These last few months with Daisy were reminding me so much of how it was with me and Ben, how becoming a mother for the first time was exhilarating yet scary. I wasn’t sleeping well, I knew that. I was waking in the mornings feeling extremely fatigued. My muscles ached daily from the amount of hard graft I was doing around the house, always trying to maintain a tidy and hygienic one.

In the mornings I looked at the bed sheets and it appeared as though I had been having some sort of fight with the pillows in the night. I had clearly been experiencing fitful sleep. I looked at my arms and legs, they were littered with small bruises.

I knew it was the stress of it all. I might not be the one pregnant this time, but I was carrying all the anxieties. I needed to de-stress.

The beach. It called to me on days like this. I would leave Daisy in bed. It was still early. She was rising later these days with only a few weeks to go. I would walk along the rocky shore, the way Ben and I did when he was young. We would look for small stones to throw into the water and sit and watch the fishermen far out to sea and guess what they might be catching.

I pulled on a light cardigan as, even though it was almost April, the sea breeze always found its way to my bones.

I set out down the garden and strode over the small wall which took me straight onto the beach. Even though it was considered private land, occasionally people would wander past. It always unnerved me, but I turned a blind eye and hid in the summer house until they were out of sight, never really wanting to draw attention to myself.

As I walked I thought about Daisy sitting alone in the house, her purpose now clear in my head. I had muddled feelings of Ben, I was hanging onto the boy he was, yet he was a man now, with thoughts and feelings so far removed from me. I had despised Daisy from the outset, but now it was clear why Ben had brought her here: to deliver the new baby into my world.

A seagull landed on a piece of driftwood in front of me but flew off the moment I approached. There was no one on the beach today, so I took the time to enjoy and reflect on what I had created for me and my son. The vast space, the gentle sound of the rolling waves, the foaming froth of the tide. It was all so close to me and yet I rarely came out and enjoyed it these days.

These sounds and these sights of the natural waves and wind healed my doubts and insecurities as they seemed larger than the problems I had. They engulfed them and swallowed them down whole. I had worried about Daisy and her impact on my life but now I was starting to feel confident again, things were starting to click into place. There were certain things that were out of my control, that I had tried tirelessly to control for too long. I felt ready to let go. It was time for a fresh start.