Eh?

Listen now, this is important.

If you cannot picture me dressed up as a giant root vegetable running around Manchester city centre, then I suggest you close this post down and come back another day.

I wouldn’t mind either because some things just aren’t meant to be.

Like, World Peace for instance.

Or even, my last set of false nails.

You think that’s a bit far fetched? That my extremely glittery, bombastically special talons couldn’t possibly have anything to do with the state of the new union, Rupert Murdoch and some bearded dude in Iran?

Well you would be wrong.

What? Where the hell am I going with this one?

I honestly do not know but seriously stick with me; it’ll be worth it in the end. I just know it.

(Obviously I can’t promise this and don’t sue me if you get to the end of this post and feel like a) wringing my neck or b) demanding your internet provider refund you the 7 minutes air time it will undoubtedly take you to decipher the insanity of this post or even c) digging up the back garden and planting a marrow. I take no responsibility for what is about to happen.)

This week the obligatory therapy sessions have left me feeling a little like I have been jumping on an emotional trampoline.

Wahhheyyyyy look at meeeeee I’m sooo hiiighhh I feel like a teenager againnn!!

Ooooooooooo fucking hell coming downs a bit hard on the old back oof!

Waheeeeeyyyy look at meeeeee I can do a star jump it feels so goooood!!

Waoooof was that my ankle that made that breaking noise? Campumf eck, my necks gone all tingly.

Wahhheyyyyy I’m going to try a sitting jump! I can do anything I’m amazinggg!

Awhaccckkk good god somebody help me up, my back is actually broken and im pretty sure I just bit my tongue in two!

Oh what the hell Waheeeeeyyyy one last go can’t hurt, I’m higherrr than everrrrr!!!! I am the QUEEEN OFFF THEEE WORRRLLLDDDDD.

Er, yes. That is wee running down my legs. Do you have a spare Tena? Anyone?

Seriously, it is such a shame there isn’t an Olympic sport for being a tit, because I seriously deserve an award. I would win it too.

‘And the gold/diamond Nork trophy, sponsored by tommee tippee and Lanosil angry nipple cream for how many emotions can you tear through in a ten minute period, goes to Lexy Ellis for being a prize floppy and floundering, utter mammary gland!!!

Congratulations all around.  You are officially a pimpled teat.’

Seriously. (In case you felt I hadn’t already used the word seriously enough. I am totally serious. Seriously.)

Either that or someone should seriously consider casting me in an emotional version of Challenge Anneka. They could call it Challenge Knobby, and instead of dressing me up in a jumpsuit (because lets face it, this is tea time telly and no one needs to see that while they are tucking in to their reduced fat Bangers and Smash) they could dress me up as a giant cucumber and have me half run half waddle around shopping centers world wide trying to find hidden objects stashed under 3 wheeler prams without anyone noticing. I can see it now.

‘Mary, was that a giant cucumber that just walked past or are these sleepless nights getting too much for me?’

‘No Laura, I think I saw it too. Actually, I am sure it stole a bottle out of my changing bag. But then again, it may have been a gherkin.’

And I would be filmed scuttling off dressed as a huge vegetable (that Addison clearly wouldn’t eat) riddled with guilt about my thievery before doing an emotional 360 and coming back, bending over and battering them both with my elongated forehead because my mother never showed me enough affection.

Can you imagine?

I can see the headlines now.

Killer cucumber strikes again.  Mr. Bloom involved in compostarium nightmare!!

First and only interview here!!

‘It wasn’t my allotment, there was fuck all to see!’ He sang with his northern twang ‘She was just a mentalist from up somewhere near me….’

BBC show gets out of hand!! Overtired mother finally loses the will to…

Anyway.

Moving on swiftly.

Dear diary,
Today I bought Addison some foamy letters for the bath. Ever since I first saw those two pink lines sat on the bathroom side (pink lines not white lines, those days are long gone!) I have imagined walking in to the bathroom post bath time and seeing my daughter’s (oops I mean son’s) name emblazoned on the wall in foamy letters. It would be so romantic. This would mean we had made it as a proper family. I would be a proper mummy. Limping around Mothercare today (two toes, one sofa, a great divide) I spotted a bag of alphabet letters and bought them! I cannot wait to give Addison a bath and make this simple dream come true! As soon as he gets up it is bath time! Can’t wait to see what they look like! Will have to take photos! I will officially be mum to a toddler!

Dear diary,
There are no fecking eses’s in the bag. (Like the letter s. Not Esse like some Spanish mafia type. I’m bloody glad there are no Spanish mafia types in the bag! The last thing I need at bath time what with all the wailing and splashing already going on, is a little Spanish man in a straw hat holding a machine gun to my head. What the hell kind of pressure would that put on me? Why the hell would Mothercare do that to me? A B C D E F YO SOY JOSE!! And what if the mafia type got hungry? What would I feed him? Do mafia types eat paella?) What the bloody hell kind of alphabet doesn’t have an S in it???? MY son’s name has two BLOODY ese’s in it. (Again the letter S. My sons name does not have two Spanish men holding machine guns and plates of badly made paella behind their backs in it.) So there goes that daydream. I couldn’t even swear. All the swear words I can think of have an S in them! (Except the c word and although I was tempted, I was that angry! There is always a chance that grandma could call round and I’m not sure even I could make excuses and get away with having the word c*nt written in bouncy letters on the bathroom wall with a one year old in the house.) How does one make paella?

Dear diary.
So pleased with my sparkly new nails! They look wonderful. Feel a little more human again after the nightmares of weeks gone by. Sarah did such a good job on them and I feel proper glam.

Dear diary.
Within 2 days of having my nails done, the plague hit.  I broke 4 in a terrible car door accident following on from shit up back –gate, and then managed to not only get my puke under the remaining 6, but also had a feeling there may have been some of Addison’s and Doodle the Poodle’s puke lodged under them too. It was a chance I couldn’t take. I ripped the remaining 6 off in a fit of fury and disgust. My hands are in tatters. (And so is my arse but that is another story all together.) I officially resemble Fagan from Oliver but with less britches and more swearing. Damn stomach bug spreading like wildfire.  Bloody motherhood!

Dear diary, I met Jo Frost. She was amazing. She gave me some great advice.

Dear Diary, I got too excited and screamed in Jo frosts face.  She was covered in spit.

Dear Diary, I am writing this from the naughty corner.

Dear Diary, I have met some truly lovely and amazing people this week.

Dear Diary, I dropped a red-hot fishcake on my foot. It hurt.

Dear Diary, The Irish one and I are going to spend some quality time together tonight.

Dear Diary, Was forced to watch Planet of the Apes. What a load of guff! How can you be romantic after watching that? For the love of god.

Dear Diary, Had a dream I was being attacked by a monkey in a smoking jacket. Woke up sweaty.

Dear Diary, Blame Tim Burton for full night of unrest.

Dear Diary, Took Addison to see the planes at the airfield. We had a great time.

Dear Diary, Until he shit up his back while I was talking to a pilot. It smelt like somebody died. The guy clearly thought it was me. Addison found this hilarious. I did not.

Dear Diary, The council say I can’t build a compostarium. I only want to grow shoes.

Dear Diary, Must find other ways of enticing Mr. bloom. I think I fancy him. What is wrong with me?

Dear Diary, Therapy is supposed to regulate my moods.

Dear Diary, Just laughed, cried, sneezed and weed in the space of twenty minutes.

Dear Diary, Have put on 5 pounds.

Dear Diary, The Irish One said that ‘compared to the empty water balloon’ my stomach resembled after giving birth I have done really well. He said he was a ‘bit worried’ it would never go and said he thought ‘what the hell is that?’ when he saw me straight afterwards ‘sitting with it plonked in front of me.’

Dear Diary, Have dug a man shaped hole in the back garden.

Dear Diary, Will this week ever end?

Dear Diary, Will I ever be an organized mother?

Dear Diary, Some things just aren’t meant to be.

Like Monkey’s ruling the world.

Or Being the perfect mother.

I think you must just have to let go and enjoy the moment.

But I see these other mothers and they look so restrained and in control! Surely they aren’t having secret rumblings for a northern man in wellies who own’s a talking cabbage? Surely they don’t forget to clean dishes and end up eating soup out of the pan? Surely they aren’t scared of turning in to Nanny from count Duckula?

Oh well.

Think I will retire my plans and settle down for a while, in the here and now. I am what I am, que sera sera and whatever will be will be. Once a brick always a brick.

(I may have made that last one up.)

But seriously, if you happen to see a giant cucumber toddling down the road looking a bit confused and carrying and Aldi bag, keep an eye on your belongings sure, but don’t write it off, maybe give it a wave. Or maybe a hug.

But be warned, it may swear at you. Or cry. Or gush, or laugh, or dance, or potentially bend over and get in to fight mode…. you just never know with those root veg.

They can be a bit unpredictable.

Just like new mothers.

The Mosquito effect.

It was while I was driving to McDonalds for a sneaky Drifter Mcflurry at 8ocklock on Tuesday evening that I decided I would probably hold off on the whole killing myself thing.

I hadn’t put much thought in to the actual event other than thinking perhaps I would leave a note describing how I would like people to behave and what I would like people to wear at my funeral (big shades and lots of random dramatic hysterical sobbing please. And then a disco that goes on all night.) And yes, ok. Maybe I had thought a little about how I would do it, but I hadn’t set a date or anything.

The very idea of it was tiny. It was just a little niggling mosquito at the very back of my head that would occasionally flap it’s wings, buzz and fanny around. At first it would annoy the hell out of me and I would fight tooth and nail to swat it away.

I have to admit though, there were times during the worst Post natal depression days when I had become so lethargic in both mood and physicality that I would allow it to bounce around joyfully and my struggle to wave it away would become very lacklustre, preferring instead to lie back and watch.

It was during these lonely and hidden moments, filled with self loathing and internal sadness that, I suppose, if I am truly honest, I thought perhaps it might be a good idea.

That the world would be a better place without me in it.

I also spent an inordinate amount of time planning the disco for my funeral.

There was going to be a disco ball and vodka fountain, where instead of dipping fudge in chocolate you dipped lemon in vodka. Fabulous Drag queens would belt out a load of sad tunes but with a glittery and marvellous twist and once all the old fogeys had retired to their own homes and just the giggly girls were left, I would organize some sort of hilariously naughty camp ra ra show involving Sinita singing a whole host of 80’s tunes in a Hula skirt bonanza.

It was during my second week at therapy in a moment of madness, I admitted I had been planning to jump off a train platform.

I surprised myself by knowing which station.

So it turns out I had put some thought in to it after all, without even realising.

Enjoying the peacefulness of sitting alone in the car, swirling cheap half melted ice cream and liquid gold around a big white plastic spoon, while staring out at the grimy grey tower block in front of me and above it at the almost translucent yellow, orange and pink, tranquil and yet somehow angry, sky, I finally swatted the mosquito and allowed myself to consciously acknowledge what was going on.

Those thoughts aren’t healthy to entertain even on a subconscious level and if I was planning anything of the sort then why the hell bother putting myself through all the therapy in the hope of getting better? Surely putting oneself through hours of torturous ruminating and reminiscing over some quite traumatic events would be totally futile if the end result would be me; dead.

I have an illness. The priory hospital has helped me understand this. It is an illness just like any physical illness except it is in my brain.

It is not my fault, it does not make me a bad person or a terrible mother. It does not make me disgusting or ugly or evil, or even unworthy.

It is not my fault. 

The illness is Post-natal depression and I am not going to let it beat me.

I have a support network of friends and family, and it is time to come clean and fess up, thus allowing them to help, however hard that may be.

And most importantly I have my beautiful, angelic, gorgeous, tottering, wobbling, giggling, slobbering son who I bloody brought in to this world, and who needs me just as much as I need him.

He is my fucking everything, and even though this ‘chemical imbalance’  has robbed me of some of the most precious moments in his first year and is still attempting to steal each and every positive emotion from me I will not let it win the war.

The occasional battle maybe, but never the war.

Did I tell you about my Drifter Mcflurry?

The machine was broken so the guy made it by hand. It was my idea of heaven in a cup. Far too much topping and not enough ice cream. I still feel all warm and gooey thinking about it now.

It was one of those once in a lifetime events.

It’s funny how sometimes a tiny action made by a complete stranger, an accidental flick of the wrist, allowing too much sugar to fill up a cup, can effectively change somebody else’s life path forever, without either of them even ever realising.

Last night a Mcflurry saved my life. (The lesser known In Deep song.)

Oh and, FYI– if I ever get married, one day (cough cough, M-A-R-R-I-E-D Irish One, that thing where one person gets down on one knee and then you go to church and profess your love for one another….) my reception is going to be bloody brilliant!!!

How do I get hold of Sinita?

The quiet before the storm. (Cert 18.)

There comes a certain point in a woman’s life where she has to break the silence.

The past few weeks, in and out of the priory more times than Amy Winehouse during the drug years (and with very similar hair, much to my disappointment) has left me feeling locked inside my head with no escape.

Alcatraz holds nothing in comparison to the self-imposed confines of my radio silence let me tell you. Swimming through all types of nauseatingly smelly and putrid mud that even the likes of (that wimp) Andy Dufraine never experienced has been a regular occurrence as of late and has left me feeling both emotionally drained and exhausted as well as suffering from a pretty horrific stomach bug.

Therapy is hard, there is no two ways about it, but what is harder? Not being able to break the silence when one desperately needs to.

My fight to break the silence came to an abrupt and shocking end at approximately 8pm on Saturday night. I had just received a text from a friend requesting my company at the local pub.

‘The mums are out partying, we are at the cinema, we miss you. Where are you?’

I felt;

‘I am currently trying not to poo while violently throwing up, enjoy the film.’ 

would probably have been a slight over share on my part, and more than likely would have put the girls right off their half pints and chocolate raisins, so I chose instead to not respond, and direct my full attention and maximum focus to the task at hand.

The task being emptying ones stomach without opening ones bladder against ones will, while moaning erratically each and every time the wave of nausea crescendo’s up in to my throat, as well as, at the same time groaning ‘I’ve been siiiiiiiiiick’ at a volume the entire neighborhood can hear in a bid to ensure each and every person in the vicinity has a full understanding of what I am having to endure and can completely agree and attest to the fact that I, Lexy Ellis am a brave little soldier who is being poorly but really should win an award for her blatant courageous vomiting.

The sweat was rolling down my forehead, my stomach was cramping, convulsing and contracting and I was doing my damnest to hold on to consciousness while at the same time cleaning up the rim of the loo with a wet wipe (is there anything worse than sick on the loo rim? See? Even in times of trouble, mother nature calls to me, singing words of wisdom… hang on sorry, that’s not what I meant, I am clearly still delirious…I am still conscientious of others that’s what I meant!) When like a demon of stupidity whispering in my overworked and underpaid ear, from behind the bathroom door came a little voice, filled with fear.

‘Darling, I am sorry to trouble you, but the dog has shit everywhere and Addison has been sick all over the sofa, do you know how long you will be? I could really do with some help out here.’

I honestly think that this simply horrifying and nightmarish experience deserves a moment’s silence. I really do.  We should totally give it the respect it deserves.

But to be honest, having had enough silence over the last 3 weeks, this was the prick that broke the camels back, the cherry on the ball shaped cake, the stone being thrown in the big glass house and the icing on a big hairy poodle shaped turd.

My silence has been broken.

Can you hear me screaming?

I cleaned up dog poo while running to the toilet to be sick, Addison has a tummy bug and The Irish one was amazingly helpful but I had to clean up doggy doo doo while wiping a nappy one can only describe as a swimming pool of murky green poo and then had to be sick myself and there were bits of sweetcorn everywhere but nobody even ate any sweetcorn and why did I think that eating a bag of salt and vinegar Disco’s would settle my stomach when the all  they did was take what was remaining on the roof of my mouth off with their vinegary torture!?!? Why the hell do I have to catch everything Addison catches and then Why the HELL does doodle have to catch everything I catch? I had to clean up poo while cleaning my own sick up! Weeing when you sneeze is one thing but following through when you vomit? That isn’t funny at all! Not at all. It may have scarred me for life! Doodle witnessed it! He will never be the same again. Ever. Motherhood isn’t magical! It is tragic. Tragic. My friends were the cinema and meanwhile I was stuck in the little flat of horrors. There was no need for a talking plant or a woman with bouncy red hair, I had a dog with gastroenteritis and a baby who in between all the vomiting and wet farting, thought it was fun to try and lick a glass window, resulting in more bruises on his forehead and more screams of anguish than you would see on the hills have eyes. If you wanted to play connect the dots on Addison’s forehead now you totally could and you know what you would spell? THE HORROR THE HORROR.

I could go on, I really could, but I want to save some for the next and long overdue moaning bitch club! It wasn’t only my weekend that got me here, it was last week too! My bag got nicked, My phone screen smashed, my car got a flat tire… the list is fecking endless!

Today at the priory I intend to talk a lot.

Just woe betide, the person who politely asks how my weekend went.