Well, I’m sitting in a quiet pub next to a fan feeling a bit deflated. Four weeks in and I’m reaching my limit. I haven’t had more than a couple of hours away from River since the end of term and I’m finding it very draining.

I was supposed to be going to my wonderful happy place of the cinema today but Kike forgot about a prior arrangement. A simple mistake but I immediately felt sad, cheated. This was my time.

I know now that when I feel like this I’m at my limit. Next week is very busy as we are away, so there will be no breaks. I must take today easy, try to be kind to myself, carve out whatever time I can get and try to use it wisely…

Anyway, let’s look back on the last few days, as I think you’ll be able to see that perhaps it was obvious this was coming.

A Very Local Mini-Break

The day after Legoland everyone was unsurprisingly shattered. I organised a little garden playdate for River which he did not participate in for any of it. Summer and Kike were back off to music camp and work and, as I was sitting in the garden on day 1000 of the heatwave trying to get him to come out and join me, I decided that I needed a change of scene.

This has always been my default. Things not going well, feeling a bit anxious, book a flight!

Now, I can’t do that anymore so I did the next thing I could think of: I booked the hotel down the road.

Readers of the book will know that last year I did this as a last resort after reaching my limit and was barely able to speak. This time I decided that I would make a mini-break for all of us.

I paid for early check-in and River and I arrived at 10.30am ready to stay at the hotel. He was very excited! Annoyingly, I didn’t get my very early check-in. I assume when they offer it they don’t expect people that early.

It was quite a hectic 40-minute wait of River running around the lobby shouting:

“GET THE KEY. THE KEY, THE KEY!”

Honestly, I wasn’t going to spend 40 minutes desperately trying to keep him quiet. As far as River was concerned, we’d arrived at the hotel and they were withholding his key.

When we finally got the coveted key, we took the lift to the third floor and entered a very regular hotel room, a bit smaller than what it looked like online (as always), but River loved it.

He happily jumped on the beds and I, for once, didn’t have to stop him. He has broken our bed from jumping, I promise I’m not a mean mum.

Now, apart from the aircon and bed-jumping opportunities, the other reason for the early check-in was that this hotel has a pool. I’m feeling much braver since attending his swimming sessions so, armed with a pool noodle and a very excited little boy, we headed to the basement.

It went pretty well. He used the pool noodle like he does in his lessons and we managed to swim around for a little bit. It was nice and quiet, they keep the lights really low and there’s a deep-sea mural on the wall so lots to look at. I’m obviously never fully relaxed because he still likes to let go of the noodle, keeping his mouth and eyes fully open, and just sink to the bottom, but we managed a full hour’s swim.

On our way back to the room I said we were going to grab some bits for lunch. He was not happy about this as we were leaving his new shiny home, the hotel. For context, the Sainsbury’s I was taking him to was a two-minute walk away.

Let’s just say that all eyes were on us while I navigated a screaming child through revolving doors.

A magazine (don’t say anything) and his choice of lunch managed to settle things and, before he knew it, he was lying in bed with sausage rolls, Quavers and juice watching TV. In fact, the air conditioning was so good that we were both lying under duvets. It felt good.

We stayed like that for the next couple of hours, only moving to replenish juice and snacks.

The Others Arrive

Before we knew it, it was time for the others to join. Summer arrived, armed with her guitar and very excited to be at the hotel. Kike arrived hot and less than impressed with the size of the room he knew he’d be sleeping in that night but was appreciative of the aircon.

I let them settle while I snuck off for 20 minutes down to the lobby, arriving back armed with towels as it was time for a family swim.

This was not quite the calm experience River and I had earlier in the day. It was exceptionally hot and so we weren’t the only ones who thought a swim would be a good idea. The pool is not very big.

There was a couple who got out about seven minutes after we arrived. I would say I felt bad but I didn’t. They can come back when it’s adults only, I would love the option to do that.

We managed a fairly OK swim. River decided that he no longer needed the noodle. He absolutely does. So most of my time was spent ensuring he didn’t drown. Summer was very excited but, as I said, the pool was small so I also had to spend my time calming her and reminding her that there were other people.

Kike had mentally checked out.

It got to 6pm and it was dinner time. Out of the pool and the hotel did a great deal on kids’ food. The restaurant part had loads of low seating and cushions. River thought it was an obby (obstacle course on Roblox) so proceeded to run and jump back and forth. Honestly, I allowed it. He was happy and there weren’t many people.

It felt odd being there at that point. The hotel is about a minute from my old flat, so looking out at the complex and remembering the years I lived there was strange. Memories of first buying it, single and having my first place, Kike moving in, Summer being born, COVID. It felt like several different versions of my life all sitting within a few metres of each other.

I finally decided that I’d give the staff a break and took River outside. The heat hit us like it does when you step off a plane at your holiday destination. We did some balancing and went for a walk, which mainly consisted of River screaming:

“MY HOTEL, MY HOTEL!”

We didn’t stay out for long.

Four People, One Hotel Room

Now, this was always going to be the hard part. We don’t do well with all four of us being in small spaces to sleep.

River was happy until it was actually time to sleep.

“I WANT TO GO HOME!”

I put him in my bed, Kike went to his pull-out sofa bed and within a few minutes of gently soothing him, River was asleep. He had been swimming twice that day.

The night was tricky. River cried a lot in his sleep, which was a few inches from my head, and would only be soothed if he knew I was right there rubbing his stomach. I also found out that Summer talks in her sleep as well. Summer did not like Kike’s snoring and I was woken at 5.30am by a wet little boy. Bed stripped, clothes changed and he went straight back to sleep.

Summer had asked me to wake her early so she could have a swim in the morning but honestly, I couldn’t do it. 8am was early enough after not much sleep for me and I had to get everyone down to breakfast and also fill a lunchbox.

Yep. Forgot that one.

I mean she hardly did badly. Who wouldn’t want breakfast pastries, fresh ham in a baguette and fruit salad? I would actually say it was a step up.

A chaotic breakfast where River refused to eat anything, Summer wanted to try everything and burnt herself on hot chocolate meant I was slightly relieved when the two of them left.

River and I returned to our room and had 30 minutes of quiet before we went for our last swim. It wasn’t as good as the first as he was still refusing the noodle, but he is gaining awareness of drowning so did keep requesting to be near the stairs, which is progress.

Just under an hour of pool time.

“I want to go home.”

OK River, time to go home.

Home… Briefly

We went back to the room where I packed everyone’s things and we said goodbye to hotel living. I arrived back and immediately hated my house and the piles of laundry I’d left. The cleaner had also cancelled, which definitely didn’t help.

No time to wallow though because we were meeting friends and it was Summer’s performance day.

I threw all the wet clothes in for a wash and proceeded to try to explain to River that we were going out. This was not OK. He’d been out, he’d been at a hotel, he wanted to come home and now he was being asked to go out again, absolutely not.

Around this point I received a phone call from the camp to inform me that Summer had been in an accident involving a stick and her eye. Kike was stuck on a train and the thought of sitting in A&E just wasn’t fathomable. I was sent some photos and, after checking that she could see normally and that the eye itself hadn’t been injured, decided I would have a proper look when I got to her.

My friend then messaged saying there was a problem on the train so she was running late. We changed plans and agreed that she would just come to mine once she arrived. Of course, if the trains were running late, that meant Kike was also stuck, which also meant I had to get out of the house or Summer would have no one in the audience.

The crying was intense and it took some gummies and a promise that we were going bowling (this later backfired) to get River to walk up to the camp.

We arrived and sat in possibly the hottest school hall to watch children of various ages and abilities play Old MacDonald on the ukulele. River did not appreciate the noise, I doubt he was the only one. He managed to find a balloon which kept him happy for a bit, then during Summer’s group performance of Riptide he started rhythmically singing along but changing the words to “I want to go bowling” over and over again.

After the performance, I got a good look at Summer’s eye. It looked pretty gruesome but I was happy with the decision we’d made.

My friend was still stuck on the train and we made the difficult decision to cancel, which meant no bowling.

Yep. That went down spectacularly.

We stopped in at our Friday pub. I was really craving adult interaction and I hadn’t realised how much I was looking forward to seeing my friend until I couldn’t see her. We sat in the garden and I was visibly down. Summer found a friend and there was some live music which River enjoyed jumping to, which lightened the mood.

Once we were home I rang a friend to get some new adult conversation and made Kike do bedtime.

A Slower Saturday

Saturday was a slow day. I really wanted a break but knew I wasn’t getting one. I asked Kike to take River swimming, which resulted in a major meltdown as he’s getting to a point where he does not like to be away from me for any amount of time.

Once he is away, he is fine. But obviously as soon as he comes back:

“Where were you mummy? I was looking for you.”

It’s a difficult combination at the moment. The more he seems to need me close, the more I’m realising how much I need small amounts of time where nobody needs me at all.

I decided that we were all watching TV for the day while I tackled the laundry and cleaned up, preserving our energy for the evening as we were heading to the Science Museum for our Early Birds session. But this time it wasn’t at 8am, it was at 6.30pm.

Back to the Science Museum

He fell asleep on the Tube, which is becoming a default now, and after a very hot, quick dinner we headed to the museum.

I won’t go into too much detail as it was very similar to the last time and you can find that on the Accessible Days Out page. The museum was completely empty, a little bit spooky during the evening, and the two of them ran straight in, Summer was even doing cartwheels.

We returned to Wonderlab and River was probably a bit too excited. He ran around each thing lasting about two minutes at each. Luckily, as there were only about ten people in there, he wasn’t bothering anyone. After a few laps I got him to look a bit closer at a few different exhibits, although by this point he’d decided he wanted to be a scientist and therefore needed goggles and science things, which I could not provide.

Summer had a great time going down the friction slide and interacting with all the different exhibitions, although there is a new energy to her which is becoming more frantic. Her ADHD traits are really beginning to show more clearly as she gets older and it’s something I’m noticing more and more.

We headed down to the Garden for some much-needed downtime with the water play and then onto Power Up. I’d learnt from last year and bought four tickets this time.

River wasn’t too sure at first as he couldn’t get things to work but, once I showed him, he laughed at the VR game where lots of mini robots were crawling on us and then watched me play various incarnations of Mario through the years. Summer and Kike enjoyed their time and she was disappointed when time was up. It was past 9pm at this point and we were in central London so it really was time to go home.

One big difference this time was that I knew the exact layout, which lifts to get, had drinks and snacks ready and had made a little plan. There were no meltdowns, which was a huge relief. I think sometimes I forget how much easier these outings become once they’re familiar to me too.

Tube home and straight to bed. There were complaints but River was asleep in two minutes.

I wasn’t long after him.

The good bits still take energy

Which brings us to today.

I slept in while Kike took the kids to jiu-jitsu and then I was getting ready to head to the cinema when he arrived back looking very apologetic, knowing that he’d messed up.

What can you do?

I quietly said it was OK, looked at the time and realised I had just over an hour, went for a walk and sat down to write.

And actually, writing this has reminded me that it’s been a successful week. We’ve had Legoland, a ridiculous mini-break approximately ten minutes from our house, swimming, Summer’s music performance and a lovely evening at the Science Museum. There have been lots of good bits and I know I’m doing better than I was last year.

But I also don’t want to use that to tell myself that I shouldn’t be struggling.

It’s week four.

I needed a break today. I asked for a break and, through a simple mistake, I didn’t get it. I think I’m allowed to be disappointed about that without it taking away from all the good things we’ve done.

Back at home now, YouTube is playing Monster Hunt, Summer is on her iPad and the constant repetition of “MUM, MUMMY, MUM” is back on a loop.

Tomorrow it’s back to both children and we’re off to the Postal Museum, a family favourite. I’m sure once we’re there I’ll be glad we went.

Right now though, I’d still prefer the cinema.

Alone.