Mother in Law: The best things in life take time

As we reach the end of the first week of January, I expect some of us might be feeling annoyed at ourselves for not entirely 'smashing it'. You were going to drink less coffee but the kids had you up in the night. You were going to go for an early morning run but it was snowing. You were going to make your own lunch but couldn’t be bothered. You were going to do your file reviews. You were going to make your kids eat fruit. 

I’ve come to a realisation recently that things really do take a very long time to stick. A very long time. In this world of instant gratification, I would say it took me ten years to believe I knew what I was doing in my job. If you are reading this and are in your twenties, that probably feels like an unfathomable amount of time. But this job is hard and multi-faceted and even now I look at colleagues in their 50s and think 'wow, you know ten more years’ worth of stuff than me'. If you are constantly open to learning, even if (like me) you forget half of it as you go, you will become a master of your craft. But it has to be done slowly.

I remember reading that kids can take 27 attempts to like a new food. Unless you have a freakishly compliant child (and I don’t even have a slightly compliant child) you won’t be able to get them to try a food they dislike 27 times in a short period of time. It will be, like, a decade if you are lucky. Maybe two. But there are far fewer fussy-eating adults than there are children so they must be gradually coming round to the idea of widening their food choices. I know my mother in law was having a little chuckle to herself when my husband and I started dating and he started eating green food to impress me.

For the last two years I’ve set myself really small exercise goals and, for the first time in my life I’ve achieved them. This year, I thought of a new goal and then halved it so that it is, again, achievable. Like all the best solicitors I’m under-promising and over-delivering. I am particularly proud of this as I am a child of the 80s and have never seen anyone stick to a fitness goal. My kids are seeing me exercise consistently and I’ve normalised it. This is after hiding at the back in about 864 traumatic PE lessons, far fewer village hall STEP aerobics classes and my husband rolling his eyes at various Couch to 5k attempts. I’ve genuinely had to push through his eye rolling this time and, if anything, use it as motivation to prove my current exercises are not a fad. Now I just need to stop running myself down about my slightly pathetic speed/strength/performance but that might take a bit longer.

I think all the best things in life take time. I take a long time to make friends and my closest ones are the ones who have taken 30+ years to know me inside out. Deceptively Angelic Child no. 1 is cautious about making friends, but I am (more than) pleased to report that part way through her second year at secondary school my little tortoise is developing some decent friendships. Thank goodness.

I’m also taking my vitamins every day which I think on its own means I’ve finally become an adult. I’m slightly ashamed to say I’ve done this by way of habit-stacking, though, as the vitamins are next to the collagen in the cupboard and the collagen makes my hair noticeably thicker. So vain.

I’m wondering if this is how people get green fingers. If DALC1 can wake up one day and realise she has enough friends, and my husband can wake up and realise he actually likes quite a few vegetables, will I suddenly get to about 50 and know when to prune shrubs?

My friend recently told me her cycling mantra. I thought it was going to be really inspirational because she’s an awesome athlete. I was slightly disappointed to hear it was 'keep on going'. But that’s all we really need, isn’t it, to keep on going?

Some facts and identities have been altered in the above article