These have been learned over time and are the result of much experience in the mummy department. I now impart them to all young mother’s in the hope it will enable you to have a slightly easier time.
1.Boys (of all ages) never look in the back of drawers. This is true. They open the drawer about half way, have a quick look and then tell you that what they are seeking is not in there. This can be used to your advantage if, as in my house, they frequently a) misplace their own scissors and b) borrow yours and don’t replace them. Seriously, I have pairs of scissors with death threats written in permanent marker pen on the handles (slightly embarrassing when I took them to use for church sunday school, but I got over it.) It made no difference, they would still use my scissors and not return them. However, if I keep them at the back of the drawer, even the drawer where they have always been kept, then they don’t find them. Things at the back are safe. Worth remembering.
2.When they ask which child you love best, pick one. I spent years trying to explain that I loved them all equally, that I could never choose which one I loved best, etc etc – they just kept asking. So one day I picked one and gave an outrageous reason:”Rebecca, because girls are better than boys,” “James because he’s the nicest,” “Mark, because he’s clever,” They still asked occasionally (and I did try to switch which one I chose) but it put them off for a long time and always ended the conversation pretty fast. Maybe they just needed to be the one that was chosen.
3.When your children argue with their siblings, always be the most unreasonable. I always wanted my children to be friends with each other, not least because one day I wont be here to care for them and I want them to look out for each other. All children argue with their siblings, that cannot be avoided. However, when there was no clear reason for the dispute, I would try to be much more unreasonable than any of them. Comments like, “Right, that is no television ever again” or “I am banning all chocolate” would so outrage my children that they would mutter darkly about me – together – and forget all about whatever they had been arguing about. After an hour or so they would ‘persuade’ me to modify my punishment to a more sensible one.
4.Forcing your child to eat something will not make them less fussy eaters. I am an adult now, all grown up, but I still feel sick when I smell rhubarb or gooseberries cooking and I am sure it is because I was forced to eat them as a child. I did initially try the same parenting technique with my own children (most of us copy our parents to some extent) but I abandoned it when I found peas thrown out of the window and half a piece of steak blocking the toilet. If my children did not like something, they were not forced to eat it. They did have to taste it every so often, in case their tastebuds had changed, but they were happy to do that because they knew they could choose not eat it if they didn’t want to. They are all adults now and they all have a varied diet. One of them was very fussy and I do believe he could taste things that I could not taste as he was even picky over treats like chocolate or vanilla ice cream. He still dislikes a lot of food but he will eat a whole variety of food and if under pressure (like at his girlfriend’s parents house) he can force himself to eat pretty much anything. You do of course need to ensure that they have a balanced diet. However, if your child does not eat vegetables, fruit is just as healthy.
I would like to have a short rant here. I am increasingly concerned by how fat some children are in today’s society. Please have an honest look at your child. If they are over weight, you are not doing them any favours by allowing them to over eat. It is not cute. Sugar is not an essential part of life. It will not kill your child if they tell you they are hungry sometimes – offer them a baked potato or some toast – if they are not hungry enough for that, then they can wait until the next meal. They will not get enough exercise at school – that is your responsibility as a mother, not the teachers. If they are not having enough exercise, drop them off further from the school so they have to walk for a few minutes everyday. Exercise does not need to be expensive or time consuming. Also, occasionally check the ingredients of what your child is eating. If the list is full of stuff you are more likely to find in a chemistry lab than a supermarket, do you really want to feed it to your child?
5.You cannot reason with an angry boy. When girls are angry, the adrenaline stimulates the speech part of their brain and they want to talk. Sometimes for many hours non stop. The opposite happens with a boy. When they are angry, the speech part of their brain shuts down and they are more likely to hit out than discuss. Something to do with testosterone. I don’t understand the biology but I do know that it is true because I have seen it many many times with my sons and my pupils. So, if a boy is angry, do not bother explaining anything until he has calmed down. If he is small, pick him up and put him somewhere safe. If he is big, put yourself somewhere safe (the washroom is a good place. Even an angry boy will not want to risk seeing his mother using the toilet and there is usually a lock on the door.) When he is calm, then you can explain to him why he was wrong, why you behaved as you did, what is an appropriate punishment, etc.
6.You cannot raise a child on your own. We all need help, mothers especially. In an ideal world, a child is raised by two parents and four grandparents and a whole world of friends, teachers, neighbours. Ours is not an ideal world, but whatever your situation, recognise that you have limitations and get help when you need it. Lots has been written about this, about “it takes a whole village to raise a child”, or even films like “About a Boy”. It is true. When you get to the absolute limit of what you can cope with, get help. I am a sometimes praised for how nice my children are and was a successful teacher, but sometimes I couldn’t cope. I recall one evening when I phoned my brother and told him I could not cope with my teenage son. He talked to him for a while (I think they just agreed that women can be very irrational at times! But it didn’t matter, it broke a cycle that I wasn’t coping with.) Don’t let things get beyond what you can cope with, that’s when horrible things happen. If you need help, get help. It is the wise thing to do.
7.When they bring home a crap picture, tell them its crap. If you always praise them they will a) never trust you to be honest and b) always feel the need to do brilliantly. I firmly believe that if you teach your children how to fail well, then they will do well in life. One of my proudest parenting moments was when my daughter lost a race in the school sports event. She was last by a considerable margin and ran the last lap with the hugest grin to huge cheers from the crowd. She was not a sporty child, she knew she was not good at running and that was fine. In other areas she excelled and she knew that my praise was genuine. If I say something is good, they can trust that it is.
8.Treat your children differently. You can treat them equally without having to do exactly the same thing for each child. For example, I can never understand the parents who buy a gift for the other child on a siblings birthday. Letting someone else have a turn at the treat is a good learning point, this is life, they will not always be the one who gets the promotion/job/top mark etc. This is relatively easy if they are different genders – when they complain that one is allowed to go to a party or something you can explain that they are all different but equal and offer to treat them equally – if your son wants a pink tutu, to learn ballet, grow hair long enough for ribbons, etc, that would be fine with you. They will soon see the logic in being treated differently. This is the same when choosing a school, clubs etc – see them as individuals especially if they have different talents.
9.Don’t be fooled when your child tells you that you are either the best or the worst mother in the world. You are not. When they are about five and they tell you that you are the best mummy ever, that is very nice. Write it down and hold on to that memory. It wont be too long before they tell you that “all the other mother’s let their children do/have/go whatever” and they will reliably inform you that you are the worst mother ever. Brace yourself and ride the storm, taking regular peeks at the diary entry when they told you how wonderful you are and remembering that ALL good mothers are told this at some point. You are their mother, not their friend. They don’t have to like you all the time. You have to make decisions for what is best for them, not what they will necessarily want. Be brave, it is not easy. But you are the best mother that they have, so they will have to get over it. I regularly told my children, “I am not like other mothers.”
10.Do go with your gut feeling and monitor how long your child plays computer games or watches television. They can stunt creativity and the ability to communicate and keep track of real life. It wont kill your child to be bored sometimes. Or even (horrors) read a book. Decide what works for you. I found that most games, whilst addictive, also needed a certain amount of time for them to be played satisfactorily. So in our house we had ‘computer weeks’. For one week, they could play computer games for as long as they liked (not including homework times, meal times and bed times, which were rigid unless they were ill.) Then, the next week, there was no computer at all. After a couple of days, they adjusted to the lack of life support and actually managed to enjoy something like cooking or reading or playing in the garden.
11.When your child is a teenager, have difficult discussions in public. This was one of the best things that I discovered. So, if I wanted to discuss with my fifteen year old his bed time, the amount of time spent on homework or any other ‘tricky issue’ I would take him out for lunch or even a to nice coffee shop. Somewhere public. Somewhere that having a meltdown would be embarrassing for him. The social pressure helped him keep a lid on whatever anger he would like to vent and we managed to have a few very sane conversations. It was well worth the price tag.
It should perhaps be noted, that when I began writing this article I asked my daughter if she could remember any of my parenting strategies. She informed me that: I regularly told her she was adopted and suggested she could go and find her real parents (she looks EXACTLY like me, so this was never a problem for her.)
If something hurt, I told her it would probably fall off.
I wanted to burn down her primary school.
I made her move traffic cones that were blocking the road when I wanted to drive down it.
I also always told them that even if they did things that were rubbish, I would love them anyway (they liked that one.)
On reflection, I may have been a slightly rubbish mother. However, all my children have grown up to be happy sane and good company. Maybe being rubbish doesn’t matter too much. God chose you to raise your child, He has confidence that you can do it. I remember reading once, you don’t have to be a perfect mother, you only have to be good enough. There is hope for us all…….
To hatch an egg, first you need a fertilised egg (which the eggs you buy in the supermarket might be but probably are not). To obtain a fertilised egg, you either need one of these:
(a male of the species you hope to hatch!)
or you can buy them.
I buy them from ebay and they are posted to me in clever polystyrene boxes. When you have your eggs, you either have to begin growing it at once, or keep it somewhere cool (like a garage) and turn it once a day. Fresh eggs have much the best chance of survival. However, I did once want to fill a half-empty incubator and used an egg that had been in the fridge for two weeks. It hatched into a perfectly healthy duckling which we named ‘Cupcake’.
In the wild, the mother bird will lay one egg per day in the nest and leave them until she has enough to sit on. Ducks will sit on about twenty. So, should you find a nest in the wild with cold eggs in, do not assume they have been abandoned, it could be that the hen has not yet finished laying.
When you start warming the eggs, the embryo will begin to develop. Once this has begun, you must keep them warm all the time or they will die. To warm them you need one of these:
(An incubator)
Or a female who is broody.
To encourage a hen to become broody, give her a nest of eggs to sit on. This can be annoying if it’s not intentional and you have just not collected them for a few days, as a broody hen will stop laying and refuse to budge from the nest except to eat and swim (if she is a duck. Chickens are not keen swimmers.) If you have bought eggs, put them right next to the hen. She will see them, assume they are hers and push them into the nest. A broody hen will adopt pretty much anything. Not sure about other species, but certainly ducks will hatch chickens and vice versa.
The temperature and timing depends on the bird to be hatched. A chicken takes 3 weeks to grow and a duck takes 4 weeks. At first a chicken egg needs to be kept at 37℃ for 19 days and a duck egg for 25 days. It also needs to be kept humid. In an incubator you can add water. A duck will go for regular swims. Presumably chickens sweat a lot. A chicken egg needs to be kept at 45% humidity for the 19 days. The eggs also need to be turned, roughly every hour. This stops them sticking to the side of the egg and being deformed. Most incubators do this for you. I have no idea how how a hen knows all this, pretty amazing really.
As the embryo develops, it ‘eats’ the egg yolk, which it is attached to by an umbilical cord. Yes, ducklings and chicks do have tummy buttons! The yolk does not (as many people think) turn into the chick, it is just food. You can check on how the egg is developing after a week. If you shine a very bright torch onto the shell, you should be able to see lots of tiny blood vessels spreading out from a black dot. In the olden days they used candles but when I tried that I burnt my fingers and dropped the egg. I felt like a murderer. Any eggs that have not developed are probably not fertile and should be thrown away or they might go bad and the fumes will kill the other eggs. I check the eggs every few days after the first week. The black dot gets bigger until it is the only thing you can see other than the air space. But, if the air space starts to get bigger or the gunge inside the egg looks like it has separated, throw the egg away. It means the chick has died.
After 19 days, stop turning the eggs. They should hatch in 3 days. The temperature needs to be 37℃ and the humidity should be 60% . The eggs may begin to shake or even crack any time now. The bird inside is moving around, first into the air space inside the egg and then uses the little bump on its beak to begin to crack the egg. Sometimes you can hear them cheeping from inside the egg, which is very exciting! I have found that ducklings often begin to hatch fairly soon after after you stop turning the eggs and chicks do not really start until the end of the three days.
If you are a sensible person, you will do nothing during this period. You will not remove the lid of the incubator or help a hatchling that has got stuck. Any bird that is too weak to hatch is probably not very strong and is likely to die within a few days of hatching.
However, if like me, you are not particularly sensible and are more ‘mummy’ than ‘farmer’, then it is possible to help. The two things to remember are that the hatchling needs air and that it must absorb the remaining yolk. Sometimes a chick is too weak to crack the shell. If, after two days of watching an egg shake and hearing it cheep, it still has not made a hole, I tend to help it (with a skewer or sweetcorn fork!) Make a tiny hole in the air space of the egg (use a torch to check the chick is not in that bit.) I then, very slowly remove pieces of shell, about 3㎟ every five minutes, letting the chick rest in between. Do not ever remove the chick completely, just the shell around the head which will be folded over but will straighten as you remove shell. The yolk needs to stay moist, so when the chick’s head is free, I sometimes add warm water to the remaining half of shell (nowhere near the head or it might drown) so the yolk does not dry out. Then I leave it. Sometimes a chick will sit in a half hatched state for over a day. If it is warm, has air and the yolk remains moist, it will be fine.
Once it has got enough strength (from absorbing the yolk) it will hatch the rest of the way itself. Obviously this is rather time consuming, so do not begin to ‘help’ (or interfere as my children put it) unless you have alot of time and do not mind a bit of gore (there are a lot of capillaries around the shell and yolk, so expect a bit of blood. It does not seem to come from the bird, which is usually fine, but it looks a bit unpleasant.) When the bird has fully hatched, leave it in the incubator for about 12 hours. It will rest (and look like it has died) for a few hours, then will dry out and start bouncing around.
When it is fully mobile, move it to the next stage. This will either be a brooder – a box with a heat lamp, or a mother hen. I have read that it is difficult to introduce new hens to an established flock (because they fight, unlike ducks, who will welcome anyone.) It is therefore much better to give the new hatchlings to your broody hen to raise. I simply carry them outside and put them next to her nesting box. She will look extremely surprised for a few minutes, then when no one else claims the chick, she will push it underneath her and you can relax!
If I am raising the chicks or ducklings, I put them into a large plastic crate lined with hay. They need a heat lamp, water and food. I experiment with the height of the heat lamp – if they are huddled directly underneath it is too high, if they are in a far corner, it is too low. The water needs to be in a very shallow container so they can not drown (they are cute but stupid.) I feed them chick crumb. Some people give chicks medicated chick crumb because chicks are prone to infections (It’s not unusual for an apparently healthy chick to suddenly die.) However, I think it is better not to introduce antibiotics unless an animal is actually ill and I would prefer to risk the odd bird by giving them a more natural chick crumb. You cannot feed medicated chick crumb to ducklings or they will die.
In an emergency, if you have no chick crumb, you can feed egg yolk to the hatchling.
I keep the hatchlings very clean. I throw away the hay as soon as it is dirty or damp and keep their food and water fresh. However, outside raised chicks are constantly muddy, the mother hen will put grubs and corn on the ground for them to eat and will kick dirt into all the food. They seem to survive.
A duckling can swim the same day that it hatches. It is kept waterproof by the oils that transfer from the mother when they sit under her. If they are raised in a brooder, they can still swim but after a few minutes will become water logged and should be returned to the lamp to dry out. They love water and try to splash in any water that they see, so it can be hard to keep their drinking water clean unless you buy a special drinking dispenser.
Chicks do not like water! If you hatch ducklings and chicks together, the chicks will follow the ducklings to the water bowl and then look very cross when they get splashed. However, within a week, chicks have grown wing feathers and are beginning to flutter out of the box (so it needs a lid or to be in a dog cage.) You should then add a perch to the container and encourage them to roost at night (by removing the hay so the ground is not so comfortable.) When they are a few weeks old they will always roost on a perch. As most of their poop arrives when they are asleep, it makes keeping the cage clean much easier and if they are free range they are safer if they sleep on a perch.
After about seven months, you will need to provide a hay box so the females can lay their eggs. Then it all starts again…
From this to this in 4 weeks – enough evidence for me that there is a God!
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This article is aimed at people who, like me, prefer life to be easy and who own a dominant, intelligent dog. It is possible to train a dog to complete obedience (I know, I went to the classes and watched other people) but it takes either a lot of time or a degree of cruelty. If you are someone who always revised for exams when you were at school, (and probably weren’t the middle child in a family) then this article is not for you.
My qualification for writing this article is that I grew up with a Border Collie dog and I now own a German Shepherd dog, and sometimes we manage to fool complete strangers into commenting that she is “very obedient”. Both the dog and I know that this is not true, but we work together to give a good impression. I also have raised two boys. Apart from the chewing furniture part, I think most of the advice probably applies to parenting boys too.
My main suggestion is that you let the dog train you. She will try to do this any way, and it’s much easier if you just give in. The trick is to pretend that you are slightly dumb (not difficult in some cases) and only learn the things that you want to learn. Your dog will go to great lengths to teach you. So, when my dog wants to come inside, she barks. I do not want her to bark and therefore I do not respond to this. After a while, the dog will realise that I am too stupid to understand her bark, so will stop. When she is sitting quietly by the door, I open it. She will then train me to repeat this action by sitting next to the door whenever she wants to come in.
The same principle works with sticks. If my dog tries to train me to throw a stick by bringing it near enough for me to reach and then running away with it, I ignore her. After a while, she realises that I am too stupid to play the ‘chase you round the garden trying to get the stick’ game and so she will sit next to it. When she sits next to the stick and waits, I pick it up and throw it. She then knows that she has trained me to do this and when she wants the stick thrown, she will sit patiently next to it and and wait for me to respond.
I also did this when going for walks on the lead. When she pulled me, I refused to ‘learn’ that this meant “go forwards” and I stood still. When she was waiting next to me, I moved forward. She soon realised that I was ‘unable’ to walk while she was pulling and would only move forwards if I was leading.
Dogs chase things. It is very difficult to stop them. We live on farm land and when I first got my dog, the farmer suggested that I put her in with a ewe. A dog who has been tossed by a ewe does not chase sheep. (I think this is how farmers train their dogs.) I was not prepared to risk broken bones and pain for my puppy, so I decided to not do this. I am now very careful to ensure that she is always on the lead near farm animals. She is pretty good as she has regularly walked with me through fields of animals, but I do not trust her and so keep her on the lead.
I did however follow the farmer’s advice with our cats. I allowed our puppy to experience first hand what an adult cat is capable of. She acquired a sore nose and the understanding that cats do not like to be chased. Now, when I introduce kittens to her, she is always very submissive and polite (I think she is not entirely sure if they are bigger than her.)
You also need to be aware of the dog’s innate needs. When a dog is young she will go through a teething period, just like a young child. She will need to chew something to stop her jaws aching. If you do not provide something, she will chew your furniture, shoes and bags. Give her something she is allowed to chew on. I find those raw hide chews are good, though you need to keep an eye on them so they don’t choke if they pull bits off.
Puppies have small bladders. They need to be given a place to wee. Do be careful though. I know someone who trained their dog to toilet on newspaper. Then one day, when having breakfast, he went to answer the door. When he returned, his newspaper on the breakfast table had a poop on it! If you train an intelligent dog to do something, they will learn it well. ‘Unlearning’ is pretty difficult.
Big dogs need a fair amount of exercise. If you are not prepared to do this, don’t get a large dog. You do not need to do as much exercise yourself (though it might not be a bad idea in some cases.) You can throw sticks for them to fetch, either up a hill or into water so they have to swim to retrieve it. Most intelligent dogs were bred to be working dogs. They therefore need to ‘work’. No, you don’t need to buy a flock of sheep, but you do need to provide some stimulation. Hide things for them to find, take them on long walks, throw sticks in places that are difficult to reach. You can buy a toy that holds dog biscuits which are awkward for them to get out. A bored dog will find their own amusement and that is generally not good.
Have very few rules and then stick to them rigidly. There are some rooms in my house which my dogs are not allowed in. Ever. Not even a foot. If they start to come in, I say no in a ‘barky’ voice (they are dogs, they understand tone better than words.) I do not shut the doors, I do not put up a fence, they just know that they are not allowed in those rooms. Dogs understand territory. My dog gets very cross when my husband goes into those rooms, as she considers herself far above him in the pecking order, but she will merely sit at the door and swear at him, she knows that she cannot come in.
The only time she ever broke this rule was after I came home after surgery and stayed in bed for a few days and she sneaked upstairs to see if I was there. I had never realised before that a dog can tiptoe! She looked so guilty when she was spotted that she practically leaped down the stairs.
Dogs generally have very good hearing. You do not need to shout. I never understand why so many owners yell at their dogs. If you say something and your dog ignores you, it is not because she has not heard! If you say something many times, you are teaching your dog that she does not need to obey you until you have said it at least six times. Say it once. If your dog ignores you, get up and leave. Your dog is much too nosey/bossy to let you leave without her. When she follows you, take her back and tell her again, once. If you call her when you are out and she does not return, then walk away. Do not keep calling. Your dog will not let you get lost, she will come when you start to leave.
Do not give ‘mixed messages’. If you feed your dog when you are eating, you cannot then expect her to know that she cannot always help herself from your plate/table. If you are happy sharing food, then fine. If not, then only ever feed your dog in her own bowl in a specific place. As I said before, dogs understand territory, we just need to be consistent. If she even puts her nose up to the table top, tell her “No,” not even ‘nearly’ is allowed.
An intelligent dog will have opinions and there is little we can do to change those. My daughter has a friend who my dog hates. He seems a perfectly nice person but she barks and snarls whenever he visits. I do not know why (but am beginning to be a little suspicious of him myself now.)
My dog also hates pigeons. She also hates the other dog who appears every evening at the dark glass door (she has never really got the hang of reflections.)
As for hitting your dog: don’t. It wont achieve anything good. I do sometimes shout abuse at my dog (I am only human and sometimes I get angry.) She just looks at me with her superior “she has lost it” expression. (As I said before, it is a lot like parenting boys. Dogs cannot roll their eyes.) She certainly does not learn anything useful. I do not however hit my dog. I cannot see how inflicting pain will achieve anything. My vet once told me to smack my Labrador with a rolled up newspaper, saying it would create a loud noise but not hurt her. I did. It did not change her behaviour. Mind you, she is a Labrador. She does not have opinions. I love her dearly but am suspicious that the only thought that ever enters her head is, “Can I eat that?”
Usually I am very grateful for my German Shepherd’s opinions. When we are walking in a secluded place and a man approaches and my dog eyes him suspiciously and growls very quietly so he gives us a lot of space, I am pleased. When travellers come to try and sell me a new driveway and my dog snarls at them so they head back to their van before they have even finished speaking, I am pleased. There are also random people who my dog is always delighted to meet and she dances around them in joy. I am beginning to think they must be very nice people.
My dog is completely sure of her superiority. So when my mother took her for a walk and could not work out how to attach the harness properly, my dog walked patiently next to her, giving her many looks to convey, “You did this wrong so I will walk very close to you in case it falls off.” She gets very angry when wild ducks come to visit our pond and comes to tell me. She is also not too happy when we have bulls in the field next door and spends a lot of time checking they stay on their side of the hedge.
If you own a dog with opinions, you will have a faithful friend who is brilliant company and very forgiving of all your mistakes (and they will notice every single one.)
Sometimes my family complain that I love my dog more than I love them. Let’s just hope I never have to choose between them………
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If you enjoyed this, you will love my new book: The Sarcastic Mother’s Holiday Diary.
I have always written a diary on holiday, so last Christmas, I decided to find all my old diaries and blogs, and make a book for my children. However, several other people also asked for a copy, so I have written a public version – it’s available on Amazon and has been described as “The Durrells meet Bill Bryson”!
Why not buy a copy today? I think it will make you laugh.
Anne E. Thompson has written several novels and non-fiction books. You can find her work in bookshops and Amazon. Why not sign up to follow her blog today? anneethompson.com
Sometimes, people ask, “Do I have to go to church to be a Christian?” The short answer is clearly, “No.” I am a Christian, I have a relationship with a living God and if I were stranded on a desert island or in a country that did not allow churches, then I would still have that relationship with God. I would still be a Christian. However, the answer is not complete if left there.
I think we first need to think about why you might ask that question. Imagine a teenaged boy describing his friendship with a girl. What if he said, “She invites me round and I go because she cooks nice food. But I tell her before I go, ‘I will come but we’re not going to talk’, so I don’t have to speak to her when I’m there. She doesn’t seem to mind.”? Frankly, that is appalling! We should not treat other people like that! Now compare that to how you might be treating God. Understand this, God likes you. He wants to have a friendship with you. That involves some effort on both sides.
Maybe we first need to think about what is a Christian. What makes someone a Christian? “Ah,” you might say, “Well, I believe in God.” Let’s look at that for a minute. I have been reading the book of James in the Bible. I love that book – he is so rude to people! I’m sure you know that Mary gave birth to Jesus (what we celebrate every christmas) but you may not realise that after she had Jesus, she and Joseph then had other children. One of these was James. He grew up with Jesus and yet it is thought that for a while he didn’t believe that Jesus was special. There is even a story about Jesus preaching to people and his family coming to try and stop him because they thought he was crazy! That gives me hope, when I get things wrong I know that so did the people who wrote the Bible but they had a second chance at getting it right. Later, James did come to believe what Jesus was saying and at some point he wrote his book. In that book, he discusses what it means to be a Christian and he talks about people who say they believe in God. First he says, “Well done!”
Few people would dispute that just as there are good things in the world, so too there are evil influences. In the Bible these are called demons or Satan. Now, when people tell James that they believe in God, he says, “Well done.” He then adds (a little sarcastically perhaps) “So do the demons!” You see, the Bible is very clear that these evil forces believe in God and are terrified of him because they recognise his power. Clearly demons are not Christians, so there must be more to being a Christian than just believing that God is real.
Think about when your computer freezes. Something has gone wrong, nothing works properly and pressing ‘escape’ or ‘control and delete’ makes no difference. Sometimes, the only option is to shut it down and restart. Well, that is what becoming a Christian is. It is realising that we’ve made a mess of things, something is not working properly and we need to restart. You have a ‘restart’ button, you just need to ask God to press it for you! It really is that easy.
There is nothing that you can do to make things right with God, you are not big enough, clever enough or good enough. So God did it all. He became a human (in the form of Jesus) and he died and was separated from the God bit of himself, which means that we don’t have to. Jesus rose up from the dead (what we celebrate at Easter time) to show that he is stronger than death, that everything is sorted out for us. We just have to ask God to press that ‘restart’ button to set us right.
Actually, this can be quite hard to do. We like to be in control, we like to think that what we do makes a difference, that somehow we can become good enough for God. Well, I have to tell you, the Bible is very clear, there is nothing that you can do to be acceptable to God. You are not good enough. So God did it for you. You do have to be prepared to accept that gift though, you do have to want that ‘restart’ button to be pressed. If life is going well for you, that can be a bit scary. We are worried that it means loss of control, that we wont be ourselves anymore. Let me remind you of what I said at the beginning: God likes you. Really, he does! He doesn’t want you to become a different person, just a better version of yourself.
You don’t have to be a ‘bad’ person to need God. Everyone needs him. I have travelled to lots of different countries, met rich people and poor and I can honestly tell you, people are people wherever you go. I have stayed at the Savoy Hotel and been driven to St James’ Palace in a fleet of silver mercedes to have dinner with Prince Charles (this is due to who I married, nothing to do with me, in case you are mistaken into thinking I am great in any way.) I have also stayed in a mud hut in Zambia with a couple who were HIV positive. I have visited China, Singapore, Dubai, India, Italy, America and most of Europe and there is one thing that I can tell you. People are the same. They might be culturally very different, but deep down, we all want the same things, we all love, we all have fears, we all make a mess of things. We all need God. It is that simple.
So, what comes next? After we have admitted that actually we might not be perfect and we want to include God in our lives, what do we have to do now? Well, you do not have to do anything (including go to church.) However, if you really have ‘restarted’ (and not just said the words to yourself as a sort of magic chant or insurance policy), if you really do want to include God in how you live, then that will make a difference to how you live.
A baby is alive after he’s born, but he doesn’t grow into a healthy child and adult unless he eats and exercises. So, just as we need to spend time with people and chat with them to develop a friendship, so too we need to spend time with God. No, this still does not have to involve going to a church! We chat with God by praying (saying things to him, either out loud or thinking them in our heads.) We listen to God by paying attention to our consciences, reading the Bible (where he has given us lots of hints about what he is like) and by listening to other christians. Ah, now we get to the church bit. How can you listen to other Christians, hear their story and share yours, if you never meet any?
It is a bit like supporting a football team. I can say I support Crystal Palace. I can buy a scarf that’s the right colour, I can check the results in the newspaper, I can even watch a match on television. But it would be hard for that knowledge to touch my emotions. However, if I attend one of their games, if I stand with other supporters and cheer when they score, then just the volume and shared excitement will begin to affect me. I am helped along by other fans’ enthusiasm and I actually feel part of what I say I am involved with. It is hard (and a bit boring) to be a football fan in isolation. It is the same with being a Christian.
“What constitutes a church?” you might ask. Does it need to be in an Anglican Church building or does the church that meets in my local school count? Well, if we look back at the Bible, a ‘church’ was actually just a group of people who believed the same thing. The first Christians were actually thrown out of their synagogues (the equivalent of our church buildings) and tended to meet secretly in houses. A church is not the building, it is the people. Sometimes buildings can be helpful. I cannot stand in a huge cathedral like St Paul’s without thinking about God, all the architecture has been designed to make me feel like that. However, the building is not essential. Three people meeting in a field to talk about God, to pray and study the Bible together; that is a church.
Some people might say they don’t need God, they are wrong. I think this is why Jesus talked about it being hard for a rich person to know God. When we are healthy and comfortable it can be hard to acknowledge that we need God, we think we are ‘okay actually’. Some people think they are too bad to know God, they are wrong too. God is able to press the ‘restart’ button for murderers, thieves, adulterers and even that nasty gossip from down the road! The Bible calls all that ‘sin’, but it’s not a word that tends to crop up at the dinner table so I have tried to avoid using it. None of us is good enough, certainly I’m not. That’s another reason for going to a church – it will help you to realise that you are not the only bad person who God likes!
Have you ever read ‘Screwtape Letters’ by C.S. Lewis? If not, buy a copy. It’s a brilliant book, very funny but with some really poignant truths included. He talks about all the strange and ordinary people who attend church.
“Ah,” you might say, “But churches are religious. I am a Christian but I don’t believe in religion. Religion just causes trouble, look at all the wars that have been started by religion.” You are half right. Religion does cause trouble. That is why Jesus did not start a new religion, he just pointed people to God. He refused to set down lists of rules, he just gave people principles to live by. When churches start making lots of rules, when they are more concerned with religion than with God, then they are missing the point. Christianity is meant to be about relationship, not rules.
I am often told that “church is boring.” Yes, sometimes it is. If it always is, then maybe you are going to the wrong church. I would also ask you, when you go to church, what are you expecting to get out of it? If your answer is “nothing” then you are probably right, you probably will get nothing from attending. However, if you dare to go hoping that you might hear God speaking to you, then that is much more likely to happen. Sometimes it is something the speaker says, sometimes it’s something in the reading that week, or a hymn that’s sung, or even what the person giving out the hymn books says, but usually, if we expect God to speak, we hear him. I would also say that just like a growing baby, we grow in faith very slowly. Sometimes it is much later that we remember something that was said in church and it helps us. But if you weren’t there, you wont hear it.
If church is a collection of people, then try to find a church which has people like you in it. If you are a teenager, try to find where other teenaged Christians meet. If you are a retired person, then try to find somewhere that older Christians meet. If a church caters for all ages that is wonderful but in my experience it is rare.
Do we have to go to church on Sundays? I guess not. If you attend a school Christian Union or something similar, then that is really just another form of ‘church’. We are advised though that we need one day a week that we keep as a holy day, a day to rest and where thinking about God is part of our routine (I think God knew how bad we would be at including him, so suggested that it should become part of our schedule!) That is hard to do if we attend ‘church’ on a week day.
What about other religions? To be honest, I don’t know. As I said, christianity is all about that ‘restart’ button, about including God in your life and having a relationship with him. I don’t know if people can find God in other religions. I do have a sneaky suspicion that when I get to Heaven there will be a lot of people there who I wasn’t expecting! Whether or not people have a relationship with God is between them and God.
What about Hell? Again, this is something that I don’t know much about about. If being with God makes us complete and fulfilled then I guess Hell must be the opposite of that. Sometimes people ask about who goes to Hell and what about people who try but never knew God. I cannot say, that is between them and God. But the Bible is pretty clear that if people decide that they don’t want to include God when they are physically alive, then God will respect that after they have died. That’s what free will and choice is all about, even if it means terrible consequences.
So, have a think and decide what you believe. If you haven’t ever asked God to press the ‘restart’ button in your life, maybe now is a good time to do so. There aren’t any magic words, God is God, not a genie in a bottle! You might say something like:
“God, I believe that you are real. I know that I make mistakes and I’m sorry. Please will you forgive all the things that I’ve done wrong. Please be part of my life. I want you to be my God.”
Then, you should tell someone. We are physical beings and telling someone will help you to believe what you have done and not forget about it. Then go and find some other christians! In England you could look for somewhere that runs an Alpha course (they tend to be churches that welcome new Christians.)
Do you have to go to church if you are a Christian? Not unless you want to grow……
If you want to teach your child to read, as a primary school teacher, I am tempted to say:“Don’t!” There are lots of things, like tying shoe laces, identifying birds in the garden and cracking an egg into a cup, which are easiest taught at home and which you will do so much better than a teacher. When done badly, it is actually possible that you might delay your child’s reading or cause problems that can take years to undo.
However, as a mother, I know that teaching your child can be rewarding and fun and we want to do it. This article therefore aims to give you some helpful hints on the sort of things that you might do at home with your child. It also lists a few of the problems that can arise if done badly.
Firstly, the most important thing that you can do is read and let your child see you reading. Children are great imitators and if they see both their mother and their father reading, then they will want to. You can read anything: books, newspapers, recipes, instruction manuals. What is important is that your child sees you reading. Young children who never or rarely see their parents read are less likely to want to themselves because it does not seem important. They are at that stage where they think everything you do is wonderful and will want to copy. (Unfortunately, this stage does not last long. By the time they are teenagers they will think everything you do is wrong, so make the most of it!)
You also need to have lots of reading material in your home. This does not have to be expensive, join the library or visit jumble sales and buy some cheap secondhand books. If children see their parents reading and if there are books in the home, it is a natural step for them to pick up a book and turn the pages. It does not matter if they are only looking at the pictures or saying words that are not in the book, the first stage of learning to read is ‘playing’ with a book for pleasure.
You also need to read to your child. Sit them on your knee and read them a story. They will learn that reading is something pleasurable, that can be done in a relaxed manner and will also start to internalise written language. This can be done at any age (some people even advocate reading to your unborn baby!) It will help your child learn to read as naturally as they learn to speak. Much of reading is to do with prediction (which I will explain in more detail later) and if they have heard, “Once upon a time…” a few times it will help them later when they are decoding for themselves.
Let your child see that you turn the pages one at a time and read the words from left to right, top to bottom. Even before they can read, they will start to copy this behaviour.
If you are a working parent, it can be hard to find time in the day to read with your child. However, it really is important. Try to set aside the same time each day and make it part of the rhythm of the day. It does not matter if it is every day while you eat breakfast or last thing in the evening when they are in bed. Read to them! It is as important as cleaning their teeth!
Do not rush into ‘proper’ reading lessons with your child. There is an age whereby a child is physically too young to learn to read. The human brain is a wonderful organ and it takes about 21 years to be fully developed. Different parts of the brain have different functions and control different things. It develops from back to front and inside to outside. You would not sit your child in the drivers seat of your car and tell him to drive – if nothing else you can see that he is not tall enough to look out the windscreen and his legs are not long enough to reach the pedals. Learning to read also needs physical development, but it is harder to gauge because we cannot see that a child is not ready.
There is a substance called myelin, which I do not fully understand (I am a teacher, not a neurologist!) which is essential for a child to be capable of reading. It somehow enables the eye to carry symbols to the brain and for the brain to then decode them into language.
Now, if a child is ‘forced’ to read before they have developed sufficiently, they will use different parts of the brain to decode symbols (the brain is very clever, if it cannot use one pathway, it will make a different one.) This can then cause problems later and they will have to ‘unlearn’ what they are doing, which is very difficult. For this reason, some countries will not begin to teach reading in schools until a child is aged seven and they can be confident that the brain is sufficiently developed.
However, some children are ready to read long before then – which is why you are reading this article! My daughter learnt to read when she was aged three. One son learnt when he was four, the other was not ready to learn until he was well over five and had started school. There is no correlation between when they learnt to read and their long term academic success. It is not an indication of intelligence, it is an indication of physical development. So do not get involved in competitive mum talk! You may just as well be proud of your child’s hair colour as the age they learn to read!
It can be difficult to know when your child is ready to learn to read. I do not have a foolproof method, so will simply share my own experience.
Firstly, I watched my children. As children develop, they are able to use and control their large limbs first (Swaying an arm to hit a baby mobile) then their smaller limbs (holding something in a fist) then their fine motor skills develop (playing with a thread of cotton and holding it with a finger tip and thumb.) Fine motor skills give an indication of how your child is developing.
Secondly, I played a game with them to discover if they could recognise a symbol. I wrote lots of random letters on a piece of paper (or could be shapes) and wrote one at the top. Then I said: “This is an ‘a’, can you point at the other ‘a’s on the paper?
If they could consistently match letters/shapes, I would begin trying to teach reading. If they did not seem to be learning, I stopped and tried again in a few months.
So, what do you actually do to teach your child to read? I think that you need to understand the different components of reading and give your child experience in all of them. Education is constantly changing and the methods of teaching and testing reading ability seem to change from decade to decade. However, you are a parent, not a teacher, so you do not have to worry about current policy, you can just give your child a varied reading experience and discover what works for you. Here are some ideas which I suggest you muddle up and use in any order as often as you can. Just be sure that every activity is fun.
Reading is very similar to listening. To listen, you hear sounds, your brain sorts the different sounds into words and you derive meaning. When reading, you see symbols (which in English are letters, grouped into words) which the brain then deciphers into meaning. When you listen, you do not hear every word. Much of your understanding comes from the tone and the context and what you feel makes sense. The same is true of reading. When you read you do not look at every letter – you do not even look at every word if reading fluently and quickly. Again, you use the context and what is logical to make sense of what you have read.
Context is very important. You can even ‘read’ things that make no sense because you will use your understanding of how language works to fill in the gaps. So, if you read: “Judy loved to blimp. Every morning she went blimping. Whatever the weather, rain or shine, Judy could be found blimping away. When she thought back over her year, Judy realised she must have ……… a thousand times.”
If you are a fluent reader, you will probably decipher the last sentence as “Judy realised she must have blimped a thousand times. This is with you having no idea what the verb ‘to blimp’ means!
You can teach your child to use the context of what is being read by asking them to predict the end of phrases. Ask them to read with you and when you read “Once upon …” let them read “…a time.” Sit so your child can see the words, you read the story but leave some gaps where there are ‘obvious’ words and let your child say them. This is developing their prediction skills and their ability to use the context of what is written. Later, when they are reading on their own, they will also use the pictures as part of the context that helps them decode the text.
Another part of reading is word recognition. There are words which we hardly need to look at, we know their shapes so well. I would teach word recognition as a separate activity to reading. There is, in my view, a real danger that children will focus too much on individual words and not enough on the meaning of the text. We want our children to become fluent readers, not people with amazing memories who can remember thousands of words.
One good way to teach word recognition is to cut up some cardboard and write some simple words on it. Then play a game of ‘pairs’ or ‘bingo’ with the words. Then, when you are reading to your child, if you come to one of the words that they have learnt you can stop and let them read that word. Reading then becomes a shared activity, with you reading most of the story and them filling in any words they have learnt to recognise and any that are obvious from the context. Gradually, they will read more and more of the text themselves.
Children need to see lots of words and several different types of text. If they are cooking, help them follow a simple recipe. If you have time, write out a recipe for them, if nothing else they will learn lots of imperative verbs. (Imperative verbs are bossy verbs, like ‘put’, ‘fill’, ‘place’.)
Some people make word cards and place them around their house, so every coffee table, kitchen appliance, door, etc is labelled. I expect that this does help children to recognise words (however, I personally would not want to live in that house, so I never did that with my own children . Plus my children were quite inventive, so would probably have switched the labels around, thus confusing the youngest!)
Magnetic letters on the fridge are a fun way for children to practice making words. Do check them though, one of my children wrote lots of mis-spelt swear words. He thought that as he’d never heard me say them I would not know what they were! It was funny, but slightly embarrassing when visitors came.
Another part of reading is phonics (the sounds of letters.) A fluent reader rarely uses phonics unless they are introduced to a new word. It slows the flow of reading and is fairly inaccurate. Most people do not say the pure letter sounds, so ‘l’ becomes ‘le’. If you sound out ‘le’ ‘o’ ‘o’ ‘ke’ ‘e’ ‘de’ it is very unlikely you will decipher ‘looked.’ However, it can be useful in giving children a clue about what a word might be.
Again, I always taught phonics as a separate lesson to reading. It is a natural part of a spelling lesson and when children have internalised phonics they will use them very naturally when reading. If they are directed to ‘sound out’ words too often then they start to focus all their attention on individual letters and all meaning of the text is forgotten. It is possible to say all the correct words and not actually derive any meaning from the text. If given some German to read, I can probably say all the words correctly but will not have any idea what the text is about. Unfortunately, some children learn to read like this. They are able to say the sounds of the letters to form words, but the words never seem to touch their brain, to have any real meaning. They have to listen to themselves speaking to understand what the words mean, which obviously slows up their reading and is not what they should be doing.
A good way to teach initial letter sounds is to play “I spy”. You can use either letter names or letter sounds (your child needs to learn both) and they will gradually build up a good knowledge of words that begin with the same sounds. You can always write the letter on a piece of paper, so they also begin to recognise the shape.
I often told “The Magic Pens” story (see under children’s stories at anneethompson.com Story link here.) It is best told rather than read and I would tell it to the class whilst writing the relevant words on the white board. The children always, unprompted, would join in with chanting the lists of words, which made a fun way for them to learn phonics. Also, as the initial letter is a different colour, it helps dyslexic readers. It was a great time filler when waiting to go for lunch or assembly and the children always enjoyed it, especially if we included some naughty words like ‘bum’! It can be extended by the teacher returning to the classroom in the morning and making a sentence with the words, such as: “Kit wanted to sit but a nit bit her so she had a fit.” You can do the same activity at home. If you write a sentence with the words, put it on the fridge and your child can return to them throughout the day and read what was written. Obviously, change the letters used each time, so the child begins to build up a good knowledge of letter blends. You can also start with initial sounds, such as ‘br’ or ‘ch’ and change the story accordingly.
{Incidentally, I have only ever told the Magic Pen stories in a classroom. If you try them at home, please let me know if they are still fun and if the child joins in! }
Your child also needs to read books. Proper, child friendly, story books. It does not matter if they cannot initially read every word, they need the opportunity to explore them and to practice reading. Try to find some simple books that have very repetitive language. Read the story to your child a few times first (Yes, they will remember the words, that is okay, reading uses memory!) If there is a word they cannot read, just tell them. Do not tell them to ‘sound it out’, that takes all the fun out of reading. If they are asking you for help,that is excellent, they are showing that they understand the text has meaning and they want to know what it says.
Do not ever be tempted to buy the books from the school reading scheme. Your child’s teacher will be using them to both teach and as a diagnostic tool to assess your child’s progress. If your child has read them at home, they will give an unrealistic performance (which the teacher will be aware of) and will also be bored with them and not want to read them again at school. It is hugely unhelpful and will slow their progress. If your child’s teacher wants the child to practice the school books at home, they will be sent home for you to borrow.
Do not force a child who does not want to read to begin learning. I home-schooled one of my children when we were living abroad and I found reading a real tension point. It really mattered to me that he should read fluently and he decided he did not want to learn. (This is the child who every day picked up his pen by the wrong end and told me he could not remember which way round it went! Some children need more patience and prayers than others….) I did teach him eventually – mainly thanks to finding some simple books about a dragon who had a pet cat that pooped everywhere, which appealed to my son immensely! However, he never enjoyed reading. Even as a teenager, he would pay his younger brother to read to him the books set by his school while he did something ‘more interesting.’ I do not know if his personality means he would never have enjoyed reading or if my daily frustration with his four year old awkward self somehow left a lasting impression. If I could turn back the clock I would tell myself to stop trying, have a rest and start again in six months time.
On a similar vein, do let older children choose their own books. Another mistake I made was when my daughter, who had read fluently from a very young age, was about eight. I decided that she should be reading books that would extend her and gave her lots of the child classics (The Railway Children, Little Woman, that sort of thing.) She just wanted to read simple tales of magic and princesses! After a while, she stopped reading for pleasure completely. She did, after a year or so, begin again but I had made the mistake of taking the fun out of reading. It has to be fun. If children enjoy reading, they will always read. We might enjoy reading Dickens, but we need a few novels in between time too.
Your child will learn to read at his/her own pace. Just as some children learn to walk as early as ten months of age and others are well over a year, so some children acquire reading skills very quickly and others learn more slowly. Try not to worry and absolutely do not start comparing with other children! You have been given a very special role in raising your child, let them develop at their own speed, they are not like anyone else. If they seem completely disinterested in reading, stop trying to teach them (but do not stop reading to them) and enjoy other experiences instead. If there is a problem, your child’s teacher will alert you but probably your child is just not quite ready to start learning yet.
Watching your child learn to read is hugely rewarding and very exciting! I hope that you will both enjoy the experience and it will be special activity that you share.
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This is simply an honest account of the things I wish I had known when I had a brain tumour. It is necessarily subjective and you will disagree with some of it but I hope that some of it is useful. I have added to these notes, edited them, and produced a little book that’s now available on Amazon. (You can read it for free if you have a kindle.) I hope these thoughts are helpful.
Finding Out
You will probably have either a CT scan or an MRI. A CT scan is much quicker but uses lots of radiation – about 13 times the amount of a normal X-ray. An MRI is scary before you have had one but is nothing more than lying on a hard bed. The amount of time it takes seems to depend on the age of the machine. I dislike confined spaces so always keep my eyes shut.
The main thing to know is that it is noisy. At my first MRI I was offered a choice of music to listen to whilst in the machine. However, when it began the machine was so loud I could not hear anything. It made me laugh and I still have no idea why they offer it. The machine sounds like someone is digging up the road right next to your head. Sometimes the machine also vibrates. I am always sure that there has been a nuclear explosion and I am the only person left alive, but when I emerge everyone is completely fine.
Sometimes they inject you with a dye because some tumours enhance with contrast. If they are planning to do this, you may have a blood test a few days before so they can check your kidney function is good enough to flush out the dye afterwards. The rules on this seem to change quite often. They inject the dye into your arm. I told my mother that they put it in one ear and I had to lie on my side while it dripped through my brain (it made me laugh…) My cyst did not enhance and I did not much like being injected with dye unnecessarily, so I asked for them to not do it after the first couple of MRIs. Remember, it is your body and if you would prefer for something to not happen, it is okay to ask if it is necessary. Sometimes we just accept everything that happens and feel it would be rude to ask questions. It is not.
When you first discover you have a brain tumour, whatever the type, it is shocking. I put it in the same category as cancer – it was something completely horrible and soon I would be dead. However, a little research shows that there are many different types of brain tumour (as there are cancers) and some are more sinister than others. That said, I personally think they are all nasty. So, what to do?
I suggest that you try to find out some facts. This is not always easy. I was diagnosed incidentally after a CT scan due to a bumped head. The hospital told me nothing and sent me to my general practitioner. He told me nothing and sent me to a neurologist. He told me very little (he told me he had read about them) and sent me to a neurosurgeon.
All this took time. Meanwhile I had looked on the internet. This has mixed results. I did not understand much of what I read and a lot was very scary. “Sudden instant death” seemed to be a feature of my particular tumour (a colloid cyst), which was not terrifically reassuring. If I could go back in time, I would tell my newly diagnosed self that things move very slowly in the medical world, so learn patience (unless they think something is life-threatening, then they move quickly. So, if the medics are being slow, probably you will not die today.)
However, you can be proactive. You can ask your GP for the number of the person they are referring you to and you can then phone their secretary and make an appointment. You do not have to wait for your GP to write, then for the next person to receive the letter and write back with an appointment. It does not speed things up much but it helps you to feel that something is happening.
Decide how much you want other people to know. I decided that my children (then all teenagers) would realise that something was wrong and actually not knowing is more worrying than knowing. I wanted them to trust in the future that I wasn’t holding back information, so I was open with them from the start. Obviously that depends on the age and personality of your children. However, you will need some support, so I strongly recommend you tell some close friends or relatives. Choose who you tell carefully. Some will immediately plan your funeral, others will offer practical help, others will just tell as many other people as they can and invent any details they are unsure of.
Sort out what you believe. Brains are in a compact space with not much room for anything else. Many people live for decades with benign brain tumours and never even know that they have one. However, mostly they cause trouble. I think it is sensible to be realistic about this and it is a good time to sort out exactly what you believe in terms of religion. Most of us tend to follow our parent’s faith (or lack of) and it’s easy to never actually make clear decisions for ourselves. Now is an excellent time to change that. Personally, I have been a christian my whole life, but this made me really think about what I actually believed as opposed to ritualistically ‘followed due to habit’. None of us know when we will die, but being faced with a possibly terminal illness is definitely not the time to delay making a few grown up life decisions. Our society dislikes talking about death. I am not sure that this is always very helpful. Modern medicine is amazing, but no one lives for ever, so decide what you think will happen next. It also helps to take away some of the fear. If the worst that can happen is death and you have sorted out your beliefs on that, then some of the fear will go too.
Find some people who are in a similar position. I did not know anyone who had ever had a brain tumour or brain surgery. However, I soon found a chatroom called “Braintalk Communities” and found a wealth of helpful information and could read about people who felt the same as me. I later joined a group on Facebook, which was very similar. Obviously you need to use some common sense, some people will be depressed or lonely or have other issues that make them write things that may not be especially balanced. However, mostly I found it a huge support and a wealth of information. If you cannot find a group that relates to your tumour, I would recommend starting one.
Finding a Surgeon
At some point, hopefully fairly quickly, you will meet a brain surgeon. I don’t know how the system works in other countries, so this advice is based on the UK.
Decide what you want to ask. You may want all the details about your tumour, you might just want to know what s/he plans to do. However, it is worth being clear with your questions and I would recommend writing a list beforehand.
Take someone with you. It is amazingly easy to not hear correctly when you are stressed. If you have someone with you, they can often explain things you didn’t understand and repeat information that you misheard or forgot. However, agree beforehand whether you want them to speak during the consultation or just listen.
Decide what you want from your surgeon. If they intend to just observe the tumour, you might want the surgeon to be someone very approachable who you can discuss things with. If S/he plans to remove it, you probably don’t really care what their conversation is like, you just want a good surgeon. In the UK you have a choice. I did not find my first neurosurgeon very easy to talk to, he tended to try and convince me of a course of action rather than answer my questions. (When I asked “How big is the tumour?” I did not want to be convinced it was too small to undergo a dangerous operation, I just wanted to be told the size.) I knew, from various chatrooms, that it was possible to change surgeons and this is normal and not a massive insult to the one who you change from. I read on the chatroom about a surgeon at NHNN in Queens Square who sounded good and I asked my doctor if I could switch. She wrote a letter, and it was as easy as that. I am so very glad that I did. It is of utmost importance that you trust your surgeon. It removes a lot of anxiety, so decide what you need, ask different people for recommendations and find one.
It is also worth learning a few phrases that surgeons use. I do not mean especially technical terms, but sometimes what we hear is not what they mean to say. For example, I was repeatedly told my tumour was “asymptomatic” when clearly it was causing headaches. I felt as if they thought I was lying about the pain. However, what they meant was that they could not find a proven physiological reason that showed on scans for the tumour to be causing pain. I think the hydrocephalus was very intermittent, and because they could not see it, they did not acknowledge it. Once we cleared up the terminology problem, we could discuss the pain and I was referred to a neurologist for pain relief medicines.
Living with the Stress
Okay, so whether they operate or not, you will probably be rather stressed. There are a few ways that I found it helpful to deal with this.
Occupy your mind. I found that I could not stop thinking about the fact that I had a brain tumour and was in danger of it defining who I was. It is impossible to ‘not think’ about something, so I think filling your mind with something else is a huge help. I started to learn Mandarin at the same time as my diagnosis and this was wonderful. I am not a linguist, cannot speak any other language at all and gave my language teachers at school nervous breakdowns. However, Mandarin was fabulous. It is fairly difficult, so I concentrated with my whole mind during lessons and there was no time to worry about anything else. When the pain was horrible and I could do nothing all day, I could at least listen to a DVD in Mandarin, and I felt more positive about myself. Learning words was a great distraction in all those boring hospital waiting rooms. Obviously a language might not be your ‘thing’, but I really would suggest that you find some hobby to occupy your mind and give it a break from worrying. Whether it is chess, knitting or kick-boxing, find something that is quite difficult, fits into your schedule and that you enjoy.
Secondly, do some exercise. Whether they operate or not, you want a healthy body. Cycling as fast as you can or swimming a few laps, is another good way to burn off some stress and give yourself a break. Even if you are too weak for anything else, go for a walk. I had lots of pretty bad headaches but I found that cycling did not make them any worse and I felt better in myself after I had exercised. You should check with your doctor that you are safe to exercise, but if there is no reason not to, I would say force yourself to.
Thirdly, be nice to yourself. If it was a close friend suffering, you would give them treats, encourage them to do things they enjoy, etc. Do the same for yourself. You are special, going through a tough time, allow yourself some treats.
Try not to face things you do not need to. Sometimes our thoughts run away with us and we imagine being handicapped, mute, dependent and so on, when actually these things are unlikely to happen today. Try to live in the present, each day face what has to be faced that day. Don’t worry about the future until you have to. (You could still get run over by a bus, then all that worry will have been for nothing.)
Pray. If you have sorted out what you believe, now is the time to put it to the test. It’s not worth having faith in something that cannot help you right now. Praying is not a ‘genie in a lamp’, it changes us over time but I do believe that it helps hugely. If you decide that you do not believe in any God at all, then I don’t know what to suggest (maybe re-think?)
If You Are Having Brain Surgery
Depending on the type of tumour, surgery might happen very quickly or not at all. I was told that my tumour was unlikely to ever change and they would simply monitor it. After five years, it did change and within a week it was removed. Many people have their tumour removed as an emergency procedure and have no real choice. However, if things move a bit slower, what do you need to know?
Firstly, is the surgeon you have been seeing one that you trust to operate? There is a lot on the internet about surgery going wrong, people being left mute or unable to move and so on. Do not bother to read that. All that really matters is, has your surgeon operated on this type of tumour a few times before? If he has, how many of his patients were left with serious complications? Then you can make your decision. If you do not trust him, find a new surgeon. This is not something you want to mess about with and it is important to really trust the person who’s going to be fiddling inside your head.
Secondly, decide what you want to know. I am a coward. When my consultant started to explain what he planned to do, I stopped him and said that I planned to be asleep during the operation and did not need to know anything. This was a slight mistake. True, I did not need to know about the actual operation (though some people would want to know) but I was completely unprepared for what would happen before the operation.
For example, soon after arriving at hospital the day before surgery, a very nice young doctor came to attach stickers to my head. They were about 2cm diameter and were put in several places around my head. Each one needed hair shaved off first and then she drew around them with a marker pen. For some reason, this was very perturbing. I had of course known that some hair would be shaved but I had assumed I would be asleep. I also found being drawn on weirdly dehumanising. It was silly and the stickers were necessary (they did an MRI which showed the stickers and then used this as a map during surgery) and actually I found the reason very interesting but I was unprepared and so it knocked my confidence. I then had to walk down to the MRI room covered in pieces of chopped off hair. Again, had I known, I could have brought in an old shirt and used it as a ‘hairdresser’s gown’ to keep the hair off my clothes.
I also did not know what I needed to take to the hospital. This was in part the fault of the hospital, who should have sent me a list however, brain surgery is often done quickly and things get forgotten. I should have phoned the ward and asked what I needed to bring in the way of towels, clothes and food.
Do take a mobile phone and recharger. I found that friends and family sent texts and emails and this was a huge support and made the whole experience strangely special. I was never alone. However, take some care with what you send after surgery. I sent a ‘selfie’ to show my mother how I looked to help prepare her. I have no idea why I also sent it to people who I hardly know, my child’s school, the postman, etc. My daughter checked my phone after my surgery and had to send some explanatory texts to a few people. Brain surgery does somewhat muddle us.
I also should have asked what I should expect after the operation. It can help to prepare visiting relatives if they have some idea of how many machines you will be attached to, if you will be able to speak, will you be in pain and so on. One of my children arrived at hospital expecting me to be sitting up in bed chatting. He told me that seeing me look like I was dead was very traumatic and he would never visit me in hospital again unless I was dying. This could be a problem if I break a leg and he arrives – it will be like a visit from the Grim Reaper. However, joking aside, it is good to prepare both ourselves and our visitors.
I read that my surgery often results in memory loss. If that is also the case for you, it is worth writing down PIN numbers, passwords and important numbers and making sure that someone else knows where they are.
If the surgery affects the left side of your brain, it may affect your language. This is not just your ability to speak but also to form words in your head. This will probably improve over time but it is worth letting people know beforehand—you cannot speak, them giving you something to write with will probably not help much.
After surgery I mostly slept. I was nauseous but the nurses gave me anti sickness pills. They also gave me injections to prevent blood clots (in the stomach – most unpleasant.) I was on a drip. I had a drainage tube in my head and before I came home this was removed and the hole was stitched. The stitches hurt – listen to something distracting or recite poetry or something.
I went home five days after surgery. My face swelled up, starting at the top, then my nose (I looked like a centaur.) Apparently this is normal but I was not expecting it so I worried.
I also had problems with my ears, everyone’s voices sounded weird, as if they were a Darlek. I heard popping noises and buzzing. Again, this was normal and due to excess fluid settling down, but I did not know and so was worried.
Prior to surgery I had hydrocephalus (fluid on the brain.) This caused a bruised feeling at the top of my head, like a hairband was pulling my hair, even though there was no bruising when I touched it. After surgery, I sometimes had the same feeling, especially when lying down. I was worried but the surgeon told me that the fluid levels in my brain were having to readjust and it would take time, so the feeling was normal.
Similarly, reading anything in the morning had been difficult due to the fluid levels (I did not have double vision but to focus on small print was uncomfortable.) This also continued for a couple of weeks after surgery. I also worried about my stitches. They became very itchy and the wound felt tight. Again, this was normal and a doctor could reassure me that the wound looked healthy and was not ‘angry’ or inflamed or weeping.
I was expecting a lot of pain after surgery but actually there was very little. In hospital they gave me morphine a few times (which I have since added to my Christmas list but am not hopeful.) but mostly I just took paracetamol. I did have a few headaches but they were not as bad as the pain prior to surgery. I was very worried about things like sneezing in case I dislodged something important. I did sneeze soon after surgery and nothing bad happened.
Whatever the reason for being in hospital, it seems very normal to feel anxious afterwards. I know some completely sensible people who had a panic attack after being in hospital and I found that I worried about the tiniest thing. It did improve. I think perhaps it is because we lose all control when we are in hospital and it can be scary when you first get home. I also felt that I had been brave enough and I could not be brave about anything else afterwards.
I was told that it would take six months before I started to feel ‘normal’. I did not believe them. After six weeks we drove to Italy for a holiday and I expected to feel completely well afterwards. I did not. Brain surgery takes a long time to heal. You will need to rest a lot. Fill the freezer with easy meals, arrange for someone else to look after your animals and try to relax. I think that people tend to feel different afterwards too. I have heard people talk about the “old me” and the “new me”. It is not terrible, you will adjust, you just need to allow yourself time. My surgery was on the right side and they removed a cyst from the third ventricle (the middle of the brain.) I still find multitasking difficult and I burn most things that I cook. I am assuming that eventually this will improve or I will find new ways of doing things.
Whether you are reading this because you have a brain tumour or because someone you care about does, remember, it does not have to be as scary as we fear. Even when life is unpleasant, there are usually new things to learn and unexpected special times.
Thanks for reading. Take care. Love, Anne x
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I must begin by stating that I merely have an Honours degree in Education and an outdated first aid certificate, so nothing I say should be taken as having any medical knowledge at all. This is simply an honest account of the things I wish I had known when I had a brain tumour. It is necessarily subjective and you will disagree with some of it but I hope that some of it is useful.
Finding Out
You will probably have either a CT scan or an MRI. A CT scan is much quicker but uses lots of radiation – about 13 times the amount of a normal X-ray. An MRI is scary before you have had one but is nothing more than lying on a hard bed. The amount of time it takes seems to depend on the age of the machine. I dislike confined spaces so always keep my eyes shut. The main thing to know is that it is noisy! At my first MRI I was offered a choice of music to listen to whilst in the machine. However, when it began the machine was so loud I could not hear anything. It made me laugh and I still have no idea why they offer it.
When you first discover you have a brain tumour, whatever the type, it is shocking. I put it in the same category as cancer – it was something completely horrible and soon I would be dead. However, a little research shows that there are many different types of brain tumour (as there are cancers) and some are more sinister than others. That said, I personally think they are all nasty.
So, what to do? I suggest that you try to find out some facts. This is not always easy. I was diagnosed incidentally after a CT scan due to a bumped head. The hospital told me nothing and sent me to my general practitioner. He told me nothing and sent me to a neurologist. He told me very little (he told me he had read about them!) and sent me to a neurosurgeon. All this took time.
Meanwhile I had looked on the internet. This has mixed results. I did not understand much of what I read and a lot was very scary. “Sudden instant death” seemed to be a feature of my particular tumour (a colloid cyst), which was not terrifically reassuring.
If I could go back in time, I would tell my newly diagnosed self that things move very slowly in the medical world, so learn patience (unless they think something is life-threatening, then they move quickly. So, if the medics are being slow, probably you will not die today.)
However, you can be proactive. You can ask your GP for the number of the person they are referring you to and you can then phone their secretary and make an appointment. You do not have to wait for your GP to write, then for the next person to receive the letter and write back with an appointment. It does not speed things up much but it helps you to feel that something is happening.
Decide how much you want other people to know. I decided that my children (then all teenagers) would realise that something was wrong and actually not knowing is more worrying than knowing. I wanted them to trust in the future that I wasn’t holding back information, so I was open with them from the start. Obviously that depends on the age and personality of your children. However, you will need some support, so I strongly recommend you tell some close friends or relatives. Choose who you tell carefully. Some will immediately plan your funeral, others will offer practical help, others will just tell as many other people as they can and invent any details they are unsure of.
Sort out what you believe. Brains are in a compact space with not much room for anything else. Many people live for decades with benign brain tumours and never even know that they have one. However, mostly they cause trouble. I think it is sensible to be realistic about this and it is a good time to sort out exactly what you believe in terms of religion. Most of us tend to follow our parents’ faith (or lack of) and it’s easy to never actually make clear decisions for ourselves. Now is an excellent time to change that. Personally, I have been a Christian my whole life, but this made me really think about what I actually believed as opposed to ritualistically ‘followed due to habit’. None of us know when we will die, but being faced with a possibly terminal illness is definitely not the time to delay making a few grown-up life decisions. Our society dislikes talking about death. I am not sure that this is always very helpful. Modern medicine is amazing, but no one lives for ever, so decide what you think will happen next. It also helps to take away some of the fear. If the worst that can happen is death and you have sorted out your beliefs on that, then some of the fear will go too.
Find some people who are in a similar position. I did not know anyone who had ever had a brain tumour or brain surgery. However, I soon found a chatroom called “Braintalk Communities” and found a wealth of helpful information and could read about people who felt the same as me. I later joined a group on Facebook, which was very similar.
Obviously you need to use some common sense, some people will be depressed or lonely or have other issues that make them write things that may not be especially balanced. However, mostly I found it a huge support and a wealth of information. If you cannot find a group that relates to your tumour, I would recommend starting one!
Finding a Surgeon
At some point, hopefully fairly quickly, you will meet a brain surgeon. I don’t know how the system works in other countries, so this advice is based on the UK. Decide what you want to ask. You may want all the details about your tumour, you might just want to know what s/he plans to do. However, it is worth being clear with your questions and I would recommend writing a list beforehand.
Take someone with you. It is amazingly easy to not hear correctly when you are stressed! If you have someone with you, they can often explain things you didn’t understand and repeat information that you misheard or forgot. However, agree beforehand whether you want them to speak during the consultation or just listen.
Decide what you want from your surgeon. If they intend to just observe the tumour, you might want the surgeon to be someone very approachable who you can discuss things with. If s/he plans to remove it, you probably don’t really care what their conversation is like, you just want a good surgeon.
In the UK you have a choice. I did not find my first neurosurgeon very easy to talk to, he tended to try and convince me of a course of action rather than answer my questions. (When I asked “How big is the tumour?” I did not want to be convinced it was too small to undergo a dangerous operation, I just wanted to be told the size.) I knew, from various chatrooms, that it was possible to change surgeons and this is normal and not a massive insult to the one who you change from. I read on the chatroom about a surgeon at NHNN in Queens Square who sounded good and I asked my doctor if I could switch. She wrote a letter, and it was as easy as that. I am so very glad that I did.
It is of utmost importance that you trust your surgeon. It removes a lot of anxiety, so decide what you need, ask different people for recommendations and find one.
It is also worth learning a few phrases that surgeons use. I do not mean especially technical terms, but sometimes what we hear is not what they mean to say. For example, I was repeatedly told my tumour was “asymptomatic” when clearly it was causing headaches. I felt as if they thought I was lying about the pain! However, what they meant was that they could not find a proven physiological reason that showed on scans for the tumour to be causing pain. I think the hydrocephalus was very intermittent, and because they could not see it, they did not acknowledge it. Once we cleared up the terminology problem, we could discuss the pain and I was referred to a neurologist for pain relief medicines.
Living with the Stress
Okay, so whether they operate or not, you will probably be rather stressed. There are a few ways that I found it helpful to deal with this:
Occupy your mind. I found that I could not stop thinking about the fact that I had a brain tumour and was in danger of it defining who I was! It is impossible to ‘not think’ about something, so I think filling your mind with something else is a huge help. I started to learn Mandarin at the same time as my diagnosis and this was wonderful. I am not a linguist, cannot speak any other language at all and gave my language teachers at school nervous breakdowns. However, Mandarin was fabulous. It is fairly difficult, so I concentrated with my whole mind during lessons and there was no time to worry about anything else. It also was a great distraction in all those boring hospital waiting rooms. Obviously, a language might not be your ‘thing’, but I really would suggest that you find some hobby to occupy your mind and give it a break from worrying. Whether it is chess, knitting or kick-boxing, find something that is quite difficult, fits into your schedule and that you enjoy.
Secondly, do some exercise. Whether they operate or not, you want a healthy body. Cycling as fast as you can or swimming a few laps, is another good way to burn off some stress and give yourself a break. Even if you are too weak for anything else, go for a walk. I had lots of pretty bad headaches but I found that cycling did not make them any worse and I felt better in myself after I had exercised. You should check with your doctor that you are safe to exercise, but if there is no reason not to, I would say: force yourself to!
Thirdly, be nice to yourself. If it was a close friend suffering, you would give them treats, encourage them to do things they enjoy, etc. Do the same for yourself. You are special, going through a tough time, allow yourself some treats!
Try not to face things you do not need to. Sometimes our thoughts run away with us and we imagine being handicapped, mute, dependent and so on, when actually these things are unlikely to happen today. Try to live in the present, each day face what has to be faced that day. Don’t worry about the future until you have to. (You could still get run over by a bus, then all that worry will have been for nothing!!!)
Pray. If you have sorted out what you believe, now is the time to put it to the test! It’s not worth having faith in something that cannot help you right now. Praying is not a ‘genie in a lamp’, it changes us over time but I do believe that it helps hugely. If you decide that you do not believe in any God at all, then I don’t know what to suggest (maybe re-think..?)
If You Are Having Brain Surgery
Depending on the type of tumour, surgery might happen very quickly or not at all. I was told that my tumour was unlikely to ever change and they would simply monitor it. After five years, it did change and within a week it was removed. Many people have their tumour removed as an emergency procedure and have no real choice. However, if things move a bit slower, what do you need to know?
Firstly, is the surgeon you have been seeing one that you trust to operate? There is a lot on the internet about surgery going wrong, people being left mute or unable to move and so on. Do not bother to read that! All that really matters is, has your surgeon operated on this type of tumour a few times before? If he has, how many of his patients were left with serious complications? Then you can make your decision. If you do not trust him, find a new surgeon. This is not something you want to mess about with and it is important to really trust the person who’s going to be fiddling inside your head.
Secondly, decide what you want to know. I am a coward. When my consultant started to explain what he planned to do, I stopped him and said that I planned to be asleep during the operation and did not need to know anything. This was a slight mistake. True, I did not need to know about the actual operation (though some people would want to know) but I was completely unprepared for what would happen before the operation…
I have described the surgery, and my recovery in my book: How to Have a Brain Tumour by Anne E. Thompson. It has helpful information about what to take into hospital, how to get back your driving licence after recovery, and what to expect after a craniotomy. You can read it for free if you have a Kindle, and it’s also available as a paperback, available from an Amazon near you. Amazon Link Here
I think that people tend to feel different afterwards surgery. I have heard people talk about the “old me” and the “new me”. It is not terrible, you will adjust, you just need to allow yourself time. My surgery was on the right side and they removed a cyst from the third ventricle (the middle of the brain.) I still find multi-tasking difficult and I burn most things that I cook. I am assuming that eventually this will improve or I will find new ways of doing things.
Whether you are reading this because you have a brain tumour or because someone you care about does, remember, it does not have to be as scary as we fear. Even when life is unpleasant, there are usually new things to learn and unexpected special times. Things will still be funny, you will laugh again; be kind to yourself and never stop hoping.
Anne E Thompson 
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