profiterole perfection

When I was a girl my mother would always make such wonderful food, as every mother does and should, I'd say.

At birthdays she would always pull some culinary treats out of the bag (or the oven as the case may be). We always got to choose a cake. I'd always ask for a profiterole cake. Profiterole cake perfection.

Now when you picture this you must put out of your mind the image of some supermarket profiterole effort. This doesn't get you close to the sticky, rich delights of my mothers dark and indulgent cake. It was a winner, year after year.

I can make choux pastry now. Not thanks to Sheena, oh no. I learnt this one from an old neighbour. An old fifteen year old, 6ft 2inch, 15 year old boy neighbour who shared with me his home economics recipe. Thank god for that boy. Profiteroles are back in my life. 

Well that is, their recipe is enjoying a happy shelf life with my cookery books for the moment. Can't burn the calories like I used to. Not enough musical bumps, I suppose.

James Byrom Pianist extraordinaire. James Byrom husband to one, son to two, father to two, brother to three. Brother to me. James Byrom- addict.

I have just got back from from visiting my closest sibling, James Byrom. I went to Den Haag, Netherlands, where he lives with his family, to help out a person in crisis.

I love my brother James but like most sibling relationships, ours has been fraught with friction from the beginning. He was born 13 months after me and so he has always known me. I made myself known, it has to be said.

I did everything for my little brother. Helped bath him, helped him out the front door and down the front step to the bus station (I was 3 he was 2) much to mother's despair, helped him to paint his first picture at school - infact did everything for him at school to the point the teacher felt concern for James' development, helped him to his first cigarette and to sneak out of the family home to go to a party when we were teenage youths.

I have always been there for him.

He left home when he was 16 years old to pursue his piano career and live with his girlfriend Sam. He has never returned home. He should never return home. So home had to go to him.

My brother is an addict. Perhaps it started with that first cigarette or perhaps he's a dependent and it started with my impossibly overbearing need to do everything for him as a child? Either way, I feel certain I have played my part in forging his current character. Don't worry, I am not into self-loathing or blame but can appreciate the almost teratorgenic affect siblings have on each other.

I flew to Schipol to attempt a rescue mission. To un-do the un-doable. So did I succeed. Well only time will tell. But if i speak honestly then I would have to say that this is one thing James needs to do on his own. it's going to be hard for him. he's never really done anything alone. but if he doesn't start sorting himself out fast then he'll be doing most things alone for the rest of his life.

There were 8724 alcohol related deaths in 2007 in the UK alone. we know alcohol is more of a problem for men than it is for women. it's certainly a problem for James.he risks losing everything for the sake of 'one too many'.

Intensive care

I've just put my son to bed. 

He said "Mummy, you're the most beautiful girl in the universe." Then continued to tell me that he likes daddy the best. I taste wonder and concern all in a breath.

This is how it has been for me, motherhood. A strange mixture of delight and anguish muddied by an exaggerated oxytocin-style attachment to my first born.

Ours was a tricky beginning. He was 19 days past his estimated due date. I was huge, excited and under pressure, in the end, to give birth. I was induced at home and had a wonderful labour. Seamus got stuck after 24hrs of riding the waves of pain gracefully. My womb was cut and he escaped from my body on the 15th of October 2005 at 10.13hrs. The event proved a little too much for him and he spent the first week of his life in intensive care.

I spent the first week of his life in despair. Separation, pain, war, loss, expressing, support, love and bleak despair were how we spent our first few family days. This set a tone for life to come. 

Seamus never cried as baby. Much because he was with me (after his time away on NICU) for every moment of his life until I went back to work when he was 10 months old 2 days a week. For the first few weeks of his life I carried him around on a pillow, like a Prince. From then on I carried him in a sling. He never left my side. I fed him on demand and gave all of myself to him. Breast feeding healed all our wounds we'd received from the initial separation. Our hearts entwined and we grew in love for each other.  

Seamus' daddy left us last year in October 2008. We were thrown together, Seamus and I back into separation, pain, war, loss, expressing, support and bleak despair. It's not always there on the surface. But it's moments like this when I can see my boy struggles with it all. So I am left with the guilt that I know all mothers feel and that taste in my mouth of wonder and concern. All I have for my son is my love for him - deep, calm, yet intense.

So I stroke his head and say "you know Seamus Daddy and I love you the best and always will, you're a brilliant boy.  

Then I bend forward, kiss his soft cheek and whisper, "I love you Seamus" as slumber engulfs him. Sleep well.

I go to my bed and cry into the pillow. Separation, pain, loss, expressing, support, love, intensive care.