You know me, I like to help where I can, so I’ve made a list of tips and tricks for living with almost-adults:
Ten Rules for Living with Teens
I’m a Loser, Baby
This week I had a rejection that stung even more than the time a bee flew into my mouth when I was on the back of my friend’s bike in 1982. This rejection hurt so keenly because a) I was convinced this book and this editor were a good fit b) Rejection is agonising - always c) It was the most positive, flattering and encouraging rejection I’ve ever had.
Down The Screen Time Rabbit Hole
First published in http://www.the-motherload.co.uk on 17th January 2020 My eleven-year-old’s face once shone with bright ideas and a willingness to engage with the world around her. Now, if I see her face at all, it’s illuminated with an eerie fluorescent glow. She got a mobile phone for her birthday and that very day she disappeared... Continue Reading →
Chalk and Cheese
How Can my Girls be so Different? (First published in The Motherload Blogzine on 3/11/19) ‘It’s another girl,’ said the male sonographer at our twenty-two-week scan, ‘sorry.’ Ignoring the last comment (that’s a whole other article), I remember being delighted that our second, and definitely last, child was a girl. We already had a three-year-old... Continue Reading →
What’s in a Name?
(First Published on The Motherload Blogzine, 31st August 2019) My name is Lisa. I was perfectly happy about that until I opened a Drama School in my early 30’s and every fourth mother enrolling their child was called Lisa too. It was then I realised that my name gave away my age. Lisa is the... Continue Reading →
Should I Let my Child Watch the News?
Following a discussion on the Jeremy Vine show about my ten-year-old daughter’s response to Brexit, a listener called in to say that any anxiety my child felt was my fault for allowing her to watch the news. When I’d stopped defensively stamping my feet and blaming the politicians, I thought about it from the commentator’s... Continue Reading →
Birthmark of Respect
Walking the corridors of Great Ormond Street Hospital is a humbling experience. Your healthy child will never feel more precious than when you have seen what other children have to suffer I have visited the specialised children’s hospital in Central London many times since my eldest child was born. She failed all her post-natal tests,... Continue Reading →
The Responsibility of Being Loved
Confession of a Guilty Mother During a meeting about Secondary School admissions, the weight of my daughter’s love hit me like a tidal wave. She’d been interviewed alone by the School’s Assistant Principal, before I was invited in to join them. One of the questions he’d asked her was where she’d like to time-travel to, and... Continue Reading →
A Gift From My Daughter
A Gift From My Daughter Will I Ever Be More Than Mum? My youngest daughter is an empath, she’s kind, thoughtful and clever, but she recently bought me the kind of present which made me wonder if she knows me at all. Fourteen years into my parenting role, I believe I’ve earned my ‘useful’ stripes.... Continue Reading →
Managing Our Mental Health
Managing Our Mental Health Be Kind to Yourself this Festive Season A colony of troublesome sprites live inside my brain. These sprites hold my thoughts in their spindly fingers, and they have sprinter’s legs which can run so fast, and in such unexpected directions, it takes me all my time to control them. I need... Continue Reading →
Lisa Timoney Writes 