Happy Mother's Day

Today, in the UK, we are celebrating Mother's Day, and we celebrated International Women's Day earlier in the week. Perhaps it is apt that this week I was recommended a book called "The Female Brain". I was so compelled by the recommendation that I subsequently bought the book; I have been unable to put it down and I have almost finished it three days later (not easy with two small children).

Why is the book so good? It details the chemical reactions in a woman's brain from the age of an eight week foetus through to post-menopause. In essence, it's a high-brow "Men are from Mars and Women are from Venus". But through case studies and explanation of women's behaviour, the book is both funny and credible. It has really reasonated with me.

So, what has this to do with Mother's Day? Well today, when my OH woke up this morning, he decided that he wanted to clear the loft. To cut a long story short, we cleared our bedroom Wednesday night, as our wardrobes were being fitted Thursday. By the end of the day on Friday, they were only a third completed, with no completion date in sight. I was mightly impressed when my OH took the view that "This is an opportunity"; I am always happy to share my optomistic approach to life where my glass is always more than half full.

My OH made clear his expectations from the start: we were going to "rationalise" what we stored up in the loft. In reality, the majority of stuff that I store up there are the kids toys that are "on rotation" or old kiddies clothes that I just haven't got around to sorting out and putting on e-bay yet. And then there's loads of other stuff that's been up in the loft forever. Naturally, I didn't want to get rid of my of bits, and we both knew that we would be having a heated discussion over said items.

But an interesting thing happened. We made an initial sift of what was going to be thrown away. We calmly debated our difference of opinions on certain items. And that's when the watershed moment happened: I agreed that if the OH wanted to throw out this particular suitcase that I was attached to, then he would have to sacrifice the vanity mirror that he had bought for me and I had never used. After having made this deal, I felt librated. Suddenly I was able to let go of items that I had been holding onto for years, without fuss, regret or tears.

Now, before I had read "The Female Brain", I think I would have thought that the fact that I was still suffering from a cold was the reason for this act of insanity. However, I now realise that by making this deal, my brain had a chemical reaction: prior to making the deal, my brain was flooded with the chemicals that make mothers anxious, nuturing and protective (part of our flight / fight response). It was these set of chemicals that made me want to keep everything that I had squirreled away. But post decision, I believe I was filled with testosterone which meant that I could be brave and reckless. We were able to substantially reduced amount of items that we store in the loft. Overall, a job well done for Mother's Day.

So that was my Mother's Day. How was yours?

Making It Happen

My family & I recently went on a three week holiday to Australia, with stop-offs in Singapore and Hong Kong. It was an ideal time to go: my daughter will be going to school in September so it's the last big holiday we can make during term-time; my son is almost two and so his airfare was cheap.

During our entire holiday, we had the same conversation with fellow passengers, hotel staff or locals that went as follows:

"Going to visit relevatives? No? Oh.....you're really brave, doing such a big trip with two little ones".

I was baffled by the number of people that held this view, so much so, that I began to ponder on the significance of their comments.

Over the years, I have noticed that I have a tendancy to sometimes enter into things without fully thinking throught the challenges that I will face. For example, I went off to live in Colombia for a year, with a Colombian family, without being able to speak a word of Spanish.

With this trip, I didn't really think about how hard it would / could be travelling for three weeks, five cities and six flights with two toddlers.

Why do I do this? To be honest,I think that the fundamental reason is that my husband and I really wanted to make this trip. We had a sense of drive that meant that we were incredibly focussed on making the most out of these three weeks.

Even if somebody had pointed out.....
- that we would have no time to ourself for three weeks;
- that we would not be able to eat healthily and at regular intervals;
- that there are hundreds of posionous insects and that we'd constantly have to keep an eye on our children;
- that the constant travelling is tiring;
....I don't think that would have stopped us.

And in the end, we had a fabulous trip. We saw so many amazing sights and we had lots of fun with our children and saw their world expand as they encountered each new experience.

What I learnt from this, is that when I really want something, it doesn't matter what the obstacles or challenges are, I can make it happen. There's a passion for the experience, a drive to seize the day that makes this obstacles part of the journey, as opposed to the end of the road.

At 6am in Hong Kong airport, I noticed a well-dressed couple in their 60s giving us a look of anxiety. As I suspected, they were on the same flight as us, and were concerned about the level of disruption our children might bring to the flight (when in fact, they were both generally well behaved, even on 13 hour flights).

The usual conversation cropped up. But this time when they told us how brave we were, I replied, "If you really want to do something......".

They nodded with sage understanding.