So I’m sat on my sofa on New Year’s Eve, having already opened the wine (declaring it was after 6pm somewhere in the world after all!), reflecting on the last year and thinking about what to write as this year’s Nurture post to look back on the year just gone and forward to the year to come.

It’s been a while since I’ve blogged. I’ve not written much at all this year despite, being totally honest, having lots I wanted say! But with everything else going on in the world (and Twitter becoming a place where, at times, the haters were out in full force!) I just didn’t have the resilience to cope with any disagreeing (or worse) comments.

But as the end of the year has approached, I’ve found myself jotting down thoughts and ideas so perhaps I’ll get back into it in 2021 and it doesn’t seem quite right to not post something about this year and my hopes for the next one. So here we go…

What I’ve learnt from 2020:

1. Sometimes you just have to roll with the punches and accept you can’t plan in advance this time. It’s taken me 9 months of last minute government announcements meaning plans were thrown out of the window but I’m finally at peace with the fact it’s ok to leave some things until the last minute to reduce the need to change them anyway. I need to be better at letting go of what I can’t control!

2. Sometimes you have to accept you can’t do things on your own and you need help. Given how fiercely independent I’ve always been, this year took a lot of getting used to as the strategies I’d used to communicate in a hearing world no longer worked in a world of face masks and online meetings – speech to text software is good but it doesn’t get teaching terminology! The dizziness and headaches as my brain tried desperately hard to counter the fact I couldn’t decipher words properly have been almost constant at school but I’d rather that than not keep people safe from Covid. I need to be better at recognising asking for help isn’t a weakness.

3. Sometimes you have to remember to present the real you to the world and not just the good stuff. Looking back over my social media presence this year, with the exception of a few blips when I got fed up and cross (usually when I’d dealt with a parent telling me teachers were all sat at home drinking Prosecco during the first lockdown!), my posts have been really only about sharing the positives. Yet this gives a really distorted view of my life and hides the fact that at times the loneliness and isolation were excruciating. I know there are people I could message if I needed to but that meant admitting how I felt and it’s so much easier to present a positive front. So many people said ‘you know where I am if you need anything’ but didn’t realise I would never ask as that would mean admitting I needed help/support/just someone to say hello to. I need to be better at not hiding away and, instead, letting people in.

Looking forward to 2021:

1. After what seems like an eternity, I finally moved into my dream house in July and I’m looking forward to cooking, baking, growing vegetables and crafting as I make the house mine in 2021.

2. I haven’t read much in 2020 (just haven’t had the headspace to lose myself in a book) but I’m looking forward to reading more in 2021…starting with Rumaan Alam’s “Leave the world behind”.

3. Taking on the challenge of walking and running longer distances as I get out and continue living by the mantra of Work. Save. Travel. Repeat. The ‘travel’ aspect has just been reinvented since March!

I wish everyone a Happy New Year and here’s to 2021 being filled with hope and a brighter future for all.