William's wand and intelligent conversation

I thought I'd hit rock bottom after our aborted holiday in August (what were we thinking?), where we managed only a few days before coming home and I sank into the sofa, not moving for a week.

But this week finished me off. After the extremely hurtful comments made by my dad and step-mum (still no word btw) and then Olivier needing his own time out, plus a huge dose of PMT, and about five hours' sleep a night I ended up at my psychologist's appointment on Friday a complete emotional wreck.

I couldn't even bring myself to perform the psychological role-play games where you put yourself in your 'safe place' and imagine talking to the little girl inside you to comfort her. It actually all seemed, quite frankly, ridiculous. Futile. I had no mental energy to use my imagination, to project; and when asked to use my anger to push back against the palm of her hand, I couldn't even raise my hand to hers. She strongly suggested I go back on the anti-depressants and, you know what? I have. The time has come to admit I need them, just as a short term crutch. Dammit!

After the appointment I had to go to the bank to get the money to pay the builder who's now finished our facade. How I managed that without crying, I'll never know, but I think it was because the lady acted normally with me and was smiley and sweet without any William references or pity.

After picking Izzy up from school, it was back home and time to clean and tidy the house as Soumaya and the twins were coming to supper - which was excellent as it was my second evening without Olivier and the first was awful.

We had a lovely evening - Soumaya has become such a good friend over the last few months. We were already on the way 'before' and this has accelerated and consolidated our friendship. She has consistently called, worried, considered, and helped me in so many different ways. A truly amazing friend and person.

On Saturday I had another non-stop day! I took Izzy to piano in the morning, then after that we went to buy new school shoes (er, if you can call size 11UK (31Fr) motorbike boots and silver ballerinas school shoes! I had to come back and order black Mary Janes on-line!).

Next thing was a fabulous lunch with my new American friend, Annaleese, her son Niccolo (age 5) and the friend with whom they are staying, Redmond.

Here's a brief synopsis of that story. On Monday while I was still at Vanessa's, I received an email from Annaleese saying she had recently moved to France with her 5-yr old son who couldn't yet speak French and did I know of any English-speaking playgroups? And get this! She's in Espondeilhan! MY village! I was rather excited about this of course - instant friends for Izzy and myself! I found myself hoping they were nice and that we could become friends and the children could play together. William waving his magic wand again?

One playdate later, on Wednesday, and things were confirmed - Annaleese is lovely and Niccolo is the CUTEST little boy in the world (who wants to be a superspy!). And yesterday, my 10 year anniversary of arriving here in France, Izzy and I went to lunch at their house where I finally got to meet Redmond, of whom I'd heard, but never met. Which seems completely odd because we know all the same people, even down to my old lecturers at uni! Fantastic lunch - we were there for hours, sitting chatting in the shade of one of our last really hot September days under his magnificent fig tree. GREAT chats - they are both educated and intellectual (Redmond is an academic - an author and lecturer at Dublin University, with a background in psychology (esp depression) and drama, among other things). So time flew, and before I knew it I had to leave to drop Izzy off at her dad's and head home.

Well, so now I guess you all want to hear about my date night with my husband? Well he arrived at the house (why didn't I say 'arrived home'?) early and we fell into having a long, calm and rational (non-pre-menstrual) discussion about things. We both apologised for things said earlier in the week and talked frankly about our future.

The huge question is: Could we live with each other when the other person is a constant reminder of William? We talked about how we have changed as people, but also that we still have the essential attributes, belief system, principles and moral code that brought us together in the first place. Our blueprints are still the same as the ones we fell in love with, even though we will forever have this sad, invisible cross to bear.

But it does, unfortunately, come back to whether, for our own sanity, we need to move on in life separately or not. We went out for dinner in the end (I wore perfume for the first time 'since' - another tiny step forward) and continued talking all evening; plans for the future, whether that be me alone or us together.

We are both of the opinion that we need to get away and start afresh. My current (I operate a right to change my mind daily at the moment!) plan is to move to Montpellier at some point. I can come back here for weekends, dropping Izzy at her dad's and staying with a friend. In Montpellier I'd be near good schools and modern amenities like a good transport system (trams), museums, ice-skating, pools, the beach, aquarium, planetarium and SHOPPING!

Renting first seems to be a good plan to work out where I'd like to be ultimately. So I'll continue slowly to work my way around this house, finishing off all the things that need to be done to either market it or, new idea, summer rentals (going to try and find out what I'd get for it per week in the summer - if it's something like €2000 pw x 12 weeks, then that would equal rent money in Montpellier, maintenance and changeovers and taxes etc here plus even money left over. And would be a place to stay if needed in winter. But it's just an idea for now. Plus I need rent money now and summer has just finished! So the timing is not good. But we'll see. Could take a while to put everything in place and one thing I am in no hurry to do is change Izzy's school. I'd like her to stay fairly settled this year. And I've paid for a year's worth of tennis lessons now!

It's Sunday 16th September and today I'm going to pick Izzy up and take her to a car show in Cap d'Agde, then lunch there, followed by a trip out with my friend Isabelle and her kids to a corn maze and then dinner at their house. Busy and fun! And I'm wearing a colour today! An unironed coral pink vest, but a colour nonetheless!
 
Signing off as have to get going! Feeling so much more positive. Let's hope it lasts a tiny bit longer before the next crashing wave or life knock.