Swiping Right?
Catherine Clapham - Charity Project Lead
Dating apps have a lot to answer for; one day I’m swiping right for a Handsome Sailor and 18 months later I’m heavily pregnant and uncomfortably shoehorned into a moving van. I travelled the six hours from Cumbria to Somerset to move into my first SFA with that same Handsome Sailor. Oh, and two days after that the Prime Minister told everyone we needed to stay at home for the next six weeks. As I sat surrounded by boxes, unable to move my hefty baby bump without involuntarily groaning and looking around at my new magnolia walls, I knew I was phenomenally happy.
Fast forward another 18 months, once again I am heavily pregnant and groaning. Rather than being surrounded by boxes I’m surrounded by the toys that my very active 17-month-old has scattered all over the living room, the walls have been painted white and pictures that remind me of my past life as a Visitor Experience Manager at the Tate are on the walls. I am still phenomenally happy with my decision; I would not go back and change anything about my choices to give up my job and start a family in a town I had previously spent less than 24 hours in.
BUT that does not mean that it has been easy, or that there aren’t things about being a Military Spouse that I wouldn’t change in a second. I am still quite new to this life and alongside the crazy time that the first year of being a new mum is, it has not exactly been an easy year for anyone.
I missed having a job, putting lipstick on, talking to adults about adult things. I missed lunch breaks, and walking through my front door at the end of the day with a sense of achievement at a job well done
Being a military spouse and a new mum this last 18 months has at times been lonely and hard and some days have just blurred together. I don’t want to seem ungrateful, or overly depressive, the last 18 months have been hard for most people across the world. However recently things have changed.
Through absolute fluke I stumbled across e50K. I read an article about a military community gardening initiative, DE Gardeners, and when I spoke to the organiser, she mentioned e50K. I sent e50K an email with the vague idea of helping out in some undefined way but within a few minutes my world had totally opened up. There was a group of women out there who were just like me, and they were welcoming me in. Not only this but they were working really hard to improve my life, and the lives of every other military family. A short few months later and I am fully immersed in e50K as the Charity Project Lead, I am spending my days working on creating wonderful projects for Military Families and I do all that around my family and whilst sat at my kitchen table listening to Fern Cotton’s 'Sounds of the 90s’. What more could be better? The future is looking so good. Just need the Handsome Sailor to make me an office much further away from the fridge!
