This is the thing about friendship in midlife. It’s not that you don’t have  friends. It’s that having friends now involves admin . Actual admin. The sort of admin that used to be reserved for renewing your car tax or chasing a refund from British Gas. Because when you’re younger, friendship is basically… proximity and chips . You’re just… around people. Constantly. There’s always someone. Someone’s always doing something. You can fall into a friendship simply by standing nea

This is one of those questions that sounds harmless enough until someone actually asks it. You might feel that tiny internal scramble while you work out how to answer without overthinking it. How many friends have you got? What are we counting here, exactly? The people you see regularly? The ones you could ring in a proper crisis? Or perhaps the folks you still feel fond of, even though you haven’t managed to see them since before everything went a bit odd and time stopped me

Part Three of a series on midlife, money, visibility, and learning not to disappear. Somewhere along the way, I absorbed the idea that by this age, money would feel calm. Managed. Settled. That I’d have grown out of impulse and into permanent prudence without really noticing. That hasn’t quite happened. To be clear: my rent is always covered. The bills are paid. I save a little each month. The basics are handled. Responsibly. Reassuringly. But anything left? Anything left is

Part two of a three-part series on midlife, following   This Is NOT the Life I Ordered At the end of my last post, I said some things had settled. This is about the ones that haven’t. I thought once you reached a certain age, you stopped caring quite so much about how you looked. Not in a careless way — just a dignified, unbothered, above-it-all sort of way. The kind of woman who owns one good coat, wears sensible shoes, and isn’t quietly scanning reflective surfaces. Apparen

There was a version of me who assumed that by now I would be a homeowner again. Not flashy. Just settled. Keys dropped into a bowl. Pictures hung without permission. The quiet security of knowing no one can tell you to leave. Instead, I’m a midlife woman still renting  in the UK. Statistically unremarkable. Emotionally, still something I occasionally trip over. That’s what midlife really brings—not a crisis, but an audit. A quiet stock‑take of what you assumed would simply… h

Christmas is a magical time of year… apparently. For many midlife women, it’s less Silent Night  and more Silent Rage , as we watch everyone else float about sipping mulled wine while we carry the entire operation like an exhausted Christmas donkey. By 50-plus, we’ve learned one crucial truth: Christmas doesn’t “just happen.” Christmas is built, held together, and executed by women who are one burnt sausage roll away from walking out and joining the carol singers just for the

Christmas Day: the one time of year you receive presents you never wanted from people you wouldn’t trust to choose a tin of beans for you. You’ve cooked, cleaned, prepped, basted, chopped, peeled and hosted like the domestic goddess you are… and in return? An assortment of gifts so baffling they could be used as psychological warfare. Let’s break down the characters, the chaos, and, most importantly, your survival tactics. 1. Auntie Harrods (Budget: £5. Swagger: £500) You kno

We’re told endlessly that youth is where the magic happens. That happiness peaks somewhere between low-rise jeans and regrettable boyfriends. But then something miraculous occurs: we reach midlife… and discover that happiness hasn’t disappeared. It’s actually arrived  — finally, fully, unapologetically. Midlife women are some of the happiest, calmest, most grounded people on the planet. Not because life is perfect (it rarely is), but because we’ve stopped trying to make it pe

There’s something wonderfully liberating about reaching midlife. Not because everything is suddenly perfect — it isn’t — but because at some point you simply grow tired of wasting energy on things that don’t matter, don’t work, or don’t deserve the emotional rent they’ve been charging you for decades. Here are the things I stopped doing after 50… and the surprising improvements that followed. 1. Saying Yes When Every Fibre of My Being Meant No Once upon a time, I agreed to th

If you’re craving a calm Christmas rather than a chaotic one, this is for you! ”Christmas used to be magical. Now it mostly feels like being cast as the unpaid production assistant in a festive West End show no one asked you to organise. By midlife, many of us have learned two things: We want Christmas to feel calm, cosy, and meaningful. The people who shout “Make it magical!” usually contribute nothing except an empty tin of Celebrations. This guide is for the woman who want

The day your child leaves home is supposed to be emotional. Tears, hugs, nostalgia, the obligatory “send me a picture of your room when it’s tidy.” My own daughter left just four months ago to move into her first home — a moment of pure pride wrapped in the soft ache only a mother understands. She’s always been independent. Capable. The kind of young woman who could run her own life from the age of twelve if we’d let her. But even the most capable daughters still need their m

November arrives with a chill that seems to seep into your bones and a calendar that suddenly fills with invitations to social events you never asked for. The thought of bundling up, braving the cold, and making small talk feels about as appealing as a root canal. Instead, there’s a far superior option: retreating to the sanctuary of your home, wrapped in snuggy clothing, with candles flickering and your favourite music playing softly in the background. November nights were m