By the lovely
Gemma it seems.
So I have to give 5 facts about myself.
Going along the lines of Gemma's answers, here goes.
1. I met Nigel when I worked for him at the Old Bar at Leeds University Union. He got married for the first time just before I started working there. Obviously there was nothing at all between us then, I just admired from afar. When he seperated from his first wife I was overjoyed when things started up for us during my final year of my music degree. We got married on 29th July 2000 at the church where I was christened as a baby. It was a fantastic day. We had 6 years as Mr and Mrs Head, lots of great times, some not so great, but that's what life is about. Since Nigel died, I often find myself thinking back over the happy memories. One which springs to mind just now is our ski trip in December 2000 to Bulgaria. We had a fantastic holiday, and Nigel really enjoyed learning to ski, even if he did perfect the art of ski-ing backwards off cliffs.....
2. I am very fortunate to have two beautiful daughters, Sophie Alice and Alexandra Juliet. Nigel chose Sophie's name, giving credit to two sources, Sophie Marceau and the McCain oven chip advert. Do you remember the one with two little welsh girls on the bus home. The eldest says, "Sophie, who do you love best, Daddy or chips?"
All the way home, Sophie is chanting, "Daddy or chips, Daddy or chips?" When they are home and eating their tea, her daddy pinches a chip from her plate. She turns to her sister and exclaims, "Chiiiiiiiiiiiiips!"
Alice was my birth name before being adopted, so we wanted to pass that name on to Sophie.
I chose Alex's name. It was partly after my very good friend from Durham who is also Alexandra, and also because I had chosen the name Alexander for Sophie if she had been a boy. I decided that I liked the name so much that I wanted the female version if our second child was a girl, which she was! Juliet is my other middle name, chosen by my parents to balance out Anna and Alice, as together they sounded odd. Alexandra Juliet is a classy name, well I think so!
3.When I was 12 I appeared on 'Going Live!' with the National Children's Orchestra. They came and filmed us during our residential course at Worksop College in the Easter holidays. I did appear on screen while the camera panned across the orchestra, and also playing rounders during recreation in the afternoon. Telly superstar, me!
4. I have been in hospital in several different countries. Let's count:
Portugal, France, Germany, Italy, USA, Belgium.
Far too many! Portugal was when I had campylobacter food poisoning, France was when I fell when ski-ing and popped my cruciate ligament, Germany I had an asthma attack, Italy was the same, USA I had a chest infection which they thought was turning into pneumonia, and Belgium was when I had a massive muscle spasm in my neck and shoulder.
5. I breastfed Alex for 16 months. Not a huge amount of time compared to some people, but as I only managed 7 weeks with Sophie, it was a huge achievement. I felt I wanted to feed Alex successfully as I was pressured into giving up feeding with Sophie, maybe not intentionally, but still I gave up before I really wanted to. So Alex and I had 16 months of feeding, and I enjoyed it all. There were times when it was hard, and in the end I had to give up due to thrush. It had got into my milk ducts and it became excrutiatingly painful to feed. Alex had thrush on her bottom permanently, and regularly had big raw patches because of the infection. As soon as I stopped feeding, the thrush went for both of us. I do wish I could have kept going for longer, but hey ho, I did manage 16 months which is pretty good I think! I am pro breastfeeding, but would never question anyone's decision about feeding. The one thing which does make me feel sad is when people don't even give it a try. Even a week's worth of breastfeeding is beneficial, and even a couple of days of colostrum is better than none at all. There you go, that's my opinion on breastfeeding!
Well there you are, five things about me. Hopefully I haven't bored you rigid! I am writing this sat in bed as the girls have gone out to the
Yorkshire Sculpture Park with my mum and dad as I am not feeling great. The tonsilitis is still ongoing, as is the oral thrush. I had a good sleep last night so things are looking up.
On the diet front, things are going well! I lost 11.4 lb in my first week, so I am hoping to lose another 3lb this week to make my first stone. I am not hungry at all, and I definitely slosh when I move. Drinking 4 litres of water a day is hard work, but the food packs are going down with minimum effort. I was allowed to have bars this week, and my favourite is definitely the toffee one. The consistency is along the lines of gooey playdoh, but they taste alright. Here's to hitting that first stone lost on Thursday!
