I’ve always had a bit of a problem living in the moment, with a tendency to zoom ahead into future imaginings and plans.

I have spent large swathes of my life wishing it away. On a yearly basis I longed for the next birthday, the end of term, the upcoming holiday, etc. On a lifely basis I longed for when I would be an official adult, when I’d finally figure out what I should be doing with my life, when I’d have a family of my own, when I’d get to retire and so on.

Sometimes it felt like time moved so slowly! That has changed as I’ve gotten older which makes sense because as a five year old being told the next world cup won’t be for four years, is actually a lifetime away, whereas now four years is a mere eighth of my existence so its really not such a big deal and won’t be long before I can start the next unrewarding fantasy that this will be the competition England finally wins!

But consciousness of time passing you by as you age is nothing compared to a consciousness of time being a fleeting thing slipping through your fingers at an alarming rate as you inch closer and closer to your own oblivion that develops with parenthood! If I made that sound a little dramatic then I have failed to convey the concept properly. It isn’t a little dramatic it is a terrifyingly accurate representation of a gnawing sensation that I’m struggling to fight on a daily basis.

For example, today I got really grumpy at the beard for being pulled over by a dog, twisting his ankle and consequently not being able to drive Clara and I to the swimming pool (which is only heated up to appropriate baby temperature once a week). I realised I was being unreasonable and did apologise but ended up bursting into tears as I explained it was just that not being able to go today meant we wouldn’t be able to go for another week and then the following week we’d be in the UK and then we’d be back and it would be almost Christmas and then I’d be back at work…and… cue dizzying time distorted depression whilst desperately scrabbling to cling to every minute and hold back time.

And breathe.

It doesn’t help that every Tom, Dick and Harry, not to mention Tammy, Daisy and Harriet pointing out to you how important it is to enjoy these moments as they won’t be small forever. Seriously, people don’t need to tell me this, I’m already sickeningly aware of that fact as I witness the speed at which she grows.

It’s funny because I find myself stuck in this conundrum where I’m really enjoying seeing our daughter develop and loving watching her engage more with us and the world around her. It’s great to see her grow and learn and if my days are currently devoted to doing whatever I can to elicit a smile from our petite pomme-de-terre then it’s a good day (screw the laundry, dishes and attempting to keep the flat clean – I mean seriously, screw them, child or no, there’s always something better to do!).

On the other side the speed at which the days tumble by and the months have swept past clearly scares the beejasus out of me!

Before child, and my life can now be split into BC and AC, as a friend recently pointed out, the five months I’d be taking off as maternity and annual leave sounded like a lot of time. Three months in and an annoying amount of people now counting down to Christmas, I realise how wrong I was! For all you Christmas lovers out there, I’m not a grinch, I used to be a Christmas countdowner myself it’s just that Christmas this year is not just a fun holiday but also the real precursor to the end of my timeless days hanging out with the kid.

The problem is that the potato is just too damn awesome, and I’m sure all parents feel the same, or at least I really hope they do, so that hanging out with her everyday seems like the best way to spend any day. I’m trying not to be totally child obsessed and to have a bit of balance in my life and to keep a separate sense of my ‘self’, which I’m achieving but to be totally honest it is a bit of an effort to do.

BC, I knew that I couldn’t really know how I’d feel about being a mother until it actually happened. My own mother tried to prepare me by telling me that I wouldn’t love my cats as much when the spud arrived, I don’ think she was being cruel she was just trying to give me a point of reference.  But she was wrong, I still love the cats just as much as I did before it’s just that the love I have for my baby is so much more than I could possibly comprehend and it transcends anything I’ve ever felt before. Even saying that doesn’t really do the sentiment justice.

AC, another friend told me that she loves watching me with the babe as she said I seem to be tenderer than I used to be. She tried to reassure me that didn’t mean I seemed particularly hard before but that somehow I seemed softer now. At first I wasn’t too sure how to take that, but on reflection I feel like she’s right and that being a mother has unlocked all these capacities I didn’t know I had before.

I am so much more demonstrative of my feelings because I don’t want to leave our daughter in any doubt of how much I love her, I will gladly make fart noises at her whilst waiting in line at the checkout because it makes her smile without caring about the funny looks I might get from other customers, I will even dive into and brave bureaucratic challenges (and in French no less) where these are on her behalf.

When I met the beard he made me feel like I could do and achieve anything but there were still some challenges I didn’t want to do that I would back away from, things like singing in public or self-promotion at work. When I met the baby I felt like there are no humanly possible barriers that could stop me from doing anything for her.

What I need help with is breaking the non-humanly possible barriers. Anyone know how I can get time to just slow down or maybe just standstill for a little bit, whilst letting me enjoy everything going forward? I’m not asking for much just a life remote control where I can pause, rewind and replay episodes at will.

I feel like my return to work is now just looming around the corner, like an enthusiastic telesales person I know will just call back every day until I eventually cave and have an actual discussion with them. It’s not that I don’t want to go back to work, I’m looking forward to the intellectual challenge that’ll present and am optimistic that working with the new boss is going to be a rewarding experience, it’s just that I also don’t want to miss out on time with the minion. I basically want to have my cake and eat it (which is a very odd expression when you think about it because why would you want to have cake and not eat it)?

I suppose it’s just that for the first time since I don’t know when, I’m really enjoying being in the moment (well most moments, maybe not the screamingly wide awake in the middle of the night moments). It’s just that I never realised before how quickly each moment passes even if they are quickly passing into new and equally rewarding different moments.

Still at least I can give thanks for smartphones that make it very easy to capture a thousand and one moments a day so that its easy to flick back to pictures and videos to help me recapture some of the moments gone by. Now how do I juggle the desire to record all these incidents without giving the child a narcistic selfie-taking complex before she can walk?