Growing Pains of a Hapless Househusband

by Sam Holden

  'Oh hello.'

  This was the crunch time. This was when they were ringing me to get my response to all of Emily's allegations. The fact that it was Toby doing it annoyed me, because of all the media people I had been dealing with, he's the only one I've got any time for.

  'Where's your bloody column?' he asked.

  'My column?'

  'Yes. I was rather hoping to have had it by now.'

  'I'm sorry, I'm in a hospital at the moment. A good friend has just had a terrible accident.'

  'Does this mean you can't do it?'

  I literally scratched my head.

  'I was kind of thinking . . .' I began.

  'What?'

  'I was thinking that you wouldn't want a column from me any more.'

  'Why?' Toby sounded perplexed.

  'Um, haven't you been approached by someone about my programme?'

  'Yes.'

  'Emily Taylor?'

  'That's the one,' said Toby.

  'And, aren't you going to be doing something about what she said?'

  'Hold on a sec.'

  I heard Toby issuing some instructions to an underling.

  'Sorry about that,' he said. 'Where were we?'

  'Emily Taylor,' I said. 'Apparently she came to see you with a story about me. I was wondering if you were going to be writing about what she told you.'

  'No.'

  My heart skipped.

  'No?'

  'That's right.'

  'But why not?'

  'Three reasons. First, she's a honey-nut fruit loop. Second, there's no mileage in stories about reality TV being bollocks. We all know it is, and frankly, everybody knows your show is a comedy. No one believes your system really works. And thirdly, we are loyal to our columnists.'

  'So you're not going to run anything?'

  'That's what I said. Now when can you give me your bloody copy? If I don't get it by four, I'll be tempted to go with Emily.'

  'I'll do it right away,' I said.

  'Good stuff. Hope your friend gets better and all that.'

  'I'm sure she will, thanks.'

  I put the phone back in my pocket. I walked along, dumbfounded. I literally jumped up and clicked my heels together, and then realised too late that I am not very good at jumping in the air and clicking my heels together, and fell over.

  SAM ON A SUNDAY

  Yesterday I had one of those experiences that has reminded me what's important in life. You need these experiences pretty regularly, otherwise it's too easy to forget about who you really are, and who you really are to other people, especially those you love and care for.

  I don't know what time my friend took too many pills, but I do know that when I got there, she was in a bad way. I'll spare you the details, but she was very ill indeed. Not being a medical man, all I could do was to roll her into the recovery position and dial 999. While I waited for the ambulance, I thought she might die, because what she had taken could have felled a horse.

  The good news is that she pulled through. Her death would not just have been a tragedy to her ex-husband, who I know still loves her very much, but especially tragic for her three beautiful children to whom my friend is a brilliant mum.

  The bad news is that the pills and the alcohol will have damaged her insides, although the doctors say it is too early to establish quite how badly. But the crucial thing is that she is alive.

  So why did my friend take an overdose? As is usual, there are lots of reasons, some of them simple, some of them complicated. The simplest one is the fact that she had fallen in love with someone who didn't love her back. Another simple one is that she was clinically depressed, and I am now kicking myself not to have insisted that she sought some help. I think that the overdose was not so much a suicide attempt, more a desperate call for attention.

  Not so long ago, my friend was a vivacious, fun-loving woman. She was a bit of a flirt, frankly. Parties without her were just not the same, even if wives no longer had to keep an eye on their husbands! But it was all just a bit of fun for her, and she wasn't some kind of man-snatching monster.

  But recently, eaten away by the depression and the unrequited love, she began to change. She became bitter and increasingly poisonous. She no longer took any care of herself, and her house began to resemble a squat. Things got so bad that her ex-husband was granted custody of the children. Although this was right and necessary, it was a deep blow.

  She knew, deep down, that this sort of behaviour was not right, but she was unable to change it. She knew she was starting to mutate into a quite different person, and there was nothing she could do.

  Or she felt there was nothing she could do. She could have sought help, but a part of her was revelling in her new self. I think she enjoyed being nasty, and found it liberating. It was only when she was sober that she realised quite how horrific the mutation was becoming.

  The gap between her two selves soon became so great that she could no longer function. The more extreme the two selves, the worse she became. At some point she had to snap, and that's what must have happened on that lonely Friday night.

  Her actions have made me think of a conversation I had with her a short while ago. I was telling her that she was starting to lose it, but she was insistent that it was me who had the problems, that it was me who was living the lie, not her.

  At the time I dismissed it, but now I think she was right.

  As you know, over the past three weeks my programme WonderHubby has been airing. It's all about how I try to help families by using the techniques of management consultancy.

  It's quite fun, I like to think, and has already earned me a column in this great newspaper, as well as a regular slot on Joseph and Mary. The programme has had some great reviews and healthy viewing figures. There's already talk of another series in the wings, and, before I forget to mention it, I'm writing a book.

  To put it mildly, it's been quite a change from my old life as a househusband, in which I looked after my children Peter and Daisy.

  And that's the point, it's been a change. But has it been a change for the better? Sure, I'm earning a lot more money than before (in fact, I was earning none), but is there a gap between the old Sam and the new Sam?

  I think there is, and the reason is this. I've become a liar. WonderHubby is the biggest pack of lies that has ever invaded your living room. What you see on the screen has NO bearing at all on reality, and yet you are being told that it's one hundred per cent true.

  Well, let me tell you now. It's not. It's a load of crap, frankly. And I'm responsible for it. What started off as a bit of fun has now become deadly serious, and I've heard that there are some people who really want to use my system to bring up their children.

  My advice to them is this: Don't. I tried it with my kids and it doesn't work. The Venn diagram which shows Management Consultancy and Childcare has no bit that meets in the middle, not even a crumb.

  What my friend did has made me aware that being two people is just not a possibility. And I don't like the lying person I'm becoming.

  So, TV producers and agents and PR people, you can keep all your deals and exciting offers. I just want to stay the same old Sam. He may not be terribly rich, and he's probably a bit of a fogeyish fart, but at least I like him. And so do my family.

  All right. That's it. I'm off.

  ALSO AVAILABLE IN ARROW

  Diary of a Hapless

  Househusband

  Sam Holden

  One man's encounter with domesticity . . .

  When father-of-two Sam loses his job, he (reluctantly) agrees to stay at home while his wife returns to work. Secretly thinking this whole parenthood thing a breeze of leisurely jaunts to the park, reading the paper while the children play quietly and occasionally attending a civilised play date or two, Sam quickly realises just what exactly it means to be a stay-at-home parent.

  Inevitably, domestic mayhem ensues. Just trying to get dressed in the morning and out of the house without going to A&E
is a feat, as is managing the children's complicated play-date schedule while fending off the unwelcome advances of Jodhpur Mum at the playground. And Sam's foolproof 72-step Childcare Programme doesn't seem remotely up to the task.

  Desperate to get his life back on track, Sam seizes upon a variety of mad schemes, but just as things look like they're beginning to fall into place, he makes a very surprising discovery . . .

  'A very, very funny and often touching account of one man's struggle to try and run Planet Home.'

  Allison Pearson, author of I Don't Know How She Does It

  ALSO AVAILABLE IN ARROW

  The Playground Mafia

  Sarah Tucker

  Meet Caroline Gray: divorcee and newly-single mother. Firmly closing the door on her acrimonious divorce, Caroline and son Ben have moved to the trendy town of Frencham where they join Caroline's long-time best friends, Heather and Eva. Settling into their new life is easy, but nothing has prepared Caroline for the demands of motherhood at The Sycamore, the school the trio's beloved offspring attend. Forget classroom bullies, forget trips to the head's office, this is full-scale adult playground politics. This is battle with the mothers who won't take no for an answer – the Playground Mafia.

  Amidst the four-wheel drives, Ben's complicated afterschool playdate schedule and her friends' perilous extra-marital affairs, Caroline tries to keep a low and very single profile. But it's not long before she too finds herself under the mafia's scandal-radar, and her life takes an unexpected turn . . .

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  The Battle for Big School

  Sarah Tucker

  There are 50 places at The Oaks, the best grammar school in the area, and 1,000 children applying. Competition is fierce and parents are prepared to do everything and anything to get their child one of the coveted spaces. Absolutely anything . . .

  Close friends Lily, Julie, Karen and Paul aren't overly concerned. After all, aren't their children are bright and sociable enough? But they're quickly shaken out of their complacency when enrolment time approaches and turns out to be little more than a rigged lottery, where only the most ruthless hold the cards. Marriages and friendships crumble under the pressure, fake addresses abound and tutors rates soar. And, of course, money passes hands like water, between estate agents, local councillors and City fundraisers, all of whom hold the purse strings for school funding.

  As measures get extreme (well, down-right ridiculous really), the four quickly rally their troops and throw themselves into the battle for big school. Initially wary to be in competition with each other, they realise that the only way of out-smarting the rest of the pack is by coming up with a plan. Because getting their kids into The Oaks will demand determination and strategy akin to Mission Impossible . . .

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  School's Out

  Sarah Tucker

  In school playgrounds across the country parents huddle in worried packs, desperately putting together their final plans to survive the summer weeks of mayhem – school is officially out!

  For once, Amanda has a simple, cheap and fail-safe plan to make it through the summer holidays with her three overexcited offspring. But a last-minute addition of fellow-mum Suzanne and her perfect son Orlando quickly shatters Amanda's vision of the quintessential bucket-and-spade summer adventure.

  In fact, before she even makes it to the picture-perfect Cornish idyll that is home to her one-time playground comrade Skyler, Amanda has to endure tantrums, floods, and an eerie B&B, all with three ratty kids and a carsick dog in tow. When they finally arrive, dishevelled and exhausted, she discovers that not only must she endure Suzanne at close quarters in a cramped cottage, but also that Skyler's business is in dire need of a helping hand.

  In the weeks that ensue, Amanda discovers there is only one way to survive the summer holidays, and that's with a stiff drink, a pair of wellies and a bucket-full of bonhomie!

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  The Secret Life of a Slummy

  Mummy

  Fiona Neill

  For Lucy Sweeney, motherhood isn't all astanga yoga and Cath Kidston prints. It's been years since the dirty laundry pile was less than a metre high, months since Lucy remembered to have sex with her husband, and a week since she last did the school run wearing pyjamas.

  Motherhood, it seems, has more pitfalls than she might have expected. Caught between perfectionist Yummy Mummy No 1 and hypercompetitive Alpha Mum, Lucy is in danger of losing the parenting plot. And worst of all, she's alarmingly distracted by Sexy Domesticated Dad. It's only a matter of time before the dirty laundry quite literally blows up in her face . . .

  'This slice of angst and affluenza is several cuts above the rest . . . witty, observant and supremely intelligent.' The Times

  'There is something of Bridget Jones's hopeless-but-adorable quality about Lucy . . . Neill's hilarious depiction of the manifold daily perils of stay-at-home motherhood is so convincing that it soon looks like the most challenging job in the world – and Lucy is all the more sympathetic simply for staying afloat.' Daily Telegraph