I've been struggling to settle down to a blog post lately. Tiredness is a real issue for me since my cartotid artery dissection last year (details here - Cartotid Artery Dissection Story).
Fatigue seems to be the last thing to go although I have to say it has improved so much that I'm almost back to normal. Even so, my 3 days in work leave me completely exhausted and I've been spending a lot of weekends sleeping to try and make up for it. It just means it's hard to plan things because I don't really feel up to it. However, last weekend we had a lovely trip to Altamont Gardens in Carlow. We've been loads of times and my favourite time of year to visit is Springtime when the snowdrops are in bloom.

So here's a little glimpse of what you might see at this time of year:












I really love that stroll by the river and then back up the 100 steps to the garden again

Actually the title is a little misleading because I have never been on a diet in my life and I have no intention of ever embarking on one. The thing I hate about dieting is the concept itself, the discussion around it, the emotional relationship with food and above all, the unrealistic body image pressure that most women are subjected to from an early age.
It is a topic I have been discussing with my daughter recently and I was reminded of a book title 'Fat is a Feminist Issue'.  I hadn't actually read the book (but now really want to - to delve into the subject a little more deeply).
I found an interesting Irish Times article  where the author, Susie Orbach, discusses the continuing relevance of the book - written in 1978, the title continues to hold true and is perhaps even more relevant today.

Image courtesy of Sujin Jetkasettakorn at FreeDigitalPhotos.net

The fact is, that dieting originates in the belief that we need to change ourselves, that our bodies are flawed and need to be moulded into some kind of acceptable state.  That our 'normality' is not chosen by ourselves, but dictated by societal and media pressure.
A constant bombardment of airbrushed images of the female form gives us a completely unrealistic notion of what it is to be female.
We are shown what the 'ideal' is and expected to conform to that, regardless of age, body shape or any other number of factors.  What better way to subdue an entire sex than to make them feel inadequate and lacking most of the time?

Where does this pressure come from?  It would be far too simplistic to say that it's men but it certainly could be considered as another little link in the patriarchal chain. However, I do believe that it is a complex web of consumerism, habit, marketing and probably many things I haven't even yet considered.

The beauty and diet industry is absolutely massive, a gigantic money making force that has nothing to gain from women feeling confident about how they look.

Cosmetics companies, magazines, hair product manufacturers, the fashion industry - all of these have an enormous vested interest in making us feel like crap about ourselves.

And don't get me started on the weight loss gurus/organisations and the horrendous 'diet'products that they peddle, empty of nutrition and never a substitute for healthy real food.

Frankly if they were all that successful, there would be millions of happy healthy women out there, content with their body image and never feeling the need to diet again.

This really isn't the case, though, because they just feed into the food obsession - the belief that food somehow has a moral component. I'm 'good' if I eat an apple (not because it's healthy, mind, but because it is less calorific) and I'm 'bad' if I eat a cream bun.

Eating food does not involve some kind of moral choice here, it is simply a way to nourish and feed our bodies and I do think that this emotional bond with food is part of the problem, something that can only be exacerbated by dieting or depriving ourselves. By elevating sugary products to the elevated status of seldom allowed 'treats', we give them a power they just shouldn't have.

As I said, I have never been on a diet. It is important to me to be healthy and I think that we all need to take care of ourselves, both physically and mentally, and eating well is part of that. However, I don't feel even the slightest pang of guilt if I decide to have a bar of chocolate or a piece of cake and I think that we, as women, need to start feeling confident. Not just having confidence in our bodies, but confidence in ourselves, our choices, our abilities and our strengths.

Loving yourself is a corny concept, perhaps, but I do believe in it very much. How many times have you thought 'I wish I was younger/slimmer/taller/less wrinkly/etc.'?
Why not just enjoy who you are right now?
I also firmly believe, for anyone who has daughters, that we need to stop this endless negative body image cycle. Everytime you critique your body, you are giving a message to your loved ones that you don't value yourself and that message is slowly imbibed by young women and taken to their hearts so that they start to feel inadequate about themselves too.
It really needs to stop and I feel very strongly about this.  We need to throw away the magazines, stop aspiring to be some unattainable female 'ideal' and we need to shout from the rooftops how bloody amazing we are!

Offering parenting advice is not something I like to do generally because I think every family unit is completely different and what works for me isn't necessarily going to work for others.
However, I've been reading a lot of blogs lately about smaller children and I thought I might put together some ideas about older kids, based on my own experience.  I remember when my two were tiny thinking that everything would magically fall into place when they were older and I wouldn't have to worry about a thing!
I couldn't have been more wrong obviously :)

Happy Togetherness!

So here are some of my thoughts and tips, if you've been through the terrible teens already, you will know how it goes! If not, maybe this will reassure you that all the madness is totally normal.
I think the most difficult transition initially is making that adjustment from little cute pliable being to stroppy talking back sulky creature.  No matter what kind of personality your child has, this change will happen, sometimes overnight, sometimes over a period of time. Either way, it can come as a huge shock.
We're so used to a culture of parenting that dictates everything will be fine if we follow 'the rules'. Nothing could be further from the truth - once our kids hit the teenage years, they are starting to follow their own path and find their own way of being.  That halycon period where they looked up to us and behaved according to patterns laid down by us is eroding, and will soon be gone forever.
The very fact that we lose control can have a huge impact on family life, it can be scary and frustrating for parents to see their child transform before their eyes.
I think one of the worst things to do in this situation is to tighten the reins - this really is a time where you need to try and let go a little bit. It sounds easy but our first instinct when a child is 'misbehaving' is to put some controls or punishment in place and it really doesn't work a lot of the time with teens. They are struggling themselves with finding how they fit in the world and coping with all the huge pressures of changing bodies, social groups, school, etc.  What they need from us is to know we are there - this is often a need that doesn't come across very clearly as they push us away more often than not.
It's also hard to move away from the habit of offering unrealistic reassurance - the 'there, there, everything will be ok' approach is perfect for younger children, but older teens, especially, now know that we don't have all the answers and that we aren't privy to everything that's going on in their lives.

So offering blanket reassurance can seem patronising and false and make them turn away from us in frustration.  A better approach, I feel, is just to listen - and listen properly, not with a half ear. If you are lucky enough that your teen is confiding in you, then to hell with the housework or whatever else you're doing, just give them the time they need.

Family Outing, I'm here but I'm not liking it!

Which brings me to my next point. Lots of things that used to be lovely family outings are now anathema to teens and they spend (or mine do anyway!) lots of time in their rooms, plugged in to their music and in their own little world. I think that when this happened in our house first, I worried that something was wrong, that we weren't spending enough family time together, that I wasn't showing enough interest.  In actual fact, I think they just need this time to be themselves and do their own thing. Forcing outings or conversation doesn't really achieve anything and to be honest, I think this is definitely the time for parents to relax and find things that they want to do themselves (and maybe haven't been able to do up to now).
This doesn't mean that you are not paying attention, it's just a different kind of attention.
Often, little worries or anxieties can be relayed to us just when we're sitting in the car driving home or just as a throwaway comment.  That's why it's important to always have an ear open and be aware if they are struggling with something.
I think it's also important that we, as parents, express our own worries to some extent - not in the sense of burdening our kids with our woes but just to let them know that it's ok and normal to sometimes be anxious in certain situations.

Next up is parental expectation - I'm pretty sure this is something that we all have, it's hard not to! Even from the womb, we have a little unconscious plan mapped out for our darlings - whether it's a career in science, a prodigious musical ability or an artistic talent, we can't help but impose our own expectations on our kids. And we try to lead them in certain directions, through education or extra-curricular activities or outings or downright orders.
However, as Kahlil Gibran so beautifully put it, our children are not our own to mould, they are their own beings:

"Your children are not your children.
They are the sons and daughters of Life's longing for itself.
They come through you but not from you,
And though they are with you yet they belong not to you.

You may give them your love but not your thoughts,
For they have their own thoughts.
You may house their bodies but not their souls,
For their souls dwell in the house of tomorrow,
which you cannot visit, not even in your dreams.
You may strive to be like them,
but seek not to make them like you
For life goes not backward nor tarries with yesterday."

Sisters!

This post was inspired by my husband Mark who nominated me to post photos of nature for 7 days on Facebook. I loved doing it so much and got such a nice response that I decided to put them all together here in a blog post.

The reason I loved it so much was that each photo was not just a picture of a landscape or a flower but also a memory of family time and days out together. Each photo that I posted was a little sliver of time captured and it made me happy to see the lovely places we have been and beautiful things that surround us.

So without further ado here is my Day 1 photo:

It was taken in 2014 on our annual Donegal holiday.  We have been visiting my friend Sue for so many years and I never get tired of the incredible landscape.  This was on a beautiful day on our way to Magheragh Beach (I think!) The sky was incredible and the greens and blues were stunning.

This is my day 3 picture and it's a more dainty close up from my own garden. I love to see ladybirds in the garden, not only are they beautiful with their cheery red colour, they are also great predators for garden pests. I try to keep my garden pesticide and chemical free so it's always a joy to see it teeming with insect life.
This is an incredible avenue of yew at Huntington Castle in Clonegal, Co. Carlow. We visited here last year for a talk and of course it rained the whole time but there was shelter in the trees and I took a picture of this avenue of yew trees, over 600 years old! If there's anything that can make me feel small and insignificant, it's a tree, and these are so amazing in real life, to see how the roots entwine and their solidity.


This is the daintiest little viola taken on our lovely trip to Glasgow earlier this year. I was delighted that the Glasgow Botanic Gardens were so near our Hotel.  I've always been fascinated by tiny little flowers, they can be incredibly hardy and have such detail of pattern and colour and this violet is such a cheery little thing with a lovely soft colour.
As I've so many amazing pictures of Donegal and our hols with Sue it was really hard to choose just one. This is actually from 2014 but it's a beach we go to every year and it's just brilliant for swimming. I picked this because of the mossy stones and the sea stretching out into the distance. We've had so many gorgeous swims at this beach, I can't wait to get back there again!
This picture was taken in Burtown House in Athy, a fabulous place to visit and eat. We ate outside on that particular day and it was sunny and the flowers were in full bloom, gorgeous!  I think the octopus-like tendrils in the centre of the flowers are amazing and it was such a pure delicate white.