Fabrice Muamba

I was shocked to hear about Fabrice Muamba, a well known footballer, collapsing from a heart attack last Saturday whilst playing a match and is now critically ill in hospital.  It is so difficult to comprehend it happening to a man at that level of fitness and that age.  It is so shocking.  My best wishes and my hope are with Mr Muamba and his family.  It is an uncertain time.

Mother's Day

Continuing the theme of significant dates - Mother's Day is approaching.   This will mean different things to different people.  If mum is alive and you have a good relationship with her, it may be a positive acknowledgement of your appreciation of her.  If mum is dead but you had a good relationship with her, it may bring about feelings of warmth for her but also sadness about her not being with you now.  I think that in bereavement, the first year encompassing these significant dates can be particularly difficult but people do seem to find a way to deal with them.

If you have never met your mum, this date may not even hold any significance for you.  If it does, it may be that it reminds you of the empty gap in your life or your quest of searching for her.

If your relationship with your mum is either distant or conflicting, you may have mixed feelings about Mother's Day and perhaps feel a pressure to acknowledge her in a positive way when actually you may not feel like doing so.

There is probably a lot more I could write about mothers but perhaps that may be more suited to a proper article.  

As always, any comments to add to the discussion are welcome!

Anna

Vampire woman

Maria Jose Cristerna - a Mexican woman who turned herself into a vampire look-a-like after suffering years of domestic violence - read a little bit about her on the http://www.yahoo.co.uk/ home page.  Would be interesting to read your views?

International Womens Day

An interesting article on Yahoo Lifestyle about Clare Francis whose husband committed suicide - http://www.uk.lifestyle.yahoo.com/.

Men and suicide seems to have been in the media even more in the last few months - perhaps because of well-known people deciding to take their own lives.

In the above mentioned article the man concerned experienced a number of years with depression before he took his own life.  I am sure whether he sought professional help but some men can find it difficult to ask for help, seeing it as a sign of weakness and choose to either "down their sorrows" in alcohol or other addictions.  This does not need to happen.  Everybody has emotions and running away from them will only mean they build up inside and then hit you at some unexpected time.  People can become stronger by, what I call, meeting their emotions and not being afraid of them.

Once we stop avoiding, there is hope for change.