How do you feel right now, emotionally? If you came up with something like ‘sad’ or ‘happy’ or ‘angry’, can you drill down a little deeper into that emotion? Is it possible to identify what’s causing it, or is it a vague sense that you can’t explain? Are there other feelings swirling around to keep that first one company? Or even ones that seem to exist in conflict with it? It’s possible, after all, to feel both angry and content – one an immediate flash of something bad, set against a backdrop of a life that’s otherwise giving you all the things you need. How good are you at identifying your emotions? In how much detail could you answer the question: how do you feel right now?

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It’s embarrassing to admit that I don’t like myself very much. Far more embarrassing, though, to tell you all that sometimes I think I’m OK. The latter carries way more shame, I want to whisper it in small-font italics. Sometimes I think I’m quite good, actually. Occasionally the tall, loud, brash, opinionated mess that makes up ‘me’ doesn’t feel so obnoxious. I like myself when I’m with you.

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Usually when I split up with someone, I’ll wallow in wistful nostalgia and take a little time to say goodbye. I’ll be gutted, of course, but sadness is familiar and life has helpfully taught me that it will pass. This time it’s different: I’ve found myself frightened and destabilised – turning fear and despair inwards till the panic of it starts to choke me. Life goes on, though! Unfortunately, it kind of has to! Despite my most fervent wishes, I am not allowed to just shut down all my organs and give up the ghost! This is partly because my lovely friends won’t let me. Here are eight things I have been offered by kind people who want to comfort me in the darkness.

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When I was young, my family used to be big followers of soaps: Neighbours, Eastenders, Coronation Street. I can’t remember what else there was to do on evenings in the nineties besides yell things at the telly as ludicrous fictional characters cocked up their lives in ever more creative ways. Perhaps this is testament to how my Mum raised me, but when I watched soaps, the thing that got me most irate was how terrible people were at just fucking talking to each other. 

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Many years ago I used to write for a website called The Debrief: a magazine-style site run by Bauer Media that has since disappeared. Thanks to my recent sex blogging anniversary (I’ve now been doing this for ELEVEN YEARS!) I’ve been taking a few trips down memory lane and contemplating how lucky I am to have spent so long making a living from what I can only describe as ‘this horny bullshit.’ The Debrief gave me a great start in freelance writing, and my editor allowed me the freedom to do some pretty awesome stuff: writing sex position guides which were entirely gender neutral (a practice that was rare in 2014, and which often got sub-edited back into ‘he’ and ‘she’ if I submitted similar pieces to other magazines); smashing stigma around things like period sex and discharge; writing articles about how to wank in front of someone without feeling like a complete tit; even getting to interview fucking STOYA. You know Stoya? Off of porn? I met her in real life! We chatted for ages about the problems with tube sites and I learned so much from her. I had a blast, that’s the point. And I got paid £100 per article for doing it. All the stuff I wrote for The Debrief disappeared along with the website, but it still exists in my email. And as I’m feeling nostalgic, I thought I’d share one of my faves. This is a piece I wrote in 2014, when I emailed a bunch of my ex partners and asked them to review my performance in bed. You’ve met some of these people on the pages of this blog, and I’ll catch you up on who’s who at the end. Here’s what they thought of my shagging skillz when I popped into their inboxes ten years ago to ask their opinion…

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