Don't preach to people about family................

This isn’t really dating related but I do wonder sometimes if it goes some way to explain why I struggle to make attachments to people and take so long to decide if I actually like someone or not?

I guess it’s come to a head as this is the time of year that people should spend with their family and when you tell people you aren’t they tell you that you only have one Mum and that you should put your differences aside because they won’t be around forever, so because someone gave birth to you they should be able to treat you however they like and you should keep forgiving them each and every time? Is that really the case?

I was raised in a single parent family, although we lived with my Nan and some Uncles and Aunt’s until I was a teenager, I have never met my father properly, they had split before I was born, apparently he saw me once when I was about six month old and I continued to see his parents in my early years until I decided at about 6 that I didn’t want to anymore (I’m not sure that I could make informed decisions at that age if I’m honest but I assume that it worked out better for my Mum that way)

The only man I’ve ever really had a father/daughter relationship with was my Grandad, he and my Mum never got on as she found out at 16 that he wasn’t her Dad, I still can’t understand how she could be angry with him for something that was totally out of his control, if anything he was the person that took on someone else’s child? I’ll never get that one as I think he was a truly great man and has always been my real life hero.

I can’t remember my Mum being around much while I was a child, I guess all being in the same house it was easy to leave me with my extended family while she went out and my Nan had me a lot, she told me as a child that she had wanted an abortion but my Nan wouldn’t let her, that is something that your child should never know, not ever and it’s always stayed with me, maybe it’s added to the reasons why I’ve felt like the unwanted child. 

She also made it clear that she had wanted a boy, when I was born she only had a boy’s name, as that was what she wanted so my Nan named me, a year later my Nan had another son, he has the name my Mum had for me, as a child she spent more time with him than she did with me.

Apparently from the time I was tiny I had wanted a dog, it was I’m told not far off my first word and a word that I used frequently over the years, ‘what would you like for Christmas?’ ‘A puppy’ when I was little we got one, a Black Labrador that I called Tank, I totally adored him but it wasn’t even a week before my puppy was sent back for going to toilet on the floor (seriously what did they think that puppies did?) I remember being devastated when he was taken away, it was an early lesson for me in promises that she wouldn’t keep and that what she gave with one hand she took with another. 

When I was 8 a lot happened, my super special Grandad died, I can still remember my Aunt (that he was living with by that time) walking into my Nan’s, I didn’t need to hear the words I knew what had happened and was devastated, apparently at the funeral they literally had to hold me back from running into the grave with the coffin. 

My Mum also got married that year to a man that she had met via some kind of forces pen pals dating, he was in the RAF and I think they had met one or two times before getting married, I can’t really remember a great deal about it or him, I think I had maybe met him once before the wedding, at this time she also decided to change my surname, I’d never had my father’s name but I remember being at school and having to tell everyone that I wasn’t called what I was before, I remember it all being quite confusing at the time, I now had the same surname of a man I barely knew, the marriage lasted less than six months, as a small mercy at least she didn’t decide to change my name back and make me go through all of that again. 

We also had our first and only holiday that year, a week in Spain with my Great Aunt and her son, it was great but we never went again.

There were various ‘friends’ I was introduced to  and trotted out to meet over the years, I don’t think that there was much time that she was on her own, I don’t think I ever got to know anyone terribly well, there was a guy at one point but he was literally just a friend, he was lovely and was brilliant with me, when they fell out or she decided she didn’t want anything more than friendship I wasn’t allowed to see him anymore, I remember being quite upset about that, I loved it there and was really fond of him, I guess I learnt then that I shouldn’t get too close to people as they could be gone as quickly as they arrived.

When I was 13 a boy I went to school had a dog that had, had puppies, we had been friends for years and I badgered at home until they finally gave in, provided that I looked after him, I met him at four weeks old and it was love at first sight, I adored him and he seemed to feel the same about me, he eventually came home a few weeks later and we did everything together.

It was at his dog training classes that my Mum met my Step Dad, he had a Border Collie puppy of a similar age to my little scruffy friend and like the other people at club all used to talk, it wasn’t long before they became ‘friends’ and then more than that.

At about that time we moved out of my Nan’s into a lovely but small 2 bedroom house, only a few miles away, however my Mum would be up at his house most evenings and every weekend from Friday to Sunday, I was dragged up there a lot in the evenings at first but left at home on my own mostly at weekends, by then another dog had come along, so I was left alone to look after him and my little one, I didn’t think much of it at the time but seriously who leaves a 13 year old alone for days at a time? 

I guess I went a little off the rails in my teenage years, I was out clubbing from about 15, house parties at mine (well there was no one there) I remember one week when she grounded me 7 times, then went out each time and actually expected me to stay in, I didn’t of course and she soon gave up on trying to discipline me as it was too much like hard work for her. 

While I was a bit of a wild child I still understood boundaries even then, I never did anything really stupid and hung around with a good group of people, there was the odd party that ended with a very occasional visit from the police about noise, a little bit of drugs and a LOT of alcohol.

I was lucky that I had good people around me to keep me on the right track really I think, the person I’d met at dog training at 13 had taken me under her wing and I spent a lot of time with her and her partner, I showed their dogs for them all over the country and spent time with them whenever I could, I also had my best friend/Mum hybrid, who is 10 years older than me but has always been a great source of stability for me, her kids were young when I first met them and I’ve been as much a staple in their lives as their Mum has for me, she’s been the person I’ve always run to, even now.  

I can’t really remember my Mum being a major part in my life for very long periods, if there wasn’t a man involved she used to take me to things so she wasn’t alone,  so I guess at those points we were closer but I soon got used to being pulled in and pushed away when the next thing came along. 

My Mum was strange as I was growing up, she messages me and tells me she loves me now but I can’t remember hearing that as a child, she is a self-confessed ‘not a cuddly’ person, I get that, totally but I also find a person that doesn’t cuddle their child very strange. 

W@nk Bag and his family were similar, they didn’t do affection, he was described to me early on an ‘emotional retard’ but it took a while before I realised the extent of it. I knew his sister long before him and her daughter used to cling to me because her Mum didn’t do affection, what sort of parent can’t cuddle their own child? I guess the little girl reminded me a bit of myself as a child, absolutely craving affection, no child should ever feel that and it makes me massively sad when I see a relationship like that, incidentally her child is grown up now and barely sees her Mum at all as they have such a strained relationship.

My Mum has a long history with trying to buy me off, however one of her greatest efforts was when I was 17, I was taking driving lessons and one day she was dropping me off at the Best Friend/Mum Hybrid’s house, which was a couple of miles away, as we turned into the close she said ‘I’m pregnant but I’ll buy you that car you want’ I had few words, apart from to tell her that I was the one that was at the age where I should be doing stupid things like that. I didn’t know they wanted children, he didn’t have any and she’d never wanted me and had in my opinion done an awful job of bringing me up, it had never been discussed in front of me, I guess she never had to tell me those things?

I remember walking in and telling my Friend/Mum Hybrid, she was as horrified as me at how I’d been told, she wanted a boy and was annoyed again when she realised she was having another girl, my sister was born 8 days before my 18th birthday and was joined by another one a year or so later, I really hoped that she would change and to be fair it looked like maybe she had, the girls had so much that I’d not had as a child, my Step Dad was fairly well off and the girls had everything they could possibly want,  including a lovely Dad but they also had a lot of things that were totally unnecessary and I thought was her buying their affection, just like she had with me.

My Step Dad and I got on quite well but I was 13 by the time he arrived, I’d never had a Dad and didn’t want or need a pretend one but he was a good man and a good person, if anything he was probably too good for her, he paid all of her debt off and made sure she had everything she could ever want and much more.

When my sisters were born I was told that should anything happen to my Step Dad I would be their legal guardian, it was written into the wills, if they died it would be up to me to look after them and their inheritance until they were old enough to look after themselves, at that point I learnt that I wasn’t included in that will in anything other than a share in my Mum’s jewellery, apparently because the rest had come from my Step Dad it would be split between the two of them, my Mum had always to the day he died told me that he looked at me as his own, so if he did why was this the case, how could you treat your children so differently?

When I was 23 she told me she was moving in with my Step Dad (they weren’t married by that point) He had a three bedroom house but his Mum lived there too, so with my Mum and two sisters moving in there would be no room for me, I get that I was 23 and maybe I should have moved out earlier but I also lived in one of the most expensive towns in the Country.

I had been with my boyfriend at the time for about 9 months and was kind of pushed into us moving in together which we just weren’t ready for, she wouldn’t even wait until we’d found a flat so I moved in with him and his parents for a few months first. 

His parents were the first sense of great parents I’d really known, I’d first met them on a Sunday morning when I was leaving his soon after we’d got together, they had five boys and I was treated immediately like the daughter that they never had, they did lots together, dinners, parties and soon became the people that I treated like the family I’d not really had, they were close, affectionate and I’m pretty sure that they were totally unshakeable, one of their son’s recently came out as transsexual and although I’m sure initially they were shocked but they have totally supported him, just as I would have expected him to.

In the five years that we were together they were my family, I was often round there both with and without my boyfriend, we bought our house together the following year and I’d go and discuss what I wanted to do, I’d arrive home from work one day to find his Dad there doing it for us, I feel a bit bad for saying this but they were one of the reasons that when things started going wrong I stayed for so long, I knew that I would lose the family that I loved so much too. 

One of the things that started the breakdown of our relationship was that he wanted children, preferably yesterday, at that time though and largely due to the relationship I had with my Mum I didn’t think I wanted children and it started to put the strain on, I was also still young and he would have waited but I didn’t think that would ever change at the time and I started to think that there was more out there for me, he wanted to tie me down and I was still a fairly wild thing who had tried hard at settling for a gorgeous man and a beautiful home with a lovely family but wasn’t quite there with no sign of it being in the near future.

When it finally ended we were all devastated but it couldn’t continue any longer, we have been split up for 12 years now but they still send me a Christmas and Birthday card and keep in touch when anything major happens, they are totally wonderful people who gave me some idea of how a family could be, if I ever manage to have one myself!

My Mum and Step Dad eventually got married as they wanted to all have the same name, so I was the only one left with the name of the man that she had been married to for six months when I was eight, how bizarre is it that I am the only one that has been left with the aftermath of her mistakes?

My Mum had always had a very tumultuous relationship with my Nan and she’d made a big deal of having to do things even though they didn’t get along, she even said she hated being there when she was dying as she hadn’t treated her well and for a time I did that too, I went to visit at Christmas and Birthdays and made an effort to see her weekly, the girls are lovely and I love them but I was always treated very differently which although I’ve tried not to let it bother me I guess it always has.

My Step Dad became ill, he had a degenerative disease that over the years took away all of his functions, his movement, his speech, his ability to do anything for himself, being able to eat, communicate, in the end the only thing that seemed to work was his brain, for a man that had always been really able it must have been awful, he was given 5-8 years but the disease started to rob him of his functions quickly, that was the next form of bribery from my Mum, if I wanted to go away for Christmas she told me that it might be his last, so I did it, I ran every time, each time he was hospitalised I dropped everything to be there, I did love him, not as a Dad but as a person that had been part of my life for a long time. 

He loved my Mum, he must have to have put up with her shit for so long, she ruled him with a rod of iron, she made his Mum’s life difficult in her own home and was delighted when she finally got her moved into a home, she alienated his brothers family, the family that before he met her he spent so much time with.

Throughout his illness I struggled with seeing him, I couldn’t understand him and felt awful for that but I also hated how she treated him, I have no doubt that looking after someone with a condition like that isn’t easy but she would shout at him for always wanting to eat when but when he was able to it was one of the few pleasures he had left, she’d shout at him for not being able to understand him, it was totally embarrassing and I hated seeing him berated like it, especially in front of my sisters who were still young. 

He died five years ago, my sisters were 14 and 16, some of what I felt was relief, relief that he was finally out of the misery that trapped him and that his pain was over, I also felt sad that my sisters had lost their Dad so young.  She was an embarrassment at the funeral, not once were his brother and family mentioned that he had been so close to, I was disgusted with her, they were terribly upset and he had loved them, they should have been mentioned without doubt, I mentioned it to her at the funeral, she said she had ‘forgot’ to me it showed just how twisted she really was, from that day onwards his brother and family have had nothing to do with her and my sisters have lost another part of their family and their history.

That year I did the whole Christmas thing with them but I promised myself that it was the last year I’d be held to ransom, I went over, watched my sisters get ridiculously spoiled while I got a couple of presents that I didn’t want or need and left feeling like the unwanted child again, I have kept that promise and not been for Christmas since.

That year she offered me some money in order to move from my flat to somewhere with a garden, I’ve always wanted a garden but said it wasn’t necessary and when I had the money I would move,  however she had, had a couple of big pay outs due to my Step Dad’s illness, she took me to look at houses and two weeks later told me that she wasn’t going to do it, now although I’d love a garden, I’d never have looked at houses I couldn’t afford, it was just like that puppy when I was a kid, given with one hand taken with another, I think what was worse was that I’d not asked for it, it was totally her suggestion.

The Christmas after that she asked me what I wanted, I told her that I wanted a digital SLR camera and if she could give me some money towards it that would be great, she told me that she would buy it for me, I said there was no need but she insisted, a few days later she sent me a photo of a cheap bridge camera telling me that she was going to buy it for me, instead of giving in for probably the first time I stood my ground and said no, that wasn’t what I wanted and if she didn’t want to buy the one that I wanted some money towards it would be lovely, as we’d discussed, she told me she’d get it for me after Christmas, on Christmas Day I rang to say Merry Christmas as I did each year, she asked what I’d got and I said nothing, I was single at the time, she told me what she’d got and I asked about the girls, her words were ‘it’s easier to tell you what they didn’t get’ I was used to her behaviour by now but even with that in mind it was still hard to swallow and made me cry before I went out. 

My Mum quickly went back to her old ways one my Step Dad had died, I had heard from someone that the girls were being left alone for weekends while she went to meet men she’d met on Internet dating sites, now I’m the last person in the world to criticise internet dating that but I’m pretty sure that I’d not be leaving my kids that had not long lost their Dad to go and meet random men and definitely not in hotels, I checked in on the girls and told them that I was here if they needed me, what else could I do?

I had to play the adult in our relationship from pretty early on, I was used to it and I tried to talk to her about leaving my sisters alone, she wasn’t interested, she took the opportunity to tell me that I was a selfish bitch and was just like my Dad and that I was jealous of my sisters, while I was totally ok with being a bitch, I wasn’t ok with having a man that I’d never met thrown at me, I wasn’t the one that had chosen to have a relationship with someone she obviously hated and got pregnant by them, I don’t know if I am like him, how could I tell that about a man I’ve never met but I assume that as I have 50% of his genes I do share some of his traits, how could I not?

I don’t think I’m jealous of my sisters but I guess I am a bit jealous of how they are treated, I had a tough upbringing and they’ve been handed anything they wanted, I couldn’t go to University as I couldn’t afford to go and support myself, they have both gone, I had one holiday as a kid they have had several a year, I had a puppy, they had 6 (that’s not even a joke!)

Weirdly my father has three other children, all girls that went to the same school with my sisters, my Mum made a point of telling me that she sees him at school picking them up, I’m not even sure why you would share this information, I know nothing about the man, apart from his job and the area  where he lives, I have five half-sisters, three of them I wouldn’t know if they walked past me in the street, how strange is that?

I think those messages with her were exchanged in around 2014 and I just can’t get past her throwing that at me, I didn’t choose to be born, in the time that’s passed since we’ve spent about an hour together in I think summer of 2015, I agreed to meet her for lunch, which I did and I couldn’t get away quickly enough, to this day I’ve not had an apology for her behaviour, largely because she won’t think she’s done anything wrong and probably partly because she will have forgotten. 

She sends me messages on Facebook message every month or so, I won’t add her on there as I don’t want her to see what I’m doing, each time I see her name pop up my heart sinks, I’ve just got nothing for her, I would love to have a close relationship with my Mum like the ones that lots of my friends have with theirs but I don’t ever see that happening, she often asks when we can meet, I tell her I’m busy, what else can I say, should I tell her the truth? I guess at some point I’ll have to?

Life with her is a vicious circle, she’s nice for a little bit, then she’s nasty, then she’s nice, I just can’t keep putting myself through it, even for the woman that gave birth to me, in the interest of fairness when W@nk Bag and I split she was amazing and I hoped it would be the change for us what I didn’t realise was that we were getting on really well because I was so broken that I had no fight in me, she told me I was staying at hers for a few days and I wasn’t in a fit state to say no, I was happy for someone to control what I was doing but once the real me started to return so did the problems. 

This year she has done it again, I got a message a few months ago saying that she was moving, half way across the country, I knew there would be a man involved but said nothing as I didn’t want to give her the satisfaction, I spoke to my sisters who were devastated, both were in their first year of uni and the oldest of the two was struggling with being away from home so was coming home every weekend to see her friends and feel like home.

Neither of the girls wanted to be uprooted, their Dad had been born in the house, all of their friends were there, they confirmed there was a man involved, neither knew a lot about him, one had met him briefly once, the other hadn’t even met him, despite all of this she sold their childhood home and moved anyway, I shouldn’t have expected anymore but again tried to play the adult and attempted a conversation, it was just wasted on her, she didn’t care about uprooting my sisters, just being closer to this new man.

She’s been gone a few months now, I only know the County she lives in, it’s where the bloke she’s seeing lives, I guess at least I know she won’t marry this one, if she did she would lose her rather significant pension, I was hopeful that she would have learnt from her experience with me and tried to have a better relationship with my sisters, I honestly wish that she would have put them first and tried to have at least one out of three of the children in her life that she didn’t need to try and buy. 

On Christmas morning she sent me a ‘Merry Christmas’ message, I wrote back but as usual tried hard not to get into conversation, on Instagram last night my sister had posted a photo of her presents from my Mum under the tree, there were loads, including several designer label bags, it’s been around 5 years now since I’ve had a present off of her for my birthday or Christmas, am I selfish? Maybe I am?

Over the years there have been some awkward situations, like when I started this job, they needed to see my birth certificate, my birth certificate clearly states, ‘Father Unknown’ do you have any idea how it feels to hand that over to your new employer? I felt like it said, ‘my mother is a slapper’ he isn’t unknown and she could have done me the courtesy to have a name on there, even if it was the name of a man she hated, I also had to hand over a deed pole form, of when my name was changed to the name of the man she married. Each time someone asks where my unusual surname comes from I’m embarrassed, no, it’s not my Dad’s name, no, it’s not my Mum’s family name, it’s the name of some stranger I barely knew.

My mother has trotted me out for occasions over the years, when I was still blind enough to not realise, I was touted as the daughter that she raised alone, that has a good job and her own home, hadn’t she done well, doing all of that alone?

I have done ok for myself but I don’t want to be used as something to try to impress her friends, while I do have a good job and I do have my own (small) home (I’m always the first to admit that it’s owned majorly by the mortgage company though!) I don’t think she can take the credit for most of it, a lot of it has been a battle, something that my Mum will never understand is doing things alone, she’ll never know understand the pressure of a job or a mortgage because she’s never had either.

I don’t think that children should ever be kept from their parents or used as weapons between parent or that there is any excuse in the world for ‘I don’t see my children’ I can’t comprehend any excuse that would be enough, how could you walk away from a person that you are responsible for making?

I’ve been told many times, by many people that I’m nothing like my Mum and I hope on every level that is true, I think myself lucky that I have some great people in my life that have been the family that I choose, there is a lot more to family than blood.

Never tell someone you only get one Mum or Dad when you don’t understand the circumstances, we all know you only get one set of parents and for some of us that is a good thing because not all of them are amazing, families are complicated and not all people deserve to be parents and not all of us should keep taking shit from people just because they gave birth to us. 

My Knight in Shining Leathers…………….

Walked into my life on a Saturday night in May 2010.

I’d called time on my big love on Valentines Day and was totally broken, despite living in the village since 2006 it was my first night out locally since I’d arrived here three years before and I was out for a neighbours birthday, who had not far off dragged me out kicking and screaming, I’d already been over to my home town for a night out and been out with friends but was suffering quite badly with depression and anxiety so something new was just a whole lot of stress. 

We had a few to drink at hers first before venturing out, I had no idea where we were, it was all back lanes and little paths through the wood, we arrived at the local football club, where a band were playing, it turned out to be a good night of drinking, dancing and laughter.

Then this guy came up to me and said ‘I’m sure I know you from somewhere’ to which I replied ‘I doubt that, I’m not from around here’ I can clearly remember looking around the room and trying to work out why he was talking to me, he was GORGEOUS, a year older than me, 6’2, brown eyed, brown hair, classically handsome, nice shoulders, good body, lovely to talk to.

I had come out of a relationship after five years with an emotional bully, he told me I was fat (but when I later found out he has slept with someone else she was much bigger than me and he married her, go figure) and all sorts of other damning things that had completely destroyed my confidence over the years so I genuinely couldn’t understand why this gorgeous man was talking to me when we were in a room full of people.

Before the end of the night the friend I was out with did a disappearing act, which I learned later was pretty normal for her, he knew where she lived as everyone knows each other here so he said he would walk home with me as he was only in the next street and a few houses away.

He walked me home and came in for tea, the flirting continued which led to lots of rather unexpected and great sex, he spent the night telling me I was beautiful, amazing and all of the nice things that a girl could expect to hear, when we weren’t having sex he spent his time cuddling me and it was a good 12 hours before he said he’d better head home, he kissed me goodbye and left.

And that was it until a couple of weeks later I walked into the local pub and there he was, without the alcohol I’d had to drink last time, he was; if anything more gorgeous than I remembered, as soon as he saw me he came and gave me a kiss and hug like we’d known each other forever which was rather unexpected, my neighbour was quite surprised that she had witnessed that as he is ‘not like that with anyone' and she’d known him since he was a kid.

He walked me home that night too but we did actually sit and talk this time, I knew that a girl from the village had recently died of an overdose, what I didn’t know until then was that it was his ex girlfriend and someone that despite her being an ex he cared for her, he talked and I listened, eventually we ended up in bed again, more great sex, compliments, cuddles, again it was the middle of the day before he left with a kiss goodbye.

This happened a few times over the passing months, I wasn’t ready for anything more and neither was he but we had such a lovely, easy ‘relationship’ at times we came home together, other times we didn’t but he was always the same, each time I saw him I got the same greeting and we always talked, other times we would come home together, we’d talk, end up in bed, he’d kiss me goodbye at some point the next day, if you were ever going to have a friends with benefits, this was definitely the way to do it.

At some point during this time we became friends on Facebook and through that discovered that we were both movie lovers, he messaged me saying he had a great movie that I ought to see, he then brought it round, we watched it together and ended up in bed, every time he had something he thought I’d like he’d arrive on my doorstep, sometimes he’d stay and watch it with me, other times he’d just drop it off and leave, I’d messaged saying I’d watched it, discuss the movie and then he’d come and replace it with something else, his taste in movies was impeccable, off the wall and he never failed to bring something that I didn’t love.

On one of these occasions he arrived on his bike; in his leathers which is where his name comes from, leathers can look good or bad on a man but a man with an incredible body in leathers is really quite a sight and he didn’t disappoint, that may have been an occasion where I was disappointed that he didn’t come in!

I loved how easy things were between us, no matter how long it was since we’d seen each other it was never any different, we sometimes exchanged messages between, we sometimes didn’t, there was never any expectation and I liked that, I think he did too but also there was never that empty feeling that I have found can come with sex but it wasn’t just sex.

Christmas that year he turned up on my doorstep, he was upset as his Gran had died, he said that I was the one person he could talk to and it never mattered what he said, I thought that was rather lovely, I comforted him, we talked things through and he stayed.

We have confided in each other about all sorts of things over the years, it was me he turned to when he was having problems with his girlfriend and asked what he should do, when he was having family issues it was my door he knocked on, that’s not the only time he’s turned up though, his timing over the years has been impeccable, his ability to know I’m having a bad time and to arrive at my door with a great movie has always been incredible.

Over the years our ‘relationship’ has evolved into different things, there’s been sex, friendship, companionship, comfort, advice, sometimes all of those things have been together at other times independent of each other, over the years this has continued on and off, at one point I was seeing someone for about a year and he was too, though I don’t think at the same time, so during those times the sex stopped but we never did stop being friends, if he sees me now he’ll stop the car if he can so that we can chat.

I don’t honestly think that he would ever realise that he’s been a bit of a hero in my life, although I have told him in the past, he totally doesn’t get how important he was in that first year after the break up, it was incredibly hard for me and he was the one that scooped me up, told me how amazing I was and made me realise that there were not only good men out there but good men that were incredibly hot, he definitely set the bar for dating! He is the one that turned up through those early days when life was really shit, he’s the one that when someone in the village was bragging that they’d slept with me he unashamedly pulled them up on it (after checking with me that it wasn’t true) he is the person that I know wouldn’t be in a room if someone was slagging me off and not totally defend me.

The last time we slept together was about 18 months ago, it was the first time in a while and rather unexpected as I kind of thought we were ‘done’ with the whole sex thing, seems we weren’t, I felt a shift that night though, it didn’t quite feel the same for me, I just wasn’t as ‘into’ it as I had been before and in the morning when he suggested sex again I said I wasn’t feeling it (which he knew isn’t very like me) for the first time, he was totally cool with it though just as I would expect and I think that sadly because my head is out of having sex with him that will be the last time, shame as that might be, however I know that we will always be friends and would be there for each other at the drop of a hat.

I had never really believed that Friends With Benefits was a concept that could be successful before this and I’m still not sure that I believe there are many situations where it can work and not feel unfulfilling and empty but on this occasion it worked perfectly.

Although I myself forget this quite often, good men and superhero’s really do exist, sometimes they live just a few doors away and instead of a cape they wear bike leathers just like My Knight in Shining Leathers does.

When your heart and head are in opposition.....

I don’t really have a great deal to report currently, I was supposed to have a date with a Bumble match next week but work have put paid to that by changing the meeting I was going to and with there being a significant distance between us rearranging isn’t terribly easy, however so far we appear to have quite a lot in common so we will see!

I’ve had a bit of a wobble this week, I’ve seen some updates on Instagram of Cunt Face’s and I can tell from them that he’s having a bad time, there is still a part of me that wants to reach out to him but I know that no good will come from that, it never has. There have been a couple of times this week that I have had to quite literally step away from my phone to stop me sending a message.

I’ve done the whole depression thing several times, I know how hard it is and I think that’s what makes me want to get in contact, it was me who told him what it was when it was happening last year but it was also me that supported him through it, got him to go and see his doctor and encouraged him to get some help, all while he had a girlfriend that I knew nothing about.

While I would like to think that it’s Karma doing it’s job I don’t believe that depression happens as a result of your actions, it happens to good people too and is just a horrible thing that actually never really goes away, it’s just better or worse at times.

I nearly broke this morning, I don’t know why, I wasn’t even thinking of him when it popped into my head to message him, I did get rid of it but currently it’s in my mind, I have no idea why, we have had no contact now in over two months and I really do intend to keep it that way, it’s not even that I see a future in it, it’s been a long time since I’ve been at that point with him, I guess I just find it hard to switch off caring about someone.

Don’t think from that statement that I’m a pushover, by no means am I, in fact those closest to me would tell you quite the opposite but then it’s rare that even those people ever see me break, I don’t take people into my life and heart easily at all, I can walk away from anyone and anything but that doesn’t mean I find it an easy thing to do.

My heart and head are in opposition but I know I wouldn't trust another muscle in my body to make decisions meant for my head and it's rare that my heart makes good decisions, with W@nk Bag for example, my heart spend five years telling me that's where I needed to be, until one day my head managed to overrule it and make a sensible (although heart breaking) decision. 

In other news Procurement Guy continues to be in touch at work and we are meant to be doing a venue visit together next week, he has offered a cheese toastie as bribery, does he know that cheese is ultimately the way to my heart?

The hot Welsh Tennis Coach has reappeared (this is a super original name as he is Welsh, lives in Wales and is a Tennis Coach!) he does this quite often and we have never really lost contact, I’m not sure I wrote about him at the time (about 18 months ago) as we never got to meeting, we were going to then he met someone, he told me and I was happy for him, he then decided he wanted to be friends, which I was also cool with, then he decided she wouldn’t like it if we were, I was cool with that too, I’ll talk more about him some other time. 

Women, Friends and Bikini Photos!

This post was inspired by a recent Twitter post about a girl that was alone in a bar, a guy started talking to her, she ended up chatting to the group he was with, both male and female and when she came back from the bar she got the cold shoulder, it seemed the girls had told the guys to give it a rest, seriously, is that how we want to treat other women?

I hope and I’m pretty sure that; if I’d have been in that position instead of being like that I’d have welcomed her into the group, regardless of whether I had a boyfriend or not, it’s hard being female you know, however even our friends can be really bitchy at times.

I’ve done this on holiday twice now, a girl on her own has been there and she’s joined us, both times we’ve stayed in touch, one of which I’m off to a cheese festival and winter wonderland with soon, they were welcomed into the group and I wouldn’t have dreamed of giving them the cold shoulder.

Women seem to see other girls as a threat when in actual fact many of us single girls are single because we can’t find the right man, that doesn’t mean we want to steal someone else’s, in my case I’ve waited far too long to ‘settle’ and want some that when I do need to compromise it is only on the small stuff, I have tried to change myself to be what someone else wanted and I have to say that the only thing it did was to make me miserable.

One day Prince Charming will sweep me off my feet but you know if he doesn’t I’m cool with being eaten by my cats when I die, for me that is still preferable to settling.  

Recently I spent a day with a friend of mine, we don’t spend a lot of time together but met about 13 years ago, at this point we were both in relationships and now both single.

I went on holiday this time last year and some photos of me in a bikini were put on Facebook, they weren’t posy or posed shots, they were taken by the friend I went with because the sea was really brutal and you weren’t supposed to swim in it (it also had sharks in it)

I’m neither little or large but still bigger than I’d like to be, largely because I like eating (especially cheese) but I also go to the gym and swim regularly in an effort to counter that, I am the kind of girl that looks in the mirror and only ever sees a fat girl staring back at her, no matter what size I am. I am however not the kind of girl that worries about wearing a bikini in a foreign country when it’s boiling hot and no one I know is going to see me. There will always be people that are smaller than me but there will always be people that are bigger than me too and if people don’t like it I’m not forcing anyone to look.

I met some lovely people out there. I’m a Cancerian and apparently, we are drawn to the sea which for me is totally true. I was a miffed at seeing I couldn’t get in it and spent each day longing to go for a proper swim.

The friend I went with wasn’t the type that liked to get her hair wet in the pool, let alone the sea (I wasn’t told that before we booked the holiday) Having a chat with one of the couples he said that his wife wouldn’t go in either but he’d be happy to have a swim out with me, another of the couples we met said she’d love to go too but her hubby wouldn’t, we a plan forming here and the wife in the first couple said that she’d give it a try if we all did.

So we waited until the next morning, checked it didn’t look too rough in comparison to normal and thought sod it, we’d give it a go, it seemed fine, we walked in had a paddle and headed out, managing a good swim, once you had got in it was amazing out there, then the first wife tried to get out, that wasn’t easy and she ended up rather bruised, then after a while the rest of us headed out onto the beach, that was an experience!

I’m not a particularly fast swimmer but I’m happy to go fairly far out as long as it’s under my own steam, I don’t like my head being under the water though. Even though I’d timed it pretty well I didn’t expect to be so violently barrel rolled as I went to get out, thankfully I remained really calm, tucked in my arms and legs and I was fine, as were the others. I got that bikini out recently though and despite being washed several times it’s still got sand in places that sand should not be and I was very much like that bikini for several showers after!

It was amazing though and we were all glad that we’d done it.

When we had arrived at the hotel the first thing we’d done was to walk along the beach and as we did the fishermen were pulling sharks out, I was totally mesmerised to see sharks out of an aquarium (I love animals and wildlife) and we got chatting to them, each night after that we got some beers from the bar and walked to sit and watch them fish for a bit, each time we got there they caught sharks, no matter what time we went, they said we were lucky and called it Shark’O’Clock! We were welcomed into the group by both the fishermen and their wives.

That night the group were pretty horrified that I’d gone in after seeing them pulling sharks out every evening and told us stories of people being airlifted to hospital from going in and a YouTube video of someone getting bitten by a shark on that very beach, would it have stopped me? Probably not if I’m honest, from some of the men I’ve dated over the years it’s quite apparent that I love a challenge!

Now, back to those photos, they are of a bunch of people enjoying the sea, in a variety of beachwear, laughing, paddling and having fun together.

I don’t think I look that bad in them, I’m pretty busty and if I was really skinny I would look like boobs on a lolly stick, believe me I’ve tried it.

She said that she thought that I was ‘brave’ for putting a photo of me in a bikini on Facebook and I have to admit that I took offence to that comment. Why is it brave to put a photo up in a bikini? Would that be questioned if I was posing on the beach at a size 6? No, of course it wouldn’t.

I had lots of comments to the contrary on this, it’s funny isn’t it, that a female friend saw a fat girl in a bikini but that’s not what the majority of my male friends saw, they saw a normal girl having a good time in the sea, there were obviously some females that also had this view and others of both sexes that just kept their mouths shut.

I had numerous nice comments, messages and likes on the photos, one in particular messaged me the day I got back, saying that he’d missed me (we talk a couple of times a week or so) but was glad I’d been away as he got to see me in a bikini and he thought I looked great in it. I am using this friend as an example as he is gorgeous, the kind of guy that I’d probably get whiplash walking past if I didn’t know him (he’s very happily married to a lovely girl, we are just friends) but if someone that looks like that can’t see a problem with it, why should she?

Perception is a funny thing isn’t it?

It came to light later that she was with her then boyfriend when she saw the photos and had mentioned them, she was annoyed that shortly after that he had added me as a friend on Facebook, which she assumed was to look at those photos; so there it was, her annoyance had nothing to do with me at all, it was her distrust in the boyfriend that had cheated on her before they had been together a year, she says she’s forgiven him for it but while she may have forgiven him she is happy to take his actions out on her friends, who have done absolutely nothing wrong.

She also made a point of saying that he had told her in the past that he preferred girls that were more my size to hers (several sizes larger than me, but is that really important?) but his preferences aren’t my choice or my fault, even if I’d not have met him as my friend’s boyfriend I wouldn’t have had any interest in him, he wasn’t my type and there is no way I’d have taken the shit from him that she did.  

Is it ok to say things like that to your friends to make them feel uncomfortable or like they’ve done something wrong to make yourself feel better? I am the kind of person that would be the first to tell my friends that something doesn’t suit them or that they are being an arsehole (believe me they rely on me for this!) but I would never try to make them feel shit about themselves and I would be horrified if I thought I had.  

On the day out with that same friend she also spent the day criticising every little thing from getting to where I live (pretty much the middle of nowhere if you live in a town) my car was noisy on the road on the way back (I love my car, it is also convertible which means it is more noisy than some cars) despite that I had done her a favour in taking her with me, had saved her an extra hours drive, a £20 parking fee and brought her breakfast.

I have to say that I was pretty fed up with it by the time we got back to mine, oh and when we did she didn’t offer any help to get everything inside, just got in her car and said goodbye, I think its safe to say we won’t be seeing each other for a while! 

Shoe Guy………

I met through the Space Cadet and he and I met on POF YEARS ago, like in the first year I was single, so late 2009 we had a couple of dates and decided not to pursue it but to be friends and we still are really good friends.

He has all the traits I wouldn’t want in a boyfriend, he’s definitely a player (although insists he isn’t) has more female ‘friends’ than you can shake a stick at (I’m 99% sure most are from online dating) he’s flaky, rubbish at planning, late for everything, so it was undoubtedly a good choice; however he is really good company and while he’s flaky if I needed something he would be right there which is a really important factor and I love him for that, even though when we have planned something and he flakes it’s bloody annoying, so usually I invite him to things I’m happy to do on my own should he flake, such as bike racing.

We’ll call SC’s friend Shoe Guy because he has a REALLY big thing about shoes.

In the middle of 2015 there was an advert for a film ‘The man and Le Mans’ which I wanted to see, mentioned it to SC and when we looked at it, it was on very limited showings, so he said he’d get tickets for December 19^th and we’d go, he suggested asking some of his other friends which I was cool with, I kind of expected a load of girls (you would with SC) I guess they probably weren’t up for it!

I’d arranged to meet SC nearby for lunch and he would drive from there, he picked another friend up on the way there and said another two were meeting us there, we walked into the bar by the cinema and upon laying eyes on Shoe Guy all that went through my head was ‘why didn’t I wear any makeup today’ well I didn’t because I was going to meet SC who has long been written off in the romantic sense! He wasn’t amazing looking, about 5’10 with a nice smile (and a receeding hair line) but there was something quite attractive about him.

It was apparent that he had recently split with his girlfriend as the boys were talking about when she had moved out, he came to sit next to me when we sat down and made an effort to talk to me, ask where I lived, what I did etc, there was definitely a little bit of flirting going on, we had a nice afternoon the five of us and the film was brilliant.

The boys were all taking the piss out of him as he has a habit of buying old cars with the intention of fixing them up (I’m talking 70’s classics here not shit heaps) but always seems to buy ones that are much worse than he thought and he has little or no mechanical knowledge, just a big wallet.

During this time I was seeing the guy that ‘didn’t want anything serious’ so was still doing the dating thing, although I hadn’t been on dates with anyone else.

Anyway that evening on the way home SC suggested that I add him and one of the others on FB to see what they were doing with the cars (I am a big car/bike fan) so I added them both.

Shortly after he sent me a message saying that it was nice to meet me and it was a great film, I responded saying that it was good to meet him too and had been a nice afternoon, I think he thought that Space Cadet and I were together as he said things about me needing to whip him into shape and that I should get him to organise more things, I said that wasn’t a job I would take on and that I was amazed he’d actually pulled this off.

He switched from friendly to flirty REALLY fast once he realised that SC and I weren’t together, he asked for my phone number so that he could Whatsapp me photos of the current car that they’d all been laughing at and to be fair even with my limited knowledge I could see that it was going to take a LOT of work!

He’d spotted photos of me in a Halloween outfit on Facebook, which consisted of a red corset, long skirt slit at the thigh, stockings, heels, witches hat, red lipstick, curled hair, it’s a photo I love, even I who rarely thinks of myself as anything but fat think I look good in a corset. He immediately went to ‘oh you like to dress up’ I can’t deny it, I love a good party and I love an excuse to be in an outfit, so that again took the conversation to a whole new dimension.  

Then he mentioned boots, he apparently goes weak at the knees for boots, I’d had my boots on that day and then changed out of them, kinda wished I hadn’t! It was in the coming days and weeks that it all started to come out, he said he’d not told anyone before but that he had a big thing with shoes and boots, I soon realised that this wasn’t a lie he really does and for outfits and boobs, all of which I’m not short of!

The conversation went on for months, actually it wasn’t far off a year, he kept mentioning meeting up but was talking meeting up for sex and that’s not me, I wish it was but it’s not. We talked a bit about our dating but had very few serious conversations in that time, mostly shoes, outfits and how he saw himself as a bit of a Christian Grey (not sure I’d have a massive issue with that) sadly, however without the billionaire bit! One of the things I liked most about him was that he pushed the boundaries with his messages but never once in the whole time we've known each other over stepped them, this; I've found is a rarity. 

He did however offer to buy me numerous pairs of shoes, I declined. 

In December last year the messages dropped off, which I was fine with, it was obviously going nowhere but I had got used to talking to him fairly regularly. Then this year, in September I got a message from him, late night, he was obviously out but it wasn’t a beered up message, it was a ‘You’re up late’ I didn’t respond that night but did the next day, he said he was in Norfolk with his mates for their annual weekend away and that we should catch up the following day.

In that time I had a bit of a Facebook stalk (you know you all do it too!) early this year it had changed to ‘in a relationship with…………’ a very dull looking girl and although it’s very judgey of me I did think then that she probably wouldn’t tolerate his ‘thing’ with shoes, dress up etc and I imagine that the missionary position is on the menu a lot, in looks she is also a downgrade from his very pretty ex but downgrading seems to be a big thing, I’ve done it myself and despite all of my friends telling me that at the time it was only looking at photos after the event that brought it home, I had massively downgraded, sadly not only in looks but in personality too. Not only did I downgrade I fell head over heels with the bastard!

The Facebook stalk told me that his relationship status was no longer showing on there, it didn’t say single but it had gone, even more strangely that he was no longer Facebook friends with the GF, that I found incredibly strange and if I’m honest I was just a little bit excited about it.

We had a bit of a catch up on the Monday, I asked why he’d got in touch after so long, he said that he just thought he would say hi, the conversation started fairly general, work, cars, he’d moved to London, that he’d not seen SC or his brother recently, what I’d been up to, I said that I’d thought about him recently, he asked why.

I explained that I had bought new shoes, beautiful, new shoes, the kind that he would love, he said that he’s glad I remembered him in a nice way, I said that shoes and chickens (he kept chickens in his old house) occasionally made me think of him, he asked about the shoes, at no point had the GF been mentioned and I was hopeful there was a reason for that, he said that his mind had immediately gone into overtime, he then said ‘my other half will give me a slap’

Ah, so there it is, she IS still around. FUCK.

I responded with ‘Buy her some’ he ignored my comment totally, asking if my PVC outfit was ok still. I said that our conversation has been very sensible until shoes had been mentioned but yes, it was still in the wardrobe.

He said that he’d never turned up on my doorstep like he’d talked about, I mentioned that  I’d never given him my address and said that with him having a girlfriend the time had passed for us. He said he’d let me know next time he was in the area so we could meet up, I made a pretty firm stand at this and said that wasn’t on the cards, he changed his tune quickly saying he meant for a catch up, nothing else, I wasn’t terribly convinced, I don’t see him being a cheater but if he wasn’t bored with her I’m pretty confident that I’d not have heard from him.

I’m in London soon for a couple of nights, he’s asked for the dates and mentioned meeting up for a drink, he messaged me one morning last week telling me he was in Birmingham this week, I’m not sure what he expected me to say to that, I didn’t however offer to meet up.

If he was single again I don’t think I’d hesitate given the right circumstances but he isn’t, he’s also bought a place in London with her so I don’t see it ending anytime soon really, we never know what would have happened but I feel a little like this was an opportunity missed, maybe he does too?

Am I just too slow for modern day dating?

I had lunch yesterday with a former work colleague, someone I’ve always got along well with that has left under a bit of a cloud.

It was early 2015 that he left his wife (that also works for us) for a girl that works on his team and was dating another of his team, she was promoted in this time and is quite frankly as useful as a chocolate teapot on a bonfire. If I wasn’t already suspicious about them once I heard she had been promoted I definitely was! However it was apparent before the split that they were always in the same place, despite the fact that they didn’t really need to be.

He and I never discussed it as he knew that I wouldn’t approve of the cheating and I wouldn’t approve of sleeping with one of your staff, it’s such a bad plan and to be fair it was, I’m pretty sure it contributed to his fall from grace, however both she and the boyfriend she left (who will be her husband next year!) both still work for the company, the only innocent party I see here is the wife, I felt for the boyfriend too until the muppet took her back and asked her to marry him, I see a rocky future ahead of those two.

So since early January he has left his (second) wife and been seeing the girl he promoted, they split and within weeks he was seeing someone else, within weeks he’d met her child and she his, they moved in together fast and they broke up in the late summer, since then he’s been dating which we discussed yesterday, since this time he’s had a short relationship with someone else and several dates.

He went on a date last Thursday, had dinner, then Saturday he stayed over and did the same on Sunday, in the space of the week they’ve been talking, he’s had several dinner, two overnight stays and met her parents.

Then you have me, for one I’d struggle to fit that many dates into four days, I wouldn’t be having someone stay over within the first week because I’d want to get to know them before they were getting into my bed, so my question is, am I too slow with all of this? Should I be upping my game and just moving them in by date three instead of cracking on with my life and being such a snail?

I seem to be kind of a slow dater, initially seeing someone once or twice a week is just fine for me, my weekends are usually booked up way in advance and I’m not making changes to plans I’ve already made.

At first I thought this gung ho chuck yourself into it was a man thing but there are women involved here too and what sort of woman introduces her kids to someone she doesn’t even know yet?

Lets go back to baggage boy, who I had 3/4 dates with before we decided that friends was the better option for us. One of our last conversation’s was when I told him that his son didn’t need to meet everything his cock touched.

In the short time we were friends there were more women than I could shake a stick at walking in and out of those doors, now at first I thought he was a good Dad, he had his son every weekend, which I was terribly impressed at, it was only later that it dawned on me that his little boy (who was four) just had to fit in with whatever he was doing, if he was going out on a date he’d get a babysitter and if he had a woman over it was no big deal, the little one many times went to sleep with a babysitter and woke up to a woman he’d never met, if she’d gone by the time he woke up I would have had more empathy with this but that wasn’t the case.

The little boy had a lot of issues, although Baggage Boy would never admit to them, there were a lot of issues with BB and the little boys Mum, I only heard one side of the story which of course made her out to be evil and him to be the hero, this I don’t believe but I can assure you that if Boy was my child he wouldn’t be meeting different women all the time as I wouldn’t have allowed that. He definitely had attachment issues, from the minute we met he was very cuddly, wanted to hold my hand all of the time, if we watched a movie he wanted to be sitting on my lap, now children to tend to like me but I think that’s because I’m a little nervous around them and I’m not one of these people that always wants to grab them for cuddles etc but normally I find children of that age are a little shy at first, he desperately wanted to be loved which made me a bit sad.

He also had some anger issues and wasn’t reigned in by his Dad, now most things I can tolerate, however one day when I was there I spotted him being cruel to the hamster, I don’t care who you are animals aren’t meant to be dropped from a metre in the air, so I told him that he couldn’t do that and got his Dad in, ‘he loves the hamster’ is what I was told and I could believe that totally, until he thought no one was watching, I imagine that quite a lot happens when he is unsupervised and his Dad is too busy entertaining to keep an eye on him.

He had a girlfriend in Germany for a while, a girl he’d met while he was with his wife and she was with her husband, but nothing had happened…… she was the love of his life, he wanted her to move over which was what they were planning, he’d also propositioned both me and a waitress when we were on a day out with his son at this point.

Then suddenly within days of all this on Facebook his relationship status changes to ‘in a relationship with………..’ a girl that didn’t have the same name as the girl in Germany…….. despite our conversation she had posted photos of her with Boy and him with her children and all of his posts were how much he loves his ideal woman and he’d never felt like this before…….. I know I’m a sceptic but……

We had a conversation about it and I told him that I felt he was rushing in, that while I was happy for him in the last year he’d told me he was in love many times and I had concerns and also concerns for Boy, he brushed them off, put it down to me not being happy for him, which categorically wasn’t the case.

The next conversation we had was a couple of months later, Facebook and Instagram were covered in how happy they were but our conversations were filled of how insecure she was, how she wasn’t as adventurous as him in bed and how he didn’t like one of her children.

The next minute they were on holiday and an engagement ring appeared, surrounded by messages of how much in love they were and how perfect for each other they were, he rang me after and I congratulated him, mentioning that it was only a week ago that they weren’t terribly happy and the holiday was make or break, that was the last I heard of him and I was deleted from Facebook.

They have got married, Instagram is covered in photos of how perfect they are, I did note that the child he doesn’t like doesn’t appear in a lot of the photos though, take that as you will.

A little side note about Baggage Boy, on a night in 2016 (before the now wife but when he was with the German GF) we had planned a night out, we were going to a car show, then for a night out and I was staying at his.

We’d gone to the car show and come back covered in dust, so I went to get showered and ready, as I headed into the bathroom he said ‘I’ll be in, in a minute’ which I laughed off thinking he was joking, he wasn’t. Now there was no lock on the door but it was shut, he then walks naked into the bathroom and climbs into the shower with me, very brazen, I’m not sure what he expected but I finished my shower, got out and went and put my dress on, I was pretty shocked if I’m honest but I’m not the sort of girl to wobble with something like that and I fronted it out, we had a brilliant night out but if I’d already worked out before this that he couldn’t be trusted but this really did clinch it, if I’d given him the slightest hint that I was up for it he would have been straight in there, despite the girlfriend, he spent the evening giving the come on to anything that had a pulse, even exchanged numbers with some and I was totally fine with that but he did then try it on when we got back to his, even drunk I’m pretty firm in my resolve, it did come up over the coming months how I’d batted off his advances but it was long before that we’d decided that we were just going to be friends and in the months that followed all of the reasons that was a brilliant idea became apparent.

So, should I throw caution to the wind when it comes to dating?

If I had I could have well ended up with Baggage Boy and many others that I’ve been saved from but does my caution hold me back because by the time I’ve worked out I do actually like them they’ve found someone else?

We all know that most people multidate these days, do I want to be with someone that isn’t prepared to wait? I honestly don't think I do but I wonder if I've wasted chances by being cautious, like the Shoe Guy, the friend of a friend from two Christmases ago that got in touch recently and today in fact. 

The Cat Breeder, the Vet and finding out I work with his Mum………….

In December last year I matched with a guy on Bumble, quite nice looking with some nice photos and it was pretty obvious from the baby lambs in them that he worked with animals.

Now if I could pick an occupation for my perfect man a vet would be way up that list, being an animal lover someone that likes animals is important and with cat breeding having a vet to hold my hand through birthing would be amazing! (The list would also have most uniformed professions. I quite like the idea of the forces as I could get rid of them for months at a time and most men look better in uniform – although I have seen times when this rule doesn’t work)

We chatted for a bit, did the whole what do you do etc and he was indeed a vet, working about an hour away from me, at the time I had a quite pregnant, very precious, pedigree cat and was fairly concerned so that was mentioned, he was working for a small and large animal practice at the time but large animals are essentially what he is passionate about.

We soon discovered that we were looking for different things, he was not long out of a relationship and just looking for ‘fun’ and I have no interest in that at all, he said that he’d like to keep in touch and should I ever change my mind to let him know, I assured him that I didn’t see that happening.

Over the next few days, he was very sweet, I was watching my girl all the time and was getting very little sleep, if anyone can empathise with that feeling it’s a vet, we had a discussion about how things were with her and he agreed that we could well be looking at a C-Section which was already where I was with my thinking, he’d given me his number by this point but I’d not used it.

A couple of days later the kittens were born, by C-Section, things were still a little fraught with a Mum that didn’t have a clue what to do with these little shouty things that had appeared next to her when she woke up and I was shattered, I also knew that I was going to have to feed these little one’s two hourly until her milk came in. I sent him a message saying thanks for listening with a photo of the newborns and he messaged back asking how they were doing and saying he hoped I was feeling less stressed (I wasn’t!)

I have to say it was nice to have someone level headed to talk to when everything is looking so shit, it was a really tough time kitten wise, Mum wasn’t settling with them at all, she’d only stay with them if I was with her, even then she’d rather be cuddled up with me, I was feeding every two hours day and night and I was exhausted and upset, to the point that I was looking to see if anyone had a surrogate when I had an idea and called my vet, asking him for a specific injection for her, he wasn’t convinced but I was at the end of my rope and was literally willing to try anything. That day I was in such a state that my vet hugged me as I walked in, I literally was the great unwashed, I couldn’t tell you how long is was since I washed my hair as I’d not had time between feed’s (you’ll be pleased to know I’d managed a couple of showers though!)

It worked, within six hours of having the jab she was settling with her little ones, feeding them with just a bit of help from me and became the Mum I knew she could be, which took the pressure off of me a bit, in the week that had elapsed I’d had an awful morning where I had to revive two of them and I was a completely frazzled zombie, I had friends telling me that even human babies don’t need that much looking after! Once my girl was feeling better the babies followed and started putting on weight, apart from the little boy that was a struggle, he was putting on but not as much as the others, so I continued to feed him as well as him feeding from his Mum.

You bond much more with babies that you are hand rearing, it’s hard not to, just thinking of him now makes me well up. He was full of fight, hated feeding from his Mum but fed really well from the sponge that I fed him from, eventually in the early hours of boxing day I lost him, after a vet visit and an X-Ray and some drugs, it’s hard to treat a baby that is so tiny, it was awful and it’s those times when being on your own really sucks, there are very few friends you can call sobbing at 3am when they are miles away and there is nothing you or they can do about it.

I struggled with it, you always think that you’ve not done enough when you lose one and I was terrified I’d lose more, I became totally OCD and weighed them much more than ever possibly needed, probably worrying myself more, I knew that weighing once a day was the sensible solution and slowly as they continued to grow and thrive I managed to get a grip of reality again.

It was literally a month before I left the flat for anything that wasn’t a vet visit, I’d seen no one, I think I’d have felt incredibly lonely if only I had, had time to think about anything.

If you aren’t an animal lover you’ll think I’m mad and I’m ok with that, if you are you’ll have an idea of how I felt! By the time they had reached a month old I had been in the office for one half day meeting, thankfully my boss is an animal lover and I bend over backwards to be flexible, often working when I’m on holiday so he was really understanding of my answering emails at 4am for a few weeks and working from home for that period. That was the only time I’d left flat for anything that wasn’t a vet visit, I’d seen no one, I think I’d have felt incredibly lonely if only I had, had time to think about anything.

During this time the Vet had checked in regularly with ‘This is your regular vet check-up, how are the kittens?’ which I have to say I thought was massively sweet and just what I needed, he always asked how the kittens were and how I was. He said a couple of times that it was a shame that we wanted different things as he thought we’d really get on and have a lot of fun together, to be honest I didn’t disagree but we did want different things.

Facebook did its thing and at some point in January threw the Vet up as a friend suggestion, I obviously didn’t add him but I couldn’t help but notice his surname which was not only fairly unusual but the same as someone I work with.

The lady I work with is probably in her fifties, she worked for us as a Business Development Director and at some point of her time here she’s worked directly for my boss, although mainly she’s worked for our team, however she used my office fairly regularly. She’s lovely and we’ve always got on well, she breeds Race Horses, lives on a Sheep Farm with her husband and is very lady of the manor.

Hmmmm, thought I…. it’s can’t be………..can it?

Now, it wouldn’t be obvious that they were related, based in different area’s and it wouldn’t be obvious that she and I worked for the same company, her home base is two hours from my office and he’s an hour away but the name is a bit like mine, you’d have to wonder.

I mentioned it to him and he kind of shrugged it off but in a manner that almost seemed a bit shifty, however it didn’t stop him doing his regular check in’s on me and the kittens and a bit of flirting.

A couple of weeks later she was in the office and we were chatting, I HAD to know, she was saying that she had a Grandchild on the way from one of her son’s, so we talked about that, I asked her what her other children did, she had two sons and a daughter.

‘……….. is a vet, currently working in……………………. in a mixed practice but he’s just got a new job working with large animals which is what he wants to do’

BOOM! The Vet is her son, or she happens to have a son with the same name, same job and that has told me exactly that same thing in the last couple of weeks…… unlikely hey?!

Soooooo I mentioned  him about it when he next got in touch, he asked who I worked for and then said that he hadn’t wanted me to feel awkward when she was in and that she disapproves of dating sites (which I could imagine if I’m honest) he asked me not to mention it, which of course I would never do.

Fast forward 11 months and the Vet still gets in touch, probably around once a month, he’s always quite sweet, usually asks if I’ve changed my mind (I haven’t) I thought about him last week as his Mum was put on garden leave before she exits the business and I missed saying goodbye as I was in meetings but it was a passing thought.

He missed his October check in (I didn’t know this until I checked the messages for this post) and saw that we’ve not spoken since September and then yesterday a ‘Good evening how are you’ popped up on my phone, it was him again, what timing eh?

It’s funny how these people pop up isn’t it? I’m pretty sure my mind won’t change, as good idea as a Friend With Benefits sounds (because to be fair it’s been a LONG time) I’d be worried that we’d have no chemistry and I couldn’t sleep with someone I had nothing there with, on top of that I’d worry that feelings would become involved for one of us.

I dated someone about two years ago, he said a few dates in that he didn’t want anything serious which I was ok with, however once that was said any feelings I may have developed were switched off, a few more dates down the line he changed his mind and wanted more but I wasn’t there because he said he wanted nothing serious I’d made sure my feelings hadn’t developed, I then had to call it a day because we were in different places so I’ve seen it go wrong, in fact years before that with Blue Eyes, I told him straight off I wasn’t ready for anything serious, he got his feelings all involved and then I had to call it a day as we were in different places again, so casual doesn’t really work for me as it never ends like that.

I think he probably hopes that at some point my mind will change which is probably why he keeps popping up, I don’t think mine will but he does seem genuinely quite nice and one thing I do like about him is that he’s been as upfront as I have about what he wants and I’ve got a lot more respect for someone that is upfront than someone that lies to get what they want, I’m not sure they’ll ever be any more to this story unless one of us changes our minds………..meeting the parents could be a bit awkward eh?!

How much can you support a stranger without being a fool?

There is both lots and nothing to report this week!

No dates last week, however I matched with two total hotties, one ghosted not long after swapping numbers, called him out on it, he blamed being busy, I’m done.

Second one sounded perfect, hot, 5’11 (a little under what I’m after for perfection but you can’t have it all!) Ex Marine, now Electrician, lives in the town I work in (amazing, I never match with anyone decent that is close) he messaged me on Tinder saying that he was going to delete his account as it wasn’t for him and sent me his number, so we messaged off app for a few days and poof……he disappears too, what the fuck is wrong with them?!

The guy I went on one date with is still in touch however his messages are massively depressing largely, he pretty much blames everything on his ex wife, I don’t believe that when a relationship breaks down that it is ever solely the fault of one person, even with W@nk Bag there were things that I could have changed too, he was however a massive cunt but I can’t honestly say that I had nothing to do with our relationship failing, if nothing else I should have opened my eyes to the fact that he didn’t love me instead of wasting five years of my life on it (and probably the best years for meeting someone and starting a family at that!)

So, I find it massively hard to believe that his wife is a totally bad person in all of this, I think he’s been trying to get me to believe that he is the better person and has used the term ‘but I’m too nice’ far to many times, no mate you aren’t too nice for letting your wife sleep in the main bedroom while you go to the spare room, once we split with someone if we can’t move out straight away we have to make compromises like that, it’s not being too nice, it’s a compromise to get you through until you sort things out. I did it with my ex before W@nk Bag, we lived together for around 9 months while we were selling our house, we both made compromises to make it work and try to make life as easy for each other as possible.

He told me he was having his son over the weekend ‘while she’s away’ and mentioned that he found it daunting having him overnight, it’s his son for gods sake, he shouldn’t feel daunted by having his own child overnight, it’s his job! I hate this notion of ‘Daddy babysitting’ Daddy doesn’t babysit, Daddy has joint responsibility for the child that he jointly made, he’s not a bloody babysitter!

To be fair on the date I thought that his photos were a bit out of date as he’s definitely got less hair now and that there wasn’t any chemistry but I would have been willing to meet him again as he seemed quite a nice guy but all of these little messages have been making me wonder, probably the more messages I’ve had the more I’ve wondered about seeing him again.

He messaged this weekend asking if I’d like to go to a local race meeting, I couldn’t as I already had plans so said no, which is where I think the message I received this morning came from and I don’t know how I feel about it, if I’m honest.

My question is; Is this the message from a person that is having a rough time and a cry for help or a manipulator who is expecting that to make me feel bad?

Part of me feel’s sorry for him, he’s obviously having a rough time of it and I totally understand that, I’ve been there, we’ve all been there and partly because I’ve been there I feel I should be supportive but he’s actually a stranger and I signed up for dating not being someone’s support structure, I’ve been there before let’s be honest.

Last year when I met Cunt Face he’d not long lost his Dad, I spent months checking he was ok, it was me that sent him off to the Dr to discuss the depression that I could see, it was me that he talked to about his counselling sessions (Don’t forget that I didn’t know about the GF) it was my shoulder he cried on, it was me messaging on his first trip that he’d always done with his Dad, it was me crying when I realised there was a girlfriend of 7 years…….it’s not me he’s now dating (more about that later this week)

With Cake Destroyer I supported him through RAF basic training, I told him he could do it when he didn’t think he could, I baked cake to make him smile, I sent him supportive messages, told him he’d be awesome on graduation day…….the week after he’d graduated he called it a day………….

I’m also support for ALL of my friends, I’m really fucking good at it too,  I don’t need and don’t have time for friends that message every day but in a crisis I’m there, up or down the country, if I can’t be there I support in other ways, I check they have got out of bed, that they can cope with life (or pretend they can to get to work or whatever) and I do that because I’ve been there, I’ve been in the position where I couldn’t get out of bed, couldn’t leave the flat, couldn’t stand up without passing out because I was THAT stressed and depressed, did all of my friends rally round for me? Largely not to be fair but I’m brilliant at hiding things, I’m a ‘I’m fine thanks, how are you?’ kind of girl, even when I’m totally broken, I’m the kind of person that sends ‘I saw this and thought of you’ presents a lot because I really enjoy making people smile.

Do I want to do it for someone else? No, I can’t say I do, I take care of enough people (I’m a PA for fuck sake, it’s my job too!) What I want is to spend time with someone that makes me smile, not that tells me his ex is evil and he’s such a good person.

I spent five years of my life with an emotional bully and manipulator, W@nk Bag convinced me it was all my fault and I believed him, if we were out together and I talked to his mates I was flirting with them and he’d get shitty with me, if I didn’t talk to them he’d say I was a miserable bitch to the point that I just didn’t go out, it just wasn’t worth the shit that I used to get for it.

He told me I was rushing him into us moving in together (after four years) he made me feel bad for moaning when yet again he couldn’t be my plus one because he had work but he didn’t need to work on pool night or when his mates were out, if I feel someone is being manipulative now I avoid them like the plague because I’ve been there and he was so good at it I didn’t even know it.

When we started our relationship he told me his ex was a psycho, I have no doubt he now says the very same about me and to be fair I think I probably did act like a psycho girlfriend at times but I assure that while I spent some time in psycho he certainly drove me there and pushed me through the door.

I am the sort of person that if anything I’m too kind, I help anyone and everyone I can, I give too many chances to too many people, even after they’ve hurt me so I hope you’ll understand why I can’t take this one on, I don’t think I can do it again, I don’t think he’s over his ex and I can’t help him do that, I think he needs to sort himself out before he brings anyone else into his life – I responded, hoping I’ve been kind but I also didn’t want to open it up so that I was a person he could vent to, in all honesty he already has, too much for someone you are thinking of dating.