A fringe is cheaper than Botox
And other things I learnt recently
In the spirit of the publication’s name, I thought I’d share with you a few things I’ve learnt recently. If writing this has taught me anything, it’s that you never know who might find a random thought useful. I’m still a bit overwhelmed by the response to my washing system.
A fringe is cheaper than Botox
On the school run this week, a neighbour complimented me on my new fringe. I cut it in myself a few days ago because I kept noticing a severe vertical crease between my eyebrows when I was on Zoom calls. I look like I’m frowning and I don’t like it. A good solution would be Botox. Perhaps a better solution would be accepting - or even embracing - the inevitability of ageing, but I’m not down with that to be honest. The thing is, Botox is very expensive i.e. about £200 and it only lasts a few months. I couldn’t really justify it. So, I cut the fringe instead. It covers up the crease pretty well.
Always paint behind the cupboards
One of the many things nobody tells you about having kids is the sheer amount of time and effort you have to put into sorting out and getting rid of their old stuff. They are constantly growing out of clothes and shoes and toys and it’s a never-ending battle to keep on top of it.
We have a smallish room at the front of our house. Designed as a dining room but used as a playroom, it houses the kids’ toys and games, a sofa, a tv, and a desk I sometimes work at. Not all that long ago, you’d have found the twins in matching jumperoos (ahh, I loved the circles of neglect) in there, and it’s been through a few iterations since. This week I embarked on another sort out and move around, reducing the toy storage to make space for a second sofa now they are getting that bit older. It’s one of those jobs you kind of wish you hadn’t started but you know it will be good when it’s done.
For this iteration, I decided to move the toy storage units to the other side of the room. All was going ok until I moved the final one, only to discover that past me hadn’t completed the painting job behind the unit. I am not happy with past me. How hard would it have been to just finish the job at the time?
Answer: Less hard than it has been doing it now.
WhatsApp have moved towards the dark side
If you have a tweenager or older, you’ll no doubt have been forced to examine your principles around children, mobile phones, and social media. I certainly have. In my mind, parental leniency regarding phones and social media sits somewhere on a spectrum which looked like this:
The scale is determined by how much unfiltered access they get to stuff I don’t want them seeing. The dark side is on the right, clearly. When deciding where we should sit, I have in mind this line from Jonathan Haidt’s The Anxious Generation:
“We've overprotected our children in the real world and underprotected them online”
After much deliberation, we settled in a place between burner phone and WhatsApp. I felt ok about WhatsApp because (in my mind) it wasn’t much different to text message, but she needed it because that’s the way they all communicate. We’ve got an app called Kidslox which restricts her usage of WhatsApp - and other things that have a pull such as Capcut and Canva - to 30 minutes a day on weekdays and an hour on weekends. Once the time is up the phone operates as a dumb phone so she’s safe and contactable, and it switches off completely at 8pm. She can’t get any apps without us agreeing them. This was all working fine.
Until…
Over half term I discover that WhatsApp have introduced Channels. And it’s become a ‘thing’ at school to have your own Channel. A Channel is essentially your own, one-way social media account. You can post text, pictures, videos, and polls and the people who follow your Channel can react to them, but not reply. The kids are posting pictures of their outfits, videos of their skincare routine, updates on where they are going, and pleas for people to share their Channel link so they get more followers. Some of them even orchestrated ‘give-aways’ to incentivise this. But here’s the things:
Anybody can follow a Channel. I got some links and sent them to Deri who was able to see the whole thing and would have been able to send them on if he was dubious in character. You have no idea who is watching the videos of these kids sharing what they are wearing, where they are going today, and what their cat is called.
The kids get unfiltered access to all other Channels. They can follow literally anyone and anything, and WhatsApp impose no restrictions and no moderation.
It’s bad to be wiring their little brains for dopamine dependence. When adults can’t fight the phone addiction, how can we expect kids to. This is a thesis in itself - see Jonathan Haidt’s The Anxious Generation.
Some of the kids were reposting their TikTok videos to their WhatsApp Channel. If you are in the TikTok zone of my spectrum then maybe Channels won’t be a problem for you, but for me it was a real worry. I’m also annoyed with WhatsApp because it’s moved along the line towards the dark side and taken us with it. We’ve had to have another chat and introduce some more principles - you don’t have your own Channel, and you only follow those run by people you know in real life.
This shit is tiring.
Quick perimenopause tip
The response to my perimenopause rantings was immense. Let’s surmise, ‘YOU ARE NOT ALONE’.
I’m going to write a whole thing on this. My friend Emma who runs the Women’s Circles sent some sage and calming advice that I need to share. And I also got some more funny-not-funny-really stories. I think it’s good that women are talking and sharing, and I like feeling that we are all in this together.
Anyway, for now, check out Ashwagandha. Sounds like an exotic travel location - I wish I was in a position to recommend that - but, no. It’s a small, evergreen shrub.
I got a newsletter from My Menopause Centre listing a load of herbal things that might be helpful. I immediately went onto the NIH to check out the clinical trials and efficacy because…well, if you’ve been subscribing a while, of course I did. Most of them were of ‘limited or no clinical evidence’, but Ashwagandha was interesting. It worked. So I got some on Amazon. And, to add to the evidence base, I can say it has worked.
It’s been really good for reducing anxiety, improving sleep, and keeping my moods on a more even keel. For 3p a day, I’ll take that.
