How the Bloody Hell Did I End Up Publishing a Book?

I didn’t wake up one morning and decide to become an author.

There was no lifelong dream involving a typewriter, a cottage in the Cotswolds and me staring thoughtfully out of a window while waiting for inspiration to strike.

I was a 53-year-old woman with a busy family, a dog, a cat, approximately four thousand things that needed doing and a fairly recent habit of making art.

And then, somehow, I wrote a bloody book.

Even more surprisingly, I published it.

And people bought it.

People I don’t even know bought it.

This is still slightly alarming.

What if they find out that I’m not actually as talented as I think?

Well, who cares?

Life as a fifty-something woman has been one of the most inspirational and empowering times of my life. Alongside the rapidly growing middle-age spread and the inconvenience (massive understatement) of menopause, I have started to really find myself.

Was I lost?

Not physically. I’m always with me.

But mentally and emotionally? Quite definitely.

Don’t get me wrong, my life has been massively brilliant. I have been married for almost 30 years (what a lucky bastard he is) and am a mother to two of the most wonderful and inspirational, yet really fucking annoying sometimes, teenagers.

Who knew that anyone could complete at least 200 eye rolls towards me in a single day, whilst simultaneously scrolling through the completely addictive and frankly scarily persuasive monster that is social media?

‘But Mum, it’s absolutely true that if you wear those jeans outside the house, you will get cancelled!’

Of course, used responsibly, social media can be a brilliant way to share your message with the world.

Take my book, for example (please do 😉).

Without the wonders of Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest and the rest, it would be much harder to share my efforts with the world. And at 53, I’ve proved to myself that I can still put myself out there and I can still learn new things.

Even through the brain fog.

I can honestly say that there is still so much kindness in the world. The messages of support I have received since my book was published have been incredible.

And yes, there have been a few less-than-lovely comments, sometimes thinly veiled as constructive criticism.

But they’re not stopping me.

The beast has been unleashed.

Because I am finally learning to say:

‘FUCK IT!’

Fuck it, I tried.

Fuck it if no one likes my book.

Fuck it if you think I swear too much.

I do.

And I fucking love it.

There is only one life, and so much of it is wasted worrying about the oughts, shoulds and buts.

Your greatest advocate is, and will always be, YOU.

Think about that the next time you are perched on your throne, trying to overcome the ongoing constipation that seems to accompany growing older.

If a thought or idea comes into your head (other than bloody hell, I need some lactulose), just go with it.

Try the thing.

Write the book.

Paint the picture.

Start the business.

Wear the jeans that will apparently get you cancelled.

You don’t have to be the next William Shakespeare, Taylor Swift, JLo or Emma Thompson.

You just have to be you.

It has taken me 53 years to realise that I don’t need somebody else’s permission to try something. And failing at something I wanted to do would be considerably less shit than never doing it because I was frightened of what people might think.

So I wrote a book.

I published it.

People I don’t know are reading it.

And yes, that is still slightly alarming.

But fuck it.

I’m writing another one!