Saturday 2 April 2011

Hormones

Hi Folks, my dear friend Cara was berating me last night for not writing my Blog recently. But don’t worry, I have lots of excuses!
Don’t we always? I for one can easily divert my thoughts onto all the things I haven’t done, need to do or have just done. 

Every book I have ever read concerning living more peacefully and living more meaningfully talks about “living in the now”. 
Indeed there is in reality only now, since (as the scientists have proved) there is no such thing as linear time - that’s just a man-made construct. I don’t pretend to understand the mechanics but I like the idea!
But I’ve found, like so many things in life, the theory is easier than the practice. Living in the now is a bit like learning to ride a horse. Skyler, the young horse whisperer who was teaching me out in Montana, explained beautifully to me how to sit in the saddle while my horse was trotting. 
I concentrated hard and listened carefully to what to do...then my horse started to move and it all went out of the window. “Push your weight down in your stirrups and curve your butt into the saddle.” Yeah right. The horse was going up and down and I’m going down and up and the whole thing degenerated into an ungainly jiggle. The story of my life!
Just about sums up my last few weeks. 
We’ve had a lot going on in our business recently.Those of you who know our shops here in Petworth will know we closed our shoe shop last week. It has been a sad excercise. It’s never much fun ending something, and it was a bumpier ride than I’d imagined it to be. I’ve learnt over the 7 years that I’ve been a business owner that making decisions based on sound financial proof is the only way to go. But tell my heart that when I’m dismantling one of our dreams and admitting defeat.
But this is what I mean about living in the now. When we discussed this closure 4 months ago I was all for the streamlining of our shops. Our overheads were too high, our profits were too low - “you do the math” as the Americans say.
Four months down the line we have successfully managed the closure and secured a new tenant for the premises. I got exactly what I asked for - so why do I feel so lousy?!
Excuse number two: Hormones!! (men’s favourite) My husband keeps a closer eye on my Menstrual Cycle than I do. Which is why I found myself on Wednesday panicking quite spectacularly (and internally) about our future.
Now for those of you out there who don’t directly experience PMT I’ll describe my own personal symptoms:
Small dense black rain-cloud hovering permanently over my head.
A head full of demons (mine) who form a cacophonous background of abuse in my head. You know the stuff: “You’re useless. Have you made the right decision? What are you doing with your life? What about the future? What does your hair look like?!” Deafening and prone to cause paralysis.
Then there’s the leaking. Poor Chris is driven demented by my crying at this time of the month. The tears just leak out unbidden, all over the place. I read recently that crying releases the stress hormone Cortisol. Finally, the perfect excuse for a “good greet”.
No consolation when I’m trying to have a serious business conversation and have an overwhelming urge to throw myself on the ground and bawl. 
My old Jenners friends and I used to meet up regularly by the service lift to discuss work problems. Can you see the three of us, all dolled up in heels and big earrings, lipstick in place -  frazzled all to hell? 

On a really bad day when everything was out of control Sonya would say, our minds were going “whoop, whoop, whoop” (accompanied by eye rolling and upward hand gestures). The only answer was to call in a helicopter and be airlifted from the building. Picture it - a stressed out, hormonal fashion buyer flailing around on a rescue stretcher while the whump whump whump of the blades slowly fade away above the Department Store.
The rescue helicopter didn’t arrive this week and I had to manage through the morass that was my brain unaided. As we say in Scotland: “Ma heid’s mince”. Which literally translated means “my head’s full of minced beef”. Quite.
I make a promise to myself that I’ll keep up my Blog - no more excuses - being honest about what’s going on in my minced head and in the hope that some of you out there know what I’m talking about.
Laura x