Author: samantha

Tackling Insomnia – Part One

On By samanthaIn HEALTH3 Comments

Happy New Year!

This week I have really battled with insomnia. I tend to go to bed around 10.30pm and am usually asleep by 11pm but have been waking about at around 3am and finding it almost impossible to fall back to sleep. If I do manage to nod back off, I am plagued by the most terrible nightmares, possibly caused by the Propranolol that I take for migraine prevention. The sort of nightmares that stay with you all day. Menopause apparently is also a major culprit when it comes to low quality sleep.

Last night I woke with a migraine after sleeping for four hours and got out of bed to take a Sumitriptan tablet. That was it for the night then, I just lay there trying not to disturb my husband. We have a burglar alarm and, although I know you are suppose to get out of bed and not just lie there trying to sleep, I didn’t want to venture downstairs and risk the beeping waking the rest of my family. Fortunately today is a Saturday and I am not working and I don’t have to drive anywhere because I feel shattered.

My daughter bought me a rather lovely silk sleep mask from Millie & Boo for Christmas. The mask has wonderful reviews with people stating that using it radically improved the quality of their sleep. The mask, which is well made, super soft and a pretty silver grey, arrived beautifully boxed. It fastens with velcro and I have been careful not to secure it too tightly nonetheless I think the slight pressure across the top of my face has contributed to my migraine. Maybe not the solution I have been searching for.

My GP was optimistic that the Utrogestan capsules that I take before bed as part of my HRT routine would help, and for a few months they did, but my insomnia is now back with a vengeance. Once it gets to around 3am I am wide awake and unable to stop the racing thoughts that flood my mind. I start to worry about…well everything. A mistake I made at work in 1989, something daft I said at a coffee morning in 1999, I’m stressing about it at 3am in 2025. Apparently we experience a Cortisol (known as the stress hormone) spike at around this time and this is why early morning waking is so common. I note that my fists are often clenched and I have slept with a sheet over my face since I was a little girl and was frightened of ghosts whispering to me. Both of these things are apparently signs of high stress levels. It has become increasingly clear that one of the first things I need to tackle in 2025 is my insomnia as it is going to start affecting my long term health. In particular, in light of my mum’s Alzheimer’s disease, I am keen to regularly achieve a good night’s sleep to help prevent cognitive decline.

This week I am not going to watch television on my computer before bed which is a habit I have fallen into. I am going to sit in bed and read an actual book, nothing dark or frightening. I do read three or four books a month but it used to be around double that before I discovered the endless entertainment on Netflix . I am also going to try to do some sort of pre-sleep meditation to relax my body, particularly my hands and jaw which is where I seem to store most of my stress and tension. I shall report back.

Wish me luck.

Thank you for reading

Samantha

Mean Girls – The Musical, a Review

On By samanthaIn GOING OUTLeave a comment

My daughter’s twenty first birthday is fast approaching but she will be at university, taking exams. I thought it would be nice to take her out for lunch in Covent Garden and then on to see a show. I looked at what was on and decided to book tickets for Mean Girls which has recently opened at The Savoy Theatre on The Strand. I paid around £200 for two tickets for a 2.30pm Saturday matinee perfomance.

From the town where we live to Charing Cross is around a half hour train ride and then we walked to Covent Carden and had a look around the East Collanade Market which has dozens of stalls selling handmade items, similar to the sort of thing you might find on Etsy. We stopped off for lunch at a pizza place and then went on to the theatre.

The Savoy Theatre is covered in scaffolding at the moment but there is a big banner outside so it was easy to find. In the lobby there is a stand selling some merchandise such as “I’m a Massive deal” tote bags for £20 and “On Wednesdays We Wear Pink” T shirts , also £20. I have only seen the Lindsey Lohan movie once and wasn’t aware that there has been another film made in 2024 so the catch phrases didn’t mean much to me. There were lots of little girls in the lobby dressed in boucle mini dresses (the Mean Girl uniform) which was surprising to me, I thought the target audience would be much older than six or seven years old.

Although the tickets stated that audience members should arrive by 2pm the theatre was very slow to fill. We had terrific seats but, annoyingly, a huge man sat right in front of me blocking my view so I had to spend the entire performance peering around him. While we waited, the backdrop was back-lit pages of the “burn book” featued in the story which wasn’t very inspiring to sit and look at. Then the show started and we are introduced to the characters of Damian and Janice, the school’s arty, gay outcasts. Damian has a crush on George Michael and this is a running theme in the set design.

If you haven’t seen the film, written by comedy genius Tina Fey, the story revolves around the character of Kady Heron, played by Charlie Burn. Kady has has recently moved to Illonois from Kenya and High School with its different cliques is rather a revelation to her. The school Queen Bee is Regina George, played by Georgina Castle, who presides over The Plastics, a clique of pretty, popular, shallow and insecure “mean girls” who are all desperate to be Regina’s best friend. The most memorable moment of the show was Regina’s majestic entrance onto the stage. Despite being a maths wizard, Kady finds herself damping down her academic ability and morphing into a Plastic herself and decides to topple Queen Regina when they clash over a boy, Aaron.

To be honest the whole production felt slightly amateurish, particularly the dancing, and some of the singing was a little screechy, even from the leads. Georgina Castle, Elena Gyasi (Gretchen) and Grace Mouat (Karen) were the stars of the show and Tom Xander provided the well-timed comic relief. The songs were fun to listen to but, in my opinion not very memorable apart from Karen’s solo “Sexy”. There was one instance were Janice hopped into a scene to clarify what was going on which was irritating and unnecessary. The cast seemed very joyful and genuinely delighted to be there which is always contagious and it is definitely a feel-good production. I enjoyed Mean Girls and so did my daughter, it isn’t a show that I would go and see again but we left the theatre feeling uplifted and entertained.

Thank you for reading

Samantha

The Substance – A Film Starring Demi Moore and Margaret Qualley

On By samanthaIn GOING OUT3 Comments

This review does contain spoilers. The Substance, directed by Coralie Fargeat truly is a bonkers movie. I can’t really think of a more eloquent word to describe it. Bonkers, horrific and, in places, very funny. I haven’t see Demi Moore in a film for over thirty years when she appeared in some of the iconic movies of that era such as Ghost and Indecent Proposal . Margaret Qualley (who is the daughter of Andie McDowell) starred in the fantastic Netflix miniseries about domestic violence and poverty in America, Maid, based on the book of the same name by Stephanie Land. I heard Moore speaking on BBC Radio Four’s Women’s Hour about her role as Elisabeth Sparkle in The Substance. She was so engaging during the interview, several listeners rang in with questions and she seemed genuinely delighted to hear from them and provided thoughtful and comprehensive answers. I asked a friend if she’d like to see the film at the cinema but, annoyingly, it wasn’t showing locally so I ended up watching on Amazon Prime with a Mubi subscription.

The Substance is a commentary on aging in Hollywood. More specifically, women aging in Hollywood. Elisabeth Sparkle is a TV fitness star, she has a show where she works out, Jane Fonda style, with a team of back up dancers. On her fiftieth birthday Elisabeth, all swishy dark hair and blingy sunglasses, meets Harvey, the oily big boss at the TV network for lunch. Harvey is brilliantly played by Dennis Quaid. Harvey sits in front of Elisabeth eating a dish of shrimp in the most stomach-churning manner and explains to her that she is all washed up. He says it “stops” at fifty for women. Elisabeth asks what stops but Harvey just moves onto schmoozing with somebody more important than her. Harvey himself is as old, if not older, than Elizabeth but of course the washed-up rules don’t apply to him and his cohort of white, old men that also run the network. Elisabeth is so upset by the lunch that she crashes her car on the way home and ends up in the Emergency Room where she meets a dashing young doctor who slips a note into her pocket. This is Elisabeth’s invitation to try The Substance, a black market drug that promises a person can become the best version of themselves using some sort of cell replication process.

Now, I had no idea what to expect when I sat down to watch and it did come as something as a surprise to find that this is actually a horror film with some very graphic scenes. Elisabeth receives a list of instructions for using The Substance and one of these is Remember, you are one. Elisabeth injects herself and then the viewer is treated to her eyeballs multiplying and her back splitting open and another human being steps out of the gaping wound in the shape of Margaret Qualley. Elisabeth is left lying in an unresponsive heap on the floor.

In the scenes where Elisabeth is inspecting her aging (but, being Demi Moore, pretty perfect) body in the mirror we see her flat, misshapen bottom. Qualley, whose character settles on the rather unimaginative name Sue, has the most perfect, pert bottom in existence. In fact everything about Sue is so perfect that she seems to radiate youth and vitality through the screen. Sue sews up Elizabeth’s back and it is her turn, for the next seven days, to go out into the world. That’s how it works, Sue has a week of consciousness then Elisabeth has a week. They cannot deviate from this schedule without dire consequences. Sue dons a skimpy, shiny purple leotard, lashings of lip gloss and immediately heads to the studios to apply to be Elisabeth’s replacement. The inappropriate men auditioning all drool over her boobs and perfect buttocks and she lands the role.

Sue, it turns out, has rather impressive DIY skills and builds a concealed room in Elisabeth’s apartment so she can bring people back without them discovering Elizabeth’s comatose body. When it is Elisabeth’s turn to wake up, with a very sore back, she finds that she has been replaced by Sue in the world of TV fitness. There is a giant billboard of Sue right in front of her penthouse window, she cannot escape it. Isn’t this what Elisabeth wanted, another shot at being young and vibrant? Isn’t Sue’s success Elisabeth’s success? Sue, when awake, is thoroughly enjoying all the attention and does not remember that she and Elisabeth are one, she leaves her on the cold floor for longer and longer periods effectively stealing Elisabeth’s remaining youth from her. You may be wondering where the comedy is in all of this but there are some funny scenes. Sue’s interactions with the tongue-tied man in the opposite apartments are hilarious. When Elisabeth wakes up she finds her Louis Vuitton handbags thrown in an old box labelled Elisabeth’s junk. When Sue is doing a filmed work out strange things start to happen to her perfect behind.

There is a lot of gore in The Substance and the film just gets crazier scene by scene. Sue is offered the job of presenting the network’s big New Years Eve show but it is Elisabeth’s turn to be conscious. This is where things start to go very pear shaped to say the least. The ending is horrifying but it is also very funny. I really liked Elisabeth and it was sad that she felt so worthless because some slimy man had judged all women to be finished at fifty. She could not see the beautiful, talented woman looking back at her in the mirror, only the rejected former TV star. Sue is a more one-dimensional character, beautiful, young and ruthless.

I thoroughly enjoyed this interesting and strange film. Moore herself is famous for her multiple plastic surgeries and I think it was brave of her to be so vulnerable and exposed in this role. Qualley, a rising star, brought so much energy to her part and Sue’s desperation to hold onto her new found fame and glamour was palpable. The Substance is a little long at over two hours twenty minutes but it is well worth watching.

Thank you for reading

Samantha

Angry People & How To Avoid Them

On By samanthaIn FAMILYLeave a comment

I had a horrible encounter this week which left me really shaken. My son travels to school by train and, most weekdays, I drive to pick him up. I always do a U turn before parking so that I am facing in the right direction to go home again. So do all the other people collecting commuters. Anyway I checked the road was clear on both side and swung my car round when there was a startling blaring of horn. Another driver, a man of about sixty, had sped right up behind me and was incandescent with rage because I had held his journey up by a nanosecond while I completed my turn. He rolled down his window and spewed the most vile barrage of abuse at me. A sensible person would have just driven off but, I rolled my own window down and asked why he felt the need to be so aggressive. Oh my goodness, he went nuts. The veins in his neck and forehead were bulging and I’m sure he would have like to have hit me. There was a lone woman sitting in the back of his car looking sheepish and I wondered if she was his partner or if he was actually a taxi driver. Anyway I was quite shaken up by his frothing-at-the-mouth behavior but glad it had happened to me and not one of my children. I am sure that he would not have behaved that way had I been a big, burly man. I did also wonder how anyone can go through life sustaining that level of anger, would he go home and take it out of the people he lives with? My dad and my husband are both calm people who I have hardly ever heard raise their voices thank goodness, I’m just not used to being screamed at like that.

Then today I was in the supermarket when the woman behind me began to put her shopping on the conveyor belt before I had unloaded mine. It was a little irritating but I didn’t take much notice. However a couple of her items spilled over onto my own pile and the cashier rang them up as mine. It was easily sorted out and the woman whose shopping it was said “thank goodness you’re not one of those angry people”. Yes, angry people, they are everywhere and they frighten the heck out of me. My aunt, almost ninety, took her dog to the vet and pipped a woman in her twenties to the last parking spot. The young woman called my aunt a wh*re. How disgusting and unnecessary. If one of my kids spoke to an elderly lady in that way I would consider myself a failure as a parent. Again, my aunt, a feisty woman, was very shaken up .

My advice to my children who are all out in the world with these walking time-bombs, is avoid confrontation at all costs. If you are driving and someone irritates you don’t beep them, just let it go. Don’t make eye contact and don’t gesticulate. If you are at a bar or party and you sense the atmosphere become menacing, leave straight away. It’s just not worth it. I remember a man screaming at my mum at a bus stop when I was a very young child, these perpetually furious people have always been amongst us. Yes, they may be having a bad day but there’s no reason to take it out on the rest of us.

Thank you for reading,

Samantha

Christmas Gift Ideas for Family and Friends

On By samanthaIn SHOPPINGLeave a comment

I went to the dentist a couple of weeks ago, it was the 26th October and she asked “are you all ready for Christmas?” Huh? Christmas, we hadn’t even had Halloween. This year has flown by and I suppose I need to get organised. It will only be the five of us and my parents for Christmas lunch but I also have my elderly aunt and my parents over sometime in early December.

So gifts, I want to get on with buying them and wrapping them up as they arrive so I am not wrestling with the Sellotape for hours on end. I would like to say the presents I choose are all sourced from local businesses and, before I went back to work, that would be the case but now I have no time to go to the shops so they are mostly bought online. For my elderly relatives I now stick to Marks and Spencer vouchers and they can spend them on nice food if they wish. Here are my picks for other gifts for 2024:

Girls older teens/early twenties

Earrings, not very expensive because they lose them but no so cheap they will turn their ears green. I have chosen these nine carat gold studs from QVC, I bought them when they were on special offer, they are currently £75 which is a little expensive for a stocking filler. They will look nice with my daughter’s suits when she is on her new work placement.

Travel Jewellery Box from Oliver Bonas, because I always have to buy something when I go in to this shop, they sell so many pretty things. These boxes are reduced at the time of writing. They come in lots of pretty designs and are a useful, inexpensive gift for just about anyone.

Joggers from ASOS My daughter plays a lot of sport and all young people seem to live in joggers. Last year I bought her a fleece lined pair but I don’t think they were a hit. These are a little sleeker. I noticed while shopping for these that most of the styles now have wide legs but they’d trip my daughter up if she were wearing them for lacrosse practice.

Teenage Boys

Cash, that’s what they really appreciate but I will also buy some clothes for my younger son. Again, joggers, boys seem to prefer grey. Wide hems seem to be the trend for boys too but I have stuck to the traditional, cuffed style

Crew neck sweatshirt from Uniqlo. My younger son already has one of these in navy and the quality is great. He doesn’t tend to wear hoodies, he likes something a little smarter.

Suitcase, one of my sons is travelling to Australia next year and will need a new case. I was not terribly impressed with my recent purchase from Samsonite so am thinking of ordering this one by brand Americal Tourister from Amazon, Not a brand I am familiar with but this product has almost 1500 excellent reviews and is reasonably priced at £90.

Anti-theft laptop backpack, my older two children take very inexpensive flights where they cram clothes for a week into a backpack because it costs around £100 for them to upgrade to a small suitcase. I purchased two of these from Amazon in grey and in black, they have proved to be a winner so I will buy another for my younger son. My older son takes his into the office as does my daughter when she is on work placement. She said all the girls use similar, no one uses a traditional handbag for work anymore.

I always seem to be buying water bottles and then the lids get lost and they are useless. I am sure there are ten lids under my son’s bed but I daren’t look for fear of what else is lurking there. I will probably buy one or two of these from Chilly’s

Other sure-fire winners are those nylon, fluffy socks, slipper boots, plaid pyjama bottoms in brushed cotton, lip balm sets, body sprays and some of their favorite sweets.

Friends

I have about half a dozen friends that I buy gifts for, usually spending around £30 on average. Most of us complain about the amount of clutter in our homes and I am keen not to add to anyone’s burden of “stuff”.

For my friend who works from home I am going to buy this burgundy Parker Pen. I think it is a useful and elegant gift.

For my friend who takes her dog on lots of chilly walks I am going to buy her this cosy sweatshirt from Marks and Spencer which she can return if she doesn’t like it.

For my friend with whom I just exchange a tiny little gift, I am going to buy her this cute teddy keyring from Harrods. A very little bit of luxury.

So, an expensive and busy time of year, especially for women in my experience. Start writing your cards now, assuming people are still sending Christmas cards given the recent rise in the cost of stamps. My aunt writes her during August. Last year I sat writing ours for so long that my legs went to sleep and , when I tried to stand up, I fell flat on my face, not the best start to the festive season!

Happy Shopping!

Thank you for reading

Samantha

University Work Placement Challenges

On By samanthaIn FAMILYLeave a comment

It is the beginning of November and getting dark at 4pm. I find the approach of winter a little more difficult with every year that passes. The people opposite put a spooky figure onto their garden wall for Halloween and every time I look out of the window I shudder. Hopefully he will be put back in a cupboard soon. Somebody asked me today if I am all ready for Christmas which made me feel a little panicked. The answer is resounding no – I have hardly given Christmas a single thought. Humbug.

I should have gone to the gym today but instead had a bacon sandwich for lunch and sat on the sofa watching Katharine Hepburn and Humphrey Bogart in the wonderful 1951 film African Queen. I actually managed to relax instead of sitting there thinking about all the other things that I should be doing.

My daughter came home from university for one night as she had an interview for her second work placement. She had to prepare a case study, PowerPoint presentation and travel into London. As I have mentioned in an earlier post Heading Back to University , finding these work placements is a stressful process for students and extremely time consuming. They cannot just submit their CV, every position requires a bespoke application. The university is at least a two hour journey from the centre of London which is where many of the companies are based and train travel is expensive, one company did reimburse my daughter the £75 fare. Many of the students apply to multiple companies and it can be confidence destroying if they receive a few rejections. Not finding a placement is not an option on this course so they have to keep on going down the list provided by the university. My daughter attended one interview where she was questioned by a panel of four people then asked to complete some maths papers, the position went to someone else on her course. This time she was up against her friend and housemate. My daughter’s friend was interviewed and gave her presentation but my daughter was only interviewed. When she got home she had to hurriedly pack her bag and head back out as she is finally getting away for a few days. Before she left she received a call from the university placement officer saying she had been offered the position. I could see the tension leave my daughter’s body but she immediately started worrying about her friend who will have to keep on searching.

My mother-in-law has now been in hospital for a month with pneumonia. She cannot go home until her carers have been trained in using a nebuliser. My husband said she appears astonishly calm and we suspect that she is being given some sort of sedative. It’s difficult to believe one of the busiest hospitals in London can spare a bed for this long but the real worrying will start when she goes home and begins the cycle of not letting her carers in or shouting at them so much that they refuse to return. She will be ninety years old tomorrow and her other sons have travelled from their homes abroad to spend some time with her.

So some little wins this week, my daughter has her placement and I managed to enjoy a lazy couple of hours. Hopefully my daughter won’t spend her week in the sun cathing up with her university work and will come back feeling refreshed.

Thank you for reading

Samantha

The spooky, and quite frankly sinister, view from my windows.

The Dementia Diaries – Chapter Twelve Alzheimer’s Disease

On By samanthaIn THE DEMENTIA DIARIESLeave a comment

I am in rather a low mood so please forgive me if this post is a little miserable. It’s been a tough week with one thing and another. My mother in law is in hospital in London again, this time with Pneumonia A doctor rang my husband and said that he thought my mother-in-law must be hallucinating because of the abusive things she was saying to staff in A & E. My husband had to explain that this is just her every day behaviour. She has now been abusive to every nurse on the ward and, when a woman visiting another patient offered her a chocolate biscuit she went ballistic. My husband has been to see her almost every day but my mother-in-laws tells anyone who will listen that he doesn’t even ring to see how she is. He speaks to her multiple times every single day of the year. My husband’s brothers both live overseas but also speak to her daily and are coming over to see her as it is her ninetieth birthday in a week or so and they had a celebratory dinner planned. I haven’t been visiting her. My mother-in-law, as you may have gathered, is a complex and difficult person and I don’t fancy being in the firing line.

Today I got up early and did some housework, washing and ironing. At 11am I loaded my car with my vacuum cleaner, mop and bucket and drove for two minutes which is all the time it takes to get to Mum and Dad’s, I prefer to walk but obviously I can’t carry so many cumbersome items. Dad timed the Tesco delivery arrival with my visit so I vacuumed their house, mopped the kitchen floor, put the laundry mountain away and then dealt with the grocery delivery. I was standing in the hallway with an enormously heavy crate and mum just would not move out of my way “go around me” she said. I couldn’t without banging into her. Now my shoulder is killing me.

On Tuesday I took my parents to the memory clinic at the local hospital. Getting Mum into the car was an ordeal but we managed it. I decided that I was going to accompany my parents into the actual appointment rather than waiting in the reception area for them as I usually do. The consultation was with a psychiatrist. Dad had changed the batteries in Mum’s hearing aids that morning but she still could not hear a thing or follow the conversation at all. She was sitting right next to the doctor and just smiling vacantly at everything he said. It felt really sad and undignified. The doctor asked if mum is still driving. Thank goodness she has never driven so we haven’t had the same battle that some of my friend’s have had of persuading their parents that they are no longer safe on the roads. Then he spoke about her having a will and Power of Attorney. He told us that Mum’s recent brain scan showed that her Hippocampus, the part of the brain associated with memory, has shrunk considerably and gave her a diagnoses of Alzheimer’s Disease which was not entirely unexpected but still difficult to hear. He asked Dad if they are managing and Dad replied yes. I interjected at this point because, despite Dad’s heroic efforts, this isn’t quite true. Mum is not washing anymore and can’t get in the bath or shower. I don’t mind washing Mum’s hair but I am not comfortable with giving her a more intimate wash and they are still refusing to have a carer in to help. Throughout this dementia “journey” I have found that my parents prefer everything to be a secret and this attitude is proving a huge barrier to them receiving appropriate assistance. The psychiatrist said they should contact social services. I asked if he could organise a referral himself and he agreed. Dad has rung the district nurse multiple times about some hygiene-related issues that Mum is having but we can’t even get a phone call back.

So, two frail, elderly ladies, one in hospital and one being cared for at home. Meanwhile my aunt, almost ninety, is zipping around here, there and everywhere in her car, looking very “with it” as she says right down to her Zara outfits and sparkly nail polish. Dad is still as sharp as a tack but has had to give up his own interests to look after Mum. Life is not always easy but like, thousands of other families, we are muddling along.

Thank you for reading,

Samantha

Cover Photo by Pawel Czerwinski on Unsplash

This Week I Have Been…. Gripping Reads, Chilling Viewing & a Spooky Podcast

On By samanthaIn GOING OUTLeave a comment

Reading – The Woman Who Lied by Claire Douglas

I recently reviewed The Wrong Sister by Claire Douglas which was a real page-turner. The Woman Who Lied is even more gripping, I thought. There are so many inexpensive thrillers available for Kindle, usually described as “completely gripping” and “unputdownable” but so many of them aren’t very well written or have big plot holes. Like most readers, if find a book I enjoy then I am likely to read more of that author’s work.

Emilia is a successful author of nine crime novels featuring a fictional detective called Miranda Moody. The ninth book is just about to be published and Emilia has a surprising storyline planned for the tenth and final novel in the series. The fruits of her labour have bought her a huge home in Richmond which she shares with her second husband, Elliot and her children Jasmine and Wilfy. Emilia’s first husband left her for her former friend Kristen. Ottilie, Emilia’s long standing friend from boarding school lives nearby and often visits so that they can bitch about Kristen. Emilia has recently made a new friend, another mother at at Wilfy’s school, Louise, herself a detective with The Metropolitan Police, a useful contact to have when you’re a crime novelist.

One day, a harassed Emilia is on her way to a meeting with her agent when her bus is evacuated. Something begins to niggle, didn’t the exact same thing happen in one of her early Miranda Moody books? Surely just a coincidence. Then things begin to get really sinister, skylights open by themselves in the house, funeral wreaths are left for Emilia and that’s just the tame stuff. If you have a virtual assistant in your home, especially an Alexa, you may wish to scrap it after reading this book. Unfortunately, in order to find out who is terrorising her, Emilia is going to have to divulge a pretty big secret of her own. Lots of red herrings keep the reader guessing to almost the last page.

Watching –.Baby Ruby on Netfilx

Baby Ruby is listed under the horror section on Netflix and there are many typical horror elements but it is really a film about post natal psychosis. If you are pregnant you may wish to give it a miss. Jo, a French woman living in the US (played by Noemie Merlant), has a successful lifestyle blog, Love, Josephine. Here she posts the usual influencer pictures of herself in pretty outfits, her home looking pristine and healthy meals she has of course rustled up from scratch. Her last post is for her baby shower which she threw for herself as she doesn’t trust anybody else to do it as perfectly as she can. Jo and her husband, Spencer, are excited about their impending arrival, their first baby, and there is no reason to think anything is amiss. Then, Jo has an odd encounter with a new mother in a baby store and things begin to unravel.

When she does make an appearance, Baby Ruby herself is the cutest little thing. She looks like she should be wearing the cap of an acorn on her head and be living in a forest as a pixie However, she is a non-stop crier and Jo is soon exhausted. Motherhood has no respect for Jo’s perfectionism. Her colleague impatiently asks when she will be posting a picture of her new baby as the readers (and no doubt sponsors) are waiting in anticipation but Jo just has no interest, she is teetering on the edge of a mental breakdown.

Even at the end of the film it is difficult for the viewer to discern what was real and what formed part of Jo’s delusion. At first it’s not clear whether she has stumbled upon some sort of witches coven or whether it’s all in her head. Is it some sort of Rosemary’s Baby situation or is Jo unwell? I found this film really frightening and didn’t entirely understand the ending but the plot was compelling.

Listened To –Classic Ghost Stories by Tony Walker on Apple Itunes

As it is the month of Halloween it seems fitting to recommend a spooky stories podcast and this one really is top notch. The title of the podcast, Classic Ghost Stories is slightly misleading because the story I listened to today, The Premonition by Lewis Darley, was set in around 2016 and takes place in modern day Bristol so not yet a classic. I particularly enjoyed the fact that Walker interviewed Lewis Darley after the reading and we found out a little about his inspiration and other creative works. Of course most of the authors featured are long since deceased but the stories have stood the test of time. I have enjoyed every one so far, particularly Three Miles Up by Elizabeth Jane Howard and The Work of Evil by William Croft Dickinson. Walker narrates beautifully making this podcast a delight to listen to and I am happy to see there are five seasons so I have a lot of supernatural scariness to catch up on.

.Thanks for reading

Samantha

Cover Photo by Aaron Burden on Unsplash

A Beginner’s Tale: Core Fitness Struggles

On By samanthaIn HEALTHLeave a comment

I joined the gym a few months ago and my membership gives me access to any number of scary-sounding exercise classes. Most of those I would be interested in attending fall on my working days so I am left with “Core Fitness”. I am looking to improve my core strength and stability so this sounded perfect.

The first week I went along, the class was packed and I couldn’t believe how difficult I found it. I was by far the least coordinated in the group although I later found out some of the other women (they are all women) have been attending this class for years. There were lots of yoga poses involved and everybody else seemed to know exactly what these were. For the following five days the muscles in my abdomen were killing me. I have started watching some YouTube videos where I can learn how to do the exercises correctly without injuring myself and in the privacy of my own bedroom. After my fourth class, I began to feel a little more confident. Then, the Swiss Balls appeared and all was lost. Michelle, the instructor, tells us we are going to be using the balls and the entire class erupts in a sort of synchronised groan. I had no clue what was going on. Then Michelle distributed the inflatable balls. I am given the largest one. She tells me I am tall and therefore need the super sized ball. I am five foot eight inches tall, not six foot five. I lie on top of it and don’t feel safe at all, wobbling all over the place and my feet don’t reach the floor. I have never done this type of exercise at all and this wasn’t a very successful first attempt. In the end I did the exercises on the mat, putting the inflatable to one side. I left feeling really quite humiliated.

The following week I forced myself to go back, hoping the wretched balls wouldn’t feature again. Unfortunately they did and we were told to go to the equipment cupboard and select one appropriate for our height. One of the other women, who I had never even spoken to before, passed me a smaller ball and told me she had felt really sorry for me the previous week. Then another women piped up that she had too and that she was really impressed that I kept going. I thought it was so kind of them to take the time to say something encouraging. We all got in our rows and the woman to my left was told that she needed the moon-sized ball but she actually refused to take it. It was still a wobbly workout but I managed the exercises much better on the smaller ball and this time left feeling pleased that I’d made the effort.

I have missed a month of my classes due to working additional days and my never-ending cough but I returned yesterday and, sure enough, the Swiss Balls, were rolled out. I think I will have to find another class if this continues. I managed the exercises reasonably well but the balls are filthy as is the gym floor, covered in other people’s hair. There isn’t really enough space for all of us either. After my class ended one of the women asked me if I would like to join her walking group one day. There are some really nice people around.

Thank you for reading

Samantha

Cover Image by Nhi Nguyễn Tường from Pixabay

The Dementia Diaries – Chapter Eleven – A Long List of Lasts

On By samanthaIn THE DEMENTIA DIARIESLeave a comment

When my mum was younger she was such a busy person, she had a variety of different jobs, secretary, school dinner lady (why are they never called lunch ladies?), barmaid and she would sometimes do a little bit of cleaning for neighbours or feed their pets when they were away. There wasn’t a single day of my childhood that we didn’t have a hot meal, maybe not always from scratch, Mr Brains Faggots and Findus crispy pancakes would feature occasionally but most of the time she’d cook something time consuming after being at work all day. We didn’t have a car so she would have to carry the food shopping back, her palms often red from where the plastic bags had been digging in. She would take evening classes in bizarre things like making pictures out of copper and rush off to meet friends, especially my lovely Godmother, Jo, who died a few years ago just after her one hundredth birthday. Also my friend’s mum, R, who herself sadly now has memory problems and stoically dealt with breast cancer in her late eighties, making less fuss than I would over a stubbed toe. My Mum spoke to R on the phone most Sundays until a couple of years ago but now their forty plus year friendship seems to have been erased from both their memories.

Jo, or Josephine, was about twelve years older than my mum and had never married. Her fiancé had been killed during the war. They met when they both worked for a Greek shipping company. Jo lived on the top two floors of a beautiful terraced town house in Pimlico, her brother and his wife lived on the lower floors. Mum, myself and my twin brother would take The Tube into London to visit Jo, sometimes staying for a few days in the summer. I think my Dad must have been on one of his Open University summer course at this point. In the summer we would go to St James’ Park and Kensington Gardens. In the winter we would go and see the Christmas lights and the Selfridges windows. We’d catch the number 24 bus from Victoria. Jo and her sisters, Baba and Pat, would visit us at our little semi in Hornchurch and my mum would get flustered, cleaning madly before they arrived. She would always cook a huge roast. Jo would always wear one of her many navy blue dresses, usually from Peter Jones. Happy days. Jo died in a nursing home during the pandemic, I couldn’t even attend her funeral. She didn’t know who I was when I last visited her but she looked at a picture of Mum and said “that’s my friend”. It was very moving.

This post has rather gone off tangent but what I wanted to write about was how sad it is when the last time for doing something you loved has been and gone and perhaps you haven’t even realised. Mum will never go into London again, will never see her friend Jo again, never see R again, never cook a roast again (although she helps Dad prepare their meal every evening by peeling the vegetables) . She’ll never again come striding into view, weighed down by grocery shopping. But she is still here. Maybe she can only walk a few steps and perhaps she doesn’t really know what is going on but she and Dad still love each other and still follow their little routines. She still sounds happy to hear my voice when I ring. Less happy to see me in person because she doesn’t like me doing their housework. Life has become very small for Mum and therefore for Dad also, but it is still worth living. Find time to do what you love while you can.

Thank you for reading,

Samantha

Cover Photo by Pawel Czerwinski on Unsplash

Photo of Pimlico by Lisa van Vliet on Unsplash