I took her to be assessed after realising that every apparent eccentricity Ed and I had noticed since she was very small aligned perfectly with what I’d read about the condition. At the time, she’d been having major meltdowns – tantrums over the slightest thing that could last for hours. She’d get so red-faced and hysterical that by the end, she’d forget what had upset her in the first place, only to be filled with remorse over what she’d done.
School was also a battleground. At the age of ten, she wasn’t badly behaved as such – and never had been. On the contrary, teachers described her as sweet, kind, and popular. But she was also impulsive and unable to wait her turn. She never listened in class, preferring to channel her efforts into making other kids laugh.
I saw first-hand how impossible she found it to focus, whenever she had homework to do. Tasks that were supposed to take minutes could be dragged out for an hour, even with me sitting next to her to nudge her along. More often than not, we would both give up, exhausted, demoralised and with little to show for our exertions.
Eventually, we were offered medication.
I’m no anti-vaxxer, but as someone who rarely takes more than a paracetamol even when I’ve got a headache, I felt uneasy about the idea and grappled with it for nearly a year. What about the side effects? Would it make her think we wanted to ‘fix’ her? And, at times, I’ll admit it: I had atwisting, nagging doubt that maybe there was something in the pernicious idea that this was all just down to my own failures as a parent.
‘I think even you realise that’s completely ridiculous,’ Ed had said, as I took solace in his arms after a particularly trying day.
‘I just can’t help feeling like I should be able to help without resorting to giving her pills,’ I’d argued.
He shook his head and looked me straight in the eyes. ‘Jules, I think this counts as one of those times when a right answer doesn’t exist. And we’re really not helping her by not at least trying.’
I booked an appointment the following day.
There was a lot of trial and error. The first tablets she took didn’t agree with her – she felt nauseous and could barely eat, which did nothing to assuage my feelings of guilt. After a few more fails, we finally hit on something she took only on schooldays. It definitely helped.
But this – like the parenting courses I went on, the books I read and the changes I tried to make to her diet and sleep patterns – was just one part of the puzzle. They were small things that helped, but none was a magic wand that made it all disappear.
And her teenage years brought new challenges.
At school, she was constantly in detention. The frustrating thing was that nobody ever thought she was abad kid. When they weren’t tearing their hair out, most of the teachers were really fond of her. But she never remembered to complete homework. Sports kits were always being lost. She was endlessly, spectacularly late for everything. I tried my best to save her from these daily minor disasters. I can’t count the number of times I was late for work myself after dropping in a forgotten swim cap or a permission form that I’d never even seen. Running around after Frankie was once a full-time job, on top of my actual full-time job.
The thought of that prompts a pang of anxiety, so I try watching TV again. ButAlly McBealisn’t cutting the mustard now – and that’s before a text from Kayla pings on my phone.
‘Check your emails – a big meeting has been called tomorrow. Presumably about this. . .’
I click on a link to a news story that reads: ‘Exclusive: Barisian Group in Fable & Punk takeover’.
I sit in numb silence for a moment, before pulling up the link I found in the middle of the night, when I googled techniques to combat perimenopausal anxiety. At 3am I was convinced that the answer to all my problems lay in a bottle of St John’s Wort – which I’ve subsequently forgotten to go out and buy. Instead, I’m forced to do some mindfulness techniques, which I’ve always dismissed as useless, though that’s largely because I’m so bad at them. I sit back, resigned to a simple fact: I am a nervous wreck. For the last year, I have been engaged in a full-scale war with my own brain and there’s only one weapon left in my arsenal. I phone Jeff.
‘So what if your company has a new owner?’ he says. ‘Why would they sack you? You’re good at your job, aren’t you?’
‘Well, yes. I like to think so. Still.’
‘Still what?’
‘Jeff, you’re an accountant. You know these things always involve job losses. Barisian is a huge, multinational concern. They don’t care about people. They care about numbers. Besides, I’m acutely aware that at forty-seven years old I’m not the shiny new thing in the office anymore.’
‘Age brings experience, a strong work ethic and a refusal to take any shit whatsoever. From anyone.’
I’m not sure an employer would see the last one as a benefit, but I sort of take his point.
‘And as for Frankie, she’s got her phone back, hasn’t she?’ he says.
‘Yes but—’
‘What was it that nice teacher used to say?’
‘“She just lives on Planet Francesca, which is a wonderful place to be,”’ I reply, parroting the words of the lovely Miss Ridley from way back when Frankie was at primary school.
For years afterwards, I’d cling onto that reassuring phrase. To Miss Ridley, young Frankie was clever and kind, a ‘bright, chatty little spark’, to quote her report card. She wouldn’t hear a word against her.
‘You’re making me feel like I’m going mad. Am I making a fuss over nothing?’
‘No,’ he says gently. ‘I understand why you’re worried. I’d be the same.’
