I seem to have finished my glass of wine very quickly. What kind of mother sits there intending to get pissed the minute her daughter’s gone away on a wholesome camping trip? This one, obviously. I pour another glass, remembering that I haven’t eaten tonight, and check the fridge to see what I could throw together for my solo supper. Hummus, eggs, cherry tomatoes and half a tub of cottage cheese, with milky liquid pooling in it. Some out-of-date ham and a bendy courgette, which I bin. I decide to just have wine.

By the end of the second glass, I’d have hoped to have felt more relaxed, and possibly pleasantly naughty, sipping away at my corner shop plonk that Andy would scoff at (‘You’d barely class that as wine,’ he’s observed on many occasions). However, I am not relaxed. I’m far from it. The booze seems to have triggered a powerful hot flush, and now, because I’m sitting here alone in my kitchen, fanning my face with a magazine, and with my laptop within arm’s reach on the worktop, it starts happening again: a small niggle, like a craving for a cigarette. Just the one, then I’ll stop and that’ll be the end of it.

Just one little peek at those photos of Estelle Lang.

But no – I definitely don’t do that anymore. I know it’s bad for my mental health, and I have better things to do, like getting sloshed on my own. I get up and bring my laptop to the table and sit there wondering what I could look at instead, to take my mind off staring at pictures of her.

I pour more wine – a huge glass, well over half the bottle gone already. How did that happen? Mid-life women are self-medicating with wine, I read the other day. I’ve never liked smoking a joint – it makes me agitated and paranoid – and I’m not about to start on the ‘party drugs’ at my advanced age. Even if I fancied a go, I wouldn’t know where to get them, and my mental capabilities feel impaired enough at the moment without being chemically altered. So what else, other than wine, am I meant to self-medicate with?