Brother vs. sister

Hermaphrodite Mum
Three kids and a single mother

Upstairs I can hear angry voices bouncing off the walls, punctuated by the banging of a door - twice. 

"I hate you! You are never borrowing my Nintendo, ever again." Slam.

"I don't care, you are just a poo-poo brain." Slam.

Best of friends and the worst of enemies 
© Cheryl Casey | Dreamstime.com

I feel obliged to join the debate. I stand at the bottom of the stairs and yell: "Don't slam the door! How many times have I told you?"

In the kitchen behind me, Non-walking Toddler (NwT) starts calling, "Ma! Ma!" She has been unsettled by my sudden exit.

"It's okay darling." I return to spooning Petits Filous into her baby-bird mouth. "More!" she tells me, pointing at the fridge. 

While I peel the film off a second yoghurt, Middle Child and Quiet One (my eldest) burst into the kitchen seeking adjudication. I listen to their account of what happened - there is injustice on both sides and I am hard-pressed to identify a culprit.

"Look," I reason, "I am busy trying to feed NwT. Why can't you just sort it out between you?"

They turn to each other, hot-cheeked and indignant. "That's enough," I shout over the ensuing argument. "The Nintendo goes on top of the cupboard until you manage to reach an agreement."

"That's not fair," cries Quiet One, "You always take his side!" And she flounces out, batting Middle Child on the head for good measure.

"YOU NEVER WANT TO PLAY WITH ME!" rages Middle Child. I wedge the kitchen door open with my foot before he can reach it to reinforce his point.

There is a jealous gene in our family - it runs through the generations, flaring with intensity in certain characters. In Middle Child, it combines powerfully with maleness and the need to compete. Whenever I hug one of his sisters, he's there within seconds to claim his share of my affection. As a toddler he would plant himself in my lap to prevent me picking up NwT when she cried.

Just recently, Quiet One has also been displaying signs of jealousy. It seems that Middle Child has fostered a sense of rivalry between them. They are the best of friends and the worst of enemies, capable of switching seamlessly between amity and conflict several times a day.

I know from my own childhood that such sibling rivalry is natural and I do my best to contain it by distributing my favours equally. However, the odds are stacked against me: I have three children competing for one parent's attention. 

In the past, my mother has consoled me: "Don't worry they are learning their way in the world and where they belong. They will find their own harmony." 

Halfway through NwT's third yoghurt, she grabs the spoon from me and shakes it at Middle Child, who is glowering in the corner.

"I think she wants you to feed her," I say.

Reluctantly he takes the spoon and begins to heap yoghurt into her mouth. She starts to choke on the third spoonful, but recovers and gamely continues. Middle Child starts to smile in spite of himself, his tongue rolling into his cheek.

"Hey, look at this!" I call out to Quiet One. She slides back into the kitchen to take a peek.

NwT immediately takes the spoon and hands it to Quiet One. After a tentative glance in my direction, Quiet One carefully loads the spoon and pops it into NwT's mouth. Middle Child watches but doesn't protest. After that, my baby diplomat scrupulously alternates the spoon between her siblings. 

"I'm sorry," mumbles Quiet One without looking at her brother. He doesn't reply but his spirits lift and before too long he is trying to dance around the kitchen, his arms wrapped around her waist.

"Let's go and play with your Furbie," he suggests when the feeding frenzy is over.

The truce holds. I know Quiet One will always be the child who says sorry first, but I also know that Middle Child has his own gift. In an attempt to get along with his sisters, he adapts to their tastes even though they differ from his own. After all, the flip-side of jealousy is wanting to fit in and be loved. For a few minutes peace reigns... until NwT starts to howl because I won't allow her a fourth yoghurt. At least she is too small to slam doors.

Hermaphrodite Mum is a fictional creation of Emma Clark Lam

Previous posts by Hermaphrodite Mum:

Growing Pains
Favoured chicks

Prehistoric parenting 

Dream kitchens

Nostalgia is a funny old thing. It is something that I suffer from on a periodic basis. The term nostalgia is defined as a sentimental longing for the past, deriving from the Greek compound for 'homecoming' and 'ache' or 'pain'. Rather appropriate in my case as today I am mourning the loss of our home - or at least parts of our home. 

Nostalgia and innovation in the making

At the end of February, we embarked on a project to extend the kitchen into the side return. In architect's speak, we are taking an innovative approach to reflect the needs of a rapidly changing world. We are contrasting a lightweight, modern extension with the red bricks of our Edwardian terraced house. In terms of old and new, it will be a bit like the Louvre Pyramid, except we are building a nice bespoke kitchen with a comfy family area (as opposed to a world-class art gallery).

As the new parts of the house take shape, however, we are bidding farewell to the old kitchen that has served us so well for seven years. My children have grown up in this kitchen - they have learnt their table manners on black granite, showcased their artwork on cupboard doors and even taken their first steps on the slate floor. In other words, I associate a bank of happy memories with a few kitchen units. And today the builders have ripped them out!

Of course I still want my new kitchen with its painted doors and double the floorspace, but I can't help feeling discomforted by the loss of familiar surroundings. Exciting as the new project is, I am still pulled to the past. That, I suppose, is how we build our identities. Our lives are indexed by the past and invigorated by everything the future promises. By holding onto that duality, we can perhaps appreciate the delights of the old and the new. 

Which, incidentally, is what we are trying to achieve with our new extension: nostalgia, innovation, some sliding doors to the garden and forty square metres of underfloor heating. May the old kitchen rest in peace.

Adventures in literary criticism

If there is one advance in technology that I am most grateful for, it is satellite navigation. Last night my trusty Tom Tom led me from Reading, along dark and winding roads, to Winchester. The light at the end of my journey was a stylish sitting room with a wood-burning stove, several plates of pizza and two bottles of wine. 

The book club ladies of Winchester

An old school friend had heroically persuaded her book club to read my new novel, A Sister for Margot, and had invited me along for the fun! Ha! The group included an inspiring line-up: four teachers, a management consultant, a doctor and a journalist. For a brief moment, I rather wished my satnav had left me stranded on the A33 Reading relief road. Seven sets of curious eyes alighted upon me. Feeling slightly sweaty, I wondered if Margot and her relations were up to this.

To date, I have chatted to journalists and I have been interviewed on radio, but this was the first time I had come face-to-face with a room of discerning readers. In some senses, this was the culmination of everything I have been trying to achieve: a book that people will read, enjoy and discuss. But like so many things, when you get there, you wonder what you've started.

There is a theory of literary criticism called formalism that strives to analyse a text by focusing on the work itself and disregarding the author. Last night we did away with formalism. The book and I came as package, and inevitably my panel of readers interpreted it through my experiences and influences. Were the characters based on real people? How did my becoming a mother shape the book? One of the characters loses her parents when she is nine. What happened to me when I was nine? 

But it wasn't all about me, I realised. Each of them brought something new to the book - their own response. There is another vein of literary criticism more concerned with the reader's experience: each reader is unique with different ideas, educations and values, and therefore interacts with the book in a singular way. The English teacher, for instance, shared her analysis of my syntax and imagery (terrifying) while the history teacher asked about my research on the second world war (slightly less terrifying). Another member enjoyed the scenes in Ibiza because it brought back memories of a teenage holiday.

By the time I climbed back into the car and handed myself over to Tom Tom's expertise once more, I felt quite exhilarated. It may have taken me ten years to complete the book, but two hours in Winchester made me feel it was worth it. (And, in the interests of formalism, I left early to give my readers a chance to say what they really thought.)

A big thank you to the book club in Winchester, and most particularly to Emily who stuck her neck out to arrange this.

Good vibrations

A few weeks ago Marlow FM radio station invited me onto its Book Club programme to chat about my novel, A Sister for Margot. Other than producing the odd burst of audio for BBC News Online, this was my first time behind the microphone. For a few minutes, basking in the afterglow of my adrenalin rush, I felt convinced I had joined the ranks of Jane Garvey and Kirsty Young! 

Unlike Radio 4, Marlow FM is tucked away on the banks of the River Thames, amidst wooden chalets and a welter of outdoor pursuits. Avoiding a trailer full of canoes, I tip-toed through the mud and into the studio building, where a large sign instructed me to remove my boots. As luck would have it, I had cracked open a new pair of 60 denier tights that morning. Thankfully I was able to tread the studio boards with pride (my toes respectably shod). 



You can listen to this recording to hear how the interview went: 

• Copyright Marlow Ltd  2012
• By kind permission of Marlow FM  LTD

At the end of the programme, co-presenters Chrissy Hayes and Clare Bones chose A Sister for Margot to be Marlow FM's Book of the Month. Tune in online Friday 1 March at 9.30am to hear what they thought of it!



This much I've learnt about radio broadcasting:

• Get as close to the mic as you can without eating it. Frantic handwaving from Chrissy at the beginning of the interview indicated I hadn't taken her quite literally enough.
• Forget about maintaining eye contact. With your mouth up against the mic, there is no neck-room for turning to look at anyone. It made me realise how the art of conversation relies upon gauging your companion's facial expression, which leads me onto my next point...
• Don't ramble. My lengthy answer about what inspired me to write the book was in danger of killing the interactive vibe!

If the audio controls above do not work, you can also listen to the interview by clicking here.

Thanks to Vanessa Woolley of Marlow FM 97.5 who arranged the programme and provided the clip for me to post on my blog. Marlow FM is a community radio station in Buckinghamshire, staffed by volunteers.

Growing pains

Hermaphrodite Mum

Three kids and a single mother

Middle Child told me at bathtime last night that he wanted to stay living with me until he was 40 years old (his equivalent of old age). This was in response to my lament that he was growing up too quickly. With tears in his eyes, he told me he didn't want to become a big boy. We are both afraid of his increasing independence and what it spells for our relationship.

This is the central contradiction of parenting: on the one hand we want our children to progress and meet all their milestones, but on the other we can't bear the idea of our babies growing up and living beyond our influence.

Don't grow up too fast, baby!
© Photographer: Rebecca Abell | Agency: Dreamstime.com

Last week I was dropping off my nine-year-old, the Quiet One, at school. Normally we say goodbye in the school hallway - public kisses are no longer permitted. I have to content myself with a wink and discreet shoulder squeeze. On this occasion, however, I popped into her classroom to remind her about some homework that needed handing in. She was horrified by my intrusion. "Mum, you are embarrassing me!"

Girls, particularly in the West, seem to grow up too quickly. I was listening to Libby Purves a few weeks ago on Radio 4's Midweek programme. One of her guests was reminiscing about attending school in India: he recalled how 17-year old girls were content to play hopscotch in the playground. That would never happen here. A slew of factors - pop culture, commercial pressures, the fashion industry and rafts of examinations - means that our children are too eager to ape the grown-ups. They cast off their innocence like a Boden party dress, in the race to keep up with their peers. Suddenly it's all about skinny jeans, Gangnam Style and rather inappropriate dance moves.

When my two eldest children were babies, I thought it would last forever. Now I see how quickly those years pass. I watch Non-Walking Toddler's progression with a crushing sense of nostalgia. And yet I am desperate for her to start walking! When she took a few tentative steps between the sofa and the coffee table the other day, I cheered her on like she was running 100 metres in the Olympic finals. We are hardwired to push our children onwards, even if our hearts protest.

Quiet One brought some friends home this week. Over sausages and chips they discussed which of the boys they liked most in the class. "Girls," I said, "don't grow up too quickly. You can always go forwards, but you can never go back to the past." They looked at me like I was talking nonsense. They were right. How can we expect them to resist the culture we impose upon them? Their budding minds are designed to absorb these formative influences. The challenge lies with us - we need to give them less screen-time, more adventures, more time outdoors and some immunity from everyday pressures. 

Parents will always have an eye to the past and an eye to the future. The trick is striking a healthy balance. When I was putting Middle Child to bed, he amended his earlier statement. "Actually Mummy, I think I will only live with you until I find a wife and build my first house." Yes, very wise, little man.

Hermaphrodite Mum is a fictional creation of Emma Clark Lam

Previous posts by Hermaphrodite Mum:

Favoured chicks

Prehistoric parenting 

My night of networking

Last night I walked into a room of about 400 women in full-flow, not knowing a soul. It was a daunting prospect, to say the least. I had found myself at the inaugural event for the Hub.London, an informal networking group for women. It all transpired on the Byzantine shopfloor of the American retailer Anthropologie on the King's Road in London. 

Buffeted by the vibrations of female chatter, I cruised the shop displays, wondering how on earth I was going to assimilate myself. The friend who was meant to accompany me had broken her ankle so I was adrift in this sea of designer handbags, elegant heels and ironed hair. But you can only mooch about Mediterranean stoneware and assorted doorknobs for so long - at some point you are obliged to join the party.

Making old-fashioned connections

The Hub.London is the brainchild of Simona Barbieri, a marketing whizz and an Italian force of nature who commanded the microphone with gusto. "Un-bel-ievable," she greeted us from a platform above our heads. We all buzzed back agreeably. "The Hub.London is the new way and the oldest way to meet new people," she told us. "We are connecting in a natural way and we are non-selective."

Apparently the concept started with a coffee morning last June where Simona invited a group of women to her house to socialise and swap ideas. She was expecting about 30 and 98 showed up. Simona is driven by the desire to connect with other women "for real," leaving behind LinkedIn and all the other tangled webs of social media. 

On arrival at Anthropologie, we were given coloured stickers to denote our priorities - I chose a green dot to indicate I was "here to be inspired" and a purple dot to show that I had a story to tell (my book). Armed with my stickers, I launched myself into the crowd. Within minutes, I hooked up with some Mexican ladies (one was selling Mexican food to up-market retailers), a new mum with a "madcap idea" (I won't disclose it here) and a homeopath who regularly leaves her surgery in London to treat people in Gambia.

A heady mix: shopping and networking

Back on the platform, our first guest speaker, Anna Murphy, editor of Stella magazine and executive editor at The Sunday Telegraph, beguiled us with tales of women "defined not by their age but by their attitude." Ahead of the gathering, Anna had asked Simona: "Who are these women and where are they in their lives?" Simona replied, "They are everything."

We hear a lot about male entrepreneurs, unequal pay and glass ceilings - last night was refreshing because it was all about women and what they could achieve. A handpicked posse took to the platform to inspire the crowd with their stories. In a nice touch of irony, they had one minute to tell them before getting drowned out by Queen's Don't Stop Me Now. These enterprising females ranged from 'Emily' who changed the lives of young gang members to 'Ella' who went to Kenya, fell in love and set up safari tours.

The objective of course was to find someone in the room aligned to your particular interests. Simona had already told us about the artist and the high-net-worth individual who met at the coffee morning back in June. Now the individual is investing in the artist's website. Life is a lottery - our chances come and go and we don't always seize them with alacrity. The Hub.London is a way of corralling some of those opportunities, all in the spirit of sisterhood. I came home with some nicely packaged stoneware, an Anthropologie loyalty card and the promise of a few more open doors.

Emma Clark Lam is the author of the novel, A Sister for Margot.

Sex and dogma

Review: Amity & Sorrow by Peggy Riley

There is something oddly titillating about the idea of polygamy, especially when it runs counter to the prevailing culture. Why would a group of free and consenting women choose to share one man? As for the husband... well, perhaps that's self-evident. Not so long ago, The Sunday Times ran a feature on the so-called 'rampant rabbi' of East Sussex and his seven wives. In an attempt to justify his lifestyle, the husband told the newspaper: "A man is capable of looking after more than one wife and it's natural that a woman needs covering and safety." 

God, sex and farming

When it comes down to it, our fascination with polygamy revolves around sex. How seven wives share the housework is less interesting. Rather we want to hear about the antics in the bedroom. In Peggy Riley's debut novel, Amity & Sorrow, there is plenty of sex to sauce her portrayal of a fundamentalist, polygamous cult. Sexual relations evolve into a ritualistic act to bind together Zachariah, the patriarch, and his fifty wives. More significantly, the nub of the story - the crisis that sets everything in motion - turns on a repugnant act of sex.

Nana was the inspiration

The Birmingham Post and Sunday Mercury newspapers have written about my new novel, A Sister for Margot, this week. The focus of both pieces was the inspiration provided by my grandmother, Jean Morton. Thank you Brum!

Click below to read yesterday's article in the Birmingham Post:
Nana was the inspiration for first novel - Post Features - Life & Leisure from @birminghampost

And in the Sunday Mercury 20/1/13

Close-up of the Sunday Mercury newspaper

Click here for more information on A Sister for Margot

Favoured chicks

Hermaphrodite Mum
Three kids and a single mother

Sunday evening finds me packing the kids' snack boxes for school. There is a golden rule in my house - everyone gets the same snack, no arguments! Last weekend the cupboard was nearly bare but I found two cereal bars peeping out from the debris of crisps, biscuit wrappers and loose raisins. As I gingerly extracted them, I noticed that they had different best-before dates: one was fine, but the other was a month out. I hesitated for a moment and then I gave the out-of-date bar to Middle Child and the in-date bar to the eldest child (the Quiet One). Job done.

The shoebill: a mother with a favourite 
© Lukas Blazek | Dreamstime.com

It wasn't until Non-walking Toddler was safely tucked up in her cot that I gave some thought to my decision. Why had I damned Middle Child with a packet of mouldy grains? Was Quiet One my FAVOURITE child? Or was Middle Child my favourite? Perhaps I gave the fresher bar to Quiet One to compensate for a shortfall in love! From this cereal-bar index, could I extrapolate which child I might pull first from a burning building?

I had stalled at an unlikely spot - the intersection between maternal guilt and Darwin's theory of natural selection. One thing stuck in my mind: a piece of footage from a BBC documentary on Africa's Savannah. Deep in the swampy marshes, a stork-like shoebill looks after her two chicks. While she waddles off to find water, the eldest chick attacks the younger hatchling - a fluff-ball on wobbly pins with barely the strength to lift his own head. On her return, mummy shoebill notices fluff in the beak of the aggressor - like most mothers she knows what has been going on. The little fluff-ball gropes his way towards his mum, seeking comfort in her feathers, but heart-breakingly she brushes him aside and bestows her gift of water on the stronger chick. Shoebills, it turns out, rarely raise more than one chick. The younger one is merely an insurance policy in case the older one fails to thrive.

According to research conducted by Catherine Conger, a professor at the University of California, 65% of (human) mothers also exhibit a preference for one of their children - often the eldest one. Just like the shoebill, we apparently orientate toward our eldest, healthiest child - a throwback, perhaps, to earlier times of high infant mortality.

I think back to my pregnancy with Non-walking Toddler and remember how I couldn't imagine loving the new baby as much as the other two. But love comes in a feverish burst, along with the breast-milk and the cracked nipples. We are compassionate creatures. Our capabilities - love, empathy, imagination - set us on a different path to the shoebill. 

For the record, I love my three children equally, but in different ways, according to their strengths and weaknesses. Naturally Non-walking toddler takes up more of my mothering time, but less of my adult space which I am beginning to share gladly with the older two. Middle Child needs more cuddles and reassurance, while Quiet One is sustained by a current of mental sympathy that flows exclusively from me to her. 

And the fiasco with the cereal bars? I worked it out. It was a practical decision. Middle Child has a stomach like a cast-iron bucket. Mouldy cereal bars are no contest for his intestinal juices.  

Hermaphrodite Mum is a fictional creation of Emma Clark Lam
Previous posts by Hermaphrodite Mum

Dissenting voices

There are so may ways of telling a story. In the weighty tomes of Victorian England, authors like George Eliot took you by the hand and led you sententiously through the novel. Eliot's all-knowing, all-seeing 'voice' helped to shape your response to the characters, and ultimately the book itself. 

Books of old: "Dear reader..."
© Photographer: Simon Lawrence | Agency: Dreamstime.com

As children of the modern age, we have rebelled against this kind of handholding. In The Art of Fiction, the writer and literary critic, David Lodge, explains that an intrusive, authorial voice claims "a God-like omniscience, which our sceptical and relativistic age is reluctant to grant to anyone". Modern fiction, he says, tends to present the action through the consciousness of the characters, or "by handing over to them the narrative task itself". 

In other words, readers of modern fiction are more accustomed to a quiet, third-person presence who moves deftly in and out of the characters' thoughts, or a first-person narrator who tells the story from their own point of view. This is not to say that the first-person narrator is a modern invention - in Great Expectations, Charles Dickens tells the story through Pip with great ingenuity. Despite the immediacy of the first person, somehow we can still feel Dickens' judgement of Pip coming through. 

Undeniably, however, there is something modern and spontaneous about the first person. It pulls us into the book with its confessional tone. There is no standing on ceremony. The authenticity of the first person can instantly bring a story to life. Immersed in the tale, we find it easier to forget that we are reading a work of fiction.

Nevertheless, there are limitations. The author, adopting the voice of a first-person narrator, has to stay in character. There are can be no sweeping descriptions of landscape (unless the narrator is prone to such diversions) or jumps into the minds of other characters. By contrast, a third-person telling allows the author to stand back, play God and pull all the strings. 

Now we come to my dilemma (and here I switch into the first person). I am in the process of writing a novel about an ex-patriate community in Jakarta during the 1970s. On a whim, I decided to write it in the first person. I wanted the novel to open with all the immediacy and distinction of a single voice. But, for the reasons above, I keep toying with re-writing the book in the third person! My view on which perspective works better changes from day to day.

So I am putting it to the vote. Below, I have included two versions of the same opening passage. If you have time, take a read of both and let me know which you prefer in the "Add a comment" box at the bottom of the page.

First Person

We arrived at dusk. Flaming Nora – what a trip! Forty-eight hours door-to-door, with fourteen pieces of luggage and a wooden crate. We were only off the plane five minutes before the sun deserted us, tunnelling down into another part of the world. Jakarta! Truthfully, I had barely heard of the place until a few months ago and here I was, one dark night.

Outside the airport window, the jumbo jet had melted away into a twinkle of lights. They swam before my eyes in fluorescent waves. Oh Holy Mary, Mother of God, grant me one cigarette, please! My fingers were twitching in my lap. And where in the hell was Daniel? I gazed out across the filthy floor of the arrivals hall and spotted him in the distance talking to some airport bloke in a cheap uniform. Daniel’s spine was stooped, his head hangdog. He looked as old as my dad. Something was wrong. Hauling myself to my feet, I tottered over.

Third Person

They arrived at dusk, a husband and wife. What a trip! Forty-eight hours door-to-door, with fourteen pieces of luggage and a wooden crate. They were only off the plane five minutes before the sun deserted them, tunnelling down into another part of the world. Jakarta! Louise, the wife, had barely heard of the place until a few months ago and now she found herself listening to crickets trilling in the trees outside the window.

On the runaway, the jumbo jet they arrived on had melted away into a twinkle of lights. They swam before Louise's eyes in fluorescent waves. Oh Holy Mary, Mother of God, grant me one cigarette, please, she prayed, as her fingers twitched in her lap. The sound of raised voices caused her to look up. Where in the hell was Daniel? She gazed out across the filthy floor of the arrivals hall and spotted him in the distance talking to some airport bloke in a cheap uniform. Daniel’s spine was stooped, his head hangdog. He looked as old as her dad. Something was wrong. Hauling herself to her feet, she tottered over.

Emma Clark Lam is the author of A Sister for Margot

Psyching up for 2013

Another new year. Time to ring in the changes. January is a month of resolutions, stodgy thighs and enforced abstinence. We leave the excesses of Christmas behind and move into a new phase of betterment. For goodness' sake, why?

Not for me, thanks!
© Photographer: Milogu | Agency: Dreamstime.com

Facebook is full of miserable people bemoaning their decision to give up alcohol this month. Why do we impose these rules on ourselves? Lose half a stone. Go to the gym more. Learn a new language. Be nicer to the children / husband / mother / mother-in-law [delete as appropriate]. 

It's all in pursuit of happiness. Or at least an attempt to increase our sense of wellbeing during one of the bleakest months of the year. Setting resolutions provides a roadmap to a better future!

If we are to believe the American psychologist Martin Seligman, there are five elements that contribute to our sense of wellbeing. So aside from resolutions, we should also be thinking about:

• Positive emotion (life satisfaction, positive thinking)
• Engagement (being absorbed in something to the point of losing self-consciousness)
• Relationships (enjoying and constructively building relationships with other people)
• Meaning (having a purpose in life, belonging to something that is bigger than yourself)
• Accomplishment (achieving goals)

Seligman, a professor at the University of Pennsylvania, was asked to help develop a program to train the US Army in positive psychology. The goal was to make one million US soldiers more resilient to psychological trauma, at a time when the army was experiencing nearly a decade of protracted conflict. As a result, positive psychology is taught and measured throughout the US Army.

A few years ago, I had the privilege of interviewing Simon Weston, a British veteran of the 1982 Falklands War. Weston, a Welsh Guardsman, suffered severe burns when his ship Sir Galahad was bombed by an Argentine plane. For 23 years afterwards, he suffered from post-traumatic stress disorder, which took the form of vivid nightmares, panic attacks and broken sleep. He even contemplated suicide.

After a slow and difficult recovery, Weston has become a motivational speaker, encouraging people to take control of their own lives. He is a classic example of someone who finally achieved post-traumatic growth. "What does not kill me, makes me stronger," the German philosopher, Friedrich Nietzsche, once said.

Of course ordinary people like you and me are unlikely to experience the horrors of war. Our combatants are more often depression, divorce, bereavement, or on a more modest scale, relationship issues and job dissatisfaction. Weston believes that we have to accept our situation and turn it to our advantage. It is all about having a positive mental attitude.

Who knows if this or Seligman's brand of positive psychology work - the US Army is still evaluating the success of its training program - but I am interested enough to put them to the test. So here it is: 2013, the year of engagement, positive emotion and accomplishment (hopefully). I guess it beats enrolling for boot camp or attempting to shed half a stone.


Click here to watch Martin Seligman deliver a lecture on the PERMA elements of wellbeing to the Royal Society for the encouragement of Arts, Manufactures and Commerce. I would like to thank Jamie Reed, an executive coach and author, for introducing me to Martin Seligman's work. 

Emma Clark Lam is the author of A Sister for Margot

Prehistoric parenting

Hermaphrodite Mum
Three kids and a single mother

I feel as if I am emerging from a dormant state. I open my eyes wide and I finally exit the kitchen. No more slaving over a hot stove, no more clearing up. The e-cloth is threadbare. Christmas is officially over.

At the same moment, a tiny prehistoric creature emerges from an egg the size of a full stop. It has become the newest member of our household: a Triops! This species of crustacean is blessed with three eyes and has existed for millions of years, just hanging out in ponds. The Triops ancestors shared an ecosystem with Tyrannosaurus Rex and now we have one living in our kitchen in a petri dish.

The un-parented Triops 
© 3drenderings | Dreamstime.com

Middle Child was given a "Terrible Triops" kit for Christmas. Ever since we have been peering into our puddle of Volvic spring water, attempting to spy our tiny vibrating hatchling.

I explain to Middle Child that the Triops is a hermaphrodite. "What's that?" comes the inevitable reply. "It means," I say, picking my words with care, "that she doesn't need a daddy to have babies." 

Middle Child pauses for thought. He wipes away a layer of snot laminating his top lip. "So you're like a Triops then," he says, looking me straight in the eye. "You are a herm-afo-dite."

In a manner of speaking, I suppose I am (Errant Husband has taken a sabbatical from parenting). It is also well-known that I have an all-seeing eye at the back of my head. So that's what I am: some kind of human-Triops hybrid.

My eldest comes downstairs - the Quiet One. "What's for supper?" she asks. It is pretty much all she has said today. 

"I'm not sure," I reply, "I've only just cleared up lunch." Then in an attempt to distract her, I say: "Look! The Triops has hatched."

Quiet One leans over the dish. "It's a shame it never gets to meet its mum." 

"What?" asks Middle Child.

"Read your booklet nim-wim. The adults live for about a month, hatch their eggs and then they die. When the babies hatch, it starts all over again."

Middle Child looks to me for affirmation. "So they never get to meet their mum?" he asks in a trembling voice.

"No, love." Middle Child promptly bursts into tears. 

Upstairs there is the echo of a wail. Non-walking Toddler has woken up early from her afternoon nap. I go wearily up to fetch her. Maybe mother Triops was onto something when she cut parenting out of the loop. After all, the species has survived in identical form for more than 200 million years.

Non-walking Toddler stands up in her cot, cheeks flushed and arms akimbo. I pick her up and breath in her warm, yeasty smell. Ah! Maybe there is something to be said for evolution and intensive parenting.

Middle Child appears at the door. "I love you Mama," he says, his face still smudged with tears. I hug them both tight until they shriek.

Downstairs, Quiet One gives an uncharacteristic yell. We all thunder down into the kitchen to discover another hatchling. It is a conundrum - how has this species made it to 2013 without evolving? Middle Child gives his best T-Rex roar to welcome the new arrival.

"Is supper nearly ready?" asks Quiet One, covering her ears.

I sigh and glance round at my four walls. Oh well, I may live in the kitchen, but at least I don't spend my days swimming around a petri dish. Evolution has won me that much.

Hermaphrodite Mum is a fictional creation of Emma Clark Lam