Letters I would like to write..........

To my new neighbours


The bin store is located at the back of the building just behind the bottom of the stairwell a few yards from where you abandoned your full rubbish bag and the flattened cardboard box. I can see from the full bin bag that putting rubbish in such a receptacle is not an alien concept. Perhaps you would like to take another bin bag and fill it with the coke bottles, bread crusts, ciggie packets, dog ends etc etc which appear to have been abandoned on the stairwell (and on my door mat) since you moved in.

I am giving you a week to settle in by which point I would hope you will have cleaned up after yourselves – if not I will ring the Council.

Oh and welcome to the area.



To Basildon Council

The big H.O.L.L.Y.W.O.O.D sign in the Hollywood hills denotes glitz and glamour. A similar sign in 5 ft letters spelling out the word B.A.S.I.L.D.O.N on a small rise alongside a busy road does not denote the same glitz and makes Basildon look even more ridiculous than it already does on the eyes of the world. Lighting up the letters at night is just unnecessary and screams “chav”.

                                  Why? I mean...... just why?



To Everyone who has said “you must be relieved to have a diagnosis for J”

Thank you for all the support we have had as it was a real shock to hear “ASD and ADHD” (even if not totally unexpected). Yes I am relieved that J has a diagnosis and a label to hang all his little quirks and odd behaviours on, I am relieved that this will be the kick up the bum which the Local Authority needs to provide him with that elusive Statement of SEN which will lay down in a legal document what his educational needs are and how they will be met, I am relieved that J will finally get the support he needs.

But actually....

I am not bloody well relieved; I didn’t want to hear “ASD and ADHD”. I wanted to hear “a bit immature but nothing which won’t correct itself as he gets older”. Not for anything in the world am I relieved to hear that my darling boy has a lifelong disability which will make his life much harder than if he did not have ASD and ADHD. I know there are plenty of people who do well in life and who are on the autistic spectrum – Einstein for example is suspected to have been autistic. But I don’t recall him having an easy life nor any of the other “autistic geniuses” who have been quoted to me since we were told J’s diagnosis.

And finally.....



To Dru

Dora the hamster is a pet, a friend and part of the family. She is not now or ever a plaything, a meal or a source of entertainment. Please could you stop sitting next to or even worse “on top of” the hamster cage. Admittedly Dora does not help matters by being a one hamster escape artist – all I can say is that she must have 9 lives pretty much in the way you have to have survived this long in your company.