January Blues

Back to work on Monday and I'm dreading it. There's no cover for my job when I'm away so 2 weeks worth of work will be piled up, necessitating lots of long hours to catch up. And back to juggling motherhood and work. The older son messed up his GCSEs and is supposed to be revising for resits next week, but cannot seem to focus without constant input from me, nagging, testing him. I'm still trying to get younger son to do his DoE work (surely defeating the purpose of it?), do the extra work necessary to catch up in English, check his homework book. They're good boys, but like all teenagers selfish and lazy at times too - unlikely to do anything to help out without considerable nagging from me, and I'm fed up of nagging. Renewing bus pass? Cleaning football boots? Finding the missing shin pads? Getting the broadband working again? Aaaaargh! Too much to do, too little energy.

I envy my friends with big families to draw on, grandparents to pitch in and help bring up children. I'm just tired of being a single working mum with no back-up, the first and the last line of defence. It's like walking through treacle.