Making Time For Friends

Post natal depression, or depression of any kind for that matter looks like something different to everyone. Something that I have really struggled with over the past couple of years is wanting to see anyone other than family. Depression, along with other various things like time and spare money has majorly affected how I have felt about having any kind of a social life. I think there has only been maybe a maximum of a dozen times over the last 3 years where I have been out and done something with friends. I just haven’t

Mental Health And The Summer Holidays

I’m sure I’m not alone when I say that the summer holidays scare the crap out of me. A couple of years ago I went through a pretty bad time with post natal depression and unfortunately, it’s not something that has completely gone away. At the time, I really wasn’t coping very well with being at home all day, every day with Erin and because of that (as well as other reasons) we decided to put Erin into nursery at 2. My stress levels came down quite quickly and I didn’t find myself panicking quite

Some Days Are S***… And That’s Okay!

I think when you become a parent, or even when you get pregnant you don’t really think about much other than how wonderful it must be to have a child. No one ever really focuses on the bits that aren’t full of fairy dust, sparkles and rainbows until they actually happen. Although I had a really bad pregnancy I never found myself thinking about how hard things might get at one point or another. I certainly never thought that parenting really is s*** sometimes! Having suffered from PND, focusing on the bad days happened more often

Sterilisation: Failed By The NHS

Last month I was supposed to have my sterilisation procedure. After months and months of waiting, and being on a waiting list, I had finally been given an appointment. The 19th September was quickly approaching and while I was nervous, I was pretty excited about having something done I’d fought hard to have and also waited so long for. About 10 days before my procedure date I received a letter telling me that my appointment at the hospital was cancelled with barely any explanation why. With the gynecology department at the hospital being no help

Bullshit, Lies And The NHS

Since the beginning of the year I have been posting on and off about the choice John and I made not to have any more children. After a really traumatic pregnancy and birth, we decided that the risk of me getting pregnant again is not worth going through what I did last time. Earlier in the year we made the decision for me to go ahead with a sterilisation and after months and months of waiting for an appointment, I finally got booked in last month. Last Wednesday I received a letter from the hospital

Improving Motivation With A Lumie Desklamp

My office is in a really dark and dingy corner of the house. We have a big 24ft living room/ dining room with a bit extra added on to the side, making it an L shape. The L bit used to be a different room at some point but there is no light fitting. When the sun sets and it’s dark outside I am left working either looking at our garden or the curtains, neither of which give me extra light! I work from home full time now and I generally don’t sit down to work

Dealing with my wife’s PND

Roughly 3 months ago I found my wife crying in the dark after an argument we had had. The argument hadn’t made sense to me. I remember not understanding what I had done wrong. Exasperated I had left my wife upstairs alone (she had demanded I leave her alone), but when I went to talk to her ten minutes later I found her crying in the dark. She hugged me and told me she thought she had Post Natal depression. I held her as she sobbed, together in the dark. One thought going through my