When the alarm went off at 5 am, I must have ignored it and went back to sleep. I don’t remember telling myself ‘5 more minutes’, but here I was; 8:55 on the clock and I was still in bed.
“Oh, FUCK!”
When I was between the ages of 14 and 17 years old, I got up every morning and completed 100 sit-ups and 50 push-ups before I went to school. At some point, I started adding yoga into my morning routine too. Everyday, there was a spring in my step, a dazzle in my eye. I felt good every time I stepped out of the house. That was the feeling I was trying to find again. At some point after I turned 18, I had completely stopped doing it because I got lazy and didn’t want to start my day at 6 am anymore. I wish I could go back and punch that version of myself in the face for quitting because doing sit-ups, especially trying to hit 100 of them after not doing any for over twenty years is traumatising. I knew how to do them, I could remember doing them with ease, but as I lay on my bedroom floor, feet tucked under the bed and attempting my first one, I couldn’t.
“How in the … urg …. what the … oof … bastard ….”
This was not going well.
I managed 20 sit-ups. I didn’t even attempt the push-ups.
“Right, get out, I want to do yoga.”
“Wha?”
The confused faces of the kids stared up at me from the sofa as I whisked the TV remote out of their grasps.
“Yep, yoga. The TV is mine for the next 30 minutes, so you can either watch me do yoga or go to your rooms and play with your toys.”
I searched YouTube quickly and found a yoga video that might work for me. It was labelled as part of a 30-day yoga challenge, had a few million views, and had been uploaded several years ago. That would do. That would do nicely.
The youngest two decided they would stay and watch yoga instead of taking themselves off. In hindsight, I shouldn’t have given them an option to stay and watch me. I had hoped they would have disappeared upstairs with the threat of something other than a cartoon dog on the screen because I did not fancy having an audience for doing exercise, especially after my sit-up non-starter.
“Welcome to the 30 day yoga challenge for beginners. Today, on day one, we are going to start with some gentle stretching, Sun Salutation, and end with some deep breathing. To start off, lay face down on your mat.”
I did not have a mat. I had a rug on the living room floor which was from my grandmother’s house, and therefore older me. Lying face down on the floor, I realised I needed to hoover, badly.
“Let’s start with a gentle back bend, lifting your arms, legs and head off the mat. This is the starting point for bow pose, Dhanurasana.”
Starting point? This was the STARTING POINT?! I could barely lift my hands off the ground!
“Now release. Bring yourself up to standing and place your hands in front of you in prayer position. Deep breath in and raise your hands to the sky. Exhale and stretch them out in front of you down to the ground….”
Reaching up in the air, I noticed the cobwebs that had collected around the light fixture in the centre of the living room. But I continued to move. The cobwebs would have to wait.
As I stretched, moved, and flicked myself head down, I discovered why the correct equipment, including a yoga bra, is important. This is especially valid if you are doing it in your living room with an audience in your leopard print pyjamas that are loose fitting.
“Bollocks!”
I grabbed the bottom of my shirt just before it flew up completely and the kids saw my titties. It was too late to stop. I didn’t think.
“Mum? Are you ok?”
When I came to, I saw two concerned faces looking down at me.
“What happened? Ouch!”
“You fell and banged your head on the fireplace. Don’t worry, we covered your boobies.”
Two cushions had been placed on my chest, my jammie top was up by my throat, and there was a warm trickle of blood sliding down my temple to my ear. The realisation hit me the same way I had hit the fireplace. I was mid-balance, trying to go from all fours on the ground to one leg and one arm when my top, which I had stupidly tried to secure by tucking it into my jammie bottoms, slipped out and up. Or was it down? It doesn’t matter, the point is, the top escaped the elastic prison of my waistband and went running in the opposite direction. In my panic, I tried to grab it, forgot I was mid-pose, and slammed to the ground, knocking myself out. This was not good.
“I’m fine. I think.”
Struggling up, the room spun slightly as I tried to hold my head and get my top back over my chest.
“Jesus! What happened?” Miles knelt down beside me, taking a good look at the damage.
“Mummy fell,” Summer helpfully informed him.
“I can see that. Go grab the kitchen roll.”
Harrison ran off while Miles turned the torch on his phone into my eyes.
“Ow! What are you doing?”
“I’m checking for concussion.”
I swatted his torch away before it burned a hole in my cornea.
“Do you know what you are doing? No.”
“Uh, yeah I do. I learned it in school. It’s your pupils changing.”
“I’m sorry kiddo, but I’m not taking medical help from someone who learned it in school.”
His face softened and his eyes looked teary as he shoved his phone in his hoodie pocket.
“I was only trying to help.”
A knot formed in my stomach as I looked at the face of a teenager who was doing his best as Harrison returned with the kitchen roll.
“I’m sorry. I appreciate what you are trying to do but you can’t just shove a torch in someone’s eyes like that. You could blind them,”
I took a whack of kitchen roll from Harrison and held it against my head, wincing as I could feel the pulse of my head under my hand.
“If you want to help, make me up an ice pack. Just grab that bag of frozen peas that is older than you and wrap it in a tea towel. And you two, move out of the way, I need to get to the sofa.”
I lumbered up and moved to the sofa, being careful that I didn’t get dizzy and trip over something else.
“Why do we have peas that have ‘best before March 2001’ on them?” Miles enquired as he returned from the kitchen with the peas in a clean tea towel.
“Those are the ‘bump’ peas. They only get used for injuries. No point in destroying multiple bags of peas for the sake of an injury.”
Miles shrugged his shoulders as he handed them over to me. But it was true. Away back in 2001, I had gone through a skater girl phase. Every time I came home, I had a new bump than needed an ice pack. My mum got fed up with throwing out defrosted veg so she came up with the idea of the “bump peas”, peas that were only for injuries. For 25 years, every boo-boo was treated with those peas.
I sat for an hour with bump peas on my forehead before I looked at the mess I had made of myself. It was worse than I thought. I’m not sure what way I fell but there was a split in the skin on the bony bit of my scalp. You know the bit. Just below the hairline where you could grow horns. On the right side of my head, it looked like a horn was trying to break out. The skin had turned milky white from the cold of the peas leaving a perfect purple line that stretched 3 inches. What completed the look was the one inch long flap of skin that resembled a loose page that was trying to escape from a book. The temptation to flick it back and forth on my forehead was overpowering. It probably needed stitches. But you don’t go through a skater phase without picking up a thing or two. I carefully cleaned, put some antiseptic cream on it, then folded some gauze and taped it shut. The important thing to remember is to make sure that the skin flap is folded the right way when you tape it down. Otherwise you will end up with a skin flap that begs to be picked. Once I was satisfied, I showed the kids my handy work.
“See? It’s not so bad.”
“Are you sure? Do you need to go to the hospital?”
“Why would I go to the hospital? How am I getting there?”
“We could phone for an ambulance!” Harrison hollered.
“I could drive,” Miles ventured with a smirk on his face.
“Er, no to both. We don’t need an ambulance and you definitely can’t drive. You’re 13.”
“Was just an idea.”
I swept my eyes around the faces of my children, their faces caught between awe and concern.
“Guys, I’m fine. I took a tumble because I was stupid. I shouldn’t have tried yoga without the proper gear. I promise you, I won’t do it again. The next time I try yoga, I’ll have the proper stuff, ok?”
“Even for your boobies,” Summer chirped.
“Yeah, even for the boobies.” I swept her up beside me and gave her a kiss on the cheek as she wriggled and giggled against me. Not wanting to be left out, Harrison threw himself at me, knocking me back on the sofa.
“Oof… right… ok… everyone happy that I’m fine?”
Three heads nodded in agreement. I was fine. A bit banged up but I was fine.
“Right, the day is getting away from me now. I’m going to have a shower. I’ll probably have to change this dressing when I get out. And then I will get started on my to-do list for the day.”
“Should you not rest for the rest of the day? And should you really take a shower? What if you get dizzy and fall? I’m not dealing with you naked.”
I looked at Miles again and spotted his phone in his hand. He was Googling “what to do when someone has a head injury”. He had a point. The last thing anyone wanted to deal with was me collapsing in the shower.
“You won’t be happy if I get into the shower behind a locked door, will you?”
His head barely moved as he shook it. He could barely look at me. Neither of us wanted to admit it but my tumble had scared him a little. For the last year, he had communicated with me in a series of grunts. When I thought about it, this was probably the longest conversation we had had in a while. All because I had tried to save my dignity.
“Alright. I won’t have a shower. But I’m locking the door when I pee. I’ll wait until your dad gets home later. That way if something happens, he can deal with my naked and unconscious butt, ok?”
I could see Miles relax his shoulders as he let out a long breath.
“That’s ok with me.”
“Good. It’s settled then. Movie day with mummy on the sofa. Let’s pop some Disney on and have a chill out.”
As Summer and Harrison scrambled beside me, Miles stood up and left the room. Just like that, the conversation with my eldest child was over as he retreated to his bedroom. His concern had been refreshing. Now that he was reasonably sure that I wasn’t about to keel over, he left. Harrison sat on my right side and shoved his hand up my sleeve to hold my forearm. Summer sat on my left side and wriggled her hand under my jammie top to squeeze her chubby fingers against the squishy flesh of my stomach. Miles used to do this when he was small. Now, there wasn’t space for him to squeeze beside me. I missed it. And I think he did too.
Lying in bed at the end of Day One, I felt like crap. My entire day was in the bin after hitting my head. When Terry had gotten home, he wanted to take me to the hospital. Keep in mind, by the time he had gotten home several hours had passed since I had face-planted the fireplace. There was no point going up to A&E by then. Throughout the day, I had placed mini ice-blocks on my forehead. I must have looked so cool with the frozen plastic unicorns that normally live in Summer’s lunchbox on my noggin. Since Terry had arrived home, I had been upgraded to the giant one we use for the picnic box. The chill from my forehead was spreading through my body; I was almost tempted to put a jumper on. I sighed as I mentally reviewed my day. The entire day had been spent on the sofa, dinner had been a selection of frozen pizzas, and I don’t think I brushed my teeth. The only thing I had achieved was drinking more fluids which had resulted in repeated trips to the bathroom. While Terry was in the shower, I opened my phone for my daily update.
“Hi guys. Well, day one is over and it kind of sucked. I slept in for a start, and when I did get up, it all went down hill. I fell over in the living room doing yoga and cracked my head open. The reason I fell is a stupid one. I was doing yoga in my jammies, didn’t have a mat or a bra on, and when I went into downward facing dog, my jammie top went up. . . or is it down? Anyway, my top moved, my boobs feel out, and I tried to grab my top and fell over. Now I have this beautiful bruise. I’m hoping there will be no scar. And I don’t just mean my head. My kids were in the living room when it happened and covered my boobs for me while I was knocked out on the floor. So, that is that. Bit of a waste of a day, but tomorrow is a new day. Here’s hoping I do better. Ok, bye.”
As the post was uploading, Terry appeared from the en-suite, naked and damp from the shower. As is customary with married couples, he preformed the sexually provocative dance known as ‘the helicopter’.
“Very sexy. Turning me on so much.”
“Hey! I gotta remind you of the goods every once in a while. And just remember, if you don’t like seeing my mini-me swinging around, you can hold him in your hand. Or if you don’t want to see him, I could shove him-”
“Ok! Ok! I get the point!” I blushed as my voice rose higher and a giggle escaped my lips. How did this man still manage to make me blush after all these years? He kissed me and turned off his lamp.
“You know, you aren’t supposed to sleep with a head injury. I might have to keep you awake for a while. . . ”
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“Downspiral” is subject to copyright laws and cannot be reproduced in any way, is owned in its entirety by The Wright Press LTD. This is a work of fiction. Unless otherwise indicated, all the names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents in this book are either the product of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental. The Wright Press LTD assumes no responsibility for errors or omissions in the content or for any actions taken based on the information provided.