walking pace again. I can't wait to start back on the walking trail, stomping out ten or fifteen miles a week at an above-average pace and watching the extra weight disappear. A fair inspiration for this is daughter, who I noticed recently has put on a couple of pounds and now has a tiny bit of body fat on her belly! I know where that's come from - too much macaroni cheese and portions which are too big - and I'm on the case to stop her putting on any more and hopefully balance my diet a little more too. I feel much better in my mind also, as shovelling junk food and booze into my body was just another factor of self-destruction and is something I have yet to completely overcome.

I can look into the future
Not literally of course, else I wouldn't be sat here blogging, I'd be in a bookies somewhere correctly 'guessing' the winners of the 3.30 at Kempston. I mean I look into the future and I see happiness, stability, progress, fresh prospects, friendships and maybe even relationships. If I ever bothered to try and look forward previously, all I would see was darkness, so it's incredible to have the clarity of mind to consider the future something to work towards, instead of something that would just happen.

There have been so many wonderfully positive changes that writing this out has felt a bit like an ego trip, but fuck it. I deserve to feel good about myself after so long, and I'm so proud of the progress I've made in getting my life back to some form of normality. It's just great to rejoin the human race.

Evolution part 1

I've just been reading back over some older posts from around the time I last moved house. I'm overwhelmed as to how much has changed in just two and a half years.

I no longer regularly smoke weed
For a long time I saw weed as a release. Then, is was a way to forget. Next, it was a tool for 'deleting the day' and finally a crutch which gave me terrible paranoia, stopped me concentrating and made me tidy-up like an obsessive freak. Cutting back on weed has been one of the most massively constructive things I've done over the past two years and I'd never go back to regular smoking now. The only time I use it now is if I'm out walking or very occasionally at home. I rarely buy any and if I do I get tiny amounts so there's no danger of anything other than a few joints over a few days so I don't overdo it. It's unfortunate that it's taken a few adverse reactions to the drug for me to take a step back but it's fantastic I've taken the step at all and I'm incredibly pleased to be free of it and the mental baggage which comes along with it. I even kept a couple of joint's worth at home for more than a week without considering having a spliff which, as anyone who's ever smoked with me will tell, you is a miracle.

My alcoholic tendencies are waning
Looking back on how much I used to drink and how often - even at the start of this year - I'm amazed I didn't slip into total alcoholic meltdown. Living on my own, having alienated most of my friends and generally sitting on my arse being bored, I turned to alcohol for entertainment and to block out the bad things I didn't want to think about. After I had counselling I cleaned my act up quite a bit but I slipped back into old habits quite quickly. Cider was the weapon of choice against boredom, formerly stupidly strong 7% or 8% stuff which broke my head for the evening and most of the next day and ruined my insides. Once it became apparent that stuff was likely to kill me I switched to slightly weaker stuff, although I've just realised 6% isn't that much weaker. I'd get a 2l bottle of that and drink it over a couple of hours and get a nice buzz on without feeling out of control or getting terrible guts the next day. Still, it was too much and I've managed to get myself out of that habit recently. It's an interesting observation that I used visit the alcohol section of the local supermarket almost every day whereas now I almost deliberately avoid it, even when it crosses my mind to 'just have one small beer with dinner'. Astonishing really, as there's been no specific point where I've told myself to do this. I think one of the reasons is that I'd noticed myself getting grouchy and picky with my daughter and didn't want to act like that. When she first moved in I virtually cut out all drinking at home, but when she settled in and things became more familiar, I again slipped back into buying 'the occasional drink'. I put a stop to that, though and now I can't remember the last time I bought 2l of cider. I'm very proud of this and intend on extending the process to reign-in my drinking in social situations so I don't get catastrophically drunk.

I've stopped smoking cigarettes
This has been a work in progress for many years. Now I'm at the point where I can take or leave cigarettes and it's a great place to be. For years I was under their spell and slave to their drug and habit but I'm happy to say I very rarely have cravings. I only tend to smoke when I'm out drinking and occasionally have one at work or at home. When I do have one, I'm constantly aware of making myself smell terrible and this is a big contributing factor in ensuring I don't start again.

Continued in part 2...

Improvements

After a few days sleeping reasonably well and longer than in recent times, and a good long and breezy walk yesterday with my parents, I appear to be enjoying some clarity of thought and vision. Despite feeling like I could go back to bed for a few hours I definitely feel better and will continue with the routine of early to bed for daughter and I until we are back to normal.

For my birthday, my brother gave me a crate of 18 half-pint bottles of Stella Artois. My heart sank when he offered it to me because I've managed to reduce my alcohol intake quite considerably since the summer and I know how rubbish I am at not drinking when there's alcohol available. I've proven this by getting through sixteen bottles in nine days, along with eight bottles of Becks a friend brought round mid-week. 24 bottles in nine days, that's alcohol two and two-thirds bottles a day on average, which is less than a pint and a half. That doesn't sound right but put like that it's not as bad as I thought it was, although I dread to think how many calories that is. Actually, I just worked it out - it's around 2,650 calories. Christ, that's more than one whole day's calorie intake added over nine days.

I've made tenuous mental links in the past between beer and belly, and one of the reasons I think I haven't been putting on weight is because I'd massively reduced the amount of beer and cider I was drinking, but looking at it this way really brings a point home. Here's me worrying about stuff like crisps and cheese and fatty foods contributing the most to my porky figure, when alcohol seems to be a massive contributing factor and should get the same attitude and treatment - it should be an occasional treat and not part of everyday living. Even allowing myself two or three units a day looks like as many calories as a large packet of crisps and I've been working to cut those out of my diet too, at least bringing them back to 'treat' status as they should be.

I've proven recently that small changes can make a big difference. If I can recover my control over my alcohol intake, continue to eat more fresh food, more fibre and less fat and get back into the walking habit I won't have to work hard at losing my extra weight. Little steps, small changes. A journey of a thousand miles, and all that.

Progress

insofar as I've managed to get to sleep by 9.20pm for two nights running. I've imposed an 8pm bedtime on daughter and she's been actively sticking to it, which is lovely as she obviously sees how important sleep is, not only for me but for her too. For the past fortnight she's been spaced out for the first ten minutes in the morning and I'm sure getting back into a reasonable sleep routine will give us both huge benefits.

I've felt a little better getting more than eight hours sleep. I've woken with thoughts such as 'That's more like it!' and 'Excellent!' which are a giant leap up from 'For fuck's sake, it's only Wednesday' and 'Zzzzzz'.

One of the unfortunate side effects of being too tired is that I'm not motivated to get my backside out of bed and get the day started. I used to be so good; my alarm would go off and I'd jump out of bed and straight in the shower or off for breakfast. For the past few months, however, I've lounged around on my mattress, reading the internet on my phone or letting Sky News depress me. I sincerely need to get out of this habit - and my bed - because it's limiting my productivity at home in the mornings. I'm not showering as often as I used to, I'm letting my beard grow longer more often, I'm not making daughter and I lunches like I should and I'm missing breakfast like a fool. Look how many positives there are in dragging my arse out of bed: I stay clean and fresh, I eat better and I save money on relatively expensive lunches! It's a no-brainer.

Hopefully, getting my sleep in order is the first step to recovering a lot of what's got away from me recently. It'll allow my brain to function at its peak - more like halfway up a steep hill - and give me the choice to make better decisions with greater clarity.

Zzzzzz...

With the very best of intentions, there was no way I was going to get an early night last night no matter how hard I may try. I'd forgotten I was supposed to meet and hang out with a friend's Malaysian travelling friend who had arrived last week and I'd offered to babysit, as it were, while she went to a class. They arrived at six o'clock with a bag full of booze and a nice, polite, smart, interactive companion for the evening. Daughter, visitor and I spent most of the time laughing at the Wii I've borrowed from my brother and chatting about his travels and work and life in general. He's a nice guy and we got on well.

Unfortunately, our mutual friend didn't return from her class until around eleven, which was already two hours later than I'd liked to have put my head down. I'd planned the evening so badly I was really quite hungry by the time they left half an hour later so I had some pasta and a final bottle of beer, watched the end of Total Recall and eventually got to sleep just before half past midnight.

On top of feeling really tired anyway, I now feel like a stoned zombie downing Nytol with its head wrapped in pillows and whose thirst for brains is being steadily eroded and replaced with a thirst for Tempur mattresses and 15-tog duvets. Mmmmm... Metaphor...

I've forewarned daughter that I'll probably come straight home from work and jump into her bed for a couple of hours sleep. I must must must get this back under control because it's really effecting my motivation and enthusiasm for life. The only thing I can do to make it better is sleep more and, starting today, that's absolutely positively what I intend to do from now on including today and for the foreseeable future until I'm less tired and able to string coherent sentences together.

I'm feeling particularly reflective today

- not that I'm wearing bright clothing or anything - and I'm quite attracted to the idea of sitting here at my desk, taking the occasional call while plugging away at my phone keypad and looking deep inside my tired soul.

I want to investigate how I feel about this whole situation with becoming a single parent. It's odd because until a couple of weeks ago I thought I was dealing with the mental side of things quite well, but it suddenly became apparent that I'd not really noticed the pressure I was putting myself under.

To quickly reel off a list of emotions associated with events since Easter, I've felt scared, sad, brilliantly happy, fulfilled, concerned, surprised, helpless, paternal, peaceful and complete.

There have been so many ups and downs it'd read like a script pitch for Hollyoaks if I wrote it all out. There have been many extremes of feelings and despite the fact it appears things have settled down, it still doesn't feel like I can allow myself to celebrate because there still seems like such a mountain to climb before everything is legal and binding. I'm still terrified her mum will dig her heels in and prevent everything going smoothly. I can honestly see her doing something as extreme as taking Sophie by force, or having me done over either physically or by some other means.

Perhaps this says as much about my confidence to handle being a parent and responsible adult as it does about my opinion on daughter's mother. My fears about my own ability haven't really been voiced as I feel they might be self-indulgent and not necessarily representative of how I really feel. Almost like if I voice these fears they'll become part of me and lead me in their direction.

Realistically, I do have concerns about my suitability to be a full time single parent. My form for the past two years has been better than ever, particularly since I finished my counselling, but there have definitely been a fair number of cock-ups and events of questionable behaviour. However, that is balanced by my unending solidity at home, in my being there for, and doing the right things by, my daughter in the time she needs me most. Despite occasional bad days, I'm a dependable father and I can be good fun and great company when the mood takes me. I've worked as much as possible to provide for her and made plans for a future together, both in terms of somewhere to live and a good steady hard-working income from a new business. I have the moral support of my family and friends and even some of daughter's extended family which is incredibly comforting that they have faith enough in us to give us their blessing.

On top of all of that, daughter seems immeasurably happier and more settled than when she first came to me at Easter. It's been an emotional rollercoaster for both of us but I can't begin to understand how hard it must be for daughter to deal with all this on a daily basis. She was promised that she could go home twice, only to be let down at the last minute. Her mother promised she'd sort her life out so she could take her kids back, but it never happened. She's gone from living with her mother, mum's boyfriend and her brother and sister to living with just me, Daddy, with my masculine ways and determination to de-embarrassify monthly periods, my creative methods of gentle punishment to establish rules and my somewhat-high-fat diet. She's coping amazingly well with the trials and tribulations of becoming a teenager and growing up along with all this family crap life's thrown at her, and she still finds time for a good hearty laugh every day. What a kid.

Good things and bad, but mostly good. I think I've spent too long dwelling on the negative aspects of the situation and need to man up a bit. Because, along with all the fears and frowns, bundled in with the uncertainty and happiness, I've gained a happy, bright daughter and she's found a reliable, settled father who's doing a much better job of caring for her than her mother has for a long, long time.

Too tired

Too tired for words. Well, I say that, but here are some words anyway.

I stayed up late on Friday night for my birthday and got up early. I intended to sleep on Saturday but just as I closed my eyes for a three-hour snooze my brother called to take me over to our other brother's house for a birthday beer and a crack at Forza 3. I got to sleep at a reasonable hour Saturday night but got woken at 7.20am by the water system chugging away as my landlady took a shower.

Sunday was a lazy day and I'd hoped for a nap in the afternoon but got distracted by the Wii. Getting to bed early was a great idea but like a fool I stayed up and watched Happy Go Lucky until after midnight.

This was very, very stupid. After my late night Friday I should have done everything in my power to catch up on the lost sleep but I dithered and distracted and just plain didn't bother, and it cost me a day at work on Monday. Admittedly I could have and should have gone into work as I really can't afford the time off, but I hoped I could use the day to catch up again.

I started drifting off around 1pm. My phone rang at 1.30pm and woke me up. After I'd had a chat and hung up, I slipped back into sleep and awoke for no real reason less than half an hour later. I finally got down for a good night's sleep around 10pm, and even here I was distracting myself with the movie 'Ultraviolet' instead of getting my head down at 9pm like I could have done.

Irony of ironies, I was woken up at 5am this morning by a nightmare. I'd dreamed I was driving down a local road known for its fast sweeping bends. I was third in a queue of cars behind a van which was going around 50mph, and there were a number of cars behind me too. I could see the drivers in front getting impatient and we approached a wider-than-realistic stretch of sweeping corner which gave everyone an opportunity to overtake. I saw the drivers in front of me speeding up and moving out to pass the van, and a dark red Audi TT overtook me and made a wide pass on all of us in one go.

The TT's back end stepped out as it tried to turn back in and it crashed sideways into a gatepost with a lot of force. I pulled my car over and jumped out, noticing one person hanging out of an open door with their bleeding head resting on the ground. I was patting my pockets down for my phone so I could call the police but I couldn't find it. I stopped a passing car to ask them to call 999 when I noticed my phone had been in my hand all along.

I dialed and waited to be connected. Knowing the procedure reasonably well, I was trying to find out how many people were in the vehicle, who had what injuries, what people's names were etc. I wasn't getting anywhere with all this and I started to panic, and that's when I woke up feeling very strange indeed. Fortunately I managed to get back to sleep with relative ease but the feeling still unsettles me somewhat.

As a recent post alluded to, I've been tired for a while but I feel bloody terrible for it now, I really do. I'm close to tears just writing this out, which is a warning sign. I've noticed certain minor self-destructive behaviours establishing themselves, specifically to do with diet and sleep. I know I'm eating badly when I put the food in my mouth but I ignore it. I know I should get to sleep earlier but I avoid my common sense thinking and stay up late, which makes me feel worse and compounds any problems I'm already having. I've procrastinated on getting things sorted both financially and legally for daughter and I, and I beat myself up for that quite a lot.

It's just dawning on me the scale of what I'm facing here. At the moment it's small but it has massive potential to fuck me up. The words 'I need to talk to somebody' have crossed my mind a few times over the past few days, and I think now is the time to act upon that.

Along with that, I've mentioned here quite a few times that I need to exercise more, sort my diet out and get more sleep. I really need to act on these ideas but my motivation has taken a nose-dive since the nights drew in and I took on the mental pressure associated with taking my daughter on full time. I know all these warning signs point to something which scares the shit out of me - the return of my depression. If only 1% of that horrible feeling threatens to manifest itself within me, it scares me silly. Christ, it scares me.

There are a few things I need to be thankful for, though. I've contacted my solicitor with a view to starting the legal process of taking my daughter on full time. I've got forms sorted for housing benefit, and a copy birth certificate for daughter so I can apply for Child Benefit. I've made in-roads to getting Christmas sorted, and I've even managed to save a little money which will go towards gifts.

Also, I notice these warning signs now. A year or more ago I'd have just buried my head in the sand and let myself spiral into horrible self-destructive darkness, but I'm more prepared to do something about it now. This is definitely a good thing, as long as I'm true to myself and feel like I deserve to follow through with what I need to do to feel like myself again.

Dear daughter

Last night when I was filling your hot water bottle and you touched my hand to show me how cold you were, you pushed slightly and I spilled boiling water on my thumb. It was only a little and fortunately it didn't burn, but the stupidity of what you did really surprised me. I shouted at you and sent you out of the room so I didn't lose my temper and really shout at you. When I raised my hand to point you out of the room you thought I was going to hit you. When you told me this I was shocked and tried to hard to comfort you and tell you that I'd never do that and that anyone who hit you was wrong.

You cried as you told me of times recent and past when your mother had hit you around the face with her hand, or around the head with a hairbrush, or on the arm with a sharp knife which made you bleed, for trivial domestic infractions such as dropping washing baskets down stairs or dropping ketchup on her foot. You were so scared I was going to hit you that it really troubled me. You said these things happened quite often when you lived with your mum, that you got most of the punishment, your brother got some and your sister never got any. You also said that your stepdad kicked you in the stomach a couple of times and that when he and your mum were together, he was more likely to target your brother and sister while your mum would take her aggression out on you.

I've known for a while that these angry episodes happened every now and again, just from things you've told me over the years. I've never felt able to do anything to help simply because I thought they were much less frequent than they obviously were. Had I known you were being treated like this on a regular basis I'd have done something about it, and even now you're out of that situation I still feel helpless because I'm sure I can't talk to you about it without it sounding like a lecture.

You are a bright, clever, sweet and honest person, on the brink of teenagehood, mature but still very much a child, and it tears me apart inside that you've been treated like this. You simply don't deserve it. It upsets me because I know how violence hurts, not just with physical pain but with mental anguish, fear and blaming yourself. It can lead to accepting this kind of violence as normal, and I can't imagine your life ever being filled with all this fear and pain.

I will never hit you. I may shout, I may mutter and grumble and punish you in meaningful and creative ways, but I'll never hit you and I'll try my hardest to prevent you from being in that situation again. I've already committed to taking you on full-time and being your parent and in the process of doing that legally, I may need to tell the people who make these big decisions what you told me above. I know this scares you and you don't want your mother knowing you've been 'telling tales' or want her punished in any way, and that's not the reason I'd tell anyone. I'd only tell a solicitor or judge because I think they need to know the whole picture to make a reliable and informed decision about your future.

I hope this sets your mind at rest somewhat. I've already encouraged you to talk to your counsellor about the nasty things that have happened because I think it's important you come to terms with them. These things have a habit of coming back to bite you when you're older so it would be good for you to try and work through it soon.

As ever, I'm always here to talk to, about anything you want to talk about. Even if you can't talk to me, I can find someone you can.

Love, as always

Daddy x

(Unsent)

Irony schmirony

Ten minutes after my last post, I plucked up the courage to email my solicitor and get things moving legally. It felt great to finally hit 'Send' and take control of the situation. I got a reply immediately - an autoreply at least. She's out of the office this week and won't be back until Monday. Haha! I think there's a lesson to be learned there, and I think it's something to do with procrastination being counter-productive or somesuch. I dunno.

Under pressure

I am still procrastinating over starting this whole legal and local process of taking daughter on full time. There's solicitors to set in motion to get Parental Responsibility and start thinking about getting a Residency Order. There's teachers and heads of year to contact to let them know I'm on the case with her educational progress and ask for help if it's needed. There's forms to fill in which open up my simple finances for all to see, and forms for all manner of benefit and housing applications to be made.

And there, hovering in the background like a scorpion ready to strike is daughter's mother, who's finally contacted our daughter after a few weeks being incommunicado. Her first interaction with her daughter in more than a month and it's full of lies - 'my phone was broken, I lost my free texts blah blah fucking blah.' Yes, you managed to text me two days after your phone broke so I know you're full of shit. Don't lie to your daughter because now she comes to accept it as fact and rarely trusts anything you say.

It's eating away at me now that I'm stalling and putting it off. It almost feels slightly self-destructive and it's the first time I've felt anything like that since I finished my counselling. This in its own right scares me quite a lot. It's comforting that I recognise the warning signs and now I'm in a position to do something about it. That something is pulling my finger out and starting the balls rolling on these applications and processes. That analogy paints a picture in my mind - that once I've put the effort in and started the balls rolling, their momentum will carry them some way until I need to give them a little push in the right direction.

I am very scared. It's only been over the past couple of weeks that I've felt the walls closing in somewhat, both in a metaphysical sense and one of metaphor. I hadn't realised until recently how the pressure and responsibility of suddenly becoming a full-time father has effected me. I also keep coming back to the housing situation and the fact that I don't really have any personal space or 'me time'. My small house feels incredibly small now there's another person living there and as much as I'd never, ever turn her away, I'd really like to sleep in a proper bed with a proper duvet instead of a sleeping bag and proper pillows instead of the rubbish ones I'm using.

I suppose though that these latter matters are trivial and transient to say the least. If I get on the case, new accommodation is simply a few months and a professional decision away and will be backed-up wholly by social services, so if I can deal with things for a time it should settle down eventually.

As far as the pressure and responsibility are concerned, I'm more than happy to take them on in return for the incredible gift of having my daughter around every day. She's just such a beacon of brightness and amusement, so thoughtful and kind. Oh, but there's the catch I think. Remembering how horrible and eternal the pain was when she first moved out with her mum nearly twelve years ago, I'm terrified I'll have to watch her leave again if her mother digs her claws in and decides she wants her back.

Why do I do this to myself?

I think I know the answer already.

For the past few weeks I've been quite tired. I spend the first hour or two of the day wishing I was back in bed and the last couple of hours yawning and knowing I should get to sleep but avoiding shutting-down in favour of tv or games.

More specifically, for the past ten days a tv show has been keeping daughter and I up until 10pm, which is the time I'd usually be asleep by. Once she goes to bed, I stay up for an hour or more having 'me time'.

There's my answer right there. My routine has almost always included some time alone or chilling out before going to sleep. Having a tv, Playstation etc in my bedroom, which is also my living room, makes it too easy to lose an hour or so once I get into it.

The problem with all this is that I get up at 5.50am and I need around eight hours sleep to be properly rested, so every time I stay up a bit late I increase my tiredness. Another problem is I find it very difficult to lie-in, especially on a weekend when I tend to get woken up before 8am.

The symptoms I recognise from being over-tired are obvious to me:

• poor mood - specifically an increase in frustration and anger. I lost my temper at work yesterday morning - the office had been left in a complete state by the person who used it before me and I lost the plot, slamming doors and throwing rubbish bags. I felt much better afterward and pleased that I'd kept the outburst proportionate, but I'm not sure it'd have happened if I'd not been too tired.
  
• lack of motivation - obviously I'd rather be in bed or prostrate on the sofa than cooking or doing the fourth load of washing today or anything at all thanks. It makes me resent having to do the day to day tasks normal people do and it's holding me back.
  
• exercise - my walking has suffered, not simply due to tiredness but the weather's been terrible too. However, being tired doesn't make me enthusiastic about getting outdoors in the cold and wind and rain to tire myself out even more, even though I know the benefits walking has for me.
  
• concentration and performance - this one's obvious too but my general performance and brain function is really suffering because I'm so tired.
  

The only way to remedy this is to get more sleep. I must once again become more regimented in my sleep patterns. I need to make sure it's lights-out and to sleep at 10pm latest every night and try my hardest to nap and catch up on lost sleep.

Before the summer, I was so proud of the positive work I'd done on myself. This included getting my sleep patterns into a positive routine and feeling brilliant every day because I was rested and not tired. Now I feel the opposite and I can feel it dragging part of me down. So, it's time to get back on track with my sleep and return to my happy, well-rested being.

Taking care of business

and having a business to take care of is such an attractive possibility. I'm sat at my desk in my dead-end job waiting for the phones to ring and watching the rain out of the window, dreaming of getting mucky up a ladder somewhere out there.

I can't wait to get out of this bloody job. March cannot come too soon. I've got to spend the next few months planning what I'm going to do and trying to build up interest in my new business as a window cleaner.

I'm really looking forward to doing something for myself, for working towards producing my own income and having a business to call my own. Running my business will give me the chance to run my charity project with more flexibility. I really enjoy the physical aspect of cleaning windows and I know for a fact there's work out there to be done.

It's comforting to know I feel ready to take such a big step and strike out on my own. I really wish I'd done it before when I was still in the swing of things, but I didn't really have the motivation then. Having daughter full time has given me a kick in the arse that I should be doing more to make her teenage years enjoyable. It'd be nice to take her on holidays, give her regular pocket money and maybe start saving towards her university fees. It'd be nice to treat myself occasionally too.

I'm looking forward to the driving, to working outdoors, to having a very active job instead of sitting on my arse all day like I'm doing now. I'm excited about seeing people's houses and meeting pets and kids and all the aspects of the job I liked when I used to do it for someone else. The main difference will be that it'll be mine. All mine. Noone taking a fat slice of the cake and stringing me along. Noone being pushy and bitchy and annoying me all day. Having the resources to look after my vehicle and keep my gear in order. Increasing my self-esteem by being solely responsible for my own income. Having the opportunity to make some proper money for the first time in a long time and it'll be mine. All mine.

I'm looking forward to working in the sunshine, in the rain. To calling it a day if it gets too windy, or sitting in the car waiting for a torrential downpour to stop. To having to work harder to keep from getting cold in the winter. To having a car again - big woo to that! To having bills I need to pay and being able to pay them. To having responsibility for keeping my household in order and paying my way without making the mistakes I've made in the past.

What a star I'll be! What do you do? I'm a window cleaner. Do you work for yourself? Yes, it's my own business. How smart is that?!

I'll be able to take holiday. I know I won't get paid for it, but I'll be earning enough to justify the occasional day off or weekend at the beach. I won't get sick pay but I've only had one and a half sick days in the year since I finished my counselling. I'll be able to pick and choose my hours, to define how tough and busy my day will be myself according to how I feel. I'll be independent and flexible and busy and responsible and reliable and full of energy and enthusiasm for my job because it's MINE.

Stumbling blocks

After almost twelve years dreaming of waking my daughter up for school every morning and cooking dinner with her and helping her with her homework in the evenings, I finally have the opportunity to take her on full time. Having spent the past few years worried whether her mother was at all capable of being a stable and dependable role model for our child, she's proven that she can't and I'm here to take that responsibility.

So why am I frozen to the spot like a scared deer in the sights of a clumsy hunter?

I'm supposed to have contacted social services and got things moving in terms of financial support and an application for housing but I've procrastinated for more than a week. It's only slowly dawning on me what I'm feeling and why.

I'm scared. Apprehensive. Uncertain and insecure of my own ability to carry this all through.

So, what's stopping me? Primarily, I'm very scared that I'll get my hopes up, take the decision to go ahead with the massive undertaking it's going to be, and her mother will come along and fuck it all up. I can definitely see this happening. She's already told daughter she would never let me have full residency of her, which I think is a cruel and disturbing thing to tell a child. From her past actions, I can see her mother doing everything in her power to screw things up for me just to get her daughter back on her side. She can be incredibly manipulative and aggressive and it really wouldn't surprise me if I had a huge fight on my hands sometime over the next few months.

I think that's my biggest fear. I know daughter still hopes and dreams that her mum will sort her life out and give her what she wants, what she needs, but if I'm honest with myself I can never see that happening, at least not without massive amounts of counselling for her mother and plenty of time for her to correct the mistakes she's made over the past ten years.

Personally, I've spent the past two years trying to get things right. From more than a decade of crippling depression and everything I've managed to screw up along the way, including friendships, jobs, relationships, bank accounts and financial obligations, I've tried my hardest to claw my way back to being level-headed, financially responsible and perhaps, dare I say it, a little grown-up?

Despite all this, and despite motivation from the outside that I'm doing the right thing and I'm capable of following through, I still have horrible doubts and even the thought of putting letters in the post or clicking 'send' on an email gives me the willies.

I suppose it's a little like a bungee or parachute jump. I know I'd be bloody terrified standing on the threshold of jumping, but the thrill and benefit I'd get from it would make taking the plunge totally worth it. I need to take that philosophy and apply it to my current situation...

But I can already feel myself tensing up...

My attitude to cleaning

I'd intended to write a post yesterday about the state of my house and my general attitude towards cleaning up, especially now that daughter is living with me full time. Due to an administrative cock-up, I hadn't credited my phone enough to qualify for free internet so I used my remaining credit up at £3 per megabyte which is a fucking disgraceful price and the only thing I hate about O2 - not least that I didn't have any warning that I was using up my credit.

I'd left a note asking my landlady to leave the vacuum out for me to use, spurring me into action when I got home yesterday. I said hello to daughter, put the shopping away and decided to tidy the house.

With daughter sorting and putting clothes away in the bedroom - her bedroom now, effectively - I raced around the living room finding appropriate homes for everything and collecting piles of things to go to different rooms. I ran around the whole house with the vacuum and was thoroughly satisfied with the final result. It's lovely to have such a clean and tidy house after a few months of being a bit apathetic about the whole cleaning thing.

The reasons for this became obvious yesterday while I was itching like a crack addict wanting to use my phone for the internet. When I live on my own, I'm reasonably tidy and my dwelling is usually quite presentable. Conversely when I'm living with someone else, if they're not a tidy person I resent having to clean up after them. This is totally natural behaviour of course, although I realise I should cut my daughter some slack and tidy her stuff up occasionally. It just grates on me, you know? She's more than capable of being tidy, but I know that at her age, and even up until two or three years ago, I had no qualms about my living area being a shit pit.

I think that fundamentally I'm quite a tidy person, but I've lived with a number of people who haven't shared the same enthusiasm for household order. Once their standards slipped, I saw no fair point in tidying their crap up along with my own. I'd feel like a bit of a bastard just cleaning up my stuff and leaving theirs - it did come to that a number of times, especially with washing dishes - so eventually I'd just give up altogether and make no effort to keep the place clean.

When I started living on my own at the start of last year, I made a particular effort to stay tidy - at least in the living room. I'd have a regular clean before daughter came over every fortnight which meant I kept on top of it. Now that she's living with me and making her own mess, I'd let my standards slip somewhat, but I'd like to be more proactive about it and get over the fact that daughter leaves the occasional hair clip or item of makeup in the living room.

The house looks great. I even bought a feather duster, FFS!

Is it just the beginning?

A few days later and now that the dust has settled following the events of last Thursday, things are no clearer. Fortunately my mind has calmed down somewhat, letting my anger dissipate and my emotions sort themselves out.

A massively positive step in all this mess is that daughter has had the first session with her counsellor - a lady I've seen myself for support in the past - and seemed to get on quite well, so much so she's really looking forward to her next appointment. I've decided to send her weekly if possible - it's expensive but if it's working towards making daughter mentally stronger, more confident and able to deal with and express her feelings it's worth every single penny.

I'd felt a big urge to talk to someone myself recently. I've felt really mentally overloaded but I'm starting to feel like I'm coming out the other side. It's been the first time since I finished my counselling where I've noticed old habits and reactions rearing their heads, such as comfort eating, underlying moods of anger or feeling very low, regular sighing and a buzzing head. I'm not sure what's changed over the past day or so - maybe my attitude a little, maybe some acceptance and a target of Saturday to hang out with my best friend and spill my brains - figuratively speaking, what with it being Halloween. Writing the blog also helps massively, so I'm here today to work out my thoughts on what action to take next.

It's absolutely clear to me from the past couple of year's evidence that daughter's mother is unstable. She can't hold down a job, her relationships usually end with her partner being torn apart, her kids don't trust her and can't depend on her words or actions, she's apparently claiming huge tax credits illegally and supposedly still has an addiction to codiene tablets.

With all that said, what's stopping me from taking firm action to keep our daughter in my care? Assuming her mum's been smart enough to hide away some of her ill-gotten gains to get her own house, there's a danger she'll make a play to take daughter back full-time. So what's stopping me?

Firstly, daughter's choice would probably be to live with her mum and although that may have changed somewhat due to recent events, but it's probably still the case. While this has been really difficult to deal with in the past, now it'd be even harder given my complete confidence that her mum would fuck it all up again and daughter's life would fall apart, AGAIN.

In recent times, I've given daughter's wishes and requirements number one priority because she's old enough and mature enough to make major decisions which effect her life. I've not wanted to take those decisions out of her hands and make them myself for fear of having her resent me for it, or having a massive backlash from her mother.

This is another thing stopping me from taking action. Her mother is notoriously catty, aggressive and will stop at nothing to get her own way. She's already told daughter that there's no way she'd let me have full custody of her - what the fuck is up with telling her that? Jesus, the woman baffles me sometimes. However, with the involvement of social services, solicitors and the legal system, I can't see they'd do anything other than give me full custody based on her mum's actions over the past few years. I've made every effort to keep my life as stable as possible for the past two years - not that it was particularly unstable before but mentally I wasn't healthy before my counselling.

The last thing holding me back is concerns about gaining financial aid for legal costs. My income is small so I'd qualify for legal aid, but my financial past is murky and my tax returns aren't up to date. I've been debt-free for some time now, which I'm proud of, but I'm not looking forward to any financial scrutiny I'll have to go through to get legal aid. I definitely couldn't afford to do it off my own back.

Writing these little hurdles out has shown me they are just that - little hurdles. They're not insurmountable. The whole thing is incredibly daunting and dependent on many external factors. I haven't even decided it's the path I want to take yet. But I'm starting to feel like I'm strong enough to start the journey should it come to it.

Is it over?

I'm a whirling mass of emotions today. I've heard from daughter's mum's boyfriend that it all kicked off at their house last night and it's completely over between them. The police were involved in trying to eject her mum from the house, mobile phones were broken and it sounds like a real shit-storm.

Thankfully, daughter has been with me this week and didn't have to be involved in the drama. So is this the start of better, more stable things for us both?

What I can be sure of is that daughter is going to be hurt pretty badly. She already seems quite mentally strained and stressed - she's having problems in her social group at school which are obviously being compounded by the stress she feels with the general situation, so I've made her an appointment with a counsellor who specialises in children which should help her gain some perspective and hopefully some confidence, as well as clarify how she's feeling about this whole saga with her mother.

I'm trying very hard not to get my hopes up, which I think is one of the reasons my emotions are so mixed. My fear is, should I dare to dream that things will settle down and we'll have the opportunity to set up a new life for ourselves on the basis that her mother can't or won't provide a stable home for daughter, something will pop up and bite me on the arse and dash my dreams.

That said, I won't keep it in for long. This weekend is an opportunity to spend some time with daughter and have a chat about what she wants to do. I'm seeing my parents for a walk on Sunday which is another opportunity to clear my head, and I'll talk to Sophie's other grandma over the weekend to get her take on what we should do to move forward.

I don't mind admitting that I'm scared. I'm scared that this whole experience might be too much for daughter to handle and she might follow the path her mother took at a similar age in similar, tumultuous circumstances. If that were to happen and she were to start going off the rails, I honestly don't know how I'd cope.

I'm scared that I'll start the whole process of taking daughter on full-time in an official capacity, give up my bachelor's residence in favour of more suitable accomodation for the pair of us, go through the form-filling and interviews involved in benefit and Housing Association applications, only to have the whole process derailed by... Well, by her mother, to be honest. That's the main spanner I can foresee dropping into these works and messing things up.

One would hope that, at the point of having lost yet another relationship, having totally given up on two kids and rapidly alienating the third, any normal person would fight to the death to claw it all back and provide a stable basis for her family. But this is no normal person we're talking about, and I'm concerned she'll just do a bunk and disappear, which would leave daughter with a mum-shaped hole in her heart. Unfortunately, I've felt it before and I'm feeling it now - I really do hope she just disappears. It'll be easier on daughter in the long run, because I honestly don't believe she'll ever sort her life and her head out sufficiently to give our daughter the mother she so obviously wants.

Rollercoaster Part 2

When I thought about discussing this possibly being the start of the changes she'd indicated she wanted, the phrase 'That's not exactly what I meant' popped into my head and I suggested we talk about what her intentions were so we were both clear.

It was at this point that my mood shifted considerably from up high to down low. Daughter said that her advocate had misunderstood what she'd meant. The whole deal was to be prefixed with 'If it turns out I can't live with mum...' meaning she wanted to carry on as it is at the moment with a view to moving back with her mum full time once her and her boyfriend had sorted their lives out. She hadn't wanted to tell me I'd got the wrong end of the stick because she didn't want to upset me.

It took a while for the whole thing to sink in but I felt my mood crash straight away. Bless my daughter, she asked if I was ok and it must have been obvious from my face that I wasn't. I was incredibly disappointed, having gone from sure things were sorted to things being up in the air and uncertain all over again in a very short time. After all these months of being strong for her and trying not to show when I'm upset or angry or feeling low, I couldn't keep it in any more. I had to stop myself from crying and hide my disappointment - daughter got upset because she thought it was her fault, when really it was just my reaction to a string of misunderstandings.

Daughter told advocate something which was misunderstood, passed on to me, then to grandma, who also passed it on to me. What a pain in the arse.

I'd like to think it's noone's fault, but I can't help feeling daughter made a couple of bad decisions which if made differently would have stopped me from getting hurt. If she'd have been more vocal and assertive in her intentions at the start then the misunderstandings wouldn't have compounded and I wouldn't have had a chance to get my hopes up.

Of course, the fact that she didn't assert her opinion at the start is a factor of everything that's happened to her over the past few months, so I don't blame her. Her confidence is shot and that's one of the reasons I'd like to get her some counselling - so she can gain the tools she needs to deal with the life she's got.

I've subsequently gone through many emotions, but chiefly anger. Since I've managed to unleash that side of my personality, anger seems to bubble up quite often when I should probably be feeling other emotions. It's constant, bubbling, ambient frustration and tension and it's really difficult to put up with. I've had it for a couple of days now and it doesn't feel like it's shifting. It's one of the reasons I'm writing this - to try and clear up my head a little bit.

The thought occurs that it's another attitude 'thing'. Ugh, what a horrible way of putting it.
Maybe it's the way I'm looking at it. Nothing's fundamentally changed since five days ago; all that's happened is mood swings for me. Yes, I've been to the top and back down to the bottom, but isn't it time to get back to the middle and pick up where we left off?

Probably, but I can't shake the feeling I've been hurt. Maybe a combination of sleep, exercise and attitude readjustment is needed to get me back on track.

Rollercoaster Part 1

During this past week or two, I've been on a bit of an emotional rollercoaster. Having spent most of the past year on level ground mentally, I'm finding my mind's currently a bit overloaded.

To start with, I'm really bloody tired. It's a well known feature of my brain that it doesn't work properly and struggles to maintain balance and motivation when I'm tired, so I must make an effort to catch up.

Next, I haven't walked at all in exactly two weeks. I'm really missing it, but I've not been able to muster the motivation to get out there and put a few miles in. I think the fact that my feet have ached quite heavily after my last two or three walks isn't helping but I'll just put that down to having to get used to my new sturdy boots for the time being. I do need to get out there though, as the exercise and mental freedom gained are both massive helping hands when I feel mentally strained.

Also, I'm starting to feel the strain of sharing my small living space with my daughter, which has been bearable until recently, when an unfortunate series of events took me to the top and crashed me down within 36 hours.

It all began last Friday. I'd taken a day off sick - unpaid - and had spent much of the day relaxing and catching up on some sleep. Daughter had a meeting with her advocate from recent social services meetings to discuss progress and performance. The advocate is a lady we both trust, who's great with kids and seems to get on with Sophie. I was expecting the advocate to ask Sophie whether she felt like she needed to see a counsellor - something her mum's mum and I had agreed would be of benefit to her and we'd asked the advocate to bring it up as an independent source.

When daughter was dropped off, the advocate said she had something to pass on from daughter. She said she's come to the conclusion that she can't live at her mum's and that with help from the government and social services to get us established in more suitable accommodation and help out with benefits, that she'd like to come and live with me full-time. There was something of a minor protest from daughter part-way through this announcement that it wasn't exactly what she'd said, but that almost got lost in the wonder that I was feeling.

When the advocate left, daughter and I tried to have a chat about what'd been said and clear everything up but daughter was having a hard time clarifying what she wanted, so I suggested she call her grandma to discuss everything and get it clear in her mind before we talked about it. I gave her my phone and she went to make the call. After a couple of minutes she came back - grandma would call back because her other phone was ringing. After a few minutes the phone rang again and daughter spent quarter of an hour talking things through with her grandmother. At the end of her conversation, daughter passed the phone to me and her grandma went through what'd been said between the advocate and Sophie and her and me.

Wow, this is confusing and I'm not committing it to bytes very clearly, but I'll keep trying.

Grandma confirmed everything the advocate had said - that Sophie had decided to come to me full-time.

As you might imagine, this news sent me to the top of the world. After six months of serious uncertainty, my mind switched to a reasonable amount of satisfaction, elation and positivity about the future. This was the start of big things: getting a new job, help finding and paying for somewhere to live from social services and the government and benefits if required. I've resisted getting benefits until now because I want to stand on my own two feet without claiming benefits if at all possible, but the offer of help from social services to get us established seemed to be an opportunity not to be missed.

It'd be a fresh start for us. An opportunity to start again and make a new life for both me and my daughter. The chance to offer her the stability she's needed for the past few years. The promise of having my daughter around to look after and share life with for the next few years.

That evening, her mother cancelled meeting up with her at the fair for an hour - the second year in a row this has happened. Daughter was gutted but by no means surprised. Then, while daughter was out at the fair with her friends, her mum texted me saying she thought it'd be better if daughter stayed with me this week instead of staying with her as planned, as things weren't going well between her and her boyfriend.

While I respect her 'honesty' in telling me this, I'm really unsure of her motives. Why is she doing this? It really looks like she's trying to push her daughter away like she's done with her other two kids. Either that or she's oblivious to the fact that her eldest is incredibly disappointed every time she cancels something or changes arrangements that are in place to give our daughter stability.

Anyway, I decided not to mention this to daughter that evening because I didn't want to spoil her night out, so I brought it up the next morning. I showed her the text message I'd recieved and she was obviously disappointed but, again, not surprised. Since we've been trying to put these arrangements in place so everyone know's what they're doing and daughter has stability, she's often said 'But what if she cancels?'

It was at this point a niggle came up in my mind.

To be continued...

The nights are drawing in

and I find myself increasingly concerned that I might slip back into depression now autumn is firmly established and Greenwich Mean Time awaits.

The shorter days affect me in strange ways. I've always seen the short evenings of winter as a bad thing. I crave daylight and sunlight, and during the cooler seasons we're lucky if we see eight hours of good light. With the inclusion of generally grey skies, I find myself battling with depressive symptoms.

Before I considered myself 'normal again' early this year, I've often noticed how the symptoms of my depression would intensify during the winter months. As soon as summer drifted into autumn and the weather turned, I'd start to feel lethargic and demotivated, low and withdrawn. Then, as soon as the first snowdrops flowered and heralded the beginning of spring, my mood would lift immeasurably and I'd become a different person.

The sudden nature of this transformation has always been apparent. It's like something clicks in my brain and I tell myself 'Spring is coming! Summer is coming!' and my mood changes for the better.

An opposite brain-click happened last week when I noticed it was dark at 7pm, dark when I got up at 6am and I looked-up the date for the clocks going back, which was three weeks away. These actions conspired to draw me into a funk and dwell on the short days to come.

It occurs to me that this is purely an attitude change which I should be able to manipulate. A book I read recently suggested that our reaction to events can be influenced by subtle changes in the way we think about these potentially life-changing events. It said to think about how often our mood is changed, for better or worse, by good news or bad. Good news brings a smile and elation, bad news brings sadness and depression. These changes are instant and tangible, and can be altered by how we perceive the event.

What I'd like to do is keep the elation that comes at the break of spring but discard the morose outlook that comes when the nights start getting longer. The realisation that my attitude has much to do with how I feel about the latter is really helpful. For example, while writing the above two paragraphs, it's dawned on me that there's much I love about autumn and winter - I often quote the transitional periods of spring and autumn to be my favourite times of year, and winter brings much of its own charm and enjoyment - not least my birthday which looms just eight weeks away. The bright sunlight of early February is only four months away, and there's plenty of nature to enjoy out walking during those months. I've been walking since spring this year and it'd be nice to get a good twelve-month experience of the cycle of nature by keeping up the walking. This also helps my mood, not only with exercise but with exposure to sunlight and a sense of pride and achievement every mile I add to my tally.

This is good motivation to keep up with my walking too, on which I've been pretty slack for the past couple of months. There's a few reasons for that which I won't go into now, but it's definitely impacted on my general wellbeing, my diet and alcohol intake. It's an odd circle which can be broken simply with a little effort and a good chunk of walking every week.

So, there. In the space of half an hour bashing this post out on my phone, I seem to have changed my attitude to the dark mornings and evenings. Result! Now, if I can just re-adjust my attitude to fatty foods and cider...

Walking for Wellbeing

I've been working on starting a charity called Walking for Wellbeing which helps sufferers of depression by taking them out for walks in the countryside. It's been great getting my head back around HTML and stylesheets and writing all the copy, and I'm really happy with the result. You can see the site at Walking for Wellbeing.

Confusion

I'm a real muddle of thoughts today.

Daughter's come back from a planned week at her mum's house with a list of tearful stories about fights and arguements and grown-ups involving her in their dramas. Within thirty seconds of picking her up, she was in tears. She said her week had been terrible, her mum and mum's fella had argued every night for the past five, she'd been caught up in the middle, plans had been rearranged, he pushed her mum, kicked the fridge etc. It sounds pretty bloody rubbish, and she released a whole lot of built-up tension in the form of sobs on a bench in the park.

Despite having had such a bad time, she still wants to go back there to live. This has got me so confused it's making me dizzy.

For a start, it's admirable and commendable that she's so loyal to her mum she's willing to go back despite all the crap that's going on. She obviously loves her mum and wants things to work; whether all this is possible is very unclear at the moment.

It does make me ask myself, however, what's so unattractive about living with me that she's willing to go home into this turbulent situation? I feel selfish for even thinking about it, but I've learned to listen to myself about these things.

I know the situation at my place isn't ideal. I sleep on a mattress in my living room because she's taken over my bedroom. While we get by for food and stuff for school etc, I'm not well off financially by any measure. I've noticed I've become tetchy recently, and sometimes my frustration or stress gets focussed on daughter, which certainly isn't fair and is something I'm trying to avoid.

That's not to say there aren't good things - we do a lot together: cooking, games, tv and movies, homework... There's generally a lot of laughter.

So yeah, I know things aren't ideal at my place. But it makes me feel so inadequate that she'd choose the tension and uncertainty of moving back with her mum over the stability of living with me. It also screams of self-destructive behaviour. It makes me think that the child she is desperately wants her mother's love and validation, while the adult she's becoming can see the dangers but is willing to let her take the risk. It's very hard for me to accept this.

I still want to give her the choice, but it seems so strikingly obvious to me that she's going to get hurt and disappointed, or live a life in a house where the two adults are hell-bent on destroying each other, maybe dragging her along with them. Even her mum's mum is surprised she still wants to go home. I tried to put it into perspective for her by reversing the situation and asking what advice she'd give me if I were about to move into an abusive relationship that she knew wasn't going to work and I'd get hurt. She started crying and told me she'd ask me not to go. It looks like she's having a real inner battle trying to decide what to do. I'm not surprised - she's just twelve and while she's very mature and has a strong head on her shoulders she's definitely still a child inside.

Fortunately, we'll see our good friend tomorrow, who daughter said 'always gives really good advice' and I can only agree. Hopefully she can help daughter clear up what's in her mind and give her some direction and stuff to think about. God knows I'm so embroiled in the situation it's impossible for me to give impartial and sound advice, especially as I feel so strongly she's taking a destructive path.

More changes

I have further reason to believe my daughter will be coming to live with me full-time. The situation gives me cause for concern and celebration, which is a confusing mix of emotions to have racing around my head.

Firstly, having daughter living with me and knowing that it'll be for the foreseeable future will give me the opportunity to aim for what I wrote about in my last post. Knowing she'll be with me for good lets me plan for our future and move forward with security of situation, instead of what's been in place since Easter, which has been a confusion of uncertainty about where she'll end up.

I'm obviously torn with a number of emotions about the whole situation. Firstly, and almost overridingly, is the feeling that having her living with me full-time is all I've ever wanted since her mother and I split up. That sounds pretty selfish to write, but it's how I feel. The image of her mother walking away down the path with daughter looking at me over her shoulder on the day they moved out, just after her first birthday, is seared into my mind like an old sepia photograph. Since that day it's been part of my whole being that I'm missing seeing her at breakfast every day, or cooking and eating dinner with her in the evenings. The hours and days lost with my flesh and blood can never be recovered but will always be regretted.

Secondly, there's apprehension about how this will affect my daughter. She's been through so much since Easter that this final change might be a sting in the tail for her. It's certainly her desire to live with her mum, but that looks less and less likely as time goes by. I'm sure she can see during this week she's spending at her mum's place that things are unstable in their relationship - there's been some indication that's the case. But I know it's going to be difficult for her to come to terms with all of this. I've already made enquiries about some counselling for her when the time's right - I'm sure she would benefit from talking to someone external to the situation.

And how do I feel about it all? Happy, generally. Confused, plenty. Apprehensive, definitely. But having the situation and the future set out in stone like this gives me the chance to make plans and move forward. Sure, it's a big change, and will trigger even more changes, but they're generally all positive and constructive.

Changes

I'm almost positive that daughter will end up back living with me sometime over the next few weeks. The situation at her mum's seems simply far too unstable for me to believe her mum and mum's boyfriend are going to stay together for much longer.

This has been at the back of my mind for a while but it's only now I've admitted it. If she does come back for good, this should be the catalyst for me to get a proper job, apply for a council house and any benefits that we might be entitled to, get ourselves sorted for a normal life instead of this poor substitute, where there's no space or storage or possessions or freedom to do things which involve money. I'd like two bedrooms, please, and two double beds. A living room, my own kitchen. Maybe a little garden for herbs and tomatoes. How about becoming someone who's succeeding in life and might even attract a lady friend - I'm ready now. I'd love to take on the responsibility for running a household, saving money for bills and those little emergencies which appear from time to time. I'd like to feel I'm providing the best for my daughter and for myself, whereas for the past year or two I've been doing just enough to get by and not much else.

On reflection, this ambition should stand whether daughter comes to live or not. Aim higher, do better, earn more, do more, achieve what you want.

Wise hypno-prick says 'If you just keep doing what you've always done, you'll just get more of what you've already got.' I've applied this theory to my diet and alcohol intake and achieved great things with it. Maybe it's time to apply it to my whole life.

Right.

Since I met you fourteen and a half years ago, you've never, ever given me a reason to trust the words that come out of your mouth. If I were to count that number of times I've caught you lying about things, even in the eleven years we've been apart, it'd easily be in the hundreds. I even told you to your face once - do you remember? I said "You need to stop lying to people. We always catch you out."

Everyone around you knows you lie. All of your family, my family, his family, all the kids, your fella, most of your so-called friends - how many ex-friends have you got because you lied?

It tests my belief in humanity, it really does. You lie about the most trivial of things, and the most important things. You lie to everyone around you, so much so it seems you even lie to yourself. You believe your own lies. Are you surprised that some around you take your words with a pinch of salt?

A boy, a girl, a field and a farmer

The summer of 1993 was a magical time full of the joys of sexual awakening. I was seventeen, as was she, and we'd been seeing each other for more than a year. We'd progressively enjoyed kisses and cuddles, massages, fumbles and fondles, mutual masturbation and the adventures of oral sex. We both knew the time was fast approaching when we'd take our respective virginities and lose them with each other.



I spent a lot of time at her house; her parents were very welcoming and thought the world of me. It actually makes me blush thinking of the number of times, places and positions their daughter and I boinked each other insensible, whether they were at home or not, but that was all to come. For now, we're talking about the first time.



With her parents at home most of the time, we'd started taking long walks in the countryside with a picnic, finding a nice sheltered spot to eat our lunch and get down to sweet, moist but entirely non-penetrative action for dessert. On the occasion previous to the walk in question, we'd ended up with her rubbing against me until we both came, but still with no penetration. Without a word spoken, we both knew next time would be the main event.



With the sun shining wonderfully on the north Buckinghamshire countryside, we packed-up our lunch and blanket and walked out of her village for an hour, without a final destination. We eventually found a secluded field full of ripening wheat that came up to our hips, and started off along the tractor lines toward the middle of the field to find ourselves some privacy.



We spread out the blanket and unpacked our lunch, which was devoured as a starter for our main course.



We were kissing and caressing then undressing and warming up then touching and rubbing then the condom's on and I'm lying down and she's on top and we're trying to find the right angle and we're there and I'm in and she's on and Christ this is really actually pretty fucking good actually.



Things were going pretty well for a few minutes. I'd heard that the first time was usually rubbish but despite our rhythm being a bit awkward I was really enjoying myself and, from the noises emanating from my companion, I think she was too. Enjoying ourselves, that is, until we heard the tractor.



With a wall of yellow-green wheat around us, it took a little repositioning for her to sit up and quickly scan the perimeter of the field. The tractor, she informed me, was making its way along the other side of the hedge towards the gate we'd come in. We lay there, joined together, blushing, twitching, squeezing and giggling at each other while we waited for the tractor to decide where it was going.



The noise got quieter, then louder, then the engine idled, and there was a jangling of chains and latches being thrown, then a revving. She looked up again and an expression of distress washed across her face. The tractor had crossed into our field.



We separated and rushed like hell to get the right clothes on in the right order, threw the remains of lunch and the blanket into the rucksack and belted off down the tramlines toward the gate. With shoes and socks in one hand and her bra in the other, we passed the farmer in his tractor. He scowled, rolled his eyes, and deluged us with tiny, painful solid fertiliser pellets from the hopper on the back of his vehicle.



Neither of us had come.

The horny season

Another effect the dawning of spring has on me is what I call Mating Season. As soon as the snowdrops and daffodils bloom, I become what can only be described as a raging horny sex animal.

It starts off small, but noticeable - the Horn, I mean - and grows until anything that moves seems fair game. I don't go around humping everything I see, but I certainly feel like doing so.

I'm not sure if my sex drive diminishes over the winter period. If it doesn't, then every spring I add another layer of hot drooling sexual energy to my person. I'll be a fucking monster in my sixties.

Spring is... springinging!

This time of year has a funny effect on me. The transition from winter to spring awakens something inside that changes my being.

The days get longer and sunrise gets earlier. The first time I hear the birds singing when my alarm goes off, my brain links that sound with the need to get up and get ready for work. For many subsequent days, weeks and even months, I hear the birds singing in my sleep and my brain wakes me up. Even during mid-summer. At half past four in the blimmin' morning.

I'm determined to train myself out of that one, and I'm initially going to try a little reverse (read: idiotic amateur) psychology. I'm going to change my alarm tone to the sound of birdsong. This may (read: does) sound like complete lunacy, but the bit of MP3 I've chosen has a very specifc bit of some thrush warbling away, so I hope to awaken to that particular part, and not the random chirpings of a sparrow sat on my guttering.

I've been a light sleeper ever since my daughter was born. Previously, my teenage years had bestowed me with the ability to sleep through elephants mating at the foot of the bed - purely hypothetically of course.

Then, the very night she was born, something in my head clicked and I became the lightest sleeper alive. A gnat could fart a mile away and it'd raise me from my slumber.

This has its advantages. I always get up on my first alarm - no need for snooze buttons in my house. I tend to feel wide awake soon after rising, which is nice - especially compared to other people I've seen who aren't 'morning people'.

Of course, it has its disadvantages too. I've only had a couple of proper lie-ins in twelve years, and those have been down to being over-tired in the first place.

I'd love to think I could train myself to sleep better. I've often thought of playing cds on loop through the night to desensitise myself to noise, but the thought of a string of sleepless nights at the outset really puts me off.

I think having someone to sleep with would help, in every sense. Having slept alone for the vast majority of the past decade, I'm sure that'd take some getting used to also but hell, it'd be worth it.

More of my spring-time idiosyncrasies to follow.

A low

Last weekend I started reading another self-help book by a certain well-known Scottish hypnoprick. It's not bad, and I'm only half-way through the first 'day' of seven. One quote stood out to me, though. I wrote it on a Post-it and stuck it on my bathroom mirror:



It rang a peal of bells in my head as I've been coming round to that concept. Because for the first time since my counselling ended, I am low.

I've had my off-days here and there, which everyone does, but I've always felt able to cope and see better in the next day. For the past week, though, I've felt progressively more down.

I can see something of a pattern in my behaviour and events around me that are contributing to my grey days.

First, my situation to work, and my attitude towards it have both changed. I've been backed into taking on more responsibility than I want, more than I would allow myself to be forced into because I knew my boss would try. So I grudgingly do the extra work, hating every minute and poisoning the rest of my work day. My attitude's changed because of this.

I know my mood's been affected by a few days off work last week, a combination of a cold and snow putting pay to three days at work, therefore no wages for those missed. I spent most of the three days with the curtains drawn dossing on the computer or watching shit daytime tv - the latter being enough to destroy anyone's soul, I guess. I did go for a couple of beautiful walks in the snow, which really lifted me - I need to listen to my own advice and walk more.

I've noticed a gradual increase in my attraction to junk food and alcohol. This certainly isn't a good sign. However, the above Post-it seems to have made a difference in my way of thinking. While shopping yesterday, I was incredibly close to picking up a couple of munchie items, but held back. I still bought cider but only drank half a bottle - just under two pints - and put the other half aside for another day... maybe tonight, maybe not.

There's stuff going on with daughter, too. She's moving house for about the fifteenth time in her life - she's twelve by the way - and I'm not sure how she'll adjust to having a third major father figure in her life. Things have settled down for her at school though, and despite not being completely happy at home she seems a little brighter than before Christmas. We just celebrated her birthday too - a bunch of baking and cooking, a couple of DVDs and some quality 'us' time was just what I needed.

So there are a few 'ups' in this down, but I keep feeling waves of darkness washing over me. I'm becoming more aware of how I've fallen out of touch with all the good practices I learned during my counselling, as I've gradually fallen back to many of my old ways. However, writing this out has given me a clue as to how I need to proceed to get things back on track:

• I should sort out my diet. Eating shit food makes for a shit body and shit mind.
  
• I should exercise more. I know deep down that not exercising is not only bad for my body - my mind suffers greatly. I'm trying to get set on a charity that encourages people to get outside and exercise to combat their depressive symptoms, and I have difficulty following my own convictions. THIS MUST CHANGE!
  
• I need to find more satisfying work. I love many of the people I work with - employees and customers alike - but I told myself I'd only work here for six months, for the very reason that the management are king-sized cockmunchers. I'm approaching one year here, and it's doing my head in. Time to move on. It's incredibly tempting to put the current financial climate in as a barrier to achieving this, but there must be work out there somewhere.
  
• I must get the charity properly set-up and active in my locality. This is a serious priority. Since I took the decision to put off the hitch-hike around the country, and since my collaborator has virtually switched-off, my enthusiasm for the project has dwindled. This is classic 'me', and I promised myself I'd see this project through. Time to be true to myself and get things moving.
  

So... despite being low and crappy, writing this out has once again helped immeasurably in examining exactly how I feel, the reasons why, and what I should do about it.

Now, let's see if I can act, like I know I should instead of burying my head in the sand and giving up, like I'm scared I will.

Being kind to myself

After a lot of hard thinking and working things out this past fortnight, I've become
increasingly daunted by what needs to happen by the middle of April, just twelve weeks away now, to let the charity hitch-hike go ahead. I'm putting too much pressure on myself to get it done in such a short timeframe. While it would have been nice to do it this spring, I'm resigned to the fact that it's simply too much for us to achieve in such a short time.

Therefore I've decided to put the hitch-hike off until spring 2010.

In the meantime, I'll be working hard to establish the charity locally, and within the surrounding counties by the summer of 2009. I think it's important to get the charity up and running this spring, and start sowing the seeds of taking the project nationally, well before doing any kind of major publicity drive.

I'll be looking at some smaller-scale ideas for fund raising and applying for grants and funds from all the organisations I can to help run the charity. Moving the hitch-hike to 2010 is an attempt to take the pressure off and get the charity established so there's something tangible to publicise next year.

It was quite a realisation, how much pressure I was putting on myself, and the scale of my fear of failure. I've forced myself to focus on achieving my goal, been so determined to not let anyone see I've failed, that I've wound myself up into a ball of nervous energy at the thought of not succeeding.

So, by taking some of that pressure off and allowing myself more time to achieve my goals, I'm being kinder to myself.

And that's rather good.

Safe!

I've actually managed to save some money!

This is incredibly rare for me - I honestly can't remember the last time I had spare money sitting in the bank. In fact, it's been more than a year since I had any money in the bank!

So, what to do with it? I've a few uses in mind. I hope to keep adding to the fund - it's currently just over £100.

I have a number of priorities.

My instinct is to save enough to buy ladders and gear for cleaning windows - a job I can already do quickly and efficiently, and have contacts for, and is an easy sideline to earn some extra cash.

Having started a charity, the money could go a long way sat in the charity account. It would allow me to fund my first walks - minor travel expenses like bus tickets and lunch for two.

I owe my landlady some money. She was kind enough to give me a break on a couple of hundred quid when my last boss got drunk and wrapped his car around a tree. It was kinda 'This is your last chance' territory - she's been very helpful as we've talked about my mental health quite often, and she's suffered herself, so she's sympathetic. But I'd like to try to pay her kindness back.

I also owe my best friend for a suit she bought me for our mutual friends' wedding.

And I'd love a Wii! I borrowed my brother's Wii recently and it was great fun. I suddenly spent more time gaming than I had for a long time.

---

Having written out my options, I think it's somewhat more clear. I'll pay back my landlady, then my friend.

As much as I want the window cleaning gear, and know how much fun I'd have with the Wii, my landlady has been patient and helpful, way beyond what any normal person would do. Therefore, I'll get it all together and pay her back this weekend.

And my friend? At least I know that I can save money now, despite not earning much. So I know I can pay her back soon.

All that other stuff can wait its turn.

---

I think Earl Hickey's karma-like philosophy might be rubbing off on me.

---

Toothpaste update!

Mr Colgate, you and your family are safe. I bought some of your Herbal brand toothpaste, which contains sage and myrrh, among other herbs. It's ace - it was cheaper than regular paste, it leaves my mouth considerably more fresh, and doesn't make me want to eat my own head. So well done - five points to the Colgates, and to the small, obscure chemist who was the only retailer in this whole town to sell alternative toothpaste for adults.