Someone else gets it.

I reheated my coffee three times today. The fourth time I drank it cold, standing up, and honestly it was fine.

If your drink went cold too, that is not failing. That is Tuesday.

Everyone asked how the baby was. I kept waiting for someone to ask how I was. Then my sister did, and I cried in the car park.

You are allowed to want to be asked. It is not needy. It is human.

I finally put the baby down and realised I had forgotten to eat. I made toast and ate it while it was actually warm. Small thing. Big thing.

Warm toast counts. Fed is enough.

I had ten minutes to myself and did absolutely nothing. No folding, no tidying. I just sat. It was the best nothing of my week.

Nothing is allowed to be the whole plan.

I cried this morning and laughed this afternoon. Both were real. Neither cancelled the other out.

A hard morning does not get to decide your afternoon.

Today I felt like myself again for twenty minutes. I sang in the kitchen. Then it passed, but now I know she is still in there.

Twenty minutes is proof, not a tease. She comes back more often than you think.

By evening I could not bear one more hand on me. I love them all and I still needed nobody to touch me for an hour.

Needing your own body back for a while is not rejecting anyone.

Someone offered to visit and I said no. Just no. Then I had a bath and did not apologise to anyone.

No is a full sentence, and it protected your evening.

I texted a friend just the words: can you bring dinner Thursday? She said yes in nine seconds. I had been dreading it for a week.

Most people are waiting to be asked something specific.