photo credit: woodleywonderworks

I was saddened to read this report today about the death of a young girl, bullied to death, in that she took her own life after the school did not act against the bullies. It made me think though about duty of care, bullying, parental intervention and a whole plethora of associated issues.

Bullying may be a contributing factor to someone’s suicide, but there are also those of us who were bullied to within an inch of our lives and have lived to tell the tale, so what makes the difference?

The school is of course correct in formulating a zero tolerance policy, but again it’s after the horse has bolted, and won’t prevent other people from taking their own lives from peer pressure, or the pressures of daily life.

Some people, without being derogatory, are more sensitive than others, have more needs and react differently to what would be perceived as normal, which is, to man up and deal with it.  Some people just can’t do that, for whatever reason.

So through this policy, I see a crack of light, that maybe policy is changing to accommodate for those that cannot defend themselves, however we cannot lose sight of the fact that there were many more factors that contributed to this

girl’s death than just the bullying.  She did not have support around her to help her deal with the bullying and as harsh as it is to say, something else had made her weak, or unable to defend herself, unable to stand up for herself in that she let someone else take all of her power, her self esteem.

Is it the bully’s fault?  Partly.  Is it our fault for letting this girl slip through the cracks and ignore the pain she was in? Yes, someone let her go, didn’t intervene, refused to act.

This bullying policy is one action, but it has to backed up by our united actions, to not only have zero tolerance, but to bend down and pick those up who have already been nearly trodden to death.

Post Script 17th October some more on bullying The Bully Project

No related posts.

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.

photo credit: Cameron Cassa

After a suicide you will hear phrases like “I never saw it coming”, “there were no clues”, “I didn’t know they were depressed”, “ouf of the blue”. So what is the key to seeing it coming, finding the clues and knowing what depression is? Hindsight.

What do I mean by hindsight? Hindsight is usually the knowledge and wisdom you get by looking behind you at the events leading up to the conclusion, in this case a suicide. So how can we use hindsight, as a tool?

Study your loved ones. If something seems out of character, unusual, they become quiet and reserved suddenly, or you notice it more and more, ask yourself what is going on now – don’t wait until after. This does not mean to turn into a paranoid nervous wreck, but it means to be aware.

Why do we ignore these changes in character? There are many reasons but I’ll outline the first few that I know.

1. We’re scared

We don’t like change.  We don’t like to face things that are hard.  We don’t want terrible things to happen to us or to our loved ones so even though there maybe a little nervous twitch in our bellies about something, we don’t act on it.

2. We may be wrong

There’s nothing worse than an intervention on someone who is perfectly fine and just having a bad day.  We don’t trust our own judgements or knowledge of a situation or the person in it.

3. We may be right

This section is not for the faint hearted but those who can be honest with themselves.  We may be right and we may want it to happen.  Sometimes situations are difficult and it seems that it would be easier if the person just wasn’t there anymore, they may be using it as leverage to manipulate you.  So go ahead and do it.

In any case, suicide is preventable.  But it takes enormous courage, not from those who are about to do it, but from those around them who can offer a hand but don’t, can’t or won’t.   If you can’t stop them or don’t have the personal tools to approach the person, find someone who can, talk to someone about your fears, let their doctor know that you think they may be depressed.  At least then, if the worst happens, you won’t be standing at the funeral saying “if  only I had done something”.

A final word, sometimes, even if you do ‘everything you can’, it’s still not enough. More on that in another post.

No related posts.

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.

photo credit: Grantsviews

When we had kids, we came to an arrangement.  I would do all the poo and vomit and he would do the teeth and nails, because I’m totally squeamish about teeth and nails.  I know, I don’t understand it either, but there you are.

So now I’m on my own, I get the full joy of pulling out those wobbly bleeding teeth of my now ten year old, who thankfully doesn’t have many of them left, but I’ve dealt with the last five years worth of them.  Also the cutting of the toe nails which I can never do right and almost always ends in tears, both of ours.  The ten year old for nearly losing his toes, and me for causing him so much pain and anguish and for being the one who has to do it even though we had a deal.

Last night I made myself some prawns.  I saw a really quick nice recipe on Everyday Italian and decided to try it.  I totally forgot about the preparation that goes into prawns when I bought six green prawns from the fishmonger.   When I unwrapped the package I was face to face, literally, with six green bug eyed prawns that I would now have to de-head, de-vein and then cook.  OMG another deal breaker I had forgotten all about.  Whenever we had prawns together, he would always de-head and de-vein them and I would cook them.  No wonder I haven’t made them myself for so long.  Funny the things you forget I guess.

Anyway I so didn’t want to eat the bloody prawns after I succesfully de-headed them and cleaned their tracts.  I also washed them for good measure, because I don’t know if you’ve ever eaten a bad prawn, but I have, and I choose death over eating another one.  So I am super careful and very suspect about every single prawn.

I ate five of the six once I’d grilled them and sauced them with pesto and lemon.  They were delicious I guess but they

made me feel sick as I was eating them, remembering the preparation I had to do.  If I’m to do it again, I will ask for them already done, but I think it will be a very long time before I do that again.

It got me thinking though how suicide itself is a deal breaker.  The worst of all marriage vows to break, aside from the small deals you make with each other, like the nails versus poo.  Til death do us part has been chosen by a partner, so miserable in your life that they chose death instead.  Pretty severe.  I’ve done my therapy and I believe it wasn’t because I was a bad wife, but there is always a hint of doubt I guess.  The most predominant emotion is anger, again, that above everything else he had promised to be with me, to help me raise our children, to open jars, fix the television, check out the weird noises at night and kill spiders.  All that is left to me now, and it sucks sometimes and I will have trouble ever believing another human being when they tell me, they’ll be here for me.

No related posts.

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.

photo credit: Mario Spann

Another unexpected bonus of being on your own, is household maintenance.  I have been fortunate in this regard in that my late husband taught me well so I can turn my hand at almost anything.

This weekend I will be fixing the decking boards, getting on the roof to clean the gutters and trim an overhanging tree then using the guerney to clean off the deck and the back patio.  At some point I need to oil the outside furniture but I’m tinkering with the idea of actually painting one set a gloss cream.  My daughters say no, that means I will probably do it.

However there are a few things that I can’t do.  My fridge/freezer has been broken since just before xmas and I’ve been

saving up for the repair guy to come out and take a look/fix it.  I almost had enough when the car battery died and had to be replaced.  The car was due for a service anyway, so in that went and now is purring like a kitten.  You look after your car, it looks after you.

I broke a light bulb in its socket in my warddrobe and after attempting to get the bayonet out (with the power off at the board my husband was a sparky) have bent it beyond all recognition so now need an electrician to come out and replace the whole fitting.  I actually know how to do this, but I’m too scared to do it.  So I’ll stumble around my wardrobe in the dark or with a torch until I can afford the service fee for the electrician.

My pool pump is also kaput so that’s also being saved up for.

People tell you that they’ll be there  ‘If you ever need anything….’ ‘ but when you do, invariably they can’t.  So I’ve stopped asking and am just doing things on my own when I can, the way I can.

Forgot to mention I’ll also be trimming the hedge and back garden with the hedge trimmer if I can get it to fire up.  Should be an interesting weekend.

No related posts.

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.

This link was in my twitter stream What the World eats – a photo essay by Time (love Time btw) and I found it fascinating for a lot of reasons.

The amount of packaged foods that are being consumed globally is quite staggering and frightening to me.  The amount of fresh foods in the weekly groceries can almost be equated to the national obesity statistics.

Interestingly, our weekly grocery bills are pretty similar for families, although in some countries the dollar definitely stretches further.

I’m still interested in childhood obesity and will again publish a series of articles on it, and having taken a snapshot look at the diets of some of the westernised countries, it’s easy to see why this problem is not going to go away.

With both parents working just to maintain a roof over the family’s head (so to speak) it’s easy to see why packaged food is so attractive.  Given my own circumstances (widow with three kids working full time) I”m also tempted to just grab some frozen crumbed unrecognizables to throw into the oven at the end of a hard day.  The only thing stopping me from doing so at the moment is that the freezer is broken!

It’s hard, no matter how many cooking shows you watch about how quick and easy it is to whip up a delicious nutritious meal for the family, to come home after a day’s work, decide what to eat, and then have the kids say they don’t want it anyway!

My compromise solution has been to have reasonably nutritious snacks available and to cut down on buying packaged food (quite easy on a single wage really because you can’t afford them anyway).

There is no easy solution to childhood obesity, but having fresh foods available has to be a start.

It’s strictly what I think anyway.

No related posts.

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.

After many months of toiling with databases, seo’ing etc. I have deleted the old database and am starting fresh, with all the knowledge in tact from my past lessons. There are new things to blog about, new things to learn about, so strictly anything is still possible here.

No related posts.

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.