53 years young comfortable with how I look.

This post was written in September 2024 and scheduled to go out on 21st October. Our daughter died on 7th October. It seems trivial to let this post go without with sharing this information with you. It's important to me that you know life isn't just carrying on as normal. It's also quite poignant if you reach the end of the post.

For the first time in my life (aged 53) I'm comfortable with how I look. My size, my style and my hair.

I'm at my most comfortable with clothing in the autumn and winter when I can stick jeans, a jumper and boots on and not have to think about layering. I hate feeling bulky. I hate feeling cold. Mind you I don't like being hot either. I do love a good summers day, the ones where you don't have to think about something warm for the evening, or a rain coat for later, or what type of shoes go with a dress because sandals won't cut it due to the rain forecast later.

I've always had reasonably good skin, although as I've got older I've developed liver spots, darkening patches of skin on my face. I've never tried to cover them although I do wear makeup, it's not heavy and I wear it for me. I''ve also always been happy to go out without make up on, but I always wear factor 50 sunscreen, since the age of 30 and I moisturise every day. I've never learnt to do my make up. All I've done over the years is change my colour of eye liner and mascara, these days it's black (it used to be blue in the 80's) and I've added in an eyebrow pencil in brown. Lipstick alters depending on my mood, but red is.a no go these days. 

I had a mall make over experience. I wiped it all off as soon as I left the store. It was so heavy and greasy. I've had two newspaper make overs and one by a professional make up artist, the latter was my favourite. She'd seen an article in the newspaper where it had aged me and offered to do a natural make over to make me look more my age. 

Before, during, the Teresa May Power Bob and after.

Mail Online 24th August 2016

Professional make up artist and photo shoot in UAE.

22nd May 2017

Sandwich Generation Mail Online 28th June 2018

Me and Mum

My nails are something I like to have done. Just a gel polish, once every 3-4 weeks, bright colours. I usually do my own soak off and spend around £30 on a new polish. I find if my nails are done, I can put my hair in a pony tail, not worry about make up and I'm good to go out.

I've lost weight recently. Only a stone. I'm now a size 10 trouser. I've fluctuated between a size 10-12 for the past 20 years. My top half is a 14. But with medication for migraines and no, the medication does not make me put on weight, it does increase my appetite and with up to 15 migraines a month I've always craved sugary foods. Just over a year ago. I realised the weight was no longer fluctuating, it was staying on and I was uncomfortable with how I looked and how I felt. My clothes still fitted me but were tight. My dresses that once fell from my bust, were now filling in and I was getting more aches and pains around my neck, shoulders and lower back. I started to watch what I was eating and slowly I managed to stabilise the weight gain and eventually started to lose some weight. A medication change earlier this year for the migraines helped me lose more weight and I'm now where I feel my most comfortable. I have more energy and in less pain.

My hair has always been the biggest thing I've had an issue with. I've NEVER been able to style it. I've NEVER had the right cut. I've grown it long, I've got fed up with it and had it cut short. I've had the worse hair cut EVER.

I asked for this in April 2022.

With an undercut.

I left like this:

I cried.

I washed and dried it, it looked like this:

I paid £48 to get it rectified. I was happy with the end result. I've only had it trimmed three times since.

I've had hair extensions, I've had it dyed almost every colour going, in fact right now, it's faded from a bright blue, underneath at the back to a pale green. Colours I've always been happy with. I've always alternated between short and long hair every couple of years. My hair grows quickly. It's only taken 2 years to grow from short to this below and you'll notice it's also gone from grey to blond and no it's not died. It was dark when I was younger, I went grey around my early 30's started to dye it blonde, let it grow out grey, then discovered it was blonde after all, could've saved a fortune.

But styling I've never got the hang of, until I bought one of these new fan dangled devices online, my hair has spent years being straightened or scrapped up in a pony tail, or just chopped short again. 

Are you happy with being you? The way you look? Your hair? Your fashion sense?

I'm not always happy with the inside, but on the outside I feel good and sometimes that's all that matters and it's what keeps me going some days, but please don't judge me by that. I might look like I've got it all together, but looks can be very deceiving. 

Spending quality time with Mum

With living abroad and being a mother of 5 myself, life is busy and hectic.
Over the past 7 years traveling back to the UK has been limited, trying to spread myself around the kids, parents, in laws, extended family, friends.

When we lived in South Africa it was two visits a year, since moving to Dubai it’s been 3 visits a year, but with the kids being scattered around the UK, most of my time has been spread thinly and all visits have been a rush starting with a round of hello’s merging quickly into goodbyes. With 2 of the children spreading their wings and moving further a field, this task has become harder.

The kids do come out to visit and my mum came to Dubai last year and we get some quality time together, but I was working last year and the time felt rushed.

So last year Peter and I decided to invest in a property in the UK where I’d have a base and be able to invite family and friends to visit to enable us to have more quality time with everyone.

It has worked and it hasn’t worked. Where the kids have been able to visit and stay, it’s a 1 bed flat and it’s been packed, I haven’t had my own space to chill out in as planned and when Peter has joined me, we’ve had limited space as it’s been used as a dumping ground by everyone, storing belongings for child 3 who has since moved to Australia and it’s Now home to an 18 year old who due to family issues this summer with the death of my father and his paternal grandmothers ill health has seen him finish 4 years in boarding school and was overlooked when it came to supporting him with finding a job.

But despite all of this, I’ve actually had some of the best times this year with my family, the time we’ve spent together, although tinged with great sadness with the loss of a husband, father, granddad and great granddad, has been wonderful.

We’ve created so many new memories, our relationships have changed, new roles have been adapted, gaps have been filled and new adventures taken up.

Mum and I had the opportunity to travel to London this week for a mother and daughter photo shoot with a National Newspaper for an article on Mothers, Daughters and Grandchildren living in different countries and how we manage.

It’s not something Mum and I would normally do together, Dad would be laughing his socks off at us, once he’d finished telling us how ricidulous we were being, but he’d have looked forward to buying the paper next week. It’ll be online also. I’ll post a link if you’re really THAT interested.

Treat yourself to a make over

I love a good make over. I wear make up most days, but I'll also happily go out without any make up on. It all depends and how long I have to get ready and what else I'm doing.

If I know I'm going out for dinner in the evening. I'll put the make up on in the morning and just top it up before I go out. If the day is just food shopping, coffee with or without friends, then I usually don't bother.

I've done my make up the same since I was 14, foundation, powder, eye shadow (no longer blue) eye liner, lipstick and mascara.

I've added sunscreen, serum and concealer over the years, as I've aged and my skin has become damaged. 

The way in which I apply my make up has also changed, I use brushes now rather than my fingers to blend the foundation and concealers in.

Last week the lovely Vicki, who you can find on Instagram as PerfectCanvasDXB, invited me to a make over session. All she asked for was a couple of photos she could use on her Instagram account to show 'less is best' but i picked up a few good tips that I wanted to share.

I'm not sure if I'm doing it right, but I have noticed my make up techniques have improved, it's taking me a bit longer to apply than usual, but it's worth the end result.

• Apply serum and moisturiser. I use products from Boots and love their factor 50 face cream, it's not greasy and living in Dubai it's an absolute necessity.
• Using a brush apply foundation and lightly dust with powder, avoiding under the eyes as this just makes them look darker.
• Using concealer, blend onto problem areas for complete, even coverage.
• Apply eye shadow to the outside corners of the eyes and blend. I have quite heavy eye lids, so applying colour all over, just makes the eye look smaller.
• Apply mascara to the top of the lashes.
• I'm not very good at drawing a straight line with eyeliner on both eyes so I'll carry on applying it to the inner lid.
• For my eye brows, I've purchased a brow pencil to fill in the missing gaps. I have my eye brows threaded every 3-4 weeks, but with age, they are thinning and the brow pencil colours the grey hairs as well as filling the gaps.
• Use a lip liner and a brush to apply lipstick. I find a gloss lasts a lot longer.

I've had a couple of make overs the last 12 months. One with Bobby Brown in Dubai, but that was more about selling products than teaching you how to apply them. I certainly didn't feel or look like I'd had a natural make over. The make up was too heavy and I could feel it cracking when I talked or smiled. It also aged me.

Last year I had a make over with the Daily Mail, which included a full transformation into a Theresa May Look alike.

I loved the before shots, where a small amount of make up was applied. I thought I looked my age, which is 45 and I loved the look, but the after shots, oh my I aged about 10-15 years.

The make over Vicki did managed to leave me looking at least 10-15 years younger and I will certainly be going back to see her when I'm next having a night out.

I wasn't asked to write a review for Vicki's time and skills and all products mentioned have been purchased by myself. I did receive payment for the Daily Mail shoot, plus travel expenses.