Page 19 of The Bad Mother's Diary

Then I said, ‘Didn’t you worry? When Callum was a baby?’

She said, ‘To be honest, I’ve blotted out that first year. It was so awful.’

I asked if Callum was sleeping better now, and she said not really.

She counted her gold-ringed fingers and said he still wakes up three or four times a night.

I asked her what she did when he woke up.

She said she hides under the duvet.

She added, ‘I love Callum to bits, but I wish I’d waited until I was a bit older. It definitely puts a crimp on things. I mean, I have like NO social life.’

Then she Facebooked her friends and arranged to hit a few clubs.

Thursday February 5th

Had a big row with Nick today. We NEED to move house. I just can’t stand Helen coming round any more.

If I have to spend another day watching her criticising, moving and wiping things that look completely perfect, I will go mad.

Helen is one of those women who has everything, but is never happy with anything.

She is skinny as a rake, incredibly rich, and works as a hobby. And yet everything is wrong. The shade of granite in the kitchen is ‘a total disaster’. Her new cashmere cardigan makes her look ‘disgustingly fat’. Henry, her husband, is going ‘horribly bald’.

When Helen’s here, the flat isn’t a home at all. It’s a showroom. There can’t be so much as a cushion out of place.

Living here is like a 24/7 job interview. It’s constant stress.

One of Daisy’s socks was on the shag-pile rug this morning, and Helen stared like it was an unexploded bomb.

‘Jul-iette.(It’s neverNi-ck.)Thisshouldn’t be here.’

I said if she was offering to do the laundry for me, that would be a great help.

She gave me her Helen glare. Then she checked her slim, solid-gold watch and said, ‘I have twenty minutes to talk about the wedding. Christ. I need a coffee.’

Usually, I’d offer to make the coffee. But there’s no point with Helen. She hovers over you, telling you exactly how to do it. So I let her do it herself. That way she can do it perfectly.

She made coffee, then stood in perfect ballerina posture, one hand on the granite work surface, stomach held in and said, ‘You’ve put on weight.’

I said, ‘Nice of you to be so supportive, Helen. Dieting is hard with a baby. I get really knackered.’

She winced at the word ‘knackered’.

Poor Helen. It must be very stressful having me as a daughter-in-law. Here she is wanting to give the appearance of a perfect well-to-do lady, and her son is marrying a commoner.

Helen told me she had ‘a few ex-ballerinas tips’ to get slim. They were basically, ‘Drink only Diet Coke, and if you feelveryfaint have a spoonful of honey.’

I told her I would never completely starve myself.

She said, ‘You don’t want to get married lookingbulky.’

I told her that Nick loved me no matter what my size. But the truth is he’s always hinting I should lose weight.

Helen went on about the wedding photos and said maybe she should talk to Mum about the dress code.

I told her there wasn’t a dress code, and that Mum had already bought her dress.

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