MUM'S THE WORD....

I've recently written in these pages how 'mind blowing' it can be when you find out something new about the person you love and have been with for many years. That person in your life of whom you believe... 'If I don't know it by now then surely it's not worth knowing' ?
Well it happened to me again just a couple of days ago when I overheard a conversation between Trudie and Jaja that went something like this....

"Mum!"...."Mum!".....(no reply)
"MUM!"....(He's shouting now because they are in different rooms and he think's she cant hear him)
"MUM! CAN YOU NOT HEAR ME?!" (Meanwhile I'm in another room and I can hear him loud & clear!)
Next, the sound of footsteps in the hallway as Jaja goes looking for Trudie and I continue to eavesdrop....
"Mum! did you not hear me?"...."Oh I'm so sorry sweetheart, where you talking to me?"....

By now my curiosity had got the better of me and I entered the room to see Trudie putting down the book she had been reading as she turned to look at the puzzled look on Jaja's face as he queried "Well who else do we call 'Mum' in this house?"

Trudie's features were contorted into a picture of what I  could only describe as 'surprise and new found realisation'. Surprise and realisation of what? I did not know at this stage but Trudie being Trudie (i.e. she loves to talk) I knew I would not have to wait long to find the answer....

"I'm not used to you calling me "Mum" yet....When I hear the word "Mum" I think whoever is saying it must be speaking to someone else because I spent so many years of my life thinking that 'Mum' would never be my name"...

Jaja knows all about the years we spent on IVF trying to get him and knew exactly where she was 'coming from' so there was no need for her to offer any more words by way of explanation and he scooped her up in his arms and whizzed her round and round as he shouted "MUM, MUM, MUM I LOVE YOU MUM"....He eventually put her down and vowed to use 'her name' more often in general conversation, then he gave her a big kiss and a hug before wondering off, back in the direction of his room. "Well, 'Son' what did you want me for anyway?"... "That was it, I just wanted to tell you that I love you Mum".....Cue 'Trudie tears'.....as he disappeared back into his room to carry on doing whatever he had been doing. 

It was a wonderful moment to witness and reminded me of exactly why we wrote our book 'Dreams Do Come True' http://www.amazon.co.uk/Dreams-Do-Come-True-Bankruptcy/dp/190829308X/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1377025219&sr=1-1&keywords=Dreams+Do+Come+True+Trudie+%26+Lloyd+Thompson. We want someone else out there to be able to say "Yes darling?" when their son or daughter calls out "Mum!" We want to afford someone the priceless gift of a child through IVF funded from sales of our book. We know there are so many couples who like us are wondering if their time will ever come to have a child because their only route to success is through IVF that they can not afford to pay for. Proceeds from sales of our book are going to fund IVF treatment for infertile couples at 'Saint Marys Hospital' in Manchester, the place where our journey towards parenthood started all those years ago.

I want to help as many guys as I possibly can in realising that magical moment when their own son or daughter looks up for the very first time and says to the woman they love, that oh so precious little word...."Mum"

    Mum... that's my name! 

CHERISH THE LOVE...

My dear old Dad reaches the grand age of 84 later this year yet strangely I have only started to really know him over the past two years. It's not that we have spent my life avoiding each other or anything like that but more a case of being busy living our own lives where since I have grown up and left the family home we have drifted apart and I don't think for one minute we are in any way unique in that respect.

As we mature into adulthood it's only natural that we start to build our own lives separate from the one we have shared with Mum and Dad and siblings.

All manner of things can effect and influence the amount of contact we maintain with our parents and in my case I suppose two of the main factors were my parents getting divorced while I was still in my teens and the fact that following the split from Mum, my Dad started to spend more and more time 'back home' in Jamaica.

He used to go out there most winters for 6 months at a time and built himself a house at 'Redground' in Negril. I still smile to myself when I hear him complaining about the cold British weather that he can't get used to after 60 years of being in this country and It just goes to show that you can take the man out of the Caribbean but you can't take the Caribbean out of the man!

It was on his last stay 'back home' just over two years ago when I got the phone call from relatives in Jamaica informing me that Dad had suffered a major Stroke. Talk about a 'bolt out of the blue?!'....My Dad is the fittest most energetic 80+  year old you are ever likely to find so the news was a great shock to me! I quickly made arrangements to fly out there and within days I was being met at the airport by my cousin who lived next door to Dad and he was going to drive me over to my Dad's place.

This was the first time I had been back to Jamaica since I was a young kid yet everything, all the sights and smells and sounds seemed strangely familiar. Cousin Steve got me up to speed on my Dad's situation as we followed the road along the stunningly beautiful  Jamaican coast.... he had been discharged from hospital after 3 days and although he appeared to be physically ok he was unable to speak...

A couple of hours after leaving the airport we were pulling up outside Steve's place and he pointed out Dad's house at the top of the hill which was too steep to get the van up so I set off on foot. There were half a dozen people at the front of the house but I could  make Dad out quite clearly and realised he was watching me approach but not recognising who I was. As I got closer he moved away from the others and moved towards me and as I went through the gate he realised it was me and walked right up to me and buried his face in my chest as he wept uncontrollably. I held him tightly for fully five minutes as he sobbed and he felt so little and frail in my arms. His tears seemed to be a mixture of joy and relief at seeing me but also of frustration because he was unable to communicate verbally and I knew in those moments that I would have to take him away from his Caribbean paradise in order to care for him for the remainder of his years.

That realisation became all the more difficult to bear as he slowly gathered himself then began to proudly show me around his house and land pointing and gesticulating but unable to speak. He turned me round to look down the hill and into the distance and said his first words since the stroke... "Look at the sea!"....the view from his hilltop retreat in paradise was indeed truly spectacular and I wondered how I could even begin to tell him that he had to leave this part of his life behind....

My heart was saying, 'Leave him here in the land where he was born and loves. OK he won't get the care and help that I can facilitate for him in England but he will be happy for whatever time he has left." but my head was telling me that I needed to get him back close to me in order to give him the best quality of life that I possibly could courtesy of the wonderful institution that is the 'British National Health Service'....

It's over two years since I had that wrestling match between heart & head and I still question the decision I made to take Dad away from paradise particularly at winter time when we get the snow and ice that most Jamaicans have only ever seen on Christmas cards but the old guy is doing OK and accepts that he's in the best place. He continues to get well and his speech is ever improving and although it's not as it was, he can communicate again and is steadily rebuilding his life and working things out as he goes along.


As his main carer I have spent more time with him in these last couple of years than I have in the previous 50 and it's as though we are 'father and son bonding' for the first time but in reverse....by that I mean it's as if we have swapped roles with me being the father figure this time round as Dad learns to cope with his new found limitations where anything remotely technical is a real challenge for him.
For example he gets so easily confused when attempting to work his television and radio and even light switches and keys can easily confuse him. The culmination of that role reversal came when I called round to do his shopping one day and he was so excited to see me because he could not wait to show me what he had learned to do for himself that week.....

As usual he was dressed ready to go on our weekly shopping trip to Asda ( that,s Walmart to all you American followers of my Blog)....except he was not wearing any shoes and for good reason too as it turned out....
"Sit down I want to show you something" he said. He waited until I was seated before he dissapeared out into the hall-way only to return seconds later clutching his trainers. "Where are the ones I bought you with the Velcro fasteners?" I inquired, (because laces are one of the technical things that his stroke left him unable to figure out)...."Wait"...."wait".... he said as he sat down in his armchair and put his trainers on his feet. I was fully expecting him to then ask me to tie his laces (yes the 'one armed Black Chap can tie laces!) but he didn't ask! Instead he ever so deliberately and painstakingly slowly tied his own laces, only looking up occasionally to check that I was still watching his efforts...I was watching alright...Granted I was unable to see much as by now the tears were pumping out of my eyes and streaming down my face but I was watching as my dear old Dad finished tying his laces before looking up at me with a beaming grin of proud achievement. Damn right he should be proud of himself too as he must have been practicing all week and I too was proud of him as I got a bigger kick watching him tie those laces than I did when Jaja learnt how to do the very same thing when not much more than a toddler!    

If I have any regrets where my Dad is concerned it's not with the fact that I took him away from paradise but the fact that it needed a near death experience to bring us closer together. Being a Dad myself I know how much I cherish the love of my own son and though I can't get back all those lost years I know that the times we have ahead of us will be times of pure love, respect and appreciation from both of us....

Dad now knows and accepts with a heavy heart that he will never be well enough to go back and live on his own in Jamaica but I will keep the promise that I made to him and bury him at 'Redground' next to his big brother Sydney but I know that will be a long time into the future because we have some catching up to do...

I love you 'Old Man'.....Always....    

          

ADDICTED....

Having shared nearly 30 years of my life with Trudie and 12 of those years on IVF, I thought I knew everything there was to know about her, yet was shocked to find out just recently that there were even greater depths of feelings and emotions driving her on through the IVF years than I could have imagined.

We still talk about IVF almost on a daily basis because it was a massive part of our lives as we went through it at the time and it continues to be even now when every day we can look at our wonderful son who serves as a reminder of the reason we hung in there all those years without ever giving up hope that one day our dream would be fulfilled and we continue to give thanks and gratitude for the eventual outcome that was bestowed on us with his birth.

I commented to Trudie that through all that time, being there with her and witnessing what she went through both physically and emotionally, I still couldn’t see how she survived it the way she did.

She had 6 full cycles of IVF and over the 12 years had over 100 fertilised embryos inseminated before we eventually hit the jackpot.  Many people can’t cope with the odd trip to the dentist without getting distressed and many so called ‘routine operations’ in everyday medical situations bring their own stresses and angst to the patient.

“So how could you cope with having your own ‘routine operation’ practically every month for 12 years”? I asked her…..

The reply I got was to say the least not what I expected. Yes I knew Trudie was desperate to have a baby. Yes I knew there was nothing she would not have done to be a mother. Yes I knew that she so much needed to feel whole and (in her own words) “Be a complete woman”, but what she said brought it all home to me. For the first time in 25 years I finally understood what had been driving her on….

“I was addicted to getting pregnant”

I was stunned into silence as I took on board the magnitude of that reply.

“Hang on a second,” I said eventually, “addicted is such a strong word to use to describe your state of body and mind over all those years. People get addicted to drugs, or alcohol, or smoking, not IVF?”

“I never said I was addicted to IVF” she replied, “I was addicted to getting pregnant be it through IVF or whatever means possible. All I know is that I had an incurable need to get pregnant”.

Now my understanding of an addict is someone who is compelled to do something almost against their own will and better judgement, someone who has a dependence that they can’t live without. Other words that spring to mind when I think of an addict are, hooked, obsessed and craving!

These are words Trudie is very familiar with too as a bye-product of her line of work and regularly has to do work that involves dealing with drug addicts and alcoholics so if she says she was addicted to getting pregnant I have to believe her.

We talked long into the night and I continued to probe her about this ‘new found revelation’. After all I was finding out something new about the person I had spent practically my whole life with and how often does that happen? 

Like I said, I thought I knew everything there was to know, I sometimes tell Trudie I know her better than she knows herself but there was more mind-blowing stuff to come when she told me something that actually stunned me to the very core of my being. She said that in the most desperate days of the IVF years, when she was at her lowest ebb and thinking the unthinkable thought that she would never have a baby, that if during one of her routine tests the doctors had found something wrong that revealed she was terminally ill and would die very soon then that would have been such a relief! A massive weight off her shoulders!  Impending death would have been easier for her to cope with than facing a lifetime of never being a mother to a child.

Yes at times her will to continue was so weak that death would have been an easier option and only her ‘addiction to getting pregnant’ kept her going.

Hearing this really upset me because she never in all those years told me as starkly as this how she felt. She coped with it all alone but then again that sums her up completely, keeping everything on the positive, to the outside world at least.

As I listened to her I began to wonder how I never picked up on how desperate and alone she must have been feeling for all those years because having been slow to get on board with the whole IVF thing in the first place I always thought that once I’d got my act together I had been 100% supportive and there for her every step of the way.  Then again in comparison to someone who is a drug addict or alcoholic I suppose the similarities are there because often times it’s the people who are closest to the addict who are last to know as the afflicted person does their best to shield loved ones from the fallout from their addiction, they prefer to deal with the problem alone. 

Trudie went onto explain that even though she considered herself an addict she would never voice that opinion because no one would take her seriously and you know I think she is right. Society readily accepts that unfortunately there are drug addicts, alcohol addicts (alcoholics) smoking addicts, gambling addicts and even sex addicts if some of the tabloids and celebrity magazines are to be believed, and there is recognised help for all these people. There are government bodies, independent associations, clinics and self-help groups catering for the needs of all these people that need help but the poor souls ‘addicted to trying to get pregnant’ are not recognised for the mental state they find themselves in and it’s not a place they choose to be at, they are coping everyday with the hand they have been dealt by ‘Mother Nature’.

It’s so easy for people on the outside to say things such as why don’t you consider adoption? Or why don’t you just accept that you can’t have kids and move on with your life? But that’s like saying to a Heroin addict, “Why don’t you just chew gum when the cravings come? It’ll take your mind of it”…. No it won’t!

I’m not saying there is no place for adoption in our society because there are so many beautiful kids out there that need adopting so that they can have a fair start in their young lives and it’s a route that we seriously considered then actually set out on even though ‘under the system’ that was not allowed for couples on IVF and is a whole new chapter that I will tell you about another time, but when that need to produce her own offspring burns deep inside a woman nothing in the world can extinguish it. Nothing that is, other than giving birth and that’s the only difference between a heroin addict and a woman addicted to giving birth.

In her work Trudie has learned (and it was news to me) that when a person takes heroin for the first time they experience a most unbelievable and euphoric high and the user has never had a ‘feeling so good’.  However what most heroin users don’t know or accept is that ‘the high’ they experience that first time is the ‘best one’ they will ever experience from using that drug. That extreme ecstasy can never be recreated to the same degree ever again but the sad and tragic thing is that heroin addicts spend the rest of their lives in the fruitless quest of trying to rediscover that very first high, in short they become immediately addicted while not realising that never ever will they find what they are desperately craving again.

The huge and significant difference with a woman addicted to getting pregnant is that in the vast majority of cases once the extreme high of childbirth is achieved the craving stops immediately and the addiction is cured.

As a society we need to recognise that without Womankind’s addiction to producing offspring the human race would not be around for very long, the world would come to a standstill.  We need to do everything we can to help all those women of the world who need a little longer to achieve their ultimate high of having a baby as their contribution to the continuation of mankind.

Writing our book ‘Dreams Do Come True’ was our way of helping someone out there to realize the dream that eventually came true for us when we got our baby. The proceeds from sales of the book go to St Marys Hospital in Manchester which is where it began for us all those years ago and we have agreed with the hospital that the money goes directly to couples who are on their IVF programme. Our sole intent is that someday soon a baby will be born to a couple who are going through exactly what we went through for all those years and then why stop at one!? We want you to help us cure someone’s ‘addiction’ and all you have to do is buy a copy of the book and I promise you a good read into the bargain and if you or someone you know is suffering from infertility then I truly hope that reading about us can in some way inspire you to keep on believing that soon your dream will indeed come true! You can buy the book here!! http://www.amazon.co.uk/Dreams-Do-Come-True-Bankruptcy/dp/190829308X/ref=sr_1_2?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1375797593&sr=1-2&keywords=dreams+do+come+true )

Now here’s the best thing to this particular addiction….in complete contrast to heroin addiction, Trudie tells me that the initial high of giving birth not only kills the craving but it then begins the journey to greater highs each and every day for the rest of your life as you appreciate the wonderment of having a child and from the great depths of despair and wanting to die she now wants to live forever….

DARLING I'VE BEEN SEEING SOMEONE ELSE ....(11 guys every Saturday afternoon actually...)

I was with a group of friends the other day when one of them asked if any of the others had seen my Blog? A couple of them said 'yes they were following my weekly postings with great interest and enjoying reading my rantings'. One of the guys who was unaware that I was Blogging asked "What do you write about?"....
Without really thinking about it I replied "I write about life, love and relationships" to which he responded: "I suppose that just about covers everything there is to discuss for any of us, I'll have to take a look."

That conversation really set me thinking and in particular about the relationships I have in my life and I'm starting to realise that we all have so much more than the spouse, partner, romantic type relationships that I have tended to write about so far....

As well as having relationships with our spouse or partner we have relationships with our offspring, we have relationships with parents, grandparents, aunts, uncles and cousins as well as work colleagues and friends and over time I'm sure I will touch on most or all of these relationships as a point of discussion. However because tomorrow sees the start of the new football season in England (that's 'soccer' for all you American readers and not to be confused with your version of 'football' ) I'm going to share with you an article I wrote for publication in a football fanzine some 15 years ago!

'What does football have to do with relationships?' I can almost hear you ask....In fact Trudie used to ask me sometimes with great frustration: "What does football have to do with anything meaningful in our lives?"... That was until she read my piece which was a tribute to 'my team Bolton Wanderers who were moving to a new stadium after playing for the past 102 years at 'Burnden Park' after which with tears in her eyes she said "I had no idea it meant so much to you and I really had no idea that you could hold so much passion"...
She saw a new side of me that she never knew existed. She saw that I had another relationship that went back way before we even met. Most importantly she understood why I am so devoted to 'my team' and she liked the emotions they cause me to display.

So I suppose my relationship tip to the guys today is this:- Show as much love, passion, dedication and loyalty to your partner as you do to 'your team' be it a Football, Baseball, Basketball team or whatever and you wont go far wrong....Here's what I wrote all those years ago, I hope you enjoy it.  

BURNDEN   PARK

MY  LAST  30  YEARS!!!

I first went to Burnden as an 8 year old in 1968.  The following are my memories of the famous old ground in the 3 decades since then.  Memories in no particular order.  Some of them very vague, others seem as if they happened yesterday.  There are very few dates that spring to mind to pinpoint particular incidents, but I know that if you were there then you too will remember.

The Embankment;  The first place I ever stood, no Normid Superstore and massive big steps at the back about 2 feet high, railway line at the back, big wooden scoreboard like a cricket ground.  A 3^rd round FA cup tie against the then mighty Newcastle United saw a sea of black and white as 17000 Geordies crammed onto the huge terrace, the result 3-3 and Malcolm McDonald scored a hat-trick.  We were on ‘Match of the Day’!

I remember crowds of 4000 and crowds of 57000 like the league cup semi against Everton.  We drank beer on the terraces and peed where we stood.  Go to the toilets?  No chance!  It was impossible to move you just swayed with the crowd.  If you did manage to get to the loo it was a mixture of smells from the 6 inch deep river of pee and the lashings of too strong disinfectant.

Later I moved to the best kop end ever The Lever End.  Here were the boys who sang brilliant songs and wore the football fashions of the 70’s.  Doc Marten boots, Crombie coats, Skinners jeans and Ben Sherman shirts.  People wore scarves then and it was cool to wear a silk Wanderers scarf tied round your wrist.  These were the boys who got involved in the many riots and pitch invasions of that time against the likes of Chelsea, Millwall and Leeds.

The big matches down the years come to mind.  The Newcastle game mentioned earlier for one.  I also remember when as a 3^rd Division Club we hammered 1^st Division Man City 3-0 in the League Cup 3^rd round in front of 42000!!!  The top of Division 2 game against Sunderland in front of a similar crowd, when big Sam Allardyce scored “that Header”, and I saw the maestro Frank Worthington score “that Goal”.  Nat Lofthouse I’ve never seen him play but from the first years I went to Burnden I knew he was already a legend.  There were other names, maybe not all as famous as Frankie Worthy and Nat, but no doubt remembered by the people who watched them at the time.  Eddie Hopkinson, Charlie Hurley, John Byrom, Gary Jones, Paul Jones, John Ritson, Willie Morgan, Alan Gowling, Charlie Wright, Tad Novack, Gordon Taylor and Neil Whatmore.  There are many more, too numerous to mention but remembered all the same because they wore the white shirt!

Burnden also carries memories of great players from opposing teams down the years.  I’m sure I remember a 16 year old Trevor Francis scoring a hatful of goals against us for Birmingham City, 3 or 4 I think, and it might have been his full debut!!  The late Great Bobby Moor was sent off for the only time in his career at Burnden while playing for Fulham.  Yes, we knew how to wind up the opposition at Burnden.  I was there on the night Bruce Rioch incited the most hostile atmosphere ever seen in a football ground as we terrorised Wolves and their fans out of the play offs and went onto gain promotion to the Premier League.

It’s not all been laughter down the years.  I’ve seen grown men cry at Burnden when we lost out to Aldershot (of all people) in the first ever play offs to get dumped into the Fourth Division.  I was one of the grown men crying at the end of the very last game to be played there against Charlton when that Burnden legend JOHN McGINLAY  took his final bow.  He could fill a book himself with his heroics and exploits for the Whites, and it all started with ‘that penalty’, 10 minutes from the end of ‘that game’ that sent Preston down and won us promotion.  We sang all the way down Manny Road just as years ago we used to sing under the Railway Bridges outside the Embankment, but they are gone now.  We used to go into the Rose Hill Tavern for a pint, now it’s known as Churchills.  The iron bridge is still there, a lasting landmark on the route to Burnden.  I even remember the dodgy bogs just after the Waggon and Horses, a welcome stopping point after one pint too many.  Then onto Rice and Easy for the best chips in town.

Burnden wasn’t the plushest of grounds with its wooden stands and broken guttering.  The banking at Croft Lane was always overgrown with weeds, and how did that ridiculous great puddle at the corner of the Lever End and Burnden Paddock survive all those years come rain or shine??  Daft I know, but I remember little things like that, things like “The Happy Shop” as the first Club shop was known.  Things like being able to buy “The Buff”, a paper that had all the days results and reports 5 minutes after the end of the game.  It was printed and sold from mobile vans on Manny Road – BRILLIANT!!!  Things like paying 3 quid to get in, and thinking it was a fortune.  Things like going to mid week afternoon matches during the power cuts of the 70’s.  Things like the Bromwich Street Training Ground and things like trying to sign Pele as our Manager!!!

Things that make up 30 years of memories of an 8 year old boy and now a 38 year old man, but all memories of the same person.  All significant in their own little way because they are memories of a place that will live forever in the hearts of the people who were lucky enough to call it “Our Ground” a place that will never be forgotten, even when the bulldozers finally move in.

BURDEN PARK WILL REMAIN FOREVER THE HOME OF

BOLTON WANDERERS!

WSFM

Footnote : The famous old stadium was eventually demolished in 1999 thus ending a wonderful era in my life. 1999 however proved to be more significant than I could ever have imagined as my son Jaja was born on February 28th of that year and now Bolton Wanderers are OUR TEAM!  And always will be regardless of which stadium we call home.

In 1953, LS Lowry's painting "Going To The Match" won a Football Association competition. He was very surprised when he heard about it as he did not know it had been entered. Depicting people going to watch Bolton Wanderers at Burnden Park, the painting sold at auction in 1999 for the record price for a Lowry of two million pounds.

To my wife "Thank you for my life .... nuff said"

LOVE AT FIRST SIGHT IS EASY!

Do you believe in love at first sight? I’m not really sure if I do or not.  I suppose this phenomenon could depend on who or what you are falling in love with when you first see it or them? I think the definition of love needs to be brought into consideration here in order to really answer the question.  At times like this I like to consult my trusty Dictionary & Thesaurus and having just done that I’m now very confused as to whether or not falling in love at first sight is possible.

Here are some of the definitions of love and you will see why I’m struggling with this……warm affection, sexual passion, whole hearted liking for something, feeling a strong emotional (and sexual) attraction for, cherish, hold dear, idolize, worship, savour, desire, caress, cuddle, embrace, fondle ….and the list goes on and on and can also mean a nil score in tennis by the way!

Now looking at some of the definitions above I would say that it is certainly possible to fall in love at first sight with, let’s say a huge cream gateaux in the window of your favourite cake shop.  Desire, caress, fondle and savour could definitely apply here too but if I were to apply those same definitions to a raven haired beauty I spotted in a nightclub I most likely would end up being escorted off the premises to a waiting police vehicle and that’s without even resorting to embracing and sexual passion!

Love at first site is a commonly used phrase and I’m beginning to think it’s a phrase that’s bandied around far too easily unless you are indeed talking about cream cakes or Ferrari s’.  But then again cuddling and fondling a Ferrari that belonged to someone else could see you taking the short walk to the waiting Police vehicle again so I’m still confused!

Maybe we need to take a couple of steps back here and say that desire or lust at first sight is certainly possible but surely in order to really love someone you need to know them?  How can you idolise and worship someone you don’t know?  I don’t believe you can.  I have seen stories of people who claim to love, idolise and worship someone they have never even met but that’s usually in the form of a front page story in the Sunday papers after the restraining order has been served on the besotted individual who is then dubbed a stalker!   I believe a lot of people confuse initial animal passion with true love.  Hey don’t get me wrong animal passion is great and a fantastic way of getting things started and it’s brilliant if you can maintain it throughout a long relationship but real and lasting love is so much more than just an urgent need to get inside each other’s pants at every opportunity.  For me real love is unconditional.  Real love sticks around when the going gets tough.  Real love is there for the long haul and doesn't sling its hook because the journey through life has had to take a detour across unexpected bumpy terrain.

Love at first sight is easy if indeed that’s what it is.  At first sight there are only positives, no complications or challenges, just two people falling in love and it’s a great way that the Universe has developed for matching us up to our ‘Soul Mate’ but then we need to take the reins from there and build on the foundations to create real and solid love.  Yes you have to work at building a loving relationship... maybe work is too strong a word because if you have to work too hard then maybe you are with the wrong person but you certainly need to nurture your new found love pretty much like a gardener nurtures and tends a beautiful garden in order to bring it out in all its vibrant, colourful glory.

When I first met Trudie more than 30 years, ago she was that raven haired beauty in the night club and all the definitions of love certainly applied for both of us that night.  I reckon I could have got away with some embracing and fondling, without being escorted to the Police car but chose instead to be the perfect gentleman and controlled my lust.  I think I knew deep down that there would be plenty of time in the future for passion and so our relationship began....

It was young love without complications or problems. It was easy and happy go lucky love that grew with each day that we knew each other more. There were no plans for the future as we enjoyed each moment as it came.  It was so, so easy to be in love and it was as if we were the only two people in the world.

We were at the getting to know each other stage of our lives without commitments to mortgages, bills or anything long term. The furthest we looked ahead was planning which club or party we would be going to next weekend or where we would go on holiday next summer.  Love on that basis is easy.  Love on that basis takes no effort because to you the other person has no fault’s, they are perfect in every way. There is not a thing in the world they could do or say that could even remotely irritate or bug you.

Because young love like that is so perfect it’s easy to see why couples decide that they want to spend the rest of their lives together.  They can’t imagine life being anything other than the perfect joy and bliss they are experiencing at that moment in time and the lifetime commitment to marriage seems to be the obvious next step.  They want the feelings they have for each other to last forever and of course that’s only natural.  No one gets married while their new found relationship is ‘a little bit iffy’ with the idea that they can grow into a loving couple with time, do they?  Well I would hope not, surely it’s the other way round because if the relationship is not strong to start with how can you cope with the stresses and strains of life that will surely come along to test your resolve in the future?

I’m beginning to answer my own question here and I’m going with the theory that love at first sight does not exist and here’s my reasoning….

I've already said that I met Trudie nearly 30 years ago but as it happens she had actually spotted me some time before.  She was walking down the high street in Preston with her girlfriends and pointed me out to them and proclaimed that she was going to marry me!  I don’t know exactly when she saw me and certainly I had no idea that she was planning a trip to Pronuptia to look at wedding dresses or I might have set about getting the restraining order served on her there and then but one thing I know for sure is that because I was out in town I would have been spruced and preened and looking and acting my best.  I’m a good looking (and as I keep saying a modest) guy so Trudie could be excused for thinking she had fallen in love with me at first sight but let’s imagine a slightly different scenario had taken place….

What if in the imaginary scenario when Trudie first spotted me I was picking my nose, scratching my arse, belching and farting (not that it would ever happen but go with me on this)….  Would she have been so quick to point me out as the man of her dreams to her mates and announce her new found love?  I don’t think so!  Yet fast forward 30 years to now, and imagine we are walking through town together and we bump into the same friends and after those 30 years I am still busy picking my nose, scratching my arse, belching and farting, is she going to pretend that I’m not with her?  Is she going to make out like she doesn't know me? No she would not.  She may be bloody annoyed and no doubt embarrassed but she would own up to being with me because she has grown to love me over 30 years in spite of my (imaginary) appalling habits.

Do you see where I’m coming from with this?  Real love is when you love someone as they say ‘warts and all’ and I’m not saying it’s ok to behave like a complete slob in front of your partner because she loves you come what may, I’m purely demonstrating that another old adage is true, the one that says ‘to know me is to love me'.

I’m being light-hearted and frivolous here in order to make a point but let’s get serious for a while…

This loving the person you know thing is a two way street.  You both have to get to know each other because if it’s only working in one direction then the relationship is doomed to failure.  In the scenario I painted earlier where I was acting like a slob in front of Trudie’s friends I said she would in the main overlook my appalling behaviour because she had grown to love and accept me for who I am over 30 years. However in that 30 years I should have grown to love and know her well enough to realise that behaving in that way would upset her (no shit Sherlock! But you know what I mean).

I’m not saying you have to live your life by the other person’s rules.  Far from it and I will talk more about that another time but I am saying that with true love grows a respect and understanding for your partner’s likes and dislikes and your behaviour towards each other harmonises to a mutual satisfaction to the point where you both act the way you want to as individuals without upsetting or offending the other person.  I’m not saying you become ‘as one’ either, because it’s your differences that attract you to each other and keeps things interesting. I’m saying share the same experiences as different people…. two individuals who find each other interesting, fun and exciting to be around.  Two individuals who know each other well enough to know what makes the other tick. Two individuals who know each other well enough to be able to make the other happy and find that making the other one happy gives you a great feeling of achievement and satisfaction.

The best thing I get from making Trudie happy is the payback of how good it makes me feel!  Just think about that for a moment….making the person you love most in the world happy makes you feel happy.  It’s the exact opposite to a vicious circle and you know what?... It comes back to you tenfold as the other person reciprocates and you have two opposites to a vicious circle (I’ll have to find a name for it, a happy sphere maybe?) intertwined!  How good is that!?  It’s brilliant but it doesn't just happen, you have to pay attention to what’s going on in your relationship.  You have to know what makes your partner happy and the way you do that is by getting to know them.  Ask yourself what on the face of it may sound like a really silly question but here goes…do you talk to your partner?  I mean really talk as in meaningful conversations?

The reason I ask is because of something I see far too often usually in restaurants....  Couples out together for a meal where there is just the two of them sitting and eating in complete silence or just exchanging the odd words such as “pass the salt please”.  I've seen old couples like this looking thoroughly fed up with each other’s company as if they have completely given up on each other after 40 or 50 years of being together. I've seen middle aged couples who look as though they are out together simply as a way of being away from the kids for a while and I've seen young couples who are more interested in texting on their mobiles as opposed to talking to the person sat right there in front of them.

I’m not exaggerating here I see it all the time and have to wonder if on a night out where you specially set aside time to be together, if you are not talking, then when do you really communicate with each other?  You have set aside quality time away from work, away from the kids and you have nothing to say to each other? That’s not working at a relationship, that’s being lazy in a relationship and the idea of ‘let’s go out for a meal’ becomes just a token gesture, something you think you maybe should do because you are a couple.  If you are going to sit there in silence you may just as well have gone to the cinema where silence is appropriate or simply stayed at home slumped in front of the TV.  Don’t let it get to that and if it has it’s never too late to change things for the better.

The old couples in the restaurant must have years of brilliant memories to share if they put their minds to it and you are never too old for romance.  The middle aged couples can talk about the kids they left at home and complement each other on the wonderful job they have done in bringing them up and talk about the great times they have had as a family.  The young couples need to put away the iPhones and start getting to know each other properly in order to plan the wonderful future they will spend together.

What’s the first thing you want to do when you first meet somebody you fancy? You want to get to know them in order to develop the relationship. You also want them to find out who you are, you want to impress and naturally as human beings we work hard to create a great impression in order to get close to the person we want.  We talk and flirt and entertain. We take care with how we look and behave in an effort to create the best impression we possibly can to someone we hardly know.  In short we do whatever it takes to get them.  So why then all too often in too many relationships do we stop making the same effort as when we were strutting around like Peacocks in the early months and years?

Why does the person you grow to know now deserve less of an effort on your part?  Why should we succumb to apathy or laziness in our relationships? How can it be right to take your partner for granted the more you get to know and love them?  Surely it should be the other way round where you want to give more and more of yourself as you fall deeper and deeper in love with that special person?

You know the saying ‘You’re as young as you feel’? Well I think the same can be said of a relationship. You can keep a relationship young and fresh by maintaining the same mind set as you had when you first got together.  I don’t mean you have to act like the oldest swingers in town and get your selves down to the disco (not that they call them that now) every Friday. I mean stay interested in each other. Unless you are joined at the hip you will both be leading separate lives, working at different places, meeting different people every day and having different experiences, so how often do you really talk to each other about your day and who you met and who did and said what?

You will have different moods and feelings about all manner of subjects and topics in life so how often do you sit and discuss how each of you is feeling or do you both just take it for granted that all is fine and dandy with your other half so there’s no real reason to talk?

On a personal level my conversations with Trudie now are far more interesting than the conversations we used to have on first knowing each other all those years ago because unlike then I really know who she is now.  I know her likes and dislikes and what makes her tick.  Likewise she knows the same about me and though you may think that knowing each other so well means there’s nothing to talk about quite the opposite is true.  There’s always something to chat about or discuss and even now after thirty years we still find out new things about each other and when that happens it’s really mind blowing!

BOYS TO MEN....

It's holiday time again and the kids (and teachers) are off school for a whole 6 and a bit weeks. Jaja is absolutely loving it...not because he hates school any more than the next kid but he's reveling in the fact that for the next month and a half he is 'a free agent', 'off the hook' and (within reason) 'his own man'!...Free to do whatever he chooses, whenever he chooses regardless of time constraints, agendas or deadlines. Please don't read this as 'bad parents letting their child run wild without supervision' because it's nothing of the sort, we just trust him to use his own internal guidance system and common sense and he's developed a knack of always doing the right thing. If ever he's not sure what action to take in any given circumstance he's not too big for his boots to come and ask Mum & Dad what to do?... and we just love that about him!

All this 'free-ness' has made me realise how his growing up has afforded more time to Trudie and me as day by day it becomes more and more apparent that our 'Baby Boy' is fast becoming a man and where as in the past the summer holidays meant we had to co-ordinate a 6 week child minding programme that was far more technical than any of his school time tables, involving Grand Parents and re-arranged work schedules we are now able to enjoy a much more relaxed summer.

Both Trudie and I have said at every stage of Jaja's life "Oh this is the best time yet"....Obviously when he arrived all new and shiny as a bouncing baby that was the best time because after 12 years of trying we wondered if we would ever be blessed with a baby. As he began to toddle around and talk that was the best time because he was now 'interactive'. When he started Junior school then High school and guitar lessons, again these were the best times as each new stage in his life came along bringing more facets to his developing personality.

As a parent I get great satisfaction from watching how my son's life is unfolding in front of him, knowing that I am playing a part and contributing towards him having a wonderful life. Trudie will tell anyone who wants to know (and many who don't) that "He's the nicest person I know"... but I don't think she takes anywhere near enough credit for guiding him that way because after all that she endured just to have him she could be excused if she tended to 'mollycoddle' him but I take my hat off to her (well I would if I wore a hat) as I stand back and admire how she perfectly balances the multiple roles of Mother, friend, nurse (when required) and teacher to him while being the perfect wife to me. Though that said the day she gave birth to the best thing that ever happened to me was 'job done' as far as I'm concerned....I could ask for nothing more...

Today I had a day off work and just a few years ago that would have meant relieving Grandma &Grandad from their duties and taking Jaja to the park to play on the swings and slides...how times change....this morning we went to the gym for a workout together, now aged 14 he's taller than I am and he's building a great set of 'guns' and the biggest indication of his growing maturity was the fact that we didn't need to fight over who was going to shower first...it was me, not because I was pulling seniority rank but because he likes to have his shave before he showers.  This really is the best time...but I guess this wont be the last time I ever say that...    

THIS IS A MAN'S WORLD...or is it?

The 'God Father of Soul' James Brown declared in one of his classic songs "This is a man's world....but it would mean nothing without a woman or a girl" The song then goes on to attribute all the works of modern civilisation to 'Man' and throws in the examples of the car, train and electric light as all being 'Man made'. The line about it 'meaning nothing without a woman or a girl' on face value sounds patronizing to women as it gives them a bit part supporting role in the running of the world.
The song was written in February 1966 and at the time Rolling Stone magazine branded the lyrics as "Biblically chauvinistic! It's only when you come to realise that the lyrics were actually written by Brown's then partner 'Betty Jean Newsome' that it starts to become apparent that in 1966 this indeed was the 'way of the world'.
'Newsome' says she wrote the lyrics based on her observations of the relations between the sexes at that time....

Fast forward to July 2013 and we can see how dramatically things have changed....Last night the winner of this years 'The Apprentice' was revealed, as Leah beat Luisa into 2nd place and the other finalist Francesca went out last week. That's right, 3 women in the final, flying the flag for female entrepreneurs everywhere with the men beaten out of sight and this was a point not missed by Karen Brady who herself is probably the best example of all of a woman thriving in a so called 'Mans World'. For the past 20 years she has been involved at the very top end of an industry that is still regarded as one of the last bastion of maleness....'football' where she has been 'MD' of Birmingham City and 'Vice Chairman' of West Ham United.

In 1966 when Betty Jean Newsome wrote the lyrics to 'It's a Man's Man's Man's World', England were winning The Football World Cup and I bet there was not a woman within a mile radius of the team changing rooms if you discount the 'tea lady' and it was still to be 3 years before Karen Brady was even born. Now we see her presiding over proceedings as the women of  'The Apprentice' flex their business muscles to the point where poor old Jason was beaten into submission by Luisa and chose to 'fall on his sword' in the now infamous 'Abdication' episode! To date there have been 11 female finalists in the show and only 7 men which is another indication that the girls are coming out fighting.

There are more and more examples of powerful women in real life and by that I mean away from our TV screens. I work for Moss Bros and we are Mens' Outfitters as well as Mens' Wedding Hire Specialists and most of the top jobs in our company are held by women who have proven that they are the best person for the position.

I know a lot of men who like poor old Jason feel threatened and intimidated by strong women but times have moved on from 1966 and who knows, in years to come our Grandchildren could be listening to a soul songstress of the future crooning about it being 'A Womans' World'?... Sex should no longer be a consideration in deciding who get's what job and if that means a woman is the best man for the job then so be it!