And twenty six years ago today....

I was exhausted in a different way! (sounds like I'm going to break into song... don't worry I'm not)


 Happy birthday Tom.


Yes this time 26 years ago I was in labor, a month early and thinking how I hadn't finished my ante natal classes, and what would happen if I needed to pant! (I leaned PDQ) It had been a lovely sunny day (A bit like today) and I'd sat in the garden with my lunch. (A bit like today)  I remember thinking, that at least I'd have a nice healthy glow for the baby pictures. (Not at all like today)


So by 6am I was exhausted, and I guess stayed that way for a good few years overall!


This week I'm exhausted for a  different reason. I'm not in labor, although in a way I am laboring. Over a key board and getting exhausted because I want to /need to finish my M/S.


I wondered as I checked back though my cross referencing file and previous m/s to make sure I had my fact's straight, If I was crazy. 


(Yeah I often felt like that when my kids were small as well. Usually as I fished Barbie or Action Man out of the loo for the umpteenth time. What is it with the 'stuff the loo with alien objects' kids like?)


But this week I felt pressurized, really pressurized for the first time, since I started writing seriously. 


It could have something to do with the fact I have just finished two straight weeks of nine—or was it ten—lots of edits for various books.  My choice, to have so much on the go at once, and I don't regret any one of them. But it did mean that the book festering in me had to stay and fester. So when I finally got to it, and dragged it out of my mind it sulked. Wouldn't cooperate, and stuck its tongue out.


Now bearing in mind this is book five in a series of six, and book six has to be with my editor by the end of May, I wasn't best pleased at this recalcitrant! It needed to be written, and I knew it was going to be he hardest of all of the books in the series to write.


Yesterday, I felt I could have shut the lap top and walked away without a thought. For good.


Luckily I happened to be on Skype with four amazing ladies. Doris, Cherie, Sukhi, and Xandra, who are the best.


They metaphorically, picked me, up set me down, and started me all over again. They could all relate, and all know how for whatever reason, it feels to be knackered, doubting yourself. and needing virtual hugs, wine, and chocolate.


They gave me the hugs, wine, and chocolate, and much much more. Friendship, cheering up, and yes nagging, coercing, threatening, and bribing. By the time they had finished, well I still felt exhausted, but I had a new lease of life.


I blitzed the last 5k of the WIP and wrote the last words at one minute to midnight a day earlier than my self imposed deadline.


And although I haven't re-read it yet, so no draw-dropping WTF at those stupid errors I know I'll find, I'm actually really happy with it. It was difficult, and I had to think hard but do you know? I think it's all the better for it.


 So exhausted but very happy and not a little bit smug at what I've produced.


A bit like I felt 26 years ago actually!