Dear Susan,

How was the Empire State building? I imagine lots of women walking around looking for Cary or Tom. Must be very exciting to be in New York; I mean with subway bashings and Central Park muggings and everything. Did you and Adrian 'make it' there, because if you can 'make it' there you can make it anywhere.

Everything here is just the same,oh except for Dulcie. She has to have grommets in her ears and her adenoids out. Poor little pet is apparently nearly deaf in one ear. and we thought she just shouted to be heard above the other four.

Any way i sort of feel sorry for Eloise. She hasn't had a full night's sleep since 2003. Of course most of it has been of her and Aaron's making. If they'd gone to bed and slept through the night they wouldn't be in this predicament.

Remember the fist full night's sleep you had when Alexis was a baby. Boy I remember mine.

I woke with a panic at 2.30am. I knew it was 2.30 because after eight years of broken sleep i had learned to tell the time by the posion of the stars.I listened. Nothing.Silence. Something must be wrong. I raced in to their bedroom and woke them one by one "Rosie do you want a drink" Josiecan I get you another blanket" Eloise do you want me to go out to the sand pit in my bare feet and collect Teddy" They all rolled over grunted and went back to sleep.

Could it be that my nights would never be interrupted again. The very idea caused me to spend the rest of the night contemplating the ceiling with my bloodshot eyes.

No more would I pour myself out of bed to the screams of a banshee whose pillow had fallen on the floor. Rosie was the worst. She would come into our room, stand at my bedside , lift my eyelid and say "mum I'm going to the toilet"

"Ok, Rosie go"

A minute later she would come back repeat the performance and say "I've finished"

The interruptions to my nocturnal inactivity were endless. Their father (and I use the term loosely) was completely oblivious to my midnight meanderings to fetch a pail of water, re-upholster an unclad five year old, cuddle a nightmare away or change the spewed on sheets. If however I had stood out in the front yard and whispered some obscene suggestion pertaining to conjugal rights, his hearing would prove infallible.

Someone in our day , probably a man, perpetuated the myth that a father lost his masculinity if he saw to his child's needs during the night. Utter rubbish. The "attendee" wouldn't notice it the "attender's" face was covered in cold cream or stubble and for that matter could care less. Apparently it's different now and dads get up to their kids at night all the time. I've heard Ivan say that our children were so perfect he never lost a wink of sleep, which I guess is half true.

Before I had children (and since they've left home) I couldn't have been woken if a 747 landed in the driveway. AK (after kids) i would wake up if Eloise's eyelids fluttered out of unison. I think once in a fit of desperation I offered to sell my soul to the devil for a full night's sleep. But even old Nick knew that was no bargain.

The absolute worst time for a mum is when one of them is sick. I remember when Josie had a cold and had been crying with pain, fever or whatever it is they cry with. I put her down to sleep and went straight to the "Home Medical Guide" (the old time Google search engine) Fatal. By the time I'd digested the symptoms side effects and treatment of every disease known to man, she'd progressed from a cold to yellow fever, athletes foot and galloping fluff in the navel.

I lay in a heap outside her bedroom floorwaiting for her to draw her last breath. I looked in on her every five minutes to see if the fever had gone up or down and every time I looked she was sleeping loke a baby. It's shattering to realise you are the only person awake in the whole of the southern hemisphere.

At 6am I decided it might be safe to go to sleep. I crept into bed cuddled up to Ivan and drifted off to the land of Nod.

At 6.07am the little darling who'd been at death's door all night clambered on top of me, lifted both my eye lids to reveal cavities which used to reveal my soul and demanded Brekkie.

I really feel soory for young mums who are going through those bad nights but at least it does get worse. You know when they hit eighteen and you lie awake until 3am waiting for them to come home.

Anyway have a good flight home and don't leave your hearts in San Francisco.

Love

Janet