Addictions to sugar and shoes ....

We all have a secret vice, a little habit that we know isn't good for us but that we can't resist. The kind of little thing that we can ignore for so long but sooner or later, despite our best efforts, it catches us out. Normally it's when we hit a low, we are tearful and need reassurance from an old favourite source. For some of us it's chocolate at the end of a bad day, copious amounts of vino on a Friday after a bad week, a cheeky pick me up outfit on the forbidden credit card or maybe its an encounter with some one we know is toxic for us. The brilliant thing about these little addictions and flirtations is that for such a short while they make us feel on top of the world. Like we are amazing, the world is wonderful and we feel empowered that we can do any thing we want. The sky is the limit and we want to touch the stars whilst we are there. Our endorphins are racing around our bodies like a child on e numbers and we are totally swept up in the whole situation. What can be wrong with that, you can ask? We all work long hours, give endlessly to friends and family, why shouldn't we do that special something for ourselves? But how special and exciting is this treat just a few short hours after it has happened? How often are we left feeling guilty and empty after the deed is done? Often after the initial pleasure comes the hours, days or weeks of pain, hurt, tears and regret. The destructive circle of self hatred is in full flow, causing us more regret and negative emotions. How often do we see our own behaviour as destructive? In a world where we are told we can do any thing, are we kidding ourselves that we are so super human that we can really handle the aftermath of our own temptations? By giving in to these toxic situations are we just short changing ourselves? Are we taking second best in a situation where we are worried that getting a first is too much to ask? 

Chatting with the girls this week over salad trays, beans on toast and fat free soup it became clear we are all running and hiding from certain temptations. Lunch with friends is the perfect place to make our confessions of credit cards spending, whole entire pizza munching and  being unable to resist communication with the toxic ex. It's a safe place to talk about what we are tempted to do and yet despite kind thoughtful advise being handed out with the celery sticks we choose to give ourselves less than we deserve. Is an addiction to sugar and shoes causing us instant happiness and setting us up with little future gain? 

Some times we just have to take a deep breath and ignore these temptations, be them friend requests from frienimies, texts from toxic men, the mcdonalds drive through after a bad day or the lunch time credit card splurge because if we look deep enough into ourselves we will see that we are worth so much more than the cheap fix's these vices give us. As for me, well the chocolate is in the freezer, my facebook page has had a frienimy clear out and my credit cards are in tiny pieces.  After all, why waste time, money and calories a big mac when it's worth waiting for steak? 

Is it a girls world?: Reason, Season, Lifetime........

Is it a girls world?: Reason, Season, Lifetime........: They say in crisis you will find out who your true friends are and this week during my (mini) crisis of moving house I truly did learn who m...

Reason, Season, Lifetime........

They say in crisis you will find out who your true friends are and this week during my (mini) crisis of moving house I truly did learn who my friends are. From the practical help to the emotional support my girls never failed me. As I sat exhausted and emotional on the ever growing pile of shoe boxes I started thinking about my friendships.

Through our teenage years friendships are formed on the school social scale. A blurry maze of unspoken rules that dictate who can speak to who, who we can berate and who we can date. School is a time in our lives when friendships are judged by the sports labels worn and the type of bag you carried. It is a time when it is acceptable to write all over things in tippex to prove our love and when the height of true friendship was in the swapping of some tiny stringy bracelet that cost a month’s pocket money. Looking back at our 13 year old selves it’s too easy to look at those friendships that were made on buses and in playgrounds and remember them as simple times. We forget the heart break of being ignored by the cooler kids, the teenage anguish of feeling no one understands us and the constant race of not being the last girl to kiss a boy or start her period. These early friendships often become the window to our past, these are the friends who remember our first kiss, our first drunken encounter and shared our pride at owning a shell suit. They not only remember and share these memories, but they are also their memories too.  It is within this rich tapestry of our early friendship that we start to develop our sense of self and shape our future friendships.

As we move forward in our late teens and early twenties our friendships, like us, start to grow, change and mature. As we start to spread our wings, follow our dreams and create our own path to find out who we are, our friendships naturally follow suit. College and University often pave the way for new and more sophisticated friendships with people we may have never had opportunity to mix with before. This is a time when friendship is based on the kindness of holding our hair back when the right answered to any question seemed to lie in the bottom of a bottle of vodka, clothes are swapped and recycled and shoulders were for crying on.

As women we invest so much in to our friendships. Hours are spent talking, crying, sharing and supporting each other. We live our lives together through our early years with make up’s, break up’s, revision week and a shared goal of getting out on Friday night and head into our thirties facing issues such as marriage, divorce, IVF and loss together.  It’s our girl friends that pick us up when are down, make us strong when we feel we can’t go on and give us the giggles when we need it the most.

The mother ship once gave me a piece of advice that has always stayed with me, three little words. Reason, season, lifetime. And as I reflect on my friendships I see she may have had a point. We have friendships for reasons that often we don’t ourselves understand and yet they are crucial in our lives. We have friendships that through work, travels or life are for a short season and then, if you are very lucky, just once, you find the one who will last a life time.

This October is Breast Cancer Awareness month. Sadly Breast Cancer is an issue that has or will touch all of our lives in some way at some point. So this blog is dedicated to all the amazing, inspirational women in our lives. To those who give so much to others without complaining, who carry on working when they are tired and in pain. The wonderful mums and nana’s who give us their wisdom, support and guidance. The women that text just to say hi when they know you feel low, the friends who live so far away yet a moment together feels life the years apart have been mere seconds to the amazing friend who will help carry your shoe boxes in a house move, strong independent and brave the support  given is unwavering. I can honestly say I am honoured to know all the women in my life. I am in awe that such inspiring beautiful people exist and excel at who they are.

So this October please spread the love for your girls and support Breast Cancer Awareness Month. For every person that reposts this link Sunflower Event Hair and Make Up will donate £1 to ASDA’s Tickled Pink Campaign and for every ‘like’ we get we will donate 50p. Get reposting and liking ladies!!

Is it a girls world?: Organised Chaos........

Is it a girls world?: Organised Chaos........: Being a girl of few organisational skills and subsequent high stress levels, an impending house move is not something I look forward too. I'...

Organised Chaos........

Being a girl of few organisational skills and subsequent high stress levels, an impending house move is not something I look forward too. I'm the kind of girl who gets in the car to find my petrol light has come on, the tax disc expired yesterday and I'm already 20minutes late for work as my hair has a life of its own. This was just a predictable Monday morning in the story of my unorganized life. The thing is, being unorganized has been a habit for so long it’s now a big part of my life. From school reports and work appraisals to my mum repeating the same, weary mantra of ‘can you please be a more organized *sigh*’, many people have tried to show me the error of my chaotic ways, yet I never seem to learn. With the mother ships voice ringing in my head, I cursed my own incompetence. At the risk of sounding trite, why does all this happen on a Monday?! As the fun and happiness of the weekend fills your head and heart, Monday stomps its miserable, cold size 9's all over it! As I ran in the house, switching the lap top on, frantically searching for the tax disc reminder I had put in the age old favourite 'safe place' that I can never remember and tripping over my pack up I had left on the stairs (so I wouldn't forget it). Great start to the day. One hour later, a quick petrol stop at the most rural garage and a tax disk had left me nearly £100 lighter and 100% stressed. As I slipped into work late (again) I made a vow to myself I would get organised and book a hair appointment. Especially for the looming house move.....

With the ink barely dry on the new house contract and the promise to myself to be more organised fresh in my mind, I set about collecting empty boxes for a move in 4 weeks time. Feeling pleased with this first step I followed this up with an attempt at writing a list. I even went to effort of doing it on one of those purpose built list making note pads, a subtle gift from the mother ship. Now I’m not normally a list writing kinda gal, maybe in that lies the problem so pushing forward with the new organized me I persevered with this list writing business. One hour later, shamefully I still had no list. I did however have a lovely doodle of some flowers, a cube, an eye and my signature as Mrs Pitt. Not particularly useful. Deciding I was much more of a practical person, it was time to tackle my shoe collection. Somewhat ashamed of the giant size of it when I moved in with the boy, I currently have shoes stashed away in secret locations all over the house and my car. Several hours later a game of hide and seek was complete and Kurt Geiger’s finest were now piled high (all in boxes of course!) neatly in the living room and blocking the Chesterfield sofa and subsequently the TV. Realising that this beautifully organized pile would have to be moved in case Arsenal were playing, I could think of no other option than to put all the shoes back where I had found them. Feeling deflated that my attempt at organization had once again not gone well, I decided to hit up my old and faithful pal, the internet. Moves to new cities require new things like Doctors, Dentists and parking permits. There are also other new essentials to be found in a new city such as hair dressers, beauty therapists and stockist of Benefit, Chanel and Dior.  Trying again with the list idea I was a little more successful this time. It’s amazing how much more motivated I am when it comes to more appealing things. Several hours later I sat back feeling proud. I had not only written a list, I had a tick to. New city, new start, new hairdresser, one tick is better than none!

As the move gets closers, I find myself surrounded by piles of shoes, clothes, make up and books. Memories of my life slowly but surely get packaged away into a variety of boxes and bags, ready to start again somewhere new. There are still boxes empty in the back of my car, shoes hidden all over and I’m not totally convinced I have found a new organised me. But what I do know is that somewhere in amongst this organised chaos is a new apartment, the start of a new chapter and a fabulous new hair cut.