Tag Archives: parenting

Dandelions & Bad Hair Days – how mental health & motherhood woke up the writer in me

Posted on April 26, 2012 by

In a few months time a book will be published; an anthology of prose and poetry on the experience of mental health issues. It will have my name on the cover and I will have written some of the pieces the book includes. … Continue reading →

Posted in Dandelions and Bad Hair Days, Mental health, Parenting, Random musings on family life, love the universe and everything | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , | 16 Comments

What’s in a name? Warnings from our family history…..

Posted on April 20, 2012 by

Prompted by a short discussion on Twitter with the fabulous @oldpostcards and @CountryBook about the first names our ancestors were given (‘saddled with’ in many cases) I went back through my tree to find patterns or traditional names handed  down … Continue reading →

Posted in Family History, History, Random musings on family life, love the universe and everything | Tagged , , , , , , | 11 Comments

Autophobia or How I Stopped Worrying and Learned to Love my Ego

Posted on February 13, 2012 by

Editor’s note: As we go into the second year of mental health guest posts here on No wriggling I am grateful for a contribution  from the other side of the world. Deb is well-known in the genealogy community and has a great … Continue reading →

Posted in Family History, Mental health | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , | 2 Comments

‘Parenting is such sweet sorrow…’

Posted on November 19, 2011 by

I am feeling drained at the moment. Sleeping badly; feeling physically creaky; eating all the wrong food again after five weeks on a healthy eating blitz: it is no wonder that my emotional reserves are in the human equivalent of … Continue reading →

Posted in Poetry, Random musings on family life, love the universe and everything | Tagged , , , , , , , | 7 Comments

The Grand National: or When is it time to end a family tradition?

Posted on April 9, 2011 by

This is an unplanned post, one of those I am prone to put out in response to an event that causes me to think deeply about an issue of importance to me. As I write, the BBC are once again … Continue reading →

Posted in Family History, Random musings on family life, love the universe and everything | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , | 27 Comments

A little tooth shows us a big, big truth….

Posted on March 25, 2011 by

This is something of a random, impulsive post; but I just had to share with you a wonderful poem that was introduced at the reading group I attend. We are lucky to have the poet Julia Copus running our group … Continue reading →

Posted in Family History, Poetry, Random musings on family life, love the universe and everything, Writing | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , | 6 Comments

She wore an itsy bitsy, teeny weeny… on feminism and being mum

Posted on October 9, 2010 by

If you are walking around Exeter City Centre today, you may spot a slim 16-year-old girl, 5ft 9 with legs up to her armpits. She is very gorgeous. She is also wearing a very short pair of turquoise shorts with … Continue reading →

Posted in Random musings on family life, love the universe and everything | Tagged , , , , , , | 15 Comments

Is childhood really ‘in crisis’?

Posted on July 28, 2010 by

I have just read a press release published today on the Open University website linked from twitter. It is entitled Paranoid parents, media hysteria and the myth of ‘childhood in crisis’ and it refers to research conducted by Dr Mary-Jane Kehily, an expert in childhood … Continue reading →

Posted in Random musings on family life, love the universe and everything | Tagged , , , , , , | 2 Comments