Less bank robber, more von Trapp family singers

The transition from old life to new..

I’m a fraud.

I’ve been living life like a comic bank robber, with a fat head stuffed into a pair of tights, trying badly to conceal who I actually am. I’ve tried to live life as others do, but an awful lot of it hasn’t felt right, a mismatch of outer and inner worlds. At 43, I wonder who I really am, I think I’m starting to find out.

Now there’s an important distinction to make in the art of being authentic. If you come out and show your true colours and everyone can make sense of it, what follows are whoops of joy and rapturous applause. Which must make the art of being authentic a truly joyful process. But what if showing your true colours means difference and at your unveiling, there’s just a landscape of silence, tumble weeds and judgement. It can be a truly terrifying place to be. This could explain why my whole life I’ve donned the pair of tights, face distorted against the fabric so that I’m half hidden, half not.

My difference became apparent when I hit my teens when there came this pressure to be more social. There were parties, pubs and pressure to chat, make a ton of friends and to flirt with boys. I just didn’t understand how it all worked; I could never find the words. I remember nights in the pub where my friends would all be off, effortlessly connecting with others, and I’d be sat on my own hating every second of it. It was about this time I also found alcohol and when I drank, I found the words I so desperately searched for, when I drank, I seemed to be able to connect with people, until I was so drunk I’d become emotional and paranoid, and people thought I was crazy. There was this optimum moment where I’d drunk enough to be the person I thought I should be, but not so much that I was completely out of control. I’d ride high on the crest of that wave until I’d fall into the abyss of total alcohol-induced oblivion.

I got a boyfriend when I was 17. It lasted a few months until it became clear, we were hugely different people, and he ended it. However, I was hopelessly attached and felt like the world had ended. When I was with him, I finally felt a validation, perhaps I wasn’t so different, maybe there was something to like about me. When it ended the feelings of difference and isolation came flooding back. I stopped eating and I drank more.

And so began a pattern, drink, find a man, feel validation, then it would end, I would be devastated, and I would drink more. This continued well into my 20’s. As I spiralled, my family became increasingly frightened, I lost some friends along the way too who couldn’t make sense of my wild behaviour. But some friends stuck around, never saying anything, being gentle and kind, and they knew. I was lonely, scared, confused and I drank and drank until one day I had a breakdown and ended up in A&E. I remember seeing my face in the mirror the next morning and scarcely recognising myself, eyes bulging from the tears, the distress. My sister came to collect me as she did on many occasions when socialising went wrong, and my family wrapped their arms around me whilst I recovered. I was referred to an alcohol support group, it was probably the lowest point in my life, and I still feel deep shame about it to this day.

Shortly after this time I remember my Mum saying to me, “I’ve lost you haven’t I”, I was sitting in my flat in London with her, having been signed off work for two weeks. She was right, even though she was there, trying to support me, I was somewhere else, in my mind, searching for answers. Who was I? How did I get here?

Alongside this I was struggling to find a career that I enjoyed. All I wanted to do was sing and write songs. I couldn’t earn enough money to support myself doing this, so I found myself in admin jobs in big, busy, social offices, where every Thursday everyone fell out of work and fell into the pub and, of course, I drank my way through it.

I had a few gigs, and I ploughed my feelings into my songs, but I never amassed much of a following, and I always felt consumed with nerves when I performed.

In short, life was messy. I was trying so hard to be someone I wasn’t, and it was slowly killing me.

In my late 20’s I met my husband, and he saved me somewhat. We were kindred spirits who had both found life hard. When the door closed and it was just us, we could be ourselves. It was wonderful.

Jon and I got married and we had our son in 2017. I loved being a Mum, it gave me meaning, I had escaped from the busy workplaces which drained the life out of me, and I existed in this lovely quiet bubble, just me, my husband and son. However, I still felt the pressure to be social and now I also felt the pressure to develop friendships for my son as well.

I had another baby in 2021, a longed-for sibling for our son. I felt strength in our growing family and my loneliness in the world got a little smaller, but I still felt this difference that I could never explain.

And then last year something happened that shifted something within.

My then 6-year-old boy had a mental health crisis. It still knocks the wind out of me even saying it now. 6-year-olds should be full of innocence and light, joy and energy, they shouldn’t be full of fear, anxiety and dark thoughts. How could a child whom I loved so much get to this place. I’d felt I’d failed as a mother, I must have missed something in the parenting manuals, why was no one else’ child experiencing life like mine. I was utterly heartbroken. What I didn’t know then was this moment would open a door to another way of living and one I’d been searching for my whole life.

At the time it felt like it intensified the isolation we felt, now we really didn’t fit in, now we couldn’t pretend to do life ‘normally’, now no one understood us and the decisions we were making to support our child. It was a truly dark time.

But what has come out of it all, is a quieter, slower, more authentic way of living.

It turns out school was deeply traumatic for our son. It turns out our son is neurodivergent and needs a different way of life to be mentally well. It turns out, through all the late-night reading and researching I did to support my son, that I’ve discovered I’m neurodivergent too and I too need that different way of life to be mentally well. And this changes everything. My beautiful boy has shown us there’s another way, because he was brave enough to call it out at a much younger age. As he physically lashed out at everyone around him, flailing in deep, deep distress, we dropped to our knees, we opened our arms, and we listened.

Over the last year I’ve done something I’ve never been able to do before, I’ve used my voice. I’ve gone up against systems and aspects of life where society says there is only one way to do things. I became a lioness protecting her cub. I took my son out of school and away from what was making him unwell. I faced judgement, gaslighting, ‘what the heck are you doing’ moments, ‘but children must go to school’ moments, I felt scared but at the same time stronger than I’ve ever felt before and I ploughed on, certain there was a different way for us to do things. And the evidence is there, living life differently has improved the mental wellbeing of my child, and whilst it’s been a bloody scary and isolating time, I can see the tiny green shoots of a new way to live that supports the mental well-being of us all.

So right now, our ‘bonkers’ life looks like this: -

• Our children are not in school or nursery. We follow an educational approach called Unschooling, which allows children to learn in a way that has meaning to them and as parents we listen, we watch, we facilitate, we participate, and we offer suggestions. Its natural, its beautiful and makes total sense for Harry, who needs autonomy in his life to feel safe. As dreamy as it sounds Unschooling can also be hard and intense. We are all together all the time and sometimes the unstructured nature of it can be overwhelming.

• We have a low demand approach to life, one in which we prioritise mental well-being over everything. We don’t force, we don’t punish, we don’t offer chocolate buttons in return for compliance, we listen to one another, we give grace for each of us to make our own choices whether we are 3 or 45 years old. This approach has helped heal our son and opened a new way of parenting that brings peace and stability to our home.

• We are at home a lot, home is our safe space, it is a predictable environment, home is where we can truly be ourselves.

• We don’t have bedtime routines; everyone chooses when they go to bed.

• We don’t get up crack of dawn early, we get up when our bodies are ready. Apart from poor Jon when he’s leaving for work!

• We have unlimited screen time; everyone chooses when they put their screens down. Sounds crazy but screen time has brought more healing and connection within our family than I could have ever believed.

• We don’t socialise as much as others, socialising can be hard for all of us, and we need time to recover and I’m starting to realise a quieter life is ok and what we all need.

• More days than not the kids are in pyjamas all day.

These are just a few aspects of our different life, and I can hear some of you quietly exiting the building thinking we are crazy. And If I’m perfectly honest I’ve often felt the same when I’ve heard of people living radically different lives. I guess its fear isn’t it, fear of something different. But that was the old me, that was the fat face stuffed in a pair of tights me. And now, NOW, I feel profoundly different.

Some might be relieved there’s another family doing life like us, hello friends, you’re welcome here. All are welcome really, those that are curious, those that want connection, those that think we are mad. I hope everyone can find something in this space.

We are just at the start of fully embracing this new way of life, and there are still days where I question what the hell we are doing. I still worry about how my son will learn to read and write. Then there are moments when he suddenly reads a few words out to me that he’s learnt from seeing them repeatedly on a screen, and I see the magic happen right there and then and it keeps me trusting this mysterious and spellbinding process. And the more we fully let go and embrace this way of life the more authentically and peacefully we appear to be living.

And I want to say this, if you are currently in the pit, with a highly distressed child who cannot cope in school and the world is telling you that’s where they should be. Trust yourself, there is another way.

And so, my family and I, find ourselves at this pivotal moment in our lives, slowly inching our way out of the dark and into the light on stage, von Trapp family singers’ styleeee, and maybe one day we might be belting out a tune from the top of a mountain, minus the lederhosen.