One of the important things that you learn as you get older is that you can, and probably will, lurch from ruin to renewal quite often. Just because everything is under control now, it may not be in 6 months’ time. And also, just because the wheels are coming off now, you will manage to get them back on at some point.
Take the ruination of summer! I am glad to see that newspapers and magazines have started taking that most destructive of seasons, summer, seriously. Beauty features sections are full of things to buy that promise to repair the damage - to your hair, skin, teeth, nails.
To which I say yes but: stop! Wait. Are you sure you actually need to buy anything else? You probably have all you need in your cupboards, you have just been so beside yourself with full-time childcare, packing and unpacking, sweating, drinking, applying sunscreen, counting down the days till term starts again etc that you haven’t been bothered with any sort of beauty regime. Vitamins, exercise, really any sort of self-care goes completely out of the window, too. Well - it does for me anyway.
I have been thinking hard about why this might be and I have come to the conclusion that, particularly when you are a woman, your family trains you, right from their babyhood, to expect to be interrupted.
It quite quickly becomes an unconscious thing. You are so used to being interrupted, stopped from completing a task, dragged hither and thither, that you stop trying to do anything. Anything. You just sit, scrolling your phone or face-down in the new Robert Harris thriller (Act of Oblivion, it’s amazing) because you know there is no point doing anything because you WILL be interrupted.
I surrender to this completely, I barely bother to brush my teeth. So I start the new term with a paunch, spots, a terrible hangover, gnarly feet and insomnia. The good news is that this is all reasonably reversible with all of the things that I already have, but I have just fallen out of using.
1 The Drinkaware app. Oh, my old friend. Let’s get off the rosé and back to business.
2 When you are drying out after a period of heavy drinking, a Vitamin B complex is most helpful for restoring… something or other (I read it in Catherine Grey’s excellent drinking memoir The Unexpected Joy of Being sober so it must be true.)
3 To get your sleep back on track, dig out your magnesium supplement - I’m sure you’ve got one somewhere. The Better You magnesium spray is also great. This was slagged off recently by Adam Kay for being “sticky” - and okay it is quite sticky but also effective. What you do is spray it on the inside of your forearms before bed, rub it in and then wash your hands. Low magnesium is the first thing you ought to suspect if you are having trouble sleeping. I know this because I once wrote a thing about insomnia and literally every “expert” I spoke to said this.
4 Your gut. A week ago my gut health hovered around zero. My insides resembled a boggy urban canal, filled with old shopping trolleys, green slime and dead pigeons, due to a diet consisting of After Eight Mints and Cornish pasties. This can be corrected over time by drinking miso soup, eating sourdough, bran, kimchee, kefir, kombucha, live yoghurt, the dark leafy greens. You know what to do.
5 Exercise. I mean, fuck that shit, right. But I have resolved with Giles that we are both going to attend a local circuit training place because our friend Kit has been doing it for six months and he is ripped. I am also quietly hopeful that cutting down on booze combined with my new, brisk 2 x per day 40 minute morning walking school run to Kitty’s new school will help a little bit - until she tells me that’s enough, thanks and she wants to go on her own ;( .
6 Weight. Haul yourself back on to whatever you were doing before summer. I was on the 16-8 fasting diet and it was working splendidly. But, it does take a modicum of willpower that I simply do not have in the school holidays because I sit about feeling so sorry for myself. And what is one supposed to do while sitting about waiting to be interrupted if not snack?
7 Face. Like I said, you’ve probably got everything you need. I respond to the ravages of summer and general neglect by attending to my face twice a day, rather than just the lazy once in the evening. My main problem is congestion, so I get out the salicylic acid cleanser and the BHA exfoliating tonics and go at it until things look on the mend then stop, as over-exfoliation does, in fact, lead to more spots.
Do not be sucked in by people trying to sell you more shit if the routine you had pre-holidays was okay. I often make the mistake of thinking that the act of buying something will sort out my skin and forget that I do, like, actually have to use it.
How about you? Where are you in your cycle of ruin and renewal? Please leave a comment in the handy box below.
I have drunk so much rose
Ex-pat in ridiculously healthy Colorado here! My top tips: I take magnesium supplements every night along with melatonin- does the trick 90% of the time. I don’t drink anymore (didn’t mix with menopause) and that’s been the most healthy thing I’ve ever done.. Inspired by you, I started the 16:8 and (mostly) stayed off sugar x 6 weeks and I’m down 9 lbs and taken off 2% body fat (!!!!) beefed up my exercise to weights x2-3 times a week and Pilates reformer twice a week (I need to stretch everything out) and I walk my dog most days or hike in the mountains. God it’s a lot of effort but I’ve had a few friends/older relatives diagnosed with awful things in the past few years (see Giles Coren ‘Snipers Alley’ bit in his Times column a few weeks ago -I’m 52) that I’m mostly trying to make up for the absolutely dreadful sins of my past… a steady diet of Marlboro lights, Diet Coke and booze pizza sugar blah blah - typical of Gen X Londoner…. My 9 year went back to school in late August and I agree it’s bliss! September always feels like a New Year too, although that’s also the Jew in me with Rosh Hashanah right around the corner! Oh and for skin I’ve really liked all of Trinny London’s products - they work well and the packaging is brilliant.