Life and Dandelions

Should a convicted pedophile be given a second chance?

2014-08-11T09:50:00.000+10:00

Last night a commercial television station aired an "exclusive" interview with the parents involved in the surrogacy mess. I didn't watch it and don't intend to go back and watch it. I have no interest in what these people have to say and I have no interest in watching a convicted pedophile pose as a father.

Harsh words?

Yes.

I don't care that it was many years ago.

I don't care that he's been through a prison reform program for pedophiles.

It means nothing to me.

Whether he's reformed or not ... I believe he gave up his right to ever have children in his care the day he committed his first crime. He didn't steal a car or defraud Centrelink - he sexually abused children. Not a one off... but twenty two, that's 22 counts of child sexual abuse he was charged for.

If I was convicted of fraud and money laundering, I'd never get a job in charge of a bank, regardless of how much I'd reformed. Or if I got the job, once found out I'm sure I'd be terminated. If I had twenty two counts of fraud related activities I doubt I'd get a job anywhere once I'd gone through a police check.

Why is this man still allowed to be a father? Why is his daughter still with him? I don't know what is happening in Western Australia, but my hope is the authorities are keeping a close eye on the family and this innocent little girl will have protection.

I believe he said last night "my daughter is safe with me". Really? We are supposed to believe this? Pedophiles are renowned for their ability to lie ... to their families, to the children they are grooming and to themselves, by somehow justifying in their own minds that being sexually attracted to children is normal and okay.

Why don't the laws prevent pedophiles from being able to have children? Why aren't people convicted of these crimes chemically sterilised so they cannot have their own children? When they leave prison they are under strict rules not to go near schools, playgrounds and other places where children frequent, yet they are still able to have children of their own. Seems ludicrous.

If I killed someone with a gun and was convicted and jailed for it, I very much doubt I'd be allowed to get a gun licence when released from jail.

I don't know what the answer is and I know that it's not something that has a black and white solution. I'd love there to be a law that ensures anyone convicted of pedophilia is never allowed to be a parent ... whether it is naturally, by adoption, surrogacy, IVF or fostering.

These people handed in their parent card the moment they sexually touched a child. In fact they handed it in the moment they imagined sexually touching a child.

End of story.

NOTE: I never wanted this blog to have any one theme ... I want it to be a place I can express my views on things that inspire me to write. Unfortunately the last few posts have been about child abuse and pedophiles ... and this post sadly continues with the same theme.

I say sadly because child abuse is a sad thing to talk about. It is also sad that there is so much talk of it in the news.

I don't know a lot of things ...

2014-07-06T21:35:00.002+10:00

Warning: This blog post discusses child sexual abuse. If this is upsetting or triggers thoughts you can't deal with please call Lifeline: 13 11 14 or Bravehearts 1800 272 831

Rolf Harris was sentenced on Friday night. He got five years and nine months.

Is it long enough?

What is long enough?

Ten years?

Life?

Death?

Castration?

Public flogging?

All of the above?

I'd like to think the victims of Rolf Harris are feeling something other than let down, but my guess is that's exactly how they are feeling.

The man who abused me died before he received any type of sentencing.

He abused many girls during his lifetime and ultimately never paid the price for his crimes of stealing our innocence.

Maybe if I had done something, perhaps he would have spent some time in jail?

But I did nothing.

Not a thing.   Ever.

My adopted sister did something ... but not until she found out he also abused her daughter.

She had him charged.

She asked me to help and I said no.

I did nothing.

Not a thing. Ever.

I just couldn't. I couldn't face him again and I couldn't bear to describe in detail what used to happen.

I wish I could explain what it is like being the victim of child abuse ... but I can't even articulate it inside my own head. You see I don't know what it feels like to not be a victim, so I don't have anything to compare it to.

I don't know what it is like to go to bed as a little girl and feel safe and secure knowing my mummy and daddy will protect me from scary things and people.

I don't know how it feels to have a daddy who loves me no matter what.

I don't know how to not have the thoughts of the things he did when he used to sneak into my room when everyone was sleep.

I don't know a lot of things.

Things others take for granted.

A lot was taken away from me by a man who thought it was okay to adopt daughters to then use as his playthings.

I sound angry and bitter, except I'm not.

I'm simply stating the facts.

It is what it is and we are all dealt a hand in life and it is up to us to play it as best we can. I feel like I've played my hand well.   There were times I got a bit lost, loved the wrong people, lived recklessly and hid from my feelings behind some massive walls.

But all in all I've turned out okay.

Except it never really goes away. Victims of child sexual abuse will always be victims of child sexual abuse because there is no erasing it.

No amount of therapy, denial, wall building and whatever else we choose to throw at it will make it go away.

These publicised cases of child sexual abuse stir up a lot of feelings for me and every other person who had their innocence stolen by a pedophile because just when you think you've packed it up and put it in a suitcase on top of the cupboard ... bang!

Out comes another Robert Hughes or Rolf Harris and it starts all over again.

Victims of child sexual abuse are everywhere. I can guarantee that every single person who reads this will have someone in their circle of friends who is one. You may or may not know, but they are there, silently reliving things they'd rather forget.

These public cases really do come at a price. We can't hide from the media - we hear news of it every single day.

I work in the media and it is part of my job to read, hear and see footage of these court cases.

Does it have an impact on me? Absolutely.

Does it have an impact on every other victim of child sexual abuse? Absolutely.

So is 5 years and 9 months enough time in jail for a child sexual abuser?

No. It really isn't.

If this blog post is upsetting or triggers thoughts you can't deal with please call Lifeline: 13 11 14 or Bravehearts: 1800 272 831

No means no. No exceptions. No Caveats.

2014-05-29T10:00:00.000+10:00

I have held off reading the #YesAllWomen tweets because, to be honest, I'm outrage fatigued. If I'm to be totally honest, I'm actually "feminist outrage" fatigued.   It seems every second day there is something for feminists to be outraged about and Twitter seems to provide the fuel for flaming the outrage fire. Being outraged all the time is tiring and if that is what it takes to be a feminist, well I guess you could say my apathy far outweighs my desire to fight for equality, that and I tend to verge on the side of lazy when I'm not at work. Cute kitten pictures and witty quotes are more my thing.

This morning I felt it would be safe to have a look, and given that I work in the media, I really should know what's going on. By now the outrage fire should be nothing more than smouldering embers. I was wrong.

The tweets are still strong and filled with feeling and intent. Usually I'm bored or tired of the issue after reading twenty tweets of people saying the same thing, but these are different to the usual Twitter outrage. They speak a long silent truth. They reflect what I feel deep down in side. They make me sad. They make me mad. They make me think and look at myself.

I have never jumped on the feminist bandwagon because I truly believe I'm not one and that men and women are fundamentally different in all ways and I kind of like that. I like a man opening a door for me. I like a man who steps back and lets me go first and I like a man who feels he needs to protect me. I also believe that if my husband is working hard all day he deserves to come home to a cooked meal if I'm home before him. I also don't mind the occasional wolf whistle, so surely I can't be a feminist? That's my fluffy pink slippers view of feminism.

Before you all hang me out to dry ... deep down I know these things aren't what fundamental feminism is all about ... I don't want to think about the real reasons because it's too close to me. I would have to think about things I have long packed away.   I would feel like I need to be involved, need to speak up and need to be doing something.

After reading the #YesAllWomen tweets, I actualy felt like I was betraying the sisterhood by doing and saying nothing. By holding onto my quaint, fluffy, beliefs I keep myself safe ... out of the fray, it's easier. But it really isn't.

Two tweets made me stop breathing. Two tweets forced me to think hard about what I really believe and what being a feminist was all about.

The first tweet that stopped me in my tracks was this one ...

And how true.

There are different types of rape ... it's not only rape because a woman is violently forced to have sex by a stranger who attacks her on the way home in the dark. If a woman does not want a man to touch her or have sex with her and he does ... it is rape. All rape is rape. No matter what the situation. Sadly so many women live with rape, some every single day, and never report it.

Rapes often occur after a night of drinking, dancing and perhaps flirting. How many women wake up after one of these nights knowing they were forced or felt obliged to have sex? This is rape.

As women we've been conditioned to question ourselves about these situations ... somehow it had to be our fault. "Was my dress too short?" "I wore a g-string, that must mean I'm asking for it?" "I let him kiss me, I sent a signal I wanted more?" "I let him up for a coffee - I only wanted coffee, but I probably sent the wrong signal?" "I've had numerous one night stands (on my terms) and if I reported him they wouldn't believe me because of my history?" "I was too drunk?" "I was too high?" "I was flirting with him all night?" "He paid for my drinks, I guess I owed him?"

When a rape of this type is reported, I wonder how many of the accused perpetrators say "she was asking for it?". How often did you hear that phrase as you were growing up? "Don't go out dressed like that, boys will think you are loose." "Look how short that skirt is, she's just asking for it dressed like that!" "It doesn't surprise me that she was raped, she was always flirting with the boys, she was asking for it." And surprisingly, it wasn't only the men who said this.

What about marital rape? How many women live day to day in marriages where they are forced to have sex? It might not be violent force, but it can be emotional force. A sense of entitlement by some husbands. How many women go into the bathroom afterwards and silently cry as they clean themselves up, to come back to bed and sleep with their husbands? How many women say "I just do it because it's easier than saying no"? How many women truly believe this and how many men make them feel this way?

How many sexually abused children never speak out because they blame themselves? How many wait until they are an adult before they feel like they can talk about it? How many are not believed by family members when they finally do speak up? How many find themselves on trial, trying to prove the type of person they are, rather than the person who allegedly committed the crimes? Woody Allen's step daughter for example, whose situation really upsets me. It's not about Woody Allen having to prove he didn't do it ... it's about her having to prove he did. It was the same for Sarah Monahan and Robert Hughes (now convicted) and now the Rolf Harris trial.

No one wants to think that a man they love or gave birth to could be capable of doing such things. We always want to see those we love and care about in nothing but the best light, which is a perfectly normal, but for the women involved in these cases ... a grave injustice.

This was the second tweet rocked me to my core:

So do I. My sons should be reading these tweets. I should be ensuring they understand that no means no ... no exceptions. Have I been vigilant in teaching my boys this? I'd like to think so, but I have never laboured the point and therefore don't think I've given this as much attention as I should have. I've spoken more about a man should not hit a woman and less about the different types of rape.

As each generation passes the next generation is better informed, more understanding, but we still have a long way to go.

It really is up to us ... right now ... the mothers and father of sons, to teach our boys to respect women. To instill in them that a woman owns her body and a man has absolutely no right to it unless she invites him to - and by invite it means she say yes ... without coercion. It is as simple as that. No exceptions. No caveats.

Ten years is nowhere near enough!

2014-05-03T11:42:00.000+10:00

Back in February I went to the doctor for a check up. I wasn't sick as such, but I wasn't feeling particularly well either.

I had put on a lot of weight. I was retaining fluid. I was tired, lethargic and unable to stop eating all the wrong foods. I craved sweet sugary starchy foods and fresh white bread with lashings of butter. Plus my exercise regime consisted of 30 minutes per week with a personal trainer and a walk with a friend.

She sent me off for some blood tests and I figured it would be the same as usual ... everything would be okay but my thyroid medication would probably need adjusting, explaining the tiredness and lethargy.

A few days letter I received a call from my doctor's surgery requesting I come in to discuss my results and not to panic it wasn't urgent. I ate more chocolate and white bread to ease my worry.

Two days later I was sitting opposite my doctor hearing the words "pre diabetes", overweight, life expectancy". Okay, now you have my attention ... "life expectancy, what do you mean? It's not like I have cancer or anything?"

She told me that diabetes would take 10 years off my life expectancy and if I changed nothing about my lifestyle I could expect to be a diabetic within two years. Ouch!   She also measured my waist, with one of those special health tape measures and I was at the high end of the red area ... red meaning "danger".

Her advice was to change my lifestyle by eating a more balanced diet, exercising more and losing 10 kilograms. She also referred me to a weight loss clinic.

I left feeling a bit overwhelmed, okay I'm lying ... I was a lot overwhelmed and all I really wanted was a hot chocolate and a piece of banana bread.    Instead I went to work and pushed it to the back of my mind, that is, until I was driving home later that evening.

Ten years off my life expectancy ... is that a big deal? Should I be worried? I started to work it out in my head. So, if diabetes would reduce my life expectancy by ten years that means living a reasonably healthy and active life until 80 would now become 70.   She also mentioned that the last 10 years of my life would be spent dealing with the myriad of diabetes related illnesses that I would now have. That takes me back to 60 ... I would be relatively healthy until I was 60.   Given I'm currently 50 ... THAT IS ONLY TEN MORE GOOD YEARS!!!!!!!!!!

Yep. That. Changed my life. Changed my outlook. Changed my eating habits. Changed everything. Ten more years is not good enough. I've too many things I want/need to do and ten years will go by in a blink.

That was the last week in February and from that night everything changed. I had been toying with the idea of quitting sugar for the few weeks before that and had even inquired about joining the "I Quit Sugar" program, but I'd just missed the close off. Never mind, I ate some more chocolate while I thought about it some more. However, the game has changed and the time for thinking about it has been and gone. It was now time for action.

So, here we are two months on and I can say I've successfully changed my lifestyle and am definitely feeling better. On 27th February I gave up sugar (fructose) and find I'm no longer craving anything sweet, including my beloved chocolate. I'm not missing out on any food, I'm not hungry and most importantly, I'm not dieting. I've also just given up gluten, which has never really been any good for me, and I've found that harder than giving up sugar. I do feel better for it, but I miss bread ... even though I'd progressed from white bread to grain bread!

I've lost 5 kilograms over the two months and have stopped retaining fluid. I am fitting into clothes I haven't worn in ages and I'm baking more brownies and treats than I've ever done!! I'm growing my own salad and smoothie greens and I'm exercising 4-5 time per week.

I hardly know who I am anymore. I haven't found this change as difficult as I have in the past and I believe there are two reasons for this. One, I want more than ten years of good quality life and two, I've made one change at a time and done it slowly until I no longer have to think about it. Not eating sugar and going to the gym or the park to exercise is now just part of my day, like cleaning my teeth or having a shower. It's true what they say about taking 21 days to make a habit. I've just never exercised or followed a sustainable eating plan longer than 21 days in a row to let it become a habit.

Whenever I've dieted in the past it has been on a program that is not sustainable in the long term. I have an under active thyroid and this can be problematic when trying to lose weight and also when exercising. If I go for a hard core exercise program like that advocated by 12WBT I end up crashing half way through because I come down with a virus and I can't recover. Also, when I reduce my calories to 1200, I start to lose weight but then nothing. A very slow metabolism caused by my under active thyroid is exceptionally good at holding onto fat.

I've been seeing a trainer since June last year and she is training me in a way that keeps my thyroid happy and I have not been sick at all. I've recently upped my exercise regime by adopting High Intensity Training (HIT) or Tabata Training and this has made a significant difference to my strength and fitness, again without the stress a hard core exercise program puts on my body. By hard core I mean training for in excess of 30 minutes six days per week. I currently train 4 days each week and it looks like this:

Monday:   HIT hill runs 4 x 30 secs & 4 minutes of tricep dips & pushups & bicep curls (not 4 minutes each - a total of 4 minutes) and a ten minute walk.   I also combine this with walking the dog so will generally get a much longer walk.

Tuesday:   PT session - 30 minutes

Wednesday:   Rest day

Thursday: 1 hour walk with a girlfriend

Friday:   Gym session - 30 minutes - cardio and strength Tabata Training or training in the park after walking the dog.

Saturday: Rest

Sunday: Rest - or sometimes a Gym session

When I go out or go to a friend's home to eat I don't go with a list what I can't eat ... I eat whatever is available or cooked for me in moderation. I don't want to be "that" person who doesn't eat stuff and makes it hard for my friends to prepare me a meal. I find the next day I'm not very hungry and I eat light foods all day. I'm no longer obsessing about food and I'm only eating 3 meals a day. No snacks at all ... not because I'm dieting ... but because my body doesn't want them.

I don't proclaim to have the answers to a healthy lifestyle. But what I do know is I've made a conscious effort to find what works for me and I've done it. I'm someone who needs a big incentive or a deadline to get things done ... seems like losing ten years was my incentive this time.

It has been a total lifestyle change. I still have 5 kilograms to lose and I'm sure over time it will go ... I'm not pushing it because I don't want a short term fix. This is the rest of my life I'm talking about here and I want that rest to be MUCH longer than ten years.

I want to be that crazy 85 year old lady you see on the news jumping out of a plane ... I'll be sure to wave to you!

I could dance all f*ck'n day ... oh yes I could

2014-03-27T09:13:00.002+10:00

So ... it's been a while. A lot has been bubbling away in my mind but nothing I've really wanted to write about. That is, until today.

You see, I turned fifty last year and oh my goodness ... the moaning and grumbling and dislike for growing older that has spewed forth from me has been, well, a ~~little~~ lot over the top.

A couple of days ago I read something that stopped me in my tracks and gave me cause to take a long hard look at myself and the amazing privilege I have of growing older.

My friend Rebecca Sparrow wrote a blog post about embracing ageing and why her babysitter, Emma has made her feel this way. Emma is 22 and has stage 4 melanoma ... to put it bluntly, this is a death sentence. Emma won't turn 50, she won't turn 40 and it's possible she won't even turn 30. Those years included some of the best times of my life ... life being the operative word.

I am alive and healthy. I am also fifty and damn lucky to be so. It's funny how I can look at that number now and not feel the angst I felt as little as seven days ago. Reading Bec's post gave me cause to sit down and reflect on what being fifty means.

I am lucky. So very lucky. My beautiful friend Suzy Connor died from cancer almost two years ago ... she didn't reach fifty, but while she was with us she gave life a damn good shake. In fact I have worn a Suzy Connor Challenge charity bracelet on my wrist since she left us, to remind me that I am here. In a way I have let her down by being so negative about turning fifty.

Another friend Tracy Rudd also died from cancer just over a year ago ... she also didn't reach fifty. So many other people won't have the privilege of reaching fifty. I am lucky. I am fifty.

Over the last few days I've reflected on growing older and have realised some things that I'd not noticed before - some really important and empowering things.

I may be fifty but that doesn't mean I've stopped growing emotionally, spiritually and knowledge wise. There is still so much I don't know and so much I still want to see and do.

I will own the wrinkles around my eyes and mouth - they mean I have laughed and laughed and that my life has been filled with joyous moments.

I will also own the mistakes I've made, the lessons I've learned and relish in the way being fifty gives me a different perspective.

I have noticed that I worry less about small things.

I'm less self conscious. I am much more comfortable with who I am and what I do and don't know.

Of course I still have some insecurities - to not have would make me arrogant. But I'm okay with that. Those insecurities will help me to continue to grow.

I will own my grey hairs because, well, they are mine, but I will cover them up with hair dye because I'm not quite ready to embrace grey hair yet. I 'll save my Helen Mirren phase for when I reach sixty. Then look out ... I'll not only keep the grey hair but I'll be running around, on a beach in a bathing suit. Oh yes I will!

This morning I saw a video on my Facebook feed ... thank you Nicky Pawsey Foster for sharing it.

The 88 year old lady in this video cemented very clearly in my mind that growing old is to be embraced and those of us who have the privilege of partaking in it ... should grab life as hard as we can and dance the shiz out of it. As she says at the end of the video ... "I could dance all f*ck'n day".

She's right you know.

Life may not be the party you expected, but while you are here you might as well dance!

Forgive me Father for I have sinned ...

2013-10-29T06:18:00.001+10:00

If you are a Catholic and were subjected to the guilt filled upbringing that accompanies Catholic schooling and attending church every Sunday, you will have very strong memories of those words.

Last night I went to bed with a good dose of Catholic guilt - something I haven't had in quite some time.

Oh don't get me wrong, I feel guilty about a whole lot of things ... working too much, not working enough, lunching with friends while hubby is working, not spending enough time with my teenagers, refusing to do my teenager's washing and the list goes on and on. But that type of guilt is more "mother and wife" guilt.

Catholic guilt is a whole other ball game.

Let me explain why I felt so guilty.

Last night I shamed someone on social media. Shaming people, those less fortunate than me or those who have been caught on camera in awkward and unattractive poses, is not kind and something I have avoided doing. Until last night.

I can't put my finger on why I thought it was okay to do it last night ... perhaps it was the fact that when I first saw the picture it did make me laugh. Out. Loud. On face value it was very funny and the accompanying caption was very clever, and funny too.

In hindsight ... not so funny. Just mean and cruel.

I saw it earlier in the day when I was working, and out of respect for my employer I didn't share it at that time. I have a rule that if it's not something I'd share to the listeners or on the work Facebook account I can't share it while I'm working. That in itself should be enough to make me stop, think and assess whether I should share it at all.

Last night I saw it again in my timeline and quickly shared it with my friends. Almost immediately I began to feel uncomfortable ... not enough to take it down though. The cloud was starting to settle above me and the slow drizzle of guilt washed slowly over me. By the time I got into bed the cloud was bucketing down on me and I lay in bed feeling all kinds of awful. A friend* on Facebook commented that we should be celebrating people who feel comfortable no matter what they look like. She is right. So very right.

The lady I shamed was someone's daughter, mother, sister, friend ... somewhere she is something special to someone else.

I was going to remove the post from Facebook this morning, but it seems Facebook has done that for me.

Life is hard, really bloody hard for some people, and none of us have the right to shame people. Somewhere, somehow the internet has made it okay to find people who look different and surreptitiously photograph them and post the photos on the internet for the world to ridicule. We've all laughed at them. We've all probably shared them. Thankfully not all of us take the photos.

In a world where I have friends who are right this minute dealing with cancer, death, suicide, mental health and everything in between ... and in a world where millions of people are doing it tougher than I could even imagine ... I think we need to practice a lot more kindness, tolerance and Catholic guilt. Or whatever it is that makes us stop and think about the things we do and say to others.

* Thank you Sandra Skelton for reminding me to be kind

Life is a Carnival ... but DON'T send in the clowns!

2013-09-22T14:34:00.000+10:00

Brisbane ... my Carnival.

Last week I blogged for the first time about growing up with a pedophile for a father. I know it was difficult for some people to read and even more difficult for some people to know what to say to me. To those people - that's okay, you didn't need to say anything.

I am okay. In fact I am better than okay. On the Tuesday night after I blogged I was asked to talk about my experience on ABC radio with Rebecca Levingston. Her Taboo Tuesday topic was child sexual abuse. It was nerve wracking to say the least but it was also terribly cathartic. If you are interested you can listen here ...

In the space of three days I wrote and spoke a story I've not told before - a story I've kept inside for over 45 years. During the years I've told bits of it, I've hinted at things and I've also talked on radio briefly about it during my Conversation with ABC's Richard Fidler in 2011 ... but I'd never written down exactly what happened and how I felt.

Today, one week later, I feel like a different person after these long held onto, unsaid words were finally spoken. I feel like I have moved from a murky pond into a pristine pool of clear water. I've not talked about it before because I was always scared that once I said the words everything would change. I was right, everything did change, but not in the way I imagined.

I thought I might be judged. I would always be known as "that girl who was molested" or I would be somehow tainted, used, dirty, different. I am none of that. I'm still me. I am a survivor, but more than that I am happy.

Someone asked me last week if I wished my life had been different. I could honestly look them in the eye and say "no". I do not wish for a different life. If I had a different life I wouldn't be the me I am today, and damn it, I really like the me I am.

Granted some times have been tough - but that's life. If I wasn't put up for adoption and if I wasn't adopted out to the family I went to, I wouldn't be sitting here writing this blog post.

I look around and I am so grateful for all that I have and all that I have become. I've had to learn some tough lessons about love and I've had to live without love at various times in my life, but that has taught me to never underestimate the power of love and friendship when I have had it.

I care deeply for my friends and family. I may not be conventional and I may not understand how mothers and daughters love each other and the deep bonds of families, but I do know that I love my children fiercely and I love my husband with all my heart.

So no, I don't wish that my life had of been different. For me, being able to help people is everything. If I can inspire one person who is struggling through a tough time to know that life is always worth living, and happiness exists in all different forms, it's all been worth it.

Life is what it is. It's how we deal with the hand we are given that makes it either a carnival or a catastrophe. Personally I like carnivals - minus the clowns. I don't like clowns, or catastrophes.

Two Little Girls

2013-09-14T22:00:00.002+10:00

Warning: This blog post deals with child sexual abuse and might be disturbing to some people.

Image Credit

Once upon a time there was a man and a woman who were unable to have a baby of their own. They applied to adopt a baby and in August 1963 their dreams came true, a tiny girl baby was given to them by the state of New South Wales.

Two years later they had the joy of bringing home another little bundle of pink, gifted to them by the State. A few years later a miracle occurred ... they fell pregnant naturally. Nine months later another little girl was welcomed into the family.

This family of five eventually moved out of the small flat on top of a garage and into the home which had been built for them. To all looking on it was a normal happy family, a man and a woman who had been blessed with three miraculous little girls. They were special.

It should have been perfect.

It wasn't.

Behind the walls of the small fibro home, a father who should have been cherishing the daughters he had been gifted, was abusing that power in the most evil of ways.

A little girl should be tucked into bed, kissed good night and left to dream sweet dreams. She should feel safe in her bed.

From a very young age the oldest of the little girls started getting special late night visits from daddy.

He was sneaky and only came in after she was asleep. He would touch her with his hands and his penis, ever so softly in the hope she would stay asleep. She was, by nature, a light sleeper and would wake up and pretend to stay asleep because she didn't know what to do. At first she felt comforted by her daddy coming in and spending time with her, but there is a point when a little girl knows that what daddy is doing is not what a daddy should be doing. This is when a little girl's world turns upside down and she is no longer an innocent little girl.

She would lay awake every night planning how to stop him coming in. She would get out of bed after she'd been tucked in and leave piles of books and noisy toys in the pathway to her bed. She would also lie awake as long as she could so she wouldn't wake up to him touching her in places that a little girl should never be touched.

He eventually stopped trying because the obstacles would make too much noise and her mother was sleeping in the room next door. It didn't stop the little girl from lying awake at night for many years to come, wondering if he would start again.

During the day she managed to hide her bad thoughts away and get on with growing up. She made friends, went to school and did all the things girls do. Despite the awfulness of the secret she carried around, she had a full and reasonably happy childhood when she was away from the family home.

On the inside however she was always insecure. She always had anxiety. She never felt loved. She always felt different. She had a secret no one else had ... or so she believed.

She sometimes thought of telling her mother what her father had done but could never bring herself to do so. She was scared that once it was said it could never be unsaid and life would change irrevocably for all of them. The strange thing was that even though the life they had wasn't right ... it was the only life she knew and she felt if their lives fell apart it would somehow be her fault.

She didn't know that down the hallway there was another little girl in the house going through the same thing. She will never know if it was happening at the same time or whether it only started when it stopped happening to her. For a long time she wondered and occasionally she would almost ask the other little girl, but could never find the right words.

Sexual abuse was never ever talked about in those days and the two little girls really didn't have a name to call what daddy was doing to them.

The two little adopted girls ultimately endured years of sexual abuse at the hands of this man. This man who applied to adopt children under the guise that he would provide a good life for them. That he would give them the love and security their natural parents couldn't. This man abused the trust of the mothers who made the most difficult of choices thinking they were doing the best thing for their babies. This man who never should have been allowed to be a father.

It wasn't until the two little girls were married woman with children of their own that they found out they had both been abused by this man.

Unfortunately they had never been close as sisters and had never supported each other. In fact the three little girls had never been close. They grew up quite a disparate group with the older two spending as much time away from the house as possible. They were three very different people who shared two parent figures yet each sister led a totally separate life.

The eldest sister spent as much time as she could away from the family, ingraining herself into her friend's families. She had close friendships which she would maintain for her entire life. She would grow into a woman who understood friendships yet had no idea how to do love and families.

The middle sister would ultimately lead a troubled life, as she too must have had trouble with love and families.

The younger sister, who was the natural child, seemed okay.

I can only surmise as to how they both feel because this is not their story. This is my story. I am the eldest of the three sisters.

When I found out via a chance telephone conversation that my sister had been abused for years by our father everything changed. I found out that she had made attempts to tell our mother but she was never believed. Our mother didn't do anything to protect her children. This was my turning point.

I was a mother and I would have done anything to protect my children. I could not fathom how our mother could do nothing. Having that man in my life while my boys were little was always a terrible conflict for me. I hardly ever saw them and when I did I would never let him hold them nor did I ever let them be alone with him.

The day I found out for sure about my sister It took me ten seconds to tell her that I never ever wanted to see our mother or father again. It transpired that he had abused my sister's daughter as well and she ultimately had him charged. I declined being part of the court case because I had moved on. He was found guilty and died before he was sentenced. I never saw him again.

Cutting them out of my life finally gave me the ability deal with this secret I had been carrying around since I was 5 years old.

Dealing with it doesn't mean I can pretend it didn't happen. I still have occasional flashes of disturbing memories and suspect I always will. What it does mean is I know it wasn't my fault and I know that there is nothing wrong me. It also means that I am not reminded of it every time I have dealings with that family.

Walking away wasn't easy ... I did have guilt. I felt bad for punishing my mother for something my father had done. She may or may not have known, I will never know for sure. But what I do know is she didn't do anything to protect us, especially when my sister had told her. She is not alone, her natural daughter has always been close to her, and still is... this made it easier for me to walk away.

I am no longer a part of them and after eighteen years I can barely remember what being part of them felt like. We all deal with things the best way we can ... this was my way.

Why am I writing this tonight? An old school friend made contact with me today to tell me that my mother was in the hospital ... she had a fall. I had to read her message a number of times to realise who she was talking about. I felt strange because I felt nothing. I felt guilty for feeling nothing. This is the woman who fed and bathed me and put me through school. I still felt nothing. I eventually felt sad ... but only because I felt nothing. The only thing I felt compelled to do was finally write about why I feel nothing. I made my decision eighteen years ago and I don't regret it.

What I do regret is not having the ability to say anything when it was happening. Unfortunately back then speaking up wasn't encouraged or supported. Anything of a sexual nature was shrouded in secrecy, we were never ever told what sexual abuse was.

We have come a long way in dealing with child sexual abuse and I know if I had been born in this time, I would have spoken up for certain.

We must never stop talking about sexual abuse.

If this blog post brings up any feelings or concerns that you are unable to deal with ... please call Lifeline 13 11 14 or Adults Surviving Child Abuse

1300 657 380 PROFESSIONAL SUPPORT LINE

ASCA's 1300 Line operates between 9am-5pm Monday to Sunday EDST*,

should you wish to send an email please email [email protected]" style="color: #2763a5; text-decoration: none;">[email protected]

It's nice to remember where you came from ...

2013-05-29T20:47:00.000+10:00

Those who read my blog may or may not know that I grew up in the town of Parkes ... you know ... that place in Western NSW made famous by "The Dish". I like to think Parkes is famous because it was, and still is, the home of some really awesome people.

I've been a city girl since I was eighteen, but those first eighteen years I spent well and truly entrenched in country life. I treasure that life ... whilst it wasn't always rosy ... it was where I grew up, and it made me who I am today.

I remember when I was eighteen I couldn't wait to move to Sydney. I wanted nothing more than to get away from that small town. I wanted adventure, freedom and a life where I didn't know what was around every corner.

I also wanted to escape the family I grew up with. My first eighteen years were such a juxtaposition ... I loved what growing up in the country meant. I loved the relationships formed and the close knit community. I loved the values living in a country town taught me. However at the same time I hated my home life. I didn't love the life within my family, within the walls of the family home. Terrible things happened there. A totally dysfunctional family were living an even more dysfunctional life.

But you know what? While that dysfunctional life was happening around me, I learnt to shut off from it. I had an exceptionally strong fantasy world. In fact, I could read a book and totally put myself in the story, to the point that when I finished a book, I was almost heartbroken. It is why I loved reading a series so much ... I got to stay with the same people for longer. Enid Blyton's Famous Five and Secret Seven were a big part of my growing up ... for so many reasons. Still to this day when I finish a book there is a physical pain I feel when I realise I'm going to miss the people who had become part of my life for that period of time, though it isn't as intense. These days I have a happy family life and I don't need the fantasy, but I guess old habits die hard.

Along with my books, I had some amazing friendships. There were families who made me feel like I was one of them. In my secret fantasy world I was a part of these families. The Bennett's in particular. Kim Bennett, my best friend since pre school with Mrs Faulkner. Aileen and Gordon Bennett - treated me like their own daughter. Lisa Bennett, had to put up with an interloper spending so much time with them, be it roast lunches on a Sunday or going away on holidays. I was always there. Without the Bennett's love I doubt very much I'd be the person I am today.

Neighbours also played a huge part in my life ... Warwick and Judy Johnstone and their three children who I babysat for as often as possible. I spent many a night staying over at their place ... sleep overs were also key to saving my sanity. Other neighbours also unknowingly gave me a safe place to stay. Ann & Jim Jennings and Carol Godden. These people have no idea the huge part they played in my life.

As I'm writing this I'm thinking about how life has a funny way of turning out okay. If these people didn't open their homes and hearts to me, I doubt I'd be standing here writing this blog post, living the fantastic life I now have and feeling like I have a reasonable dose of sanity.

I have always lived my life as an adult caring about others, putting myself in their shoes and always making sure I have a place in my heart for anyone who needs it. I haven't consciously tried to be this way, but I guess I am paying forward the love and kindness that was given to me. No one knew of the life behind the walls of our home, no one knew anything ... yet people cared for me and gave me exactly what I needed.

What I am trying to say is that we really don't know what is happening in the lives of those around us, even those we are very close to, so to one person it might just be a "friendship" yet to someone else it might just be everything. You never really know.

What started off as a little post to include some audio from a radio interview last night has turned into a missive of sorts. The words just kept coming and it felt wrong to stop them.

Why am I so nostalgic for my home town?

Geoff Anderson, a boy in ~~the grade above me~~ (correction) my grade - oops, sorry Geoff, has managed to pull together the people of Parkes who are scattered across the world, by creating a wonderful Facebook page ... Parkes - In Photos of Years Gone Past. In literally a week this page has almost 3,000 followers. Bear in mind the population of Parkes is only around 10,000.

I am a radio producer at the ABC and I also have a weekly segment on Tuesday nights. It just so happened that last night we were broadcasting to Queensland, New South Wales and the ACT ... which meant I was being heard in Parkes! I talked to Rebecca Levingston about the Parkes Facebook page and how lovely it was to be in touch with those from where I once came.

If you missed it, you can download the audio here. Enjoy!

Not My Circus

2013-05-01T09:31:00.000+10:00

Image Credit

Back in February I wrote about how I was ready for my children to leave the nest ... you can read about it here.

My boys are still at home here with us, and even though I still stand by that post, I'm not disappointed, because if the truth be known I do enjoy their company and I would miss them, a lot.

What I really don't want to do is look after them.   Menopause is bearing down on me like a freight train which I just can't stop. With it comes the stock standard hot flushes, dry skin, foggy brain and moodiness.   I totally accept the first three things, but I don't accept the moodiness.

I don't believe I am moody, and for those who are close to me (meaning those who actually live with me), you may not like hearing that what you perceive as moodiness is here to stay. Rather than me being moody, I believe I have fundamentally changed as a person. Not because I decided I want to be different, but because hormonally I am now different.

I no longer produce hormones that play a part in making babies. The maternal instincts I once had have been replaced with something new ... I call them the "circus" hormones. Thanks to Kelly Higgins-Devine, one of my work colleagues, I have taken on a new mantra this year. "Not my circus ... not my monkeys."   I am no longer buying into things that I am not responsible for, and in some instances, things I don't care about.

I know this isn't sitting too well with my children and I'm sure they think I don't love them or support them anymore. Nothing could be further from the truth. I love them more and more as the years go by. The bottom line is I just don't want to look after them anymore.

A couple of times in recent weeks I could have stepped in and tried to "fix" some things for my boys. I didn't. They were a bit surprised. I was a bit surprised. Not because I didn't help, but because I actually didn't feel bad. It wasn't my circus, and they weren't my monkeys.

Possibly you are reading this and thinking that I am selfish and not a very good mother. You are right on one account. I am being selfish and that is because this is my time to be selfish. It is the time for me to worry about me, to nurture me and to do the things that make me happy.   After twenty years of everything being about my children and how what I do might impact on them, the last few years have seen a gradual shift to me changing my priorities.

Am I a good mother? There's not a yes or no answer to this question. I've tried my best. At times I know I've been spectacular and at other times not so good, but I think that is fairly standard across the realm of motherhood.

At the heart of it all I do love my children deeply and my support is always there. It's just different.   I'm different and I'm comfortable with that.

Turning 50 next month ... I'm not comfortable with that. Not. One. Little. Bit. But that's a whole other blog post. Unfortunately that is my circus and 50 is my monkey!

Today

2013-04-01T18:12:00.001+10:00

Last night I wrote a blog post filled with self loathing after a day of eating everything in sight. This day followed closely behind the day before and the day before that. It wasn't a one day binge I was feeling guilty about. It was an unhealthy lifestyle I've adopted over the past few years.

The support I received was beyond anything I expected. The support was a mixture of tough love by close friends who know me well and many others sharing how they Were feeling the same way. A few of my lovely friends worried about my guilty feelings and hating on myself so much.

I just want to say that every single one of you said something that resonated with me. Even the person who said I needed a good burp!

I do have an unhealthy relationship with food and I suspect many of us do. I also know that dieting isn't the answer. Ultimately I want to feel healthy on the inside and that includes eating food that is good for me and doing some exercise. It means adopting a healthy lifestyle. It's not a 3 month thing. It's an all the time thing.

Of course I want to look good on the outside as well. I'd be lying if I said I didn't, but I am realistic and know I will never have a flat stomach and legs that go on for miles. I'm very much ok with that.

What I want the most is to feel strong again. At the moment it feels like my bones are doing all the work. When I am fit I can feel my muscles holding my skeleton up. When I'm not, I can literally feel my bones bearing all the weight.

So ... today I have exercised and stuck to making healthy food choices. I didn't starve, nor did i feel cheated. Tomorrow I will get up and do the same thing again. I am going to take this one day at a time. I will not make any rash promises nor set any unattainable goals.

Every day I wake up I have exactly the same choices as I had the day before. I just need to make choices that are right for me. The choices that make me feel good at the end of the day.

We all have our "messed uppednesses" to deal with and we all make excuses as to why we don't always do the things that are good for us. I'm the queen of this. I also know that most of us do the best we can on any given day. It's just that some days are easier than others. Today was one of those easier ones. I felt I had the support of you all cheering me on. I know not all days will be so easy. Life is like that.

I don't intend making this blog a journey about losing weight but I will come here regularly and share how I'm feeling. It may help someone else and if the comments I received last night are anything to go by, you all will most certainly help me.

Thank you xxxx

Fear & Self Loathing in The Gap

2013-03-31T21:11:00.001+10:00

Tonight I am disgusted with myself. In this my 50th year I always said I would be fit and fabulous. I'm not. I am probably the largest and most unhealthiest I've ever been in my life.

In three months I turn 50. This number is significant to me. I feel incredibly lucky to be here, however given the appalling way I am looking after myself right now I am not sure I deserve that right.

My beautiful friends Suzy and Tracy were both incredibly healthy, vibrant women. They looked after themselves by eating healthily and exercising. They loved life. They embraced a healthy lifestyle. Sadly neither will get the chance to see their 50th birthday.

Yet I am here and they are not. I do not have cancer and I am treating my body like I don't care about it.

Like I don't care enough about the people who love me to be as healthy as I can so I can stay here as long as possible with them.

Like I don't care about the memory of Suzy and Tracy and my three other friends who have died in the past 12 months.

The thing is I do care. I care so much yet I can't stop putting food into my mouth. Every night I go to bed filled with self loathing as I think of all the crap I've been eating. I say to myself "tomorrow will be better. Tomorrow I will get up and start the day eating healthily. I will only eat things that are good for me." The problem is, tomorrow never comes. When I wake up it is today and then I repeat exactly what happened on the today that happened yesterday.

It should be so easy. I should be able to get up and eat the food my body needs to work efficiently and do some exercise and go about my day doing the things one does in a day.

Trouble is it isn't that easy. I find myself obsessing about food and what I'm going to eat and when I'm going to eat it. It makes me feel calm to finally eat that something I've been obsessing over. Once I eat it I feel bad, but more often than not I promptly eat another one to make me feel better. I don't feel better.

See what I'm doing here? I do believe they call it emotional eating. I do believe I'm stuck in a vortex of emotional eating and I need to get the hell out of it ... now!

I know this stuff. I understand why I'm doing it yet I struggle to stop. I'm smart and emotionally intelligent, yet when it comes to putting food in my mouth I am totally devoid of intelligence.

Today I have eaten my body weight in food that is made only to line my arteries with fat deposits. I am treating my body with disdain. It does not deserve this. My family doesn't deserve this. My friends don't deserve this. Suzy and Tracy don't deserve this.

I know I've said this before and I know I've let everyone down by not following through with it. I have to get healthy and I have to do it now. My wonderful husband looks after himself so he can be fit and vital as we age. He deserves no less from me.

I am the queen of excuses. So I have a broken thyroid, big deal! I am still alive, I take medication for it and I am healthy. Suck it up princess and just do the things you know you need to do. It is as simple as one two three.

1. Eat the food Lite and Easy deliver you each week. Don't eat anything else.

2. Spend half an hour each day exercising. Just get up, go outside and move!!

3. Stop finding excuses, reasons, lies as to why you can't do 1 and 2 every single day.

This was hard to write and hitting publish is even harder. I need to do this. I need to be accountable. I need to feel some shame. We only get one body and one chance to be the best we can be. Right now I'm pissing that chance up against the wall, so to speak.

Friends I need your help. Please keep me accountable and if you smell the hint of an excuse coming out of my mouth feel free to administer the biggest upper cut you can muster.

I owe it to myself to be fit and fabulous for my 50th birthday in June.

Acid, Eyballs & Dentists

2013-02-13T09:17:00.000+10:00

Photo Credit

Some things should never mix.   Ever.

Like acid and eyeballs.

Gremlins and food after midnight.

Anxiety Warriors and dentists.

I'm an anxiety warrior and the dentist is my nemesis.

You should know that my dentist Trent is a really lovely bloke. He is kind and gentle and provides me with copious amounts of gas.   My dislike of him is not personal.   I just don't like being on his chair, unable to move, with my mouth filled with objects that shouldn't be in mouths ... it's all kinds of claustrophobic hell.

The other day I broke a tooth. I'd rather break a leg. I am serious.

I am petrified of going to the dentist. The pain doesn't bother me. It's everything else. You could say it is irrational, but I may not listen to you.

As a person who battles with anxiety on a regular basis a trip to the dentist fills me with fear and dread. I never go for regular check ups ... I only ever go when it is time to fix something.    Yes I totally understand the irony in that statement. And, no I won't listen to anyone's advice about prevention being better than cure. I just won't.

I told you. Irrational.

A few years ago this trip to the dentist would have rendered me incapable of thinking straight for at least 2 days beforehand. In fact, in days gone by I would only go to the dentist if I could have a general anesthetic. These days, with a bit of help from a hypnotherapist I can keep the truly irrational fear at bay until I'm in the car on the way. Then it is game on.

Did I mention that I'm going to the dentist today?   In approximately 2 1/2 hours.

The anxiety levels are building.   I'm trying not to think about it, but minute by minute, hour by hour the space in my mind is being overtaken by all things dentist.

Today's plan of attack will have me arriving 1/2 hour early so I can sit in the coffee shop downstairs and take a half does of valium.   He will need to take an xray and I can manage that without too much panic.   Should he need to do some work I will require gas - even for a poke around gas will be required. The minute I have to lie back and the suction machine starts, I need to be somewhere else in my head.   Somewhere else usually involves drugs and/or gas.

Last night a colleague told me he loves the dentist - he catches up on sleep when he is in the chair. What the? My mind cannot even process this. I am still trying to understand how people can watch those televisions they put on the ceilings. Seriously, the last thing I want to do is watch Mr Bean or Rage music clips.

Millions of people are enduring much worse than this I know, and as I'm writing this I'm embarrassed by how ridiculous it sounds.   I wish I could just give myself an upper cut and get the hell over myself - but it's not that easy.

Anxiety disorder makes simple things seem so complex.   Yes it is irrational, and to some people it borders on ridiculous, but to an anxiety warrior it is a very real thing and not something that can be fixed with a good dose of "get over yourself".

If only.

Are birds smarter than humans?

2013-02-06T21:50:00.002+10:00

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Are birds smarter than humans?

It’s possible. In fact, the brain to body ratio in some birds equals that of dolphins and is almost the same as humans.

Why the focus on birds? Am I about to “come out” of the bird watching closet?

Not quite.

I’ve been thinking a lot about parenting lately and I’ve come to the conclusion that birds make pretty good parents.

They look after their eggs carefully, incubating them at the right temperature until they hatch. They stay with their babies, feeding them and keeping them safe until they are old enough to venture from the nest. They teach them to fly and teach them skills to keep them safe in the world. Once they have done all that, they push them out of their nests and send them off to live their own lives.

I’m tired. I’ve had enough of parenting. It’s time to push my birds out of the nest.

There, I said it.

Are you shocked? Disappointed in my attitude?

I didn’t say I don’t love my kids … I love them to bits. More than I can ever express in words.

I’m just tired of parenting.

Birds have got it right. They equip their young with the skills they need to make it in the world then they push them out to fend for themselves.

This used to be the same for us humans. If you go back a couple of generations most had left home by eighteen and were making their own way in the world.

Somewhere in between the previous generation and this one, things changed. The game posts were moved. All of a sudden our children didn’t move out of home. Why would they? Home was no longer a place they couldn’t wait to leave. In fact, most of us have set our homes up so that our teenage children never want to go. We build or buy homes that have plenty of room so the teenagers have their own space. They can invite their friends over, there are less rules, their space is filled with every possible luxury – why on earth would they leave?

I am guilty as charged.

However, there has been a shift. It was subtle to start with, but now the subtlety has gone and the shift is more like a sledgehammer to my forehead.

My work is done here. There is nothing more I can teach them. They need to live their own lives and make their own mistakes to learn new lessons.

I’m tired of being responsible for my children. They are now almost 21 and 19. Their “stuff” is so much bigger now and I feel like I carry the worries of three adults. They don’t ask me to do this, I just do it because I am a mother. Their mother. I love that they talk to me and tell me things, but on the flipside I don’t want to know everything they are doing because I worry too much. I don’t want to know when they are out so I lay awake wondering when they are going to get home. I don’t want to know if they get up and go to work or if they don’t. I don’t want to be responsible for making sure they do the right thing anymore. They need to be in charge of this now. They want to be in charge of it.

I want to wake up in the morning and know my kitchen is exactly how I left it last night. I don’t want to find remnants of late night toasted sandwich making.

I want to wander through my home in my nightie and not have to worry that a twenty something man child, who is not my offspring, may also be wandering through my home.

I want to go to bed at night without sleeping lightly as I wait to hear them come home from their Friday and Saturday nights out.

I don't want to fight with them over the minutia of everyday life as we do now. I want to have conversations with them, adult conversations and we can't do this while I am still mothering them.

For the last twelve months I’ve wrestled with these thoughts and felt incredibly guilty. At times I’ve felt like there was something wrong with me. However after talking to other mothers with similar aged children I’ve found most of us feel the same. We are all ready to start the next phase of our lives, unencumbered by children. Free for the first time in over twenty years.

Where does this leave our children? Unloved? Orphans? Unwanted? Disposable?

Absolutely not … my boys couldn’t be more loved by me. I will love them and care about them until the day I die.

I just don’t want to care for them anymore and I know they don’t want me looking after them. They are sick of my nagging and fussing and interfering. We fight a lot at the moment. I’m still trying to mother them and they are trying to be independent. We are trying to live together but we all have different priorities. The family unit has shifted, just as it should. They are ready to start their own lives with their own boundaries – not mine.

I’m not asking my boys to leave, nor am I kicking them out – I would never do that. The changes occurring in our home are happening organically. They are both talking about moving out as soon as they can afford to and I’m not feeling saddened by this. It’s funny how things just happen and we are ready for them. I remember when my boys were younger – the very thought of them moving away from home split my heart in two. It wasn’t time then. Now it is.

This is why birds push their offspring from the nest. There isn’t enough room in the nest for a family of all adults and they know exactly when the time is right to send them off.

Reflections on Lost Lives

2012-12-09T09:14:00.000+10:00

Social media, online news and commentary everywhere has been whipping itself into a frenzy regarding the “Royal Prank Call”.

It seems that many people want to hang the blame on someone. Surely there must be someone to blame?

What about the radio announcers? They did it. Let's blame them. But is it really their fault? Should the buck stop with them?

I am a radio producer and I can tell you that the buck does not stop with them. It was a pre-recorded “interview”, most likely put together and approved by the producers and also approved by the 2DayFM legal department. It wasn’t an “on air, live, spur of the moment thing” by the announcers only. It may not have even been their initial idea – producers often come up with ideas for a radio show.

I have used the term “interview” above very loosely. Did the nurses they spoke to know the call was being recorded? Did they know it was going to be played on air? Perhaps if this discussion occurred after the pranking it may never have gone this far.

But this is all speculation. Just like everyone else I am speculating as to what actually happened.

Regardless of the speculation and who should be blamed, there has been a terrible tragedy. A tragedy that noone could have predicted. No amount of speculating will ever bring this mother back to her two children.

What makes a person take their own life? How long is a piece of string?

The tipping point for some is so tiny; like a twig that will snap with the slightest amount of pressure - whereas for others there is a much larger margin; like the solidness of a tree trunk.

We, nor the radio announcers, or her colleagues, or perhaps even her family knew of Jacintha Saldanha's tipping point.

But sadly and tragically, for her and her family, it was reached.

So, now I ask, is the loss of one life worth another?

The public hatred towards the two announcers has been vile and incredibly vicious. I’m certainly not defending what they did – prank and gotcha calls can be mildly amusing, but unless they meet all the broadcasting rules they should never go to air.

Leaving that to one side … just what do the public want from these young and inexperienced announcers?

Their scalps? Their heads on plates? An eye for an eye?

Yes, they have made a mistake and will now have to live with the consequences.

Do we know what their tipping point is? No we don’t. Nonetheless, we really should care about it.

*********************

Last Wednesday … a vibrant, beautiful, talented, caring woman; a daughter, a sister, an aunty and a friend; someone I count as my friend … took her own life.

For most of us this has come as a great shock.

There was no person more vibrant, happier, confident and full of life.

However those in her inner circle knew her torment. They knew of her battle with mental illness.

For most of us, we didn’t.

We assumed she was happy. She was okay.

She wasn’t.

Her tipping point was last Wednesday.

No one knew.

*********************

I am sad and reflective.

I tweeted this last night.

“Often it's the person you least suspect who may be sad & trapped in their own private mental hell. We should pay more attention to each other.”

It was retweeted a lot.

The message is important.

We should play a lot nicer together.

At the end of everything, we are all the same. We arrive in the same way and we leave in the same way. We just have different stuff that happens in between and we all make mistakes along the way.

Every single one of us.

Let’s start caring a little more about each others stuff and tread a little more gently when mistakes are made.

That’s all.

If this post brings up any issues for you or you feel you need to talk to someone, please call Lifeline on 13 11 14 or visit their website here

Bring back the mystery ... please!!

2012-08-14T04:58:00.002+10:00

Warning - contains graphic descriptions that will put you off your dinner, and possibly intimate relations with your partner, wife, husband and/or lover.

Dear Advertising Executives

Uncircumsised men have sweat and body oils forming under the foreskin, specifically under the hood and behind the penis crown, creating a cheesy looking gunk called smegma. This needs to be cleaned daily in the shower by pulling back the skin and washing thoroughly, otherwise a nasty odour will develop, leaving you feeling less than fresh. Our special soap is designed to make this process a more pleasant experience. Every man wants a fresh clean penis so he can go about his day with confidence. Cue ... music and beautiful women paying him extra attention.

Did that just make you squirm? Put you off your breakfast? Dinner? Intimate relations with your partner?

"You know even that bit of discharge in between our periods is our body working to keep the vagina healthy and that damp, less than clean feeling is why *insert company name* has designed these fresh liners with an absorbent core to lock away wetness and odour, helping you feel clean, dry and fresh every day."

Source

How does that make you feel as you sit on the lounge after dinner with your husband, lover, kids or worse still, your dad?

Yet they are both facts of life. We shouldn't be ashamed of what our bodies do, and we most definitely shouldn't have a problem with calling a vagina and a penis exactly what they are.

However.

Yes, there is a however.

I'm no prude. In fact, I love to find the "naughty" side of most things, as people who know me well will atest to.

However ...

I don't want to be reminded of vaginal discharge on my television. I have a vagina and I know what it does, as I'm sure most women do. Little girls don't need to know about vaginal discharge until they are older. Little boys, teenagers, husbands and fathers never need to know about vaginal discharge ... ever.

Just like women don't need to know about "cheesy gunk" that can build up under the foreskin of an uncircumcised penis. We don't need, nor want to know about it ... ever.

The only cheesy I want to see or hear on my television are ads for actual cheese that I can put on a cracker and enjoy with a fine wine. Yet after seeing an ad for keeping a penis fresh and clean, I doubt I would ever want to eat cheese again!

Personally, I'd be happy to settle for more cheesy advertisements.

For example, to advertise personal hygiene, I'd much prefer to see a pretty girl in a floaty dress with an "air of freshness" about her or a handsome man with freshly washed hair and a towel around his waist, promoting that "just washed" look.

Can we have a little bit of mystery around personal hygiene ads again please?

Can we bring back sexy?

There's nothing wrong with not stating the obvious. We don't need to be politicially correct in every single aspect of our lives. Especially personal hygiene on the television. Let's leave the nitty gritty of this to the chemist shop or family planning clinic.

We run the risk of the next generation growing up to believe that a woman's vagina is not a place of mystery, intrigue and desire, but a damp, smelly area that should always be adorned by a panty liner of some description.

I predict a sharp decline in oral sex.

Just saying.

Do you, the advertising people of Australia, want to be responsible for this?

Regards

PS: Do not get me started on toilet paper with ripples ...

Imagine ...

2012-07-18T21:42:00.000+10:00

Imagine waking up every day and wondering whether or not it was one day closer to your youngest child being taken away from you.

Imagine not knowing if he was going to be safe.

Or warm.

Imagine thinking about how scared he would be.

Imagine thinking about that moment when you said goodbye, knowing you and he would never, ever be the same again.

Imagine your baby sleeping in a prison cell every night.

I imagined this. For 6 very long months. Every single day. Every single night.

In January, my youngest saw himself on the wrong side of the law. It happened on his 18th birthday. He was involved in a scuffle and ended up biting someone in self defence. We have since found out that biting is a serious offence. So serious that the majority of biting charges end up with a jail sentence.

He was charged, despite it being self defence, and unfortunately the statements against him looked very damning.

When someone is charged with an offence they receive a little piece of paper, smaller than A5 which provides details of when they are to appear in court. I hate this little piece of paper. I've never hated a piece of paper before, but this paper sat on the fridge, under a magnet, mocking us all. Mocking us with its smugness. With its power.

We hired lawyers and went to court. For all of us it was first time ever in court. We were so green. Whilst it was scary, we thought there would be a smack over the knuckles and a fine. We were convinced the charges would be dropped. We were green and also very wrong.

You see, the police rarely drop charges and as they were the ones who laid the charges my son was not going to get off lightly. We were given another date to return to court in a few weeks time. It suddenly became more real. Suddenly all optimism had disappeared.

The lawyers were still confident and reassured us that it would be over before it got to trial. In fact they said it would be bad for my son if it went to trial. Magistrates don't take kindly to people who bite others. I held onto our lawyers optimism and confidence. Sometimes.   Sometimes I had nightmares instead.   I imagine my boy was also having nightmares in his own private world.

Our lawyers viewed CCTV footage, looked at statements did a mountain of discovery. What they found was that my son had not broken the law and that he had actually been assaulted by a third party, the person who he had bitten in self defence.

This information was compiled into a report and presented to the police. We were told it would soon be over. They were wrong. The police refused to drop it and were pushing for ... 18 months jail.   Words can't describe how hearing this felt.

I have one word for the court process - crazy. I still don't even understand how it all works and doubt I ever will. Absolutely nothing made sense. In fact, Judge Judy makes more sense. Truly.

This is how the whole process appeared to work. You turn up, the lawyer says a few words the magistrate looks in his diary and gives you another date. You turn up again and the lawyer says a few words. The police say a few more. The magistrate looks in his book and gives you another date.   Rinse and repeat!

It turns out we didn't have to go to the next appearance. The lawyer could go on our behalf. We find out the magistrate has done something different - we are going to a different court - the matter is going to trial! Our worst nightmares have come true.

I think this is the time we all bottomed out. This was serious. There was no thinking it would go away. The police weren't backing down despite the evidence. It no longer mattered about the law and who was right or wrong. It now came down to a magistrate who had the power to send my boy to jail.

Two days later I heard a news story where a prison warden was sent to jail for hitting a prisoner. The said prisoner had bitten and spat on the warden. The prisoner had hepatitis C. The magistrate decided that he/she was going to make an example of the warden and gave him a jail sentence. This made my blood run cold. I feared a magistrate would also make an example of my boy.

To be very clear, I don't think teenagers should be let off crimes because they are teenagers. Nor do I think they can behave badly without ramifications.   My son wasn't an angel in this instance.   He was verbally abusive to a bouncer and some "dancers" from a club. He was menacing. He was behaving like a feral 18 year old drunken fool.    However a bouncer, left his position on the door and went down an alley way to engage in a fight with him.   A club manager also went down the alley and attacked him from behind.   All of this on CCTV footage.   My son deserved to learn a lesson, he did not, however, deserve to go to jail.

In a last ditch attempt to have the charges withdrawn our lawyers visited the police again. This time the officer in charge was prepared to listen, to look at the facts.   He was astounded it had gone this far. He dropped the assault charges to a lesser charge of disorderly conduct. This would result in no conviction and a fine.

When our lawyer called to give me this news I have never been so relieved. I wanted to jump up and down and scream with joy.

This was a month ago. I am still jumping for joy.

We still had to go to court and it was still nerve wracking. However it was such a relief to go to court safe in the knowledge that no matter what happened I could take my son home with me. Had the trial gone ahead, he may have been taken away to jail.

The realisation of this fact caused my son to momentarily lose the colour in his face. "So I couldn't go home and pack my stuff or say goodbye?"
"Uh no, you would be handcuffed and taken away from here." I answered.
"No wonder you have been so stressed mum".
No shit Sherlock!

Whilst my son has learned a valuable lesson, he is eighteen. He is still capable of acting before thinking. He is still capable of mistakes. He is still capable of causing me heartache.

Parenting teenagers is so scary. It is heart in mouth kind of stuff. It's a scary ride where you close your eyes, hold your breath and grip on as tight as you can for dear life.   It still is the scariest thing I've ever done.

PS: The biggest ever heartfelt thanks to my amazing husband who paid the bulk of the lawyer fees. We would not have gotten through this without you. xx

PPS: My husband is not my son's father.

PPPS:   This is why he is so amazing.

I'm a room full of packing boxes - that's who I am.

2012-06-09T21:06:00.000+10:00

Someone I admire greatly, who says it how it is, who appears "don't mess with me tough", yet can be precariously fragile asked the tough question today. Who am I?

Here is Eden's answer.

Here is mine.

Who I am really depends on the day.

Some days I'm a happy, contented and loving life. Other days I'm not.

Some days I cower away inside my house, insecure, unworthy, full of self loathing and wondering just what it is I have to offer. Other days I know exactly what I have to offer.

Some days my heart is singing with joy and filled with love and I feel ten feet tall. Other days I'm very short.

Some days I have no voice, I have nothing to offer, nothing to contribute. Other days I just can't stop talking.

Some days I am happy to be anonymous, quietly pottering away in my home, keeping to myself. Other days I want to be the centre of attention.

Reading back over what I just wrote it occurred to me that we are all like this. We aren't the same every single day. There are so many variables that will influence the state of mind in which we will spend our day.

So is this really who I am? Is my state of mind the barometer of who I am or does it go deeper than this?

Damn you Eden Riley. You are making me go deeper. To that dark place where the "real" me hides out eating cake and drinking hot chocolates when she knows she should be exercising.

There is a saying ... "when the student is ready, the teacher will come". Today I feel like Eden is my teacher and I am the student.

Stripping back all the white noise and stuff, this is what I find.

I am me. I am female. I am almost 49. I am a wife. I am a mother. I am a daughter. I am a friend. I am a sister. I am flawed. I am deeply compassionate, my empathy knows no bounds. I am generous. Paradoxically, despite my compassion and empathy I am not always able to show love. I am complicated. I can seem cold, aloof. I am not. I feel things deeply, so deeply that they physically affect me. To survive I've also learned to pack my feelings into little boxes so they can't hurt me.

I've been struggling with some major issues going on in our life. They are currently nearing the end and almost resolved. The journey through this process has been emotionally tiring. I've had to put a lot of my feelings away in boxes. Like I've moved house and not yet unpacked. Every now and then the boxes split open and the contents burst out all over the floor, but I've been able to tape the boxes shut.

During this process I've been unable to write a lot. When my feelings are boxed away I become that cold, aloof person who can be quite self absorbed. I run out of energy to give to others and I don't really like who I am during these times. I find it ironic that in order to survive I have to be the person I least like to ensure the person I believe I truly am makes it through. Safely and in tact.

Human beings are complicated. Because of this we all should be much kinder to each other. At any given time nobody really knows what another human being is trying to keep boxed up. Instead of trying to rip the tape and make their boxes spill out all over the floor, why don't we spend more time lending our packing tape to them?

So to answer Eden's question. I do believe I am a room full of packing boxes. Who would have thought?

I'm PUBLISHED!!

2012-05-24T20:17:00.001+10:00

I am really proud to be a part of this wonderful project - Things They Didn't Tell You About Parenting - the eBook.

In a nutshell it is:

heartfelt stories by 32 of Australia’s most eloquent parenting bloggers, (I do believe I am one of these 32)
a foreword by Wendy Harmer, one of Australia’s best loved comedians,
an incredibly good cause at its heart; Foundation 18, sustainably supporting orphaned and underprivileged children in Indonesia (Bali),
the bargain price of AUD$4.99

When I was asked by Alison Tait late last year to be a part of this project I jumped at the opportunity. Not only is it for a great cause, but this parenting gig is so very hard and at the same time so very precious. The stories and anecdotes that fill this book will warm your heart, move you to tears and possibly have you cowering in the corner as you get a glimpse of the future as a parent!

Things They Didn't Tell You About Parenting is a must read for all parents, grandparents, aunts, uncles and those who are contemplating parenthood. It is real, it is true and the stories are straight out of the homes and hearts of everyday people.

To be included in a book with these 31 parents and writers is beyond exciting for me. It is an absolute honour.

For less than the price of coffee and cake in a cafe, you can buy this book, make yourself a cuppa and sit on the verandah or by the heater and read some amazing parenting stories. You will also be helping 12 beautiful orphaned Indonesian girls enjoy some of things our children will never be without - food, shelter and education. I couldn't think of anything nicer.

Am I mum enough? I dare you to judge me.

2012-05-14T20:13:00.000+10:00

So much judgement in the air at the moment. Aimed squarely at the jaws of parents. Mothers in particular. Breastfeeding or not? How long is too long? Smacking, not smacking? Body image for children. Schooling private or state? Early learning or not? Stay at home or working mum? The list of things we can judge other mums on seems to be endless. Will it ever end?

My boys are 20 and 18 and I couldn't be happier. I don't think I could stand the criticism if they were little right now. I would not stack up and I am almost certain I wouldn't be mum enough in the eyes of many.

I was not and am not a perfect parent. I didn't give it my best shot at all times. Sometimes life was too hard and I was too focussed on myself. Sometimes I couldn't be bothered cooking dinner and I gave my kids weetbix. Sometimes I couldn't be bothered getting them ready for school so we all had doona days. Sometimes they wore dirty socks to school. Sometimes I wrote notes to say they didn't do their homework because of a family emergency - I was just too tired. When I left my husband it was hard work. I only had them 50% of the time I totally underestimated how difficult that would be. To even begin to explain the difficulties of this will take a whole other blog post.

I was judged for leaving a seemingly perfectly good marriage for my own selfish reasons. Do I regret that? No way. Did it alter the course of my children's lives? Absolutely. For the better? I hope so, but I can never be sure. Does this make me less of a mum? Not in my eyes, but I'm sure in the eyes of the judgers it does.

I breast fed both my boys. They both stopped at 6 months. Does this make me a good mum or a bad mum? They both went straight to cows milk at 6 months. I hear the purists screaming now. My boys are okay. They always have been. Their stomachs are healthy. If they didn't wean themselves at 6 months I may have fed them for as long as they wanted. I don't know this. It didn't happen to me. Whether I breastfeed for 1 day, 1 month, 3 years or 5 years, does it really matter? Does it make us bad mothers because we do what suits us, our children and our lives?

My youngest had a dummy until he was 3. People looked and judged. I didn't care. Okay I did care, but I shouldn't have. His dummy was his security, something he needed. Something I needed to ensure he settled at night. Could I have done it differently? Maybe. But I didn't. Doesn't make me a bad mother.

My children didn't have regular 6 monthly dental appointments. They only went 3 times during their growing up years. I have a dentist phobia. Friends and family are horrified when I tell them this. As you are reading this you are probably horrified too. I took my kids when they were quite young and they were never going to need braces. I took them again when they became teenagers, their teeth were all good. I took them again in their later teens. The older one needed some fillings and the younger one didn't. The older one doesn't clean his teeth. He doesn't like toothpaste. I don't make him clean his teeth. He is 20. This is his problem. He always had a toothbrush and toothpaste to use. The fact he doesn't has nothing to do with whether I am mum enough.

My boys were not academic. They are both extremely smart. They could be anything they want. For the most part they have just chosen to cruise along, not really trying too hard. I never pushed them to be anything different. Should I have? Would it have made me a better mother? Maybe, but when you only have your children 50% of the time it is very difficult to keep up any form of consistency. They will hit their straps at some point. They see their parents and step parents work hard. They understand working hard and the rewards it brings. I'm seeing my youngest start to hit his straps now, despite the fact he dropped out of school in grade 11. In fact he just walked in from work at 7.30 pm and said "I'm psyched. I'm loving work. I'm excited." He's not a doctor, he's not an engineer, he's a salesman and I couldn't be prouder. Does this make me mum enough?

Throughout all of this, over the past 20 years, the hard times, the good times and all the times in between, we all loved each other and everyone had a soft place to land.

My boys have both been in trouble. They have messed up. They have made some big mistakes. I have despaired for their futures. There were times I worried they were actually going to survive the teenage years. They have, and so have I.

The point I am making is there is so much I could be judged poorly on as a mother. I am not even close to the "perfect model mother". I don't care about this. My boys are healthy, loving, good people. They know how to love. They know what is right and what is wrong. They know how to be compassionate and they have empathy for others.

A month ago I asked my youngest if he liked his childhood. He said "mum I had the best childhood ever. I miss it so much now that I'm an adult."    That right there is all the judgement I need.

So many parents out there don't have perfect lives - in fact most of us don't. Our circumstances are not always conducive to playing happy families. There are a million different variables. How about we all stop judging each other and start accepting that this parenting gig is tough.   When we meet in mother's groups instead of boasting about how good little Jemima is and how she can count to ten before she can say daddy, why not ask the mum who looks tired and sad if she's okay? Maybe tell her about something that you are finding difficult so she doesn't feel like she is failing and alone. .

As mums we are all doing the same thing, we all have the same fears, the same concerns and most of all we want the same outcome for our children. We want them to grow up to be happy.

It's time to start playing nice and stop judging.

Did I mention I'm a bit stabby right now?

2012-05-14T11:20:00.000+10:00

I'm quite stabby at the moment. I blame hormones. You should agree with me.

Right, now we have that sorted, let's get on with this blog post.

You might have noticed my stabbyness? Did I mention it was hormones? I have two teenage boys, who, at any given time can add greatly to this stabbyness. Especially in the mornings when they are getting "organised" to go to work. Organised in the sense of they have no idea what the word means. But they try. Did I mention I'm a bit stabby right now?

The last couple of days have been quite the disaster in the mornings. At the moment I'm not working full time and am "available" in the mornings. In my mind I am unavailable, but to my teenagers, the mere fact I am present means I am available. This adds to my stabbyness no end.

Two days ago, after I ironed a number of shirts, pants etc in a mammoth effort to find the "right" outfit. For. My. 18. Year. Old. Son.   We eventually got out of the house. Drove to the bottom of the street. He forgot something. I turn around. Stabby factor rises.

We leave again and get to the bus stop.

Yes, I drive him to the bus stop because I am home and seemingly available. If I wasn't there he would walk. Yes I know. You don't need to say it.

Son: "Mum, is your bag in the car"

Me: "No, I'm only driving you to the bus stop. I don't need a handbag for that!"

Son: "Oh, um, you won't like this but I need some money for the bus".

Me: "So you can't get to work unless I give you some money?"

Stabby factor rising significantly here.

Son: "Um no. Sorry mum."

Me, through gritted teeth: "Get. Back. In. The. Car."

We go home, get my bag and head back to the bus stop.

Son: "I'm going to be late now."

Me:   "And this is my problem because?"

Son: "I didn't say it was your fault. I was just saying."

Me: "Will it be a problem for you?"

Son: "A bit."

Me: "Fine I'll drive you then."

So we drive, into the city and over to Southbank. At this stage my new car is still a novelty so driving is a good thing, otherwise there would have been many, many words said in anger during that trip.   Some were thought, but the pleasure of driving my car helped suppress them.

Next day arrives. Mr 18 and I do the shirt/trousers/outfit dance. Mr almost 20 comes downstairs.

Mr 20: "Mum I forgot to tell you last night that I will need you to drive me to Samford this morning."

Me:    "Right." Said icily. Crank the stabby factor up to one thousand and fifty billion.

Mr 18: "Mum I need some money."

Me:   *Insert whatever the hell you like here* - it wasn't pretty.

Fast forward to last night. Mr 18 comes home from work at 8.30 pm (he works a really long day). He tells me how he spent 2 hours consoling a young guy who he works with. He told me about this boy's life and the traumatic things he's seen and his dysfunctional family life. He told me how his mum yelled at him this morning telling him how she was sick of giving him money and couldn't wait until he left home and she didn't have to be responsible for him any more. I felt so sad for that poor boy, just as my boy had.

Then my mind went back to that morning and believe I may have said words similar. I felt instantly sick to the stomach. I asked Mr 18 if he felt like he wasn't wanted and he assured me that wasn't the case. I still felt bad.

I kept thinking how many terrible things we say to our kids in the heat of the moment, when we are stabby, and was about to begin beating myself up, like I usually do. Then I thought beyond the words to the bigger picture.

My boys have a stable home life. They have a loving mother, mostly! They have a supportive step father. They have a safe place to come home to and they are always wanted, provided they don't make me too stabby. Regardless of how stabby I am they do know that there is nothing I won't support them through and they know that I will be there no matter what. I think this is the key.

We can't be perfect parents all the time, in fact I don't believe we can ever be perfect parents. What we can be is loving and supportive and accepting. We can still be stabby and snarky and have bad days where we sound like a shrill fish wife. Just like our kids can have meltdowns and say things that cut through our hearts like a knife. We are all just venting. We are behaving badly because we can. We don't have to be on our best behaviour all the time at home.   We are only human.

Sometimes I say sorry for being stabby - particularly if I've been irrationally stabby. But in the instances described above - there is not a sorry to be seen! My boys still love me and still feel loved and at the end of it all that's all that matters.

As I always say, it's about the love. There must always be love. Though it doesn't hurt to throw in a bit of stabby to keep everyone on their toes!

The Metamorphisis of a Blank Blog Page

2012-05-08T14:04:00.000+10:00

This post started out in my head being about my new car, then I changed my mind because I didn't want to write an advertorial for Mazda. Then it morphed into a post about my mother in law who is responsible for my new car, but I couldn't get that to come out right. I wanted to thank her for giving us the means to buy a new car and to say how much I missed her since she passed away. I guess I've done that now and it didn't take a whole blog post to do it in. I then thought I'd write about a place I used to visit on Mt Glorious where I would sit and think, way back when I was trying to work out who I was. But, then I didn't really know what to say about that. Who I thought I was or wanted to be thirteen years ago is really not that relevant to the right now.

So here I am with a blank blog page, some random thoughts and still no idea. I've been reading a lot of really moving blog posts lately about people going through some really tough times. There's Tiff and Ivy at My Three Ring Circus and Kim and Oscar at All Consuming. There is also the amazing Eden at Edenland who has recently been to the famine in Niger, Africa and is now going through a whole lot of realisations that will most likely change life as she currently knows it.

As fate would have it, I was just directed to another blog post via Twitter written by Cate Bolt. Generally I don't think Cate and I are particularly alike, she is far more philanthropic than I am. However, today I felt like Cate was speaking for me. I felt my words spilling onto her blog page. I wanted to scoop those words up and throw them on this blank page.

I too am adopted. I too am not a fan of adoption. I too struggle with who I am. When I look back at my life I feel like I've always been trying to "find" myself. Give myself a true identity. There are specific times where I can pinpoint going through a "phase" of wanting to work out who I was. I've recently been going through such a phase and I have come to the realisation that it is time to start being who I am right now, instead of pontificating over who I might be or might have been.

I am who I am. Just me. Imperfect and perfect all rolled into one. I get things right and I also make mistakes. Sometimes I make monumental mistakes. But throughout it all I am still me. Over the years I change, I evolve, I grow, but I don't think this happens because I consciously sit and plan it. Change happens because of circumstances ... life. It is what it is. I am who I am.

I wrote a post a few weeks ago about belonging and put down my feeling of not belonging to being adopted. So many people commented and emailed me saying they felt the same way and they weren't adopted. It was enlightening for me to see that we all struggle with belonging, even if we always have belonged somewhere and with someone.

After I read Cate's post I also wanted to write that the reason I can't "find myself" is because I'm adopted. Because being adopted meant I never was myself. I don't know who I am. But the funny thing was, as I started to write these words I realised this is not what I think anymore. The words no longer rang true. When I read Cate's blog I was nodding and saying "yes, yes, yes" in my head. However, over the last little while I've come to the conclusion that this is not necessarily the case and as I wrote the words down it really hit home just how much.

I've spent most of my life blaming the fact that I'm adopted on why I feel disconnected from people. Why I've never belonged anywhere. If I take a long honest look back over my life I have always belonged somewhere. Not necessarily with my adoptive family, in fact mostly not with them. Not with my birth mother, how could I belong to her when I was never really hers? However I have still belonged. I've always belonged somewhere. There has always been a person or persons who have been there for me. Someone who has my back. A friend or a family to take me in as one of theirs. Never, ever have I been totally alone.

Yet, if you asked me about the time I left my husband I would tell you how totally alone I was. No one cared. I was an island. It was just me. The reality is, it wasn't like this at all. I had a fabulous circle of friends who held my hand throughout that first awful year. No matter what, they were there for me. There was never a time I was totally alone. Yet in my mind I was alone because I didn't have a family.

I have a family now. I have my two boys and a wonderful husband. I have two beautiful step daughters. I even have a dog. I have extended family. I belong somewhere, yet up until recently, I have still felt the need to "find" myself. I've always blamed this need on being adopted.

I do believe there is a certain disconnect from being adopted that others can never understand. I personally don't understand the love children have for their parents as I've never had this type of love. Of course I feel it in reverse for my boys so I have a better understanding than I used to. I sometimes feel cheated that I don't have the bond that many of my friends have with their parents, but I know many people who were brought up by their biological parents who don't have a close relationship with them either.

What I have learned in recent times is the disconnect I feel doesn't give me an excuse to feel sorry for myself and it doesn't mean I've been cheated of love and belonging. It just means I'm different. We are all different. There is no longer a standard "normal".

Getting older doesn't just mean grey hair and incontinence pads ... it means getting comfortable in our own skin. It means blaming our circumstances and other people less and taking full responsibility for our own happiness. A life well lived doesn't depend on where we originally came from, it depends on where we've been and who we've shared it with.

I want to crave you ...

2012-05-02T08:36:00.001+10:00

Just like more than 2 million other viewers each night I've been keenly tuned into The Voice. Yes it is another reality TV show and yes it is another singing one, but it is fresh and different and capturing the nation. But, is it really?

I have been swept up with everyone else, tweeting like a maniac, crying at the talent, getting goosebumps during the first battle rounds, all with rose coloured glasses planted firmly on my nose.

But like all good rose coloured glasses, they eventually slip down the bridge of the nose and let some "real" light in. I think mine may have slipped last night.

I still love the show. I love the judges. I love the judges. I love the judges. Oh, did I say that already? Well aside from loving the judges I think the format is fresh and new and works well. Those battle rounds are amazing and really force the contestants to put their all into the song. It is superb to watch.

Picture Credit

What doesn't work for me, and I hazard a guess to say I'm not the only one, is the way in which the show is drawn out. It is far too long. The average person doesn't have a spare two hours plus each night to sit and watch television. We have lives, kids, work and it is a school night! I would have thought the television networks would have worked this out by now. Channel 9, in particular, are showing back to back reality television - this is over three hours each night.

I find these shows always seem start up with a frenzy of new and excited viewers, hoping for something different and then they serve up the same old, same old just dressed in a different sauce. A chop is a chop is a chop, no matter whether you crumb, fry or stew it!

I know television stations need to make money, hence commercials. But I also know commercial television stations need viewers, hence ratings. Sadly it feels like television stations care more about the money than the viewer. Which shouldn't come as much of a surprise to anyone.

With all that in mind, I write the following open letter to Commercial Television Stations.

Dear Station Owner, Manager and Program Director

I am sure I speak for 99% of Australians in this letter. If you want Australian audiences to embrace your new reality television shows, some which are quite good and entertaining, we would appreciate you keeping the following in mind:

We don't want, nor like, extended ad breaks. We don't watch them. Your advertising clients don't get any more value for the inflated amount they pay to advertise during these shows. In fact they probably get less. Because the show is so long, we are busy trying to catch up with other things, and tend to leave the room during ad breaks.
Have you heard of the concept of "always leave people wanting more"? No, I didn't think so. Let me explain. It is human nature to crave something we can't have right now. For example, think about that chocolate brownie you saw yesterday at the shop. You didn't buy it and now you can't get it out of your mind. Had you bought it and eaten it, chances are you wouldn't be obsessing over it today. Same with television shows. Stop the show before we've had enough. Don't let us get to the point where we just want it to be over so we can go to bed. This happened to me last night. Tonight - meh - I'm not that interested in watching The Voice. Had you stopped the show after 1 hour, I'd be dying for it to be on tonight because I wouldn't have quite had enough of it last night. An hour is not nearly enough time to watch the judges, er I mean, contestants. Leave us craving more.
We all know all about hooks. You need to build it up before the break, give a summary, give a preview, get the hook in to hold the viewers over through the break to watch the next segment. Then, just in case you have picked up some new viewers, you need to recap what they have missed. I get this, and believe most of us do. For a compromise, perhaps you could cut this down to a few seconds rather than a good portion of that segment. I can watch a 90 minute reality television show in half an hour if I've pre recorded it. That's a lot of advertising and hooks and not a lot of actual content.

Your audiences are smart and discerning people, please treat us this way. Commercial television is no longer the only option we have, but many of us want to like it. We want to support locally produced entertainment, but gee you make it so hard for us.

Make us crave you. Not loathe you.

Yours faithfully

Your Australian Television Audience.

What do you think? Is commercial television losing us?

On the back of the toilet door

2012-04-26T13:34:00.002+10:00

Today, whilst visiting a bathroom in the city, I saw this sign on the back of the toilet door. It made me smile.

Not because I think anxiety is funny, nothing could be further from how I think, but it made me happy to see it being talked about. Anxiety is not often given the profile it deserves. So many people suffer in silence, many not knowing they actually have an anxiety disorder. I know a lady who has lived with anxiety for over fifty years not actually realising she had a problem. She thought that's just how she was. Now she's having treatment she is finally realising that life doesn't have to be lived in a permanent state of anxiousness.

The sentence "It's always there in your mind ... and you wait" describes it perfectly. Anxiety is your stalker. Sometimes you never see it hiding in the shadows, other times you catch a glimpse of it following you and then BANG, there it is right in front of you!

It was a bit like that for me this past weekend. We went away to Sydney to spend some time with dear friends. We've done this a few times before and every single time the stalker jumps out in front of me. The very first time we visited I had a major panic attack whilst on a sight seeing trip around the Manly area. I literally had to jump out of the car and run into a hospital to find a bathroom. This attack is always in my mind, hiding in the shadows, waiting.

For the most part of the last few years anxiety has not been bothering me too much. It just hangs around in the back of my mind, rarely coming to the front. Except when I revisit a place, time or experience when it has previously occurred. Then, out of the shadows it leaps and blocks my path.

In the past my anxiety would have paralysed me to the point where every waking thought would be about our trip and how I was going to manage. I would try and micro manage every aspect of the the travel and work myself into such a frenzy that I would have a panic attack just thinking about it.

Now, not so much. It is still stressful and I still panic and worry, but not incessantly. I've got a few little tricks up my sleeve that help me cope. Needless to say, I was okay for most of the time, except for the Saturday morning. I woke up tired and unsure of the day's plans - being organised and in control does help significantly. When the plans had been made and we were about to leave I could feel it coming on. That familiar feeling in my stomach and the sweaty palms. I tried breathing deep and thought diversion - no cigar. I went for my big guns - Imodium and half a Valium and within ten minutes I was okay. Now I know this is not the only way to manage anxiety, and it is probably not the way "experts" would recommend. However when I am in the grip of anxiety this works for me.

The fact this works will often stop me having an attack in the first place without the need to take anything. Just knowing I can "stop" my anxiety is enough. Sometimes deep breathing is all I need to do and other times just redirecting my thoughts will work. Other times, I need to call in my big guns. That is just how it is.

During my fifteen years of dealing with anxiety and panic attacks I have found the key to managing it so it doesn't paralyse me has been finding what works for me. Anxiety is so unique to each person. We all have our own triggers and our anxiety manifests in different ways, which is why something that works for me might not work for someone else. Finding that thing that gives you peace of mind helps to keep the anxiety hiding in the shadows. So far I've not found the holy grail to eliminating it from my life entirely, but for now I can manage.

Let's all keep talking about anxiety. Sometimes simply sharing your anxiety with someone else can be enough.

Fist Pumpiness is Not My Style

2012-04-09T20:58:00.000+10:00

As I sit here, wondering what to write, I eat another chocolate. It has truly been an Easter blow out, starting with the baking of Brownies on Friday. Admittedly I have not eaten a single Easter egg, but have had a few chocolates and at least half my body weight in hot cross buns.

Those who know me will know I'm on the Michelle Bridges 12WBT (12 Weeks Body Transformation) program and I've been going okay with it over the past 8 weeks. I've had a few slip ups and bad days, but generally I've been eating well and exercising, which in itself is a huge improvement on my non existent prior health and fitness regime.

However, I've not been able to fully embrace this program, just as I've never been able to fully embrace any weight loss, healthy living program in the past. And believe me, I've tried a few! I've listened to all the motivation video's Michelle sends us, I've read the blog posts and forum discussions. I've seen photos of people who have lost some amazing amounts of weight and have transformed their lives. But still, I'm not inspired enough to fully embrace it. By "fully embrace it" I mean living and breathing everything about it. I follow the food plans, somewhat and I follow the exercise guidelines, albeit loosely. I think about what I'm going to eat and I make sure I do some exercise everyday, but I am not fanatical about the program. Not like many of the others who are on it.

Why? That's exactly what I've been wondering. Why? Do I lack willpower? Probably. Do I eat for comfort? Yes. Do I love food? Yes. Do I believe I should give up my favourite things and become obsessed with what I put into my body? No. I think that last question is the key for me. I've never been a fanatical type person and I don't think I ever will be. And as I've come to realise lately, nor do I want to be.

I don't really like the "fist pumpiness" that comes with these programs. I feel like it is all or nothing, and if you can't give your all you are somehow failing. There is no middle ground, no grey area. You either want to lose weight and get fit and you commit to follow the rules religiously or you will fail. Simple as that. This doesn't sit well with me. When I watch shows like biggest loser and the trainers yell at the participants and make them feel bad because they are giving up, it bothers me, a lot. I know why they do this and I know it is meant to keep the participant going, but to me it feels like the trainers have the power, the answers and the fat person must obey them or forever stay fat. Like I said, the "fist pumpiness" of it all it is a bit too much for me, if I don't follow the leader, I will not be saved. This is not my style.

I'm definitely feeling better and I've lost 6 kilos since I started this particular program. I would ideally like to lose 4 more kilos and I'm sure if I was focussed and disciplined I could do it easily. I also know, when I finish losing the 4 kilos and I go back to my old habits they will creep on again very quickly.

I don't want to be obsessive about my weight and I don't want to be the one who is always saying, "no I can't eat that, I'm on a program". I want to be fit and healthy and I also want to enjoy good food on my terms. Whilst I'm not sticking religiously to this program, I'm using elements of it and adapting them to fit into my life. I have found an exercise routine that I enjoy and for the first time ever I'm making exercise part of my daily routine. I am not prescriptive about it though - I do whatever I feel like on that particular day. The difference now is I do something every day.

Clean food is definitely appealing and I try not to buy things that are processed or pre made. I am learning to only eat when I'm hungry and for the most part I only want to eat healthy things. However there are times when I really feel like a chocolate brownie or a hot cross bun and I want to be able to eat these without feeling like I am "bad" or a "failure". I'm noticing more than ever how often I say "I've been bad" or "today has been a food fail" and I'm increasingly becoming uncomfortable with this. I'm measuring my worth by what I've put in my mouth - this is wrong. Am I really bad because I ate something delicious?

Life is too short to spend the rest of it eating low fat, low carb, no sugar all the time. When I want to eat chocolate, I shall eat good quality dark chocolate. When I want a brownie, I will either make them myself or buy one from my favourite organic shop. I definitely don't want to put rubbish into my body, but I certainly want to be able to eat foods I love without feeling like I've failed.

If I was to measure my success on this program by my stats and my ability to follow the rules, it would appear that I have failed. This is not true. Whilst I may not be "fist pumping", I am happy that I have learnt a lot about myself and it is more important to focus on how I'm feeling as opposed to how much I weigh.