Helen split from Scott Sinclair could be because she got lost in motherhood – it happened to me, says Ulrika Jonsson
IT seems that Helen Flanagan has potentially split from her fiancé of 13 years, who is father to their three young children.
She recently confessed to not having shared a bed with her beau, Scott Sinclair, for seven years because she still “co-sleeps” with her children.
So, it’s doubtful her devotion to motherhood can be questioned.
It made me wonder whether Helen has somehow lost herself in motherhood, like so many of us have a tendency to.
Their split comes after her spell away to film for I’m A Celeb All Stars, and that would definitely back up my amateur psychology theory.
Perhaps it felt impossible for Helen to extricate herself from her children, due to her strong maternal instincts, and put herself in an entirely different environment of work — and this might have made her re-evaluate things.
It might have made her view herself differently. Maybe she had a chance to appreciate that she is a person in her own right and not just mum to her gorgeous children.
READ MORE ON HELEN FLANAGAN
That may be simplifying things, I know. But it’s no less a possibility for it. Look at Louise Redknapp, who launched herself into Strictly and soon after, she split from her footballer husband, Jamie.
Adele took years out to concentrate on motherhood and eventually emerged with new work and a new partner. It happens.
A couple of years into filming Gladiators, I became pregnant with my first child, and as someone who’d had maternity coursing through her veins since she was young, I threw myself head-first into all things motherhood.
I dedicated every waking, and indeed, sleeping moment to my newborn son. I never left him because I never wanted to.
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I had become Mum and was nothing else, because nothing else apart from him mattered.
It was as if I lived in a parallel universe.
The world went on around me but my life became tiny, introspective, concentrated and quite insular.
All other aspects of my life, fell by the wayside. I started to resent work coming in because I just wanted to stay at home and be a mum.
I didn’t miss bathing in the warm sunlight of fame because nothing but my son counted.
I didn’t miss going out, seeing friends or spending one-on-one time with my then-husband. I was just ‘Mum’.
And I wanted to just be ‘Mum’.
And yet, it’s not until you are taken out of that situation that you start to reflect on who else you are.
Not all women are mothers, of course, but even if you’re not, you become something else and someone else away from your domestic drudgery.
When I went to film the next series of Gladiators when my son was not even a year old, I came alive in a whole other way. It was like some kind of rebirth of the person I had been before I became a parent.
I suddenly found myself in a bubble away from my child where I briefly became the priority, where I learnt to laugh with other people, where my thoughts weren’t on feeds and nappy changes and washing and cleaning. It was a real re-awakening.
It didn’t mean I cared any less from my son, but he was out of sight and I could momentarily concentrate on myself and my work — without distraction or anxiety or guilt.
And that’s, of course, when I tripped up. I got lost in the energy of the work environment and lost my head a bit.
I strayed from my marriage vows because I felt weirdly euphoric.
And when the time came to return home — and I knew I was returning to nappies, milk formula, night-time feeds and walks alone in the park — I felt reluctant because I wanted to take with me the person that I had become during that month of work but knew intrinsically that I would become “just Mum” again.
Many women seem quite capable of balancing the two.
They make time for extra-curricular activities away from their little ones, but I was not one of them.
Many women are great at having a separate life that runs alongside motherhood because they’ve smartly worked out that they need to hold on to their identity as a woman, a friend, a colleague and a professional in order that they don’t lose themselves.
But I forgot that bit. For me, it was all motherhood or . . . nothing.
Now that my children are nearly all adults, I’m really and truly discovering and working out who I actually am away from just being their mum.
I feel like I haven’t had a moment’s breath to concentrate on myself because I’ve been all too willing — for too long — to put others before me.
I have always been very low down on the list of priorities in the world of family and domesticity.
But thankfully, that’s changing. I’m pretty sure my kids aren’t entirely thrilled that I may not be at their beck and call at all times but that’s how it has to be.
This is my time. And maybe this is Helen’s time, too.
She’s done a sterling job bringing up her kids.
Her dedication to them has clearly gone above and beyond everything else.
She is worthy of not just being a brilliant mum but most fundamentally, being the brilliant woman she wants to be.
It shouldn’t have to be a choice between the two.
A nice idea- if we had options
MY nearest “local” city is Oxford. I use the term “local” but it’s half an hour away by car.
Longer by train. Impossible by bus. Expensive by taxi.
The County Council plans to introduce permits next month for people who wish to drive through the city which will be policed by ANPR cameras.
Each household will be given permits for 100 days a year. It’s purportedly designed to “cut local traffic and improve public transport timings”. Hahaha. Public transport timings? What are they then?
For most of us living semi-rurally, public transport is pretty much non-existent.
And if you get caught without a permit while driving, you’ll be slapped with a £70 fine.
I understand the underlying motivation will doubtless be environmental, too. Lovely idea.
I rarely rely on trains, because I can rarely rely on them. The system often makes trips tricky and unpredictable. I grew up in a country where trains and buses ran in conjunction with each other and if a bus was as much as a minute late, the Swedes felt inclined to start a revolution. So, granted – I was spoiled.
Shoppers scuppered
The introduction of schemes such as the one the council plans to implement in the city may be worthy and well-intended but they fundamentally depend on the existence of a decent public transport system in order to persuade people to get out of their cars and on to the trains and buses.
As long as that doesn’t exist, then commuters and shoppers are scuppered.
One critic said of the scheme that it’s “based on the meaningless administrative borders of the city of Oxford rather than distance or need”.
In my opinion it has #CashCow written all over it.
No ‘use by’ dates cuts my waste
MANY supermarkets have now stopped putting “use by” dates on many items such as vegetables and other perishables.
I know this is as dull as dishwater to discuss but it’s made a profound difference to how much food I waste.
I work with cooking a lot so I’m no food-virgin. But as a young child, there was very little food in my dad’s flat and what there was had invariably “gone off”.
I would eat what I could find and – without exaggeration – would have food poisoning or an upset tummy once a month or every six weeks or so.
The fridge was either bare or had scraps of things that would make me ill.
Fast forward 45 years to me as an adult: I have always kept a full fridge and been over-cautious when it comes to food that may have reached the end of its life.
That’s why I had husbands. They were my waste-disposals and would eat more or less anything.
This suited me and my conscience.
But with most of the Ungratefuls having left home and no bloke around for me to endanger with expired goods, I’m now forcing myself to be braver when facing food that’s given up the ghost and actually using the common sense that has always resided deep inside my blonde head.
Less food is wasted and my qualms have been quelled.