We grow up hearing, and maybe believing, certain things as truth. Love wins. There is someone for everyone. What’s for you won’t go by you. When you don’t settle, better things are waiting for you. ‘Finding’ love is presented as life’s greatest and most rewarding quest. We are hit over the head with the happy ever after from the time our parents start to read us bedtime stories. As we grow out of bedtime stories, we learn that love and life are not always so simple. We learn that love can come and go, that even the happiest ever after takes work and compromise and that sometimes hearts are broken. We start and end relationships, we hope and heal and trust and keep on moving towards that North star because everywhere we look, we are told that It will happen and that it will all be worth it in the end. You will find your person, someone who you love, who gets you, who values you, who loves you, who sticks around, who makes all the past relationships make sense. Podcasts, books, articles, films abound, showing us what steps to take along the way; how to work on ourselves, how to enjoy being single, how to be clear on boundaries and priorities, how important it is not to settle, to choose ourselves, how to pick yourself up and start over, how to make space in our lives and in our hearts. But they all work towards the same seemingly inevitable conclusion; that you will meet someone. That you will find love.
No one talks about what happens when good things don’t come to those who wait. No one talks about what happens when love does not conquer all or last forever. Maybe because no one wants to accept the reality that love is not a certainty, a guarantee, or a constant.
My friends tell me with all of their fierce love and protection that they firmly believe I will meet someone. They tell me I am wonderful and beautiful and of course I will meet someone. Because why wouldn’t I? Indeed, why wouldn’t anyone? But not all of us do. Single people exist, therefore it stands to reason that ‘It’ does not happen for everyone. Some of us are alone, and stay alone. For some, that is a choice. For others, it is a life we have not chosen but that we must live with nonetheless. And there is no handbook for that.
No one really entertains the idea that finding love is not inevitable, it is purely circumstantial. Nobody has written the handbook for how you heal and hope without love. No one talks about what happens when you choose yourself, make brave decisions, refuse to settle, put in the leg work, work on yourself, have acres of space in your heart and in your life, spend months and years not expecting it, and yet love and connection continue to evade you. What happens when you follow all of the accepted wisdom and advice and yet things don’t come good? No one has written the handbook for how to navigate the feeling of being a constant spectator to other people’s happiness, for how to be ok with standing still while everyone else has moved on, for how to deal with another round of frustrated hope.
Nobody can tell you what happens when there is no ‘…but then I met…’. When there is no ‘something changed’. No ‘when I least expected it’. No person who makes it all ok, who makes all the previous bullshit inconsequential, who makes the pieces fall into place. Nobody can tell you what to do when you are stuck on a carousel of hope and disappointment, when the dates and break ups come and go and your cynicism rises, when you dig deep for trust and belief only to be faced with more rejection, hurt and frustration. No one can tell you how to carry the weight of never saying ‘we’ and always saying ‘I’.
Society assumes a couple and is designed for couples and that is an issue in and of itself. Being single is tough economically and practically and there is very little discourse around that. But for me, this is also about something else. How do you live without something that your most authentic and highest self wants and needs? How do you hold onto hope and belief when the evidence continues to mount up that there is no point? How do you live a life that has gone in the opposite direction of what you were made for? How do you live with the unique pain that what is for you has in fact gone by you; where is the advice and guidance and affirmations for that?
No one can tell you how to untangle the impossible knot of ‘why not me?’. Why do the things that so many others seem to find with ease feel so out of reach? No shared home, no making future plans, no kids, no shared adventures, no love story. Christmases, birthdays, weekends, evenings, nights, mornings, milestones, holidays, weddings, parties, all pass by with only yourself to share them with. Grieving without a hand to hold, going months on end without a hug or a kiss, wondering who will look after me when I am sick, who would know if I fell down the stairs? Finding a way to face a future with no children, no grandchildren and no partner.
No one talks about you how to move on when there is nothing and no one to move on to. No one can tell you how to truly heal from a past love in the absence of a new love. Sure, podcasts and books and think pieces will talk about self-worth, priorities, boundaries, focusing on yourself, but they very seldom end with ‘and you might end up alone at the end of all of this but you will be fine….probably’. Because while that is just as likely as any other outcome, no one wants to say it or hear it.
I am 43, and my last longish relationships ended over 6 years ago. In that time I have had a grand total of 10 months of being with someone and have been on over 40 dates. That is alot of sleeping and waking alone. That is alot of solo meals, solo holidays and solo weekends. That is alot of smiling and well wishing to other peoples happy news. That is alot of quietly crying on the way home from another disappointing date. That is alot of time to swallow the feeling that maybe it is me, after all, because otherwise what the fuck is going on?
This is not the handbook for how to carry that feeling. I have no answers. All I have is saying that it is not a matter of doing any thing in particular, or looking any where in particular, or being any way in particular. For some people, in spite of everything, it simply does not happen. We need to talk about that because life is not a fairytale or an inspiring Instagram relationship post or an affirmation. There is no easy fix or defined path that will definitely lead you to love and connection. There is just sitting with it all and finding a way through and being as gentle with yourself as you can. There is finding a way to live with the harshness of circumstance. There is speaking the uncomfortable, the inconvenient, the unlucky, the undesirable reality because silence only makes the loneliness heavier.
Elizabeth Mary O’Hanlon (Lily) was my great aunt. She was born in 1917 in New Ross, the second youngest of four, younger sister to my maternal grandmother. Her father died of a heart attack in his mid 50s while driving over the bridge in the centre of New Ross when Lily was about 21.
Lily was very involved in my mother’s upbringing, as were all the O’Hanlons. There are photos of my mum as a baby on the beach with Lily, who is wearing a full length wool coat and headscarf. My mum lived with my granny, my great granny and Lily in Wicklow and then in Dublin until she got married. When my parents got married, my granny moved in with them and Lily cared for my great granny. After my great granny passed away, Lily worked as a priest’s house keeper for a time. She never married or had any children. Her and my mum remained very close and she was a constant feature in our family.
We knew her affectionately as Lil. We were close to her growing up, closer in some ways than our own grandmother. I remember being confused that other kids didn’t have a Lil in their lives. She was a constant and often complicated presence, with her sturdy shoes, thick rimmed glasses, sharp tongue, big heart and multitude of cardigans. When I was small, I associated her with being on the phone, her orange Mini, and arriving at our house with sweets. Apparently I used to pick up the phone and yell ‘Hi Lil, bing beets in beepy car’.
Lily lived for many years in a little granny flat in Ballinteer, built as part of a housing project for single older people by Cabhrú housing in 1971. I remember the hanging beads that formed the door into the tiny kitchen, the dark narrow hallway, the single bed against the wall in the sitting room, the single chair in front of the television, the Spanish dancer figurines that took pride of place on the shelf. I remember the steep concrete stairs – stairs that in time Lily could no longer manage – that lead to the balcony. I used to go and stay with her for a few nights every summer from the age of about 9 , which was always a big excitement. I remember holding her hand walking to Superquinn and Lil buying me a massive cream bun. I remember the other old women making a fuss of me and that there would always be some sort of beef going on between them all. To me, they were about 500 years old but in hindsight were probably all in their early 70s. I remember Lily sitting me down when I was about 10 and telling me firmly never to bother with men, that they were all no good.
We would visit regularly throughout my childhood and teens, something I both loved and dreaded because while I loved Lily, she was not always easy, and she could be harsh on an already awkward teenager. Her and my granny would fight like cats and dogs. We came home from holidays one year when Lily had come to stay with my granny to find the pair of them locked in a stubborn silence that seemed to have lasted for days. Lily was fond of vodka, and could have an acerbic tongue at times. There was more than one family event where she hit the vodka and dished out some healthy insults. As Lily got older, her arthritis got worse and eventually she had to move into supported living and eventually into full time care at Leopardstown Hospital. In 2002 she had a stroke and died shortly after. We were convinced that she made a decision to die once she realised the future that lay ahead of her after the stroke. And that would be fitting for Lily; stubborn, independent and not ever wanting to be a burden on anyone. We all saw her before she died, as did all her nieces and nephews, but in the end she died alone. She left very little to her name; a watch that my brother has and a brooch that my Mum has. The Spanish figurines had made it as far as the supported housing, but I don’t know where they ended up.
In the way that children do, I never questioned Lily’s role in my life. She was in our home often, and would come on holidays with us. In hindsight she must have been a real support for my Mum raising the four of us. Every year she would make a huge traditional Christmas cake that none of us liked and that would still be doing the rounds at Easter time. She would make meringue, cakes and tarts. My great granny was a baker and Lily had clearly picked up much of her talent. Like all the O’Hanlons, she was an avid and talented golfer and was ladies captain of Woodenbridge golf club.
I did wonder why she had never married, but I didn’t think too much about it, in the way that children have of just accepting people as they are. While I was not necessarily aware of it, I think on some level I always felt sad for Lily. Even as a small child, I could sense the loneliness of her life, a life in which she was clearly not happy. It was never spoken about, in the way that was standard for that generation. As I grew up, I remember thinking more and more that, much and all as I loved her, I did not want my life to mirror hers. It’s not that she was alone, more so that she was so clearly not content.
I have come to see Lily in a softer light over the years. I see a woman who poured so much of herself into her nieces and nephews and grand nephews and nieces, who was so involved in the lives of children who were not her own. I think about what that must have felt like for her, always being surrounded by other peoples children. I think about what it must have felt like for her leaving our house, always so full of chaos and activity, to return home to the silence and solitude of her tiny flat. I wonder about her romantic life. I always had a sense that she had experienced a big heartbreak because she was very angry and bitter about men. I said this to my brothers once and they brushed it off, but I have never been able to shake the feeling that there must be a story there, that there were tender wounds not far beneath her hard exterior.
I was at the funeral of a friend’s mother before Christmas. During one of the speeches, someone said that in her last weeks she had said to them ‘isn’t it wonderful that everything I hoped would happen in my life happened’. I thought it was such a wonderful way to think of a life lived. It made me think of Lily and how she might have looked back at her life in her final weeks, and the sadness she might have carried for all of those things she hoped would happen that did not happen. It made me think about the things I have hoped for in my life that have not happened; children, a family, a partner, and how arbitrary it all is. When my time comes, I hope I can say that I made the best of things, that I leave some sort of legacy, that I was true to myself, that I was loved in some way. But it won’t feel like the life I envisioned for myself as a 10 year old sleeping on a fold out bed in Lily’s flat.
My life and Lily’s life are very different. I have had opportunities in education and travel that Lily never had, I own my own home and I am financially independent. But in some ways, our lives do mirror each other, in some ways the fears and anxieties that her solitude brought out in me have become interwoven into my own life. I feel the chasm of loss and grief for the things she never had that I will never have. I think about all the things I never knew about Lily, all the things she never said or did or felt because of the random hand that life dealt her. I feel an empathy and a connection to that side of her that was totally hidden to my younger self, because I didn’t yet know what hand life would deal to me. Lily is the reason why I have always shunned the idea that is is just a matter of time until you find the right person. It simply doesn’t happen for everyone, in spite of what they might wish for or what efforts they might make. It didn’t happen for Lily and as the years pass, I settle into the feeling that it might not happen for me.
I feel empathy and understanding with her for what it would have felt like watching her siblings get married and have families, something that must have been even harder in Ireland of the 1940s and 1950s where women’s only acceptable role in society was to be mothers. I can imagine what went through her head as she turned the key in the door to her little flat, knowing there was no one waiting on the other side, because I often feel it when I turn the key in my own door. I feel something of the well of loneliness that she so often sought to bury in the bottom of a glass of vodka.
Lily used to shout at the television, even going so far as to wave her stick at Gay Byrne or whoever she was raging at at the time. Mum used to pass comment that the telly was great company for her. This flashed into my head recently when my Mum commented that the dog must be great company for me. It made me sad. I wonder will I end up shouting at the television, or the dog, because I have no one to talk to.
Lily was complicated in many ways. I wish I had understood her more, and been more sympathetic for how difficult growing old in her circumstances must have been. The main reason I want to write about Lily is to remember her. It feels so easy to be forgotten when you don’t have your own children to carry on your memory and your legacy. I don’t want that for Lily, and I don’t want that for myself. So I suppose, I also write in the hopes that some day someone will write about me simply to remember me.
I wrote this last month on holidays on Rhodes. It has sat in my notebook since then, like a cat waiting in the shadows. Every so often I’d glance at the notebook and feel these words, throbbing on the pages, waiting for their moment. But I was not ready. I needed more time to let them simmer, to let them unravel, to let them sit quietly before committing them to the universe. That is the thing about words; once they are shared, they exist on their own terms. I was not ready yet to let these words exist. Because they carry pain, and loss, and grief, and hope. They are heavy. I am unsure if their sharing will make them lighter or heavier. But they need to be shared, otherwise they just become more words not spoken. I need to take a deep breath and put them out into the world.
Words
The words crash around in my head like waves on the rocky shore. Words I wish I had said. Words I wish I had never heard. Words in the wrong order, at the wrong time. Words that sit on my lips, patiently waiting. Words that sit in my heart, gathering dust. Words I should have said sooner. Words I will never hear
Mama
Mammy
Mam
My wife
My love
Words I will never say
My baby
My child
My daughter
My son
My person
My love
Words I hear so often from others but that feel so out of reach to me
We
Us
My family
I have news!.
Words that speak the wonder of tiny arms around your neck, and a small hand in yours, or the magic smell of a baby’s head. Words I struggle to find to capture the chasm of loss and grief for these things I will never have. Words I will never reach for to express the magic and love of looking at my own child. Words that escape into the dust of years without ever taking wing; I’m pregnant. I’m getting married. I’d like you to meet your Grandchild. God, I love you so much.
Words that I say only to myself. Words I hold inside because I have no one to say them to. Words that I keep locked away, too ashamed to say them out loud – I am so lonely.
Words that long to be whispered in the dark or mumbled through tearful smiles. Words I say to the child I will never have
It’s ok, Mammy’s here
Mammy loves you
Mammy is proud of you
Words I will never have to search for to capture the vastness of a feeling
A mothers love
A mothers joy
A mothers pride
You are my person
Words that get lost in the hollow, in the place where love should live.
Words I say to the love I might never know. Words that praise my beauty and my wit and my strength, quickly morphing into a string of questions; so why do they never stay? Words that ricochet off the walls of my heart, making it harder, making it stronger, making it tender.
I reach for the words that might describe the aching well of longing when there is
No one to need you
No one to want you
No one to care for
No one to catch you
No one to talk to.
Words I spent years learning to embrace
I am strong
I am amazing
I am beautiful
And the persistent voice that whispers…….so what? It’s not enough….
Words that swirl in the confused, heart heavy vortex of frustrated potential.
Give me a chance.
I am worth it (aren’t I?)
Wasted words, careless words, cruel words, dangerously hopeful words, dishonest words, oh I have heard them all. Words I turn from over and over, as they beg me not to look for love in people and places that do not want me. Words that fall over each other as I try to unpick the impossible knot. If it is not me, then why is it never me? Words I dig deep to find, to say, to share in spite of my fears, but what was the bloody point anyway? Words that chastise my foolish, hopeful heart. Words that echo through my past, sharp in their remembering. Like pointed glass.
You want too much
I choose her
I have doubts
I thought you’d like it
I’ve met someone
I didn’t know how to tell you so I said nothing
Words matter, words carry weight, words carry meaning
Words I swallow to suppress the rising waves of panic; but this can’t be it? How is this my life? Where is the kindness? How will I face tomorrow? When is it my turn? Can’t anyone see me? Why did you leave me? It was crushing to let you go. Words I held in because I knew you couldn’t hear them. I am so damn tired.
Words I write down because I cannot carry them any more.
Time is weird. At this life stage, what feels like ten years ago was actually twenty years ago. The years ticks by at ever increasing speed, and those days of your twenties where it felt like you had all the time in the world to travel, build a career, meet someone, get married and have kids all by the time you’re 30 (or at a push 35) become an ever more distant memory. That’s the thing with time; it tricks you into thinking it will always be on your side. I used to think at the start of each year ‘maybe this will be the year I meet someone…’. But now that is usually accompanied with a hollow laugh and an inner eye roll. I know it’s Valentines week and we’re all meant to be celebrating lovely love, but I am 42 and single and I am allowed by cynical.
I’ve written plenty about how hard it can be to be single in a world that assumes a two. It is economically challenging, socially challenging and can be extremely emotionally challenging. It is six years since my last long term (ish) relationship; that’s a long time to be swiping, that’s alot of disappointing dates, that’s alot of time watching other people find their person. It’s hard not to feel like a permanent spectator to other peoples happiness. Every engagement, every wedding, every pregnancy announcement, every new baby brings up a mess of emotions. While I am always truly delighted for the people involved, I increasingly feel like it will never be me making the announcement. I will always be the one celebrating and never be the one being celebrated. I used to go to weddings and wonder about what mine would be like, I used to hold babies and think about how amazing it would be to hold my own baby.I realized recently while holding a mega cute baby that somewhere along the line I stopped having these thoughts. I guess with time they became too painful.
One of the hardest things about being single over 40 is how blurry the lines become between not having a partner, and not having children. I always assumed I would meet someone and eventually have kids with them. That’s what most (not all) people were around me were doing for the last 10 years or so, albeit not in the same order or at the same time. I figured the pieces would eventually fall into place for me, because why wouldn’t they? Multiple factors including break ups, precarious housing, and a global pandemic slowly ate away at the years and the pieces remained scattered. In my 20s, none of us were talking about fertility or freezing eggs, it was the last thing on our minds, even if any of us had the money to do anything about it. Plus I for one was full sure it would all work out, in time. Months became years became decades and here I am, the other side of 40, single and childless, fitting into none of the boxes that society creates for us. Single and 30 is ok, single and 40 and there must surely be something wrong with the poor craytur. When deciding to end a long term relationship in my mid 30s, I thought about a future with the possibility of not meeting someone, and of not having children. I knew it might happen, and I was ok with it because I was making the right decision for me at that time. But honestly, while I thought I might be single, or I thought I might be childless; I never really thought I would be both.
It is not easy to find your person. It is not easy to find connection and chemistry and shared values. It is not a matter of looking in the right places, or waiting for the right time, or ‘not expecting it’ (the least useful advice you could possibly give a single person in their 40s FYI). It is not easy to find trust and kindness and honesty, and to find someone who handles your feelings with the care they deserve, someone who is gentle with your wounds. I know well who I am, I know I am a great (albeit humanly flawed) partner, and I know it is not me. But as the years tick by, the question lingers – so why isn’t it me? Why does it feel like everyone else got on the train while I somehow ended up left on the platform?
I have travelled on three continents on my own, I go camping and hiking on my own, I bought my own house entirely on my own, I live alone, I go to cafes and restaurants alone, I go on holidays alone. But independent and tough as I may be, the little things do stack up. It is exhausting consistently being the only single person at a party, wedding or family event. Saying ‘no, no,it’s just me’, getting charged a single supplement, consuming media that consists nearly entirely of stories or portrayals of families and couples. Looking around a restaurant and realising everyone else there is in a couple or group. Never being able to say ‘we’, never having someone there to make a bit of a fuss of you for your birthday or a promotion, having no choice but to be your own comfort. Carrying a heart bursting with love and having nowhere to put it. Puttingyour key in the front door and knowing there is no one on the other side. Quieting the panicked voice that whispers ‘ Is this it….forever?’. Wondering who would notice if you fell and knocked yourself out in the shower. Wondering who will look after you and hold your hand when you’re old.
It is a regular occurrence for me to be in a work meeting where the pre-meeting chit chat revolves around children and partners. I can’t participate in these conversations, they feel like a club that I am not a part of. It’s not that I don’t expect people to talk about their children and partners, and I often love hearing the stories, but it is a weird and isolating feeling. As the years pass, I watch peoples lives shift, change, grow. I celebrate them falling in love, I go to weddings and look at wedding photos, I marvel at their growing pregnant bellies, I laugh at baby videos, I sympathize at toddler or teenager antics. I smile as their lives move while it feels like mine is standing still. It’s like watching an endless reel of other people building the kind of life you would have liked for yourself.
Relationships are hard, they can be lonely, they can be frustrating, and, of course, they can end. They are not a guarantee of happiness. Parents are super heroes, I am not romanticising the reality of parenting. I would never deny the reality and complexity of someone elses’s journey. I would never resent someone else’s happiness. It might give me a twinge of sadness,, but I never resent it (unless they’re a dick, but thankfully there’s not many of them in my life :-)).
Dating is hard and it can be exhausting and frustrating. It is hard to stay hopeful, to stay kind, to stay open, to not let the cycles of hope and disappointment grind you down. I spent a long time learning to be comfortable in my own skin, to recognise and embrace who I am and to see what I want and what I deserve. I have put in the time and the leg work, both in terms of working on myself and ‘putting myself out there’ with the drudgery of swiping and awkward dates (with the odd great date sprinkled in there, to be fair). I have put in the mileage and let me tell you, I am exhausted. Waiting for someone to see your sparkly stuff and want to hold onto it with both hands is exhausting. Have I mentioned being exhausted? Because I am. So. Damn. Exhausted.
I feel like I’ve written a version of this piece so many times over the years. It’s like an annual homage to being single, a marker that yup, it is still just me. It’s not what I would choose, but it’s where I am. It’s ok to be cynical, it’s ok to be sad, it’s ok to feel lonely and frustrated, it’s ok to know I am fine on my own while also wishing that it were different, it’s ok to want to love and be loved. So for all my fellow single folk, solo folk, uncoupled folk, whatever you want to call it, and whatever your story has been so far – I see you. I think you’re gorgeous and amazing and strong as fuck and I see your sparkly stuff.
Imagine being forbidden from walking out the front door of your home. Imagine not being able to visit your family who live 20km away because you need a permit to do so. Imagine being violently attacked in your own home, on your own land and it is you and not your attackers who are arrested. Imagine knowing your 13 year old son could be arrested for no reason. Imagine having to cross a checkpoint every day to get to work or school or college, knowing that you have to accept whatever dehumanising treatment is directed at you because you have to get to where you need to go. Imagine watching a nine foot concrete wall spring up to divide your community in two. Imagine watching new highways being built and knowing you are not allowed to drive on them. Imagine soldiers throwing tear gas into your home in the middle of the night and dragging your father away. Imagine watching your home be demolished for the fifth time. Imagine watching settlers move on to land that does not belong to them, and watching them get the electricity, water and protection that you cannot access on your own land. Imagine being told constantly that you are a threat, a terrorist, that your identity does not exist, that your humanity is illegitimate, that your fundamental human rights do not matter. Imagine living cut off from your land, your people, your place. Imagine watching your friends, family and neighbours be arrested, beaten, and killed. Imagine knowing that there is no one defending you but yourselves.
This is daily life for the millions of Palestinians living under military occupation in the West Bank, Gaza and East Jerusalem. Palestine is ancient and beautiful and vibrant. Palestinians are hospitable and engaging, with a wonderfully dark sense of humour. I was amazed at the indefatigable spirit and sheer grit of the people and communities we met. Life is being made unbearable for them. Every move, every decision, every basic aspect of their life is controlled.
It took me a while to wrap my head around how the social and political injustices are etched into the landscape all around you. Driving past Beduoin villages all designated as ‘illegal’ and marked for demolition, which do not have access to the water or electricity grid, while up the road a vineyard sits on stolen Palestinian land, with a perimeter fence, security cameras and a full irrigation system. Our driver telling us that the reason he was late picking us up was because his car was confiscated at a checkpoint. Walking down a street in Hebron, a Palestinian city, where I, an Irish person, can walk but where Palestinians cannot walk. Walking past rows and rows of shut up shops and abandoned market places in Hebron, all hollowed out because they are on streets where Palestinians are not allowed to operate shops. Where people once traded spices, fruit, camels, clothes, ceramics just like in any thriving Arab city, there is only silence, crumbling buildings and welded shut doorways. Streets stripped of their people, their community, their spirit. The ugly concrete wall snaking its way through communities, cutting people off from resources, employment, education, each other. Israeli flags flying over settler houses in the middle of the Arab quarter in East Jerusalem. Tear gas cannisters littering the roof of a community centre in Bethlehem, a place where children and young people manage a community garden. ‘Made in the USA’ is clearly printed on these canisters. A wall mural bears the names of over 160 Palestinian children killed by the Israeli military in 2014 alone. Tear gas stings my nose and eyes, fired by Israeli soldiers in a fully armoured truck, at a few kids with slingshots.
Aida Camp is declared to be the most tear gassed place in the world. People there make jewelry and ornaments out of empty tear gas canisters.
In all the people I met, I saw resistance, determination, fierce pride and a deep sense of place. They are pushed to breaking point daily, but they refuse to be broken. Speaking to 12 year olds who were full of fire and spirit and sass one minute, and then talking about how they don’t feel safe either in their homes or on the streets because they are in constant fear of an attack from the military the next. For all their spirit and fight, it is so deeply unfair that these kids cannot just be kids. It is so unfair that their lives are marred by violence and oppression, trauma and grief, simply because of who they are. There is no justice in the need to constantly resist. There is no justice in a 19 year old saying ‘I don’t think about the future’. There is no justice in the constant denial of who you are and the relentless efforts to tear apart your home, your community, your people.
I have never seen such stark, systematically inflicted injustice as I did in Palestine. As more and more Palestinians are squeezed into smaller and smaller spaces, the illegal occupation becomes more profitable and more entrenched. As I listened to the the stories shared with me and as I slowly absorbed the landscape and streetscapes around me – walls brushing up against Palestinian homes, settlers taking over grazing land, people prevented from moving where they want, when they want, people attacked with impunity and arrested for no reason, potential smothered and livelihoods destroyed – I realised that I was witnessing the slow, and deliberate, physical and social suffocation of an entire people that has been playing out since the Nakba.
Injustice is the scaffolding of systems designed to place the lives of some people above those of others. It is a denial of agency and a violation of rights. It is telling one child that their dreams matter and another that theirs don’t. It is denying one identity but not another. It is about who gets to feel safe and protected, who gets to make decisions for themselves and for others. It is stifled hopes and endless frustrations and hardships simply because of who you are. It is not being allowed to be who you are in the place you call home. It is watching your land, your culture, your people, being slowly erased while the world watches.
Injustice is not some abstract concept. It is a feeling; the feeling of fear, constant worry, no control and no power. It is a smell; of tear gas, burning olive trees, the sweat of bodies packed into a crowded checkpoint. It is a sound; of helicopters, JCBs, rubber bullets, heavy boots.
I was in awe at the strength and resilience of Palestinians, but far greater than this was a feeling that in a just world there would be no need for such strength and resilience. In a just world the Palestinian people would have their rights realised, including the right to self determination, and Palestinian children would have childhoods not defined by oppression and struggle.
Words seem so wholly inadequate, jumbled around in my head and in my heart with all of the thoughts and feelings that I am tying to unravel.
An injustice anywhere is an injustice everywhere.
My heart is sore and heavy and my soul is fucking mad as hell.
I started 2022 with high hopes. I was still living at home but was hopeful of being in my own place by March, after months and months of a protracted probate process. For once, things were going well romantically. My health was good and I felt fit and strong. I felt the universe was finally giving me a break.
In January my health started to take a turn. Nothing serious, but enough to make me quite unwell for a few months and to warrant several hospital visits. In February, the romantic situation abruptly did a 180. It was confusing and hurtful. In March I signed contracts on the house and transferred the worth of years of solo savings for the deposit. It is now August and I still don’t have the keys. I have written to TDs, talked to solicitors, tweeted, had formal letters written on my behalf…and still nothing. In June I got Covid (finally!) and was floored with it although it was a mercifully short dose, relatively speaking. I experienced a pretty sharp decline in my overall mood and peaking anxiety levels post Covid, which thankfully levelled off after a few weeks. My health has improved but I still get flare ups which impact on my energy and confidence and make doing the things I love, like hiking and camping, that bit more difficult.
I have tried to be as patient as possible with all of this, with the infuriatingly untransparent probate process, with living at home age 42 with no discernible end point, with being disappointed and hurt yet again, with the fact that I no longer felt fit and strong. I had to be patient with my body, with my mind, with my living situation, with uncertainty, and with other people. I’ve been patient about love for about 15 years now so nothing new there. That’s alot of patience for one person.
I know I deserve good things, sure doesn’t everyone? I know I deserve kindness and care and affection and to able to put a key in my own front door, to cook a meal in my own kitchen, to not have to depend on sleeping in spare rooms after a night out. I know it is not about me. I know who I am and what I bring to the world. I know it’s not personal. But it sure as hell feels personal. It it is still me going through it, it is still my life, my heart, my hopes. A friend said to me recently that she doesn’t know what the universe is playing at with me, what kind of tests it seems to think I need because I have already had my fair share of them over the years. I’m inclined to agree with her. I’m more than ready for things to be easier, to be in my own home, and to be with someone who fully sees me and wants to hold onto my sparkle with both hands. It’s not much to expect, really. I’ve done the long, hard work to turn the dial, but the universe seems determined not to let me change the station.
My stocks of resolve, patience and resilience are running pretty damn low. I was talking to the same friend about patience, and how tiring it is when you are endlessly trying to be patient with a person or a process. I wondered if I am sometimes TOO patient; am I not firm enough about my needs and my expectations? Do I place too much faith in other people? Should I be more of a thundering bitch at times? Patience is definitely a trait that comes naturally to me, but at what point does it work to my detriment? Someone said to me recently, in relation to a challenging work context, that I was ‘patient to a fault’. At what point does my patience actually become a fault?
I said this to my friend and she nodded carefully; ‘Sometimes you are so concerned about other people that you are not vocal enough about your own needs’. She’s not wrong. As a woman I am socially conditioned to consider other people, to be a carer, to put others needs – especially mens’ needs – ahead of my own. We are told not to be loud, not to make a fuss, not to make anyone uncomfortable, or else we run the risk of being a ‘crazy bitch’ or a ‘difficult woman’. My upbringing involved a fair bit of ‘take what you get and be grateful for it’. I’ve had to do alot of work to undo that narrative and understand that what I get is not necessarily what I deserve.
2022 has not turned out how I thought it would. It’s been a steady stream of disappointments, information vacuums and endless waiting. It has felt like someone putting a blindfold on me and telling me I just have to wait it out, no matter how heavy that may be on my heart and my soul. Everything has felt static and stuck and frustrating. It has felt like wasted time and potential. I’ve been at my wits end and then found new ends of my wits to be at. It has felt like wanting to move but discovering my shoes are full of cement. It has felt like an endless cycle of pushing away doubts and questions and negative self talk. It has felt like a mammoth effort to stay kind in the face of extreme unkindness.
It has also had mountains, the sea, lakes, and the sunny streets of Porto. It’s had creamy pints in Kerry pubs and being buffeted by the wind at the summit of Croagh Patrick. It’s had swims in Mayo, Leitrim, Tyrone, Kerry, Waterford, Wexford, Dublin and Wicklow. It’s had chats and hugs from treasured friends. It’s had a sunny day on Sceilg Mhichíl watching the puffins dart around like wind up toys.
Life can be testing. We don’t always have to bear it with dignity and grace. It’s ok to cry and pout and feel overwhelmed and hard done by. It’s ok to scream into the abyss that you just want a fucking break. It’s ok to miss someone and also be annoyed at yourself for missing them. It’s ok to ask the universe exactly what the fuck it is playing at. It’s ok to write a blog post bemoaning the disappointments of the last 8 months. It’s ok not to be strong and resilient and understanding all the time.
I know that no matter what I will always be kind, I will always be loyal and I will do my utmost to be understanding. I know that my patience sometimes serves me well and sometimes works against me. I work hard to stay true to myself and who I am while also taking on board those often bitter and unwelcome lessons. I will stay patient, but be more aware of the limitations to that patience. I will embrace my inner thundering bitch when needed. I will not let the bullshit steal my sparkle. And at some point, I will find those high hopes again.
The below is based on a walking tour of Rathmines that I put together for the Abortion Rights Campaign in February 2018. It traced the lives and activism of various women who lived around Rathmines and draws linkages between the suffrage and nationalist feminist movements of the early 20th century, and 21st century pro-choice activism.
It was written to be delivered verbally outside houses and buildings, so it is not remotely academic or polished. It was fun to research and threw up some interesting bits of local history.
It is also a reminder that the fight for women’s rights and women’s freedom is never over. Ní saoirse go saoirse na mban.
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The name Rathmines dates to the 14th Century and derives from Rath De Meones; De Meones referring to one William De Meones who held this land in the late 14th century.
In the early part of the 19th Century, Rathmines was quite rural, with houses along the main roads and the majority of the rest of the land consisting of fields and woods.It became a township in 1847, and this prompted a spate of building in the area as most of the commissioners were property developers. This was coupled with the fact that during the 1850s and 1860s members of the professional and middle classes began to move away from the increasingly depressed city centre, a trend which was followed in time by the lower middle classes. This led to the demolition of many cottages and cabins inhabited by poorer people in favour of the development of a business centre. The population expanded rapidly and was predominantly Protestant but with a strong Catholic population, who at that time mainly consisted of servants from the big houses.
Women in 19th century Ireland did not have the right to vote and were excluded from third level education and certain professions. Any property they owned automatically became that of their husband on marriage, and their legal identity ceased to exist upon marriage i.e they became one person with their husband (this changed under the 1882 Married Women’s Property Act).
Mid-spiel on Belgrave Road in February 2018
The aims of the early suffrage movement in Ireland reflect some of the issues impacting on women at that time. The suffrage movement in Ireland focused on equal voting rights, changes to legislation on married women’s property rights, access to 3rd level education and labour rights, as well as repeal of the Contagious Diseases Act (compulsory VD testing for any women suspected of being a sex worker). This movement was quite small and largely dominated by middle class, Protestant women who were not concerned with the question of Irish independence.
The late 19th and early 20th Century was a time of great social and political change in Ireland. Home Rule for Ireland was becoming an increasingly likely reality, women were gaining the vote in other countries, war was looming in Europe and there were advances in manufacturing and industry. Class divisions remained extreme and poverty, especially in cities like Dublin, was widespread. In 1900 Dublin had what were considered the worst slums in Europe.
There were advances in access to education and professions for middle class women for example, but women were still forced onto the sidelines of political and professional life and were greatly bound by gender norms. Many women remained living in grinding poverty, raising large families, with little or no educational or professional opportunities.
The main organisation for women’s suffrage in the late 19th century was the Irish Women’s Suffrage and Local Government Association. This was a ‘constitutional’ suffrage movement, not concerned overtly with changing women’s role in society, and focused on softer campaigning methods, which were seen as more befitting of women at the time. However, this movement did lay the foundations for the more militant suffrage movement that emerged in the early years of the 20th century.
At the turn of the 20th Century, the questions of nationalism and feminism often intersected, although there were prominent suffrragettes who were hostile to the nationalist movement. However, for many, the causes of Irish freedom and of women’s freedom were seen as intrinsically connected, but there were differing views on the order of priority of the causes. Nationalist feminists faced the question: “Nation first or suffrage first.” -should they campaign for UK suffrage legislation or put suffrage on hold until Home Rule was achieved, thus relying on Irish men to then give women the vote? For other women their commitment to suffrage came first and they were converted to the nationalist cause later.
Women’s organisations such as Inighinidhe na hÉireann and Cumann na mBan were focused on the cause of Irish independence. By late 1914 Cumann na mBan was the largest women’s organisation in the country. This organisation was nationalist rather than feminist in orientation. Its manifesto initially spoke of funding and “arming a body of men” for the defence of Ireland. This seeming auxiliary status to the Irish Volunteers did not endear it to suffrage activists. The Irish Citizen condemned its “crawling servility to the men”, while Hannah Sheehy Skeffington described Cumann na mBan as little more than “animated collecting boxes”. This however did change as the nationalist and feminist movements merged more closely. More militant feminists became involved in Cumann na mBan and played an active role in 1916, the War of Independence and the Civil War.
Through the stories of the women we will talk about today, we will see how the feminist, republican, socialist and labour movements intersected and overlapped in the early part of the 20th century in Ireland. These activists believed that a free and independent Ireland was one in which women would enjoy full and equal status as citizens.
We do have to wonder at what they would think about the fact that nearly 102 years after the Proclamation of the Republic, that we are still fighting for bodily autonomy. We can also take motivation and inspiration from these activists. They were often ridiculed, told that their cause and aim was ridiculous and impossible. They often made significant personal sacrifices for what they believed. The very idea of women having the vote was considered revolutionary, how many times must they have been told that it was a lost cause and that there was no point in the fight – that the 19th century ‘middle ground’ were not with them. Equally, we have to wonder what many of them would think of the fact that for so long, Ireland has happily exported her women to England to access abortion care.
“Allowing woman the right of suffrage is incompatible with the Catholic ideal of the unity of domestic life and would fare ill with the passive virtues of humility, patience, meekness, forbearance and self-repression looked upon by the church as the special prerogative of the female soul.” – Fr D Barry, Irish Ecclesiastical Record, 1909.
They were fighting to have their voices heard, breaking outside of enforced gender norms, and refusing to give up on their vision for a freer and more equal society. We see how they organised through public meetings, public speeches, lobbying, direct action and working with allies in other social movements, and in that we can see the cornerstones of modern day social movements including the pro-choice movement.
The feminist movement consisted of people who were unionist, nationalist, catholic, protestant and otherwise. There were divides within the movement, specifically over the national question, pacifism, World War 1 and others. Even as the movement attracted more Catholic, nationalist women, it is important to point out that the feminist movement of the early 20th century was dominated by educated, middle class women. Helena Molony said, there grew “a deep feeling of social consciousness and revolt among women of a more favoured class, [which] passed over the heads of the Irish working woman and left her untouched”.
Hannah Sheehy Skeffington was one of Ireland’s most prominent feminists, republicans and suffragettes. Born Hannah Sheehy in Kanturk, Co. Cork in 1877, she moved to Dublin at the age of 10. She was from a republican family and her father was in the IRB, however from an early age she witnessed the exclusion of women from social movements, as her father did not support various franchise bills for women. In 1903 she married Francis Sheehy Skeffington – they took each others surnames as a symbol of the equity of their relationship. Together, they founded the Irish Women’s Franchise League in 1908, and then later the feminist newspaper ‘The Irish Citizen’ for which Hannah was a prolific writer. The IWFL was a radical feminist group, aiming to secure votes for women in the proposed Home Rule Bill and committed to radical direct action. The slogan of the IWFL was ‘Suffrage before all else”.
The IWFL was formed out of frustration and disillusionment with the softer tactics of the earlier suffrage movements. Hannah herself was committed to radical action to secure women’s rights. On 13th June 1912, Hannah was arrested for smashing a window at Dublin Castle, an act which symbolised the smashing of male rule in Ireland. She spent 2 months in prison for this action. She was arrested again in 1913 for assaulting a police officer and went on hunger strike for 5 days while in Mountjoy Prison. I recently discovered a plaque in my home town commemorating a day in 1910 when Hannah and fellow suffragette Hilda Webb accosted the Chief Secretary of Irelend Augustine Birrell while on a tour of Greystones pier. Apparently this exchange took place at some point; ‘You are a disgrace to your sex’, said one onlooker. ‘You are a disgrace to humanity’, was the retort. (Anyone involved in pro-choice activism will inevitably have been called a disgrace to their sex at some point – I know I have!).
As a result of her militant feminist activities, Hannah was fired from her job at the Rathmines College of Commerce.
Plaque commemorating the smashing of windows at Dublin Castle in 1912
When we hear criticisms around the tone or tactics of the pro-choice movement, we should know that we are walking in the footsteps of Hannah and her comrades who were committed to radical direct action, even when it came at personal cost. They had learned that staying quiet often means that you are not heard; after decades of asking politely, the movement knew they had to change their tactics. What these women did would be considered radical today, and when you think about it in the context of the early 20th century it leaves no doubt as to the resolve and dedication of these activists. We have seen through the events of the last few weeks that years of activism can and does bring about political change – it was the case for Hannah and her comrades in the early 20th century and it is true for pro-choice activists as we find ourselves on the path to a referendum to repeal the 8th ammendment.
Hannah was also a close friend of James Connolly, and was a founding member of the Irish Women Workers Union in 1911, which had 1,000 members by 1912. During the 1913 lock out, Hannah worked in the soup kitchens to feed the locked out workers. Hannah supported the aims of the 1916 rebels, especially as they had enshrined women’s rights in the proclamation, and brought food and supplies to the rebels in the GPO, and also delivered messages during the Rising. She viewed the cause of an Irish Republic, as laid out in the 1916 proclamation, as going hand in hand with her feminist principles; a free and independent Ireland was one where women would enjoy equal rights and status as citizens. Ireland could not be free unless its women were free – “ Until the women of Ireland are free, the men will not achieve emancipation” (1909)
Hannah and her husband Francis had one son, Owen, who they did not have baptised, a decision for which they received much criticism. Hannah and Francis lived together on Grosvenor Place, and later, and after Francis’ death, she lived on Belgrave Road. Hannah also toured America with her son in the aftermath of her husband’s death – as she was refused a passport due to her political activity, she did so under the alias ‘Mrs Eugene Gibbons’. During her tour, she spoke at around 250 meetings, highlighting her husband’s murder and also the wider ideals of the 1916 rebels. She gained a lot of publicity during her tour, and met with Woodrow Wilson in 1917, urging him to support Irish self-determination. After her tour, Hannah was not allowed to return to Ireland legally, so she stowed away on a steamship. She was arrested and sent to Holloway prison in England, where she went on hunger strike and was released after two days.
She returned to Ireland, where she continued her work with the IWFL. She joined Sinn Féin in 1918 and Fianna Fáil in 1926. She became increasingly disillusioned as the political parties diverged more and more from the equal society proclaimed in 1916 and was for example a vocal opponent of De Valera’s policies on women. She died in 1969, having given her entire life to the cause of feminism, worker’s rights and republicanism.
49B Leinster Road (Surrey House) was the last home of Countess Constance Markievicz. Constance and her husband Casimir moved here in 1912. The area would have been Unionist leaning and conservative, so you can imagine that the presence of someone with Constance’s politics would have caused some controversy with the neighbours. This was the last proper home that Constance had.
Born in London in 1868 to a wealthy family, her father was a philanthropist, Arctic explorer and landlord in the West of Ireland. She was educated at the family estate at Lissadell House in Co Sligo, where she became friends with WB Yeats. While interested in cultural nationalism, her early life was quite apolitical as she moved in high society circles. She studied in London and Paris, and eventually married Count Casimir Markievicz. Their only daughter, Méadhbh, was born in 1901 and was raised by her grandparents. Constance’s sister, Eva Gore Booth, was also a prominent feminist and labour activist. .
Constance and Casimir moved to Dublin in 1903. At first, she spent much time pursuing her passion for painting and the theatre, and attending society functions, but increasingly turning her interest and time to politics. In 1908, she joined Sinn Féin and Inghindhe na hÉireann, a radical nationalist women’s group. Casimir accepted but did not share his wife’s passion for politics, and apparently referred to her as ‘the floating landmine’. They remained on good terms but grew apart, and eventually Casimir left Dublin in 1913. They remained in communication and he was by her bedside when she died.
Constance was arrested in 1911 for protesting King George V’s visit to Ireland, and in 1913 she ran a soup kitchen at Liberty Hall during the lock out. During this time, she set up a dining room specifically for mothers when she learned that mothers were taking the food packages and giving it to their children rather than feeding themselves.
Constance was certainly a ‘nation first’ feminist, and by the early years of the 20th century her commitment to Irish independence superseded all else. She established na Fianna Éireann in 1909 alongside Bulmer Hobson. She was president of Na Fianna from 1910 until her death. Fianna Éireann was a nationalist youth organisation (sort of like nationalist boy scouts), with a focus on Irish language, camping, hiking, marches, drills, and fostering a lifestyle in the Republican spirit. Prominent nationalists such as Con Colbert, Seán Heuston and Liam Mellows were involved with na Fianna. At the formation of the Irish Volunteers in 1913, many members of Na Fianna became Volunteers and were heavily involved in training new recruits. Na Fianna members were active during the 1913 lock out, the Howth gun running and the 1916 Rising. Bulmer Hobson established an IRB circle within na Fianna, and over time it became increasingly connected with the IRB as many older members joined the IRB.. Eventually it became, essentially, a youth branch for the IRB.
There was a girls branch of na Fianna, based in Belfast, called the Betsy Gray Sluagh, which had around 50 members, but the girls branch did not have formal recognition within the organisation. At the Na Fianna Ard Fheis in 1912, there was a debate around formal admission of girls, which was eventually carried by one vote. This decision was quashed just a month later. A separate girls organisation was established some years later, and the Betsy Gray Sluagh itself largely became members of Cumann na mBan in 1916. This resistance to girls involvement in na Fianna is an example of how women were still excluded from Nationalist movements, having to create and forge their own roles, often in an auxillary organisations such as Cumanna na mBan. Socialist republicans such as James Connolly saw a more equal role for women, but they were in the minority.
The house on Leinster Road was the unofficial headquarter of Na Fianna Éireann, and there were often drills carried out in the back garden and target practice in the basement. It was also an open house for activists, feminists, republicans and artists. Constance and Casimir would leave a window open at night so any comrades in need could climb in for shelter. The house was a hive of political activity and organising; and ‘The Workers Republic’ and ‘The Spark’ were printed from the small printing press that Constance kept in the house. In the years leading up to the Rising the house was under surveillance by the British police.
Another interesting resident of Surrey House was James Connolly. This is where he stayed and recuperated after his imprisonment and hunger strike in 1913, and he also lodged here for the rent of 10 shillings per week for a time. James Connolly was the founder of the Irish Citizen Army, which, unlike other organisations, admitted women who were given the same rank and duty as men.
Constance Markievicz with Poppet the dog. On the left is Theo Fitzgerald, a member of Na Fianna Éireann who painted the flag of the Irish Republic that flew over the GPO in 1916. The flag was painted in Surrey House.
James Larkin was also smuggled into Surrey House the night before he made his speech from the balcony of the Imperial Hotel in 1913. As Larkin was being led from the hotel by police, Constance (who had just arrived) shook his hand and wished him luck, for which a policeman punched her in the face. She was also caught up in the baton charge which followed.
As we have seen, Constance was a ‘nation first’ feminist, but she became increasingly aligned with the suffragette and labour causes. At a meeting of the IWFL in 1913 she said that the nationalist, women’s suffrage and workers movements are “ all really the same movement in essence, as they were fighting the same fight, the extension of human liberty”.
Constance is of course well known for her role in 1916. Constance saw action at Stephens Green where she was second in command before falling back to RCSI. On her surrender, Constance kissed her revolver before handing it over. She was arrested, and was the only one of the 77 women arrested after the Rising to be placed in solitary confinement. She was sentenced to death, which was commuted to life purely on account of her sex – on receiving this news she said” ‘I do wish you lot had the decency to shoot me’”
She knew her friends and comrades had been shot She was particularly impacted by the death of James Connolly and wrote these lines on hearing confirmation of his death from her sister Eva (Eva was the only one of Constance’s family who supported her politics, even though they had divergent views as Eva was a pacifist):
‘You died for your country my Hero-love
In the first grey dawn of Spring;
On your lips was a prayer to God above
That your death will have helped to bring
Freedom and peace to the land you love,
Love above everything.
She was transferred to Aylesbury prison in England, where she remained until June 1917. She converted to catholicism after her release from prison in 1917. The house on Leinster Road was raided and ramsacked after the Rising, so when Constance returned to Dublin she had no home to return to. She stayed with her friends Kathleen Lynn and Madeleine Ffrench Mullen to recuperate after her time in prison. She was imprisoned intermittently for her republican politics and activities over the coming years.
Constance Markievicz was the first woman elected to the House of Commons in 1918. In line with Sinn Féin’s abstentionist policy she did not take up her seat. She was Minister for Labour in the first Dáil, 1919-1922, making her the first ever Irish female cabinet minister. The second female Irish cabinet minister did not take office until 1979 when Máire Geoghan-Quinn was appointed as Minister for the Gaeltacht. Much like many of her fellow activists, she was disappointed in how women were treated in the Irish Republic and in the Constitution, and felt that the ideals set out in the Proclamation of the Republic were abandoned.
She took an anti-treaty stance during the Civil War, where she was an active fighter. She joined Fianna Fáil in 1926 and was elected to the Dáil for the party in 1927, but died only 5 weeks later.
102 Leinster Road was the home of Mary Christina Doyle, a member of the Ranelagh branch of Cumann na mBan until 1922 who saw action during 1916, bringing first aid supplies to the Stephens Green Garrison. One of hundreds of women, many of them lesser known, who took part in the Rising. Women served in every garrison during 1916 except in Bolands Mills, where Éamonn DeValera would not allow it.
21 Grosvenor Place (formerly number 11) was the home of Hannah and Francis Sheehy Skeffington.
Francis Skeffington was born in 1878 in Co Cavan. He attended University College, where he became heavily involved in politics and activism and was a well known character. As protest at uniformity of dress, he refused to shave and used to wear knickerbockers with long socks. He was a pacifist and vegetarian, and wore a ‘Votes for Women’ badge around the college. He was friends with James Joyce who referred to him as a ‘hairy jaysus’. In 1901 he wrote an article for a literary magazine advocating for equal status for women in the college. When this was rejected by the censor, he published it as a pamphlet. From 1901-1902 he taught at St. Kieran’s college in Kilkenny, and then became registrar of University College. He married Hannah in 1903, and they jointly took each others names as a sign of equity in their relationship. He organised a petition in the College for women to be admitted on the same basis as men; when the university refused to implement this step, he resigned his position.
He and Hannah were members of the Irish Womens Suffrage and Local Government Association, before they founded the IWFL together in 1908. The couple started The Irish Citizen publication in 1912, which became a forum for holistic feminist thinking, believing that women would use their vote to create a fairer and more equal society.
The Votes for Women badge that Francis Sheehy Skeffington was wearing when he was arrested and shot in 1916.
He was vice- chairman of the ICA but resigned when it became more of a military entity as it went against his pacifist principles. He sympathised with the rebels aims in 1916 but disagreed with their tactics, advocating for non -violent civil disobedience. During the Rising, he made speeches imploring looters to stop, and tried to organise a meeting for volunteers to guard shops and prevent looting. It was on the way home from this failed meeting that he was intercepted and arrested by British troops. He was wearing a Votes for Women badge, now on display in the National Museum, when he was arrested. In what was one of the most notorious actions of the British army during the Rising, he was detained and eventually shot in Cathal Brugha Barracks along with 2 pro-British journalists. He was shot without warning, and without cause. His wife did not learn about his death until 2 days later when inquiries were made at the barracks by her sisters (who were arrested as Sinn Féin sympathisers) – eventually it was the father of James Coade, a civilian who had been shot by Capt John Bowen Colthurst, the same officer who arrested and ordered Sheehy Skeffington to be shot, who told her of her husbands death
” That afternoon I managed to find the father of the murdered boy Coade. He told me he had seen my husband’s body in the barracks’ mortuary when he had gone for his son’s body. This a priest later confirmed, but he could give me no other information.”
On the same day as she learned of his death, while she was putting her son to bed, her home was raided by British soldiers. They fired shots through the window, and ramsacked the house over several hours, searching for any ‘seditious material’ that would justify the murder of Francis.
Clearly, Hannah was treated appallingly in regard to her husband’s death, and the treatment and handling of Francis’s body is in itself an indication of the attempted cover up of his murder.
” Without my knowledge my husband’s body was exhumed and reburied in Glasnevin, May 8. Originally it had been put in a sack and buried in the barracks’ yard. The remains were given to his father on condition that the funeral would be at early morn and that I be not notified. My husband’s father consented unwillingly to do this on the assurance of General Maxwell that obedience would result in the trial and punishment of the murderer”
(From Royal Commission of Enquiry that was set up at request of the King in August 1916)
There is a plaque in his honor in Cathal Brugha Barracks that reads: ‘Feminist, pacifist,socialist, republican, shot by firing squad without trial on 26th April 1916, aged 37’
Belgrave Road in Rathmines was nicknamed ‘Rebel Road’ at one time, This road has strong associations with the family of Joseph Plunkett who was executed in 1916. His grandfathers on both sides were property developers. His paternal grandparents and his father lived at No. 3 Belgrave Rd for a time. When Joseph’s parents married, the wedding settlement included numbers 6-13 Belgrave Road.
Grace Gifford, who married Joseph Plunkett the night before his execution in Kilmainham Jail, was born in Rathmines and lived with her family on Palmerston Road. All of the daughters bar one in the Gifford family converted to Catholicism and three of them, Grace, Nelli and Muriel became active in Republican politics, while the sons of the house remained Protestant in their faith and Unionist in their politics.
Muriel Gifford was married to Thomas MacDonagh, who was also executed in 1916. Muriel was active in the suffrage movement and in Inghindihe na hÉireann. She died in a drowning accident in Skerries in 1917. Nellie Gifford was active in the RCSI garrison during the Rising and was imprisoned in Kilmainham and Mountjoy for a few weeks after the Rising.
Grace’s marriage to Joseph Plunkett was originally supposed to take place on April 23rd 1916 in Rathmines Chapel but was delayed due to the Rising.
Hannah Sheehy Skeffington and her son Owen moved to No. 7 Belgrave Road not long after Francis’s murder.
Dr. Kathleen Lynn and Madeline Ffrench Mullen lived together at No. 9 Belgrave Roadfor over 30 years, and you can see a plaque on the wall of No. 9 in memory of Dr. Kathleen Lynn. Both Kathleen and Madeline were involved in the 1913 Lock Out, and they met during this time. For Kathleen Lynn, it was also during this time that she met Constance Markievicz , Helena Molony and James Connolly, who influenced her politics and activism.
Among the guests who stayed with the couple at No. 9 were Constance Markievicz when she was released from prison in 1917. On James Connolly’s request, Kathleen also treated Helena Molony who stayed for a while at No. 9 and who also influenced Kathleen’s nationalist politics –
“We used to have long talks and she converted me to the national movement”.
It is worth mentioning that Helena Molony, a well known Republican and Labour activist, was one of the first Irish political prisoners since the days of the Ladies Land League, having been arrested for protesting the visit of George V in 191 by destroying a portrait of the king. She became increasingly involved in the labour movement, and opened a co-op which employed women who had been blacklisted by employers for striking in 1913. Helena was a member of the ICA, fought in 1916 at City Hall, and was subsequently arrested. Kathleen Lynn’s diaries mentions Helena staying with her at Belgrave Road and I came across some references to her staying at Surrey House on Leinster Road, but there are no formal records of Helena having lived in Rathmines, however she may have not completed the census due to her political activities. She was an aide to Constance Markievicz and also served as a District Judge in the Republican Court in Rathmines, and in later years she also served as an urban district councillor for the Rathmines area.
Dr. Kathleen Lynn was born into a Protestant family in Co Mayo in 1874. She became the first female resident doctor at the Royal Victoria Eye and Ear Hospital in 1910. She was on the executive committee of the Irish Womens Suffrage and Local Government Association, and was also a member of the radical British Womens Social and Political Union, and said to have been friendly with Sylvia Pankhurst. She was a suffragist first, nationalist second. She worked in the soup kitchens and delivered first aid lectures during the 1913 lock out.
Kathleen Lynn (left) and Madeline Ffrench-Mullen
.At the request of James Connolly she joined the ICA, training them in first aid, and was their chief medical officer, stationed at City Hall during the 1916 Rising. When Seán Connolly was killed, she was the most senior ranking officer at City Hall and therefore led the surrender to the British forces.
Madeline was a Lieutenant in the ICA and was stationed at Stephens Green and RCSI.
Both women were arrested for their role in 1916. This entry from Kathleen Lynn’s diary on 2nd May 1916 read:
“Saw M this morning. Greatest joy. She and I have cell together. Such joy”
Kathleen became estranged from her family as a result of her role in the Rising .Her diary records the visit of her father and sister to Kilmainham on 12th May 1916:
‘Oh so reproachful, they wouldn’t listen to me and looked as if they would cast me off forever…why do they always misunderstand me?”
Although not officially recorded other than through their affectionate and intimate diary entries, it is clear that Madeline and Kathleen were romantic partners. Their friend Rosamund Jacob, who also lived in Rathmines, said of them that they had ‘no use at all for men’. Helena Molony was bisexual, had relationships with several men, including Bulmer Hobson, and lived with psychiatrist Evelyn O’Brien for the last 25 years of her life. Elizabeth O’Farrell lived with her partner Julia Grenan for many years. These women’s sexualities, and those of other revolutionary women, were silenced and largely written out of history, reduced to ‘friendship’ and ‘companionship’. It was more socially acceptable for two single women to live together as ‘lifelong companions’, something that would have been much harder for men to do, as it was illegal for men to have sex at the time. As historian Mary McAuliffe said “ a lot of female couples could hide in plain sight without anybody questioning it,”.
The grave of Elizabeth O’Farrell and her partner Sheila (Julia) Grenan. An example of how same sex relationships were reduced to ‘friendships’ in the recording of history.
Kathleen campaigned for Constance Markievicz in 1918. She was elected to the Dáil as a Sinn Féin TD in 1923, but she did not take her seat in line with Sinn Féin’s anti treaty stance. She left Sinn Féin and politics in 1927 due to lack of commitment to social reform within the party. Together, Madeline and Kathleen founded St. Ultan’s Hospital in 1919, a female run hospital, committed to the care of infants. It became the Centre for the BCG vaccine in 1937.
Local history recalls one more person, someone who is very relevant to the pro-choice movement, and that is Mamie Cadden. Mamie Cadden was born in Pennsylvania to Irish parents in 1891. She was trained midwife, and was well known to provide abortion services. In 1931, she opened a maternity nursing home called St. Maelrúins in Rathmines, where she provided care for pregnant women and arranged foster and adoptive families for children. In time, she began to provide abortions. Having been arrested for abandoning a new born at the side of the road in Co Meath, she was forced to sell St. Maelrúin due to her financial circumstances. Having served a year in prison, she continued with her practice on a rented premises, eventually serving a further 5 years in prison.
Prior to the introduction of the 8th amendment in 1983, abortion was illegal in Ireland under the 1861 Offences Against the Persons Act.
In 1956, a woman named Helen O’Reilly died on the table in Nurse Cadden’s clinic and her body was discovered on the street. Mamie Cadden was sentenced to death for murder, was declared insane and placed in an asylum before her death in 1959.
Nurse Cadden was apparently often invoked in the 1983 referendum to highlight the dangers of abortion and what would unfold were the 8th not to be introduced. Of course there was no consideration given to the difference between safe abortions and the unsafe practices that result from abortion care not being accessible. Over 60 years later, pro-choice activists in Ireland, Poland and the US are still fighting for access to safe abortion.
Mamie Cadden’s services were well known to the point where she did not have to advertise. The authorities would have been well aware of her activities but turned a blind eye until events such as the death of Helen O’Reilly forced their hand. Mamie was certainly not the only person providing abortions in Dublin at this time, and many, such as William Henry Coleman of Merrion Square had no medical training.
As we all know, women will access abortions no matter the restrictions and obstacles. In Mamie Caddens case, she knew this and turned it into profit for herself. She was not a feminist icon, she spoke disparagingly of many of the women she treated, and she profited greatly from the service she provided rather than doing it for the greater good of poorer women. During this time, upper class women were travelling to England for abortions, so the women who used Mamie Caddens’ services tended to be poorer. There is no doubt that Mamie Cadden is a problematic and complex figure in this regard. However, the demonisation of her as a mad woman with a sadistic and cruel streak, resonates with misogny and with the stigma and shame that surrounded abortion. During the trial over the death of Helen O’Reilly, the word abortion was not even used in court – ‘illegal operation’ was used instead. The idea of a sane woman doing what Mamie Cadden did was not one that was palatable to the authorities so it was easier to demonise the provider and sitgmatise the user – this quote from Diarmuid Ferritear in interesting in relation to this case
“…she was so defiant and regarded as so amoral that it was easier to incarcerate her as a mad woman than to face the reasons she ran an abortion clinic and refused to apologise for it’
Helen O’Reilly herself was a mother of 6 who had been abandoned by her husband. She had travelled to England seeking an abortion but had been unsuccessful. During the trial, she was vilified as a woman of loose morals. There was no consideration or empathy for her situation or the role that her husband played in creating it. At a time when women had no access to contraception, when there was massive stigma around illegitimacy, Helen O’Reilly was degraded for seeking an abortion, even though she already had 6 children and had been abandoned by her husband. She was in many ways the archetypal ‘fallen woman’ who had ‘gotten into the situation’ which brought her to Mamie Cadden’s clinic. While there was no attempt to understand or acknowledge why Mamie Cadden provided the service that she did, there was equally no attempt to look at the circumstances faced by women like Helen O’Reilly. It was easier and more palatable to portray them both as ‘bad women who did bad things’. If Helen O’Reilly’s story tells us anything it’s that the question is not whether or not women have abortions, it is whether or not the abortion care available to them is safe. It also shows how restricting abortion access disproportionately impacts on marginalised people.
In this case, we see the utter silence and stigma that existed around abortion, the hypocrisy of a time when women, especially poorer women, had no control over their reproductive lives and were therefore expected to just keep having children. Just as it has always been known that women in Ireland have always had abortions but yet many continue to pedal the myth of ‘abortion free Ireland’, here was a situation where it was a scarcely concealed secret that these clinics existed but where abortion providers, especially women, were demonised. And of course we see the vilification of women who have abortions and in particular the disregard and silencing of the voices and needs of marginalised women. Mamie Cadden’s story highlights that women have always and will always need abortion access, it shows the misogyny, hypocrisy and stigma that dominated Irish society for so long and against which we are still fighting. And finally it highlights why abortion needs to be safe, legal and free, because abortion bans do not prevent abortion from happening, they only prevent abortion from being safe.
I have written previously about how isolating and singular housing can feel at times, especially as a single person. The sense of the collective that surrounded repeal is often lacking (with the notable exception of housing unions like CATU). This could be due to the fact that housing need is so immediate and tied to such a fundamental human right and basic need, which makes it hard to see beyond your own immediate housing needs. We also carry some heavy baggage around housing and land, echoing back through a history of landlordism, subsistence tenant farming, evictions, and in more recent times, the civil rights movement in the North and Dublin’s tenements and slums. All of this is underpinned by a long and painful past (and present) of emigration and displacement, seldom discussed in terms of its impact on our sense of place and belonging. We carry all of this in our DNA, in our national generational trauma and in our national psyche. We are dressing up our history of landlordism in a different cloak, now that of investors, vulture funds and a system that facilitates and protects landlords with no scruples or morals to exploit tenants for sex and ever rising profits.
I have always felt that we carry a deep sense of shame around housing, a heavy judgement if you fail society’s standards around home ownership and ‘getting on the property ladder’. Housing has become an arena of increasing inequality, dominated by those with access to generational capital and the highest wage earners. Home ownership is assumed for a secure retirement, and increasingly as a means by which to fund your retirement. In short, housing in Ireland has become about profit and capital, rather than about fulfilling a social need. Housing has become about the value and profit making potential of the building, rather than about being a place where lives can be lived and memories made. Communities have become places where connection and security is sacrificed to profit, where support networks and social fabric are torn apart, where people are left facing impossible choices for the sake of having a roof over their head. The ideologies and policy decisions of successive governments have created this landscape. Our broken housing system did not appear from thin air, it was created and nourished and defended and those of us caught in the middle just have to deal with it. When I contacted the Minister for Housing last year to point out the impossible situation of single buyers/one income households due to the huge gap between borrowing ability (3.5x your salary) and house prices, his response was ‘you can borrow up to 4.75x from some lenders’. So his response was for me to take on more individual debt. Seems lessons learned in 2010 are soon forgotten.
I have always felt uncomfortable speaking up about housing because I am very conscious of my relative privilege. These homeless figures provided by the Simon Community in January 2022 say it all:
“According to the latest figures by the Department of Housing, Heritage and Local Government, there were 9,150 men, women and children in homeless emergency accommodation in Ireland during the last week of January 2022.
1,119 were families – this is 42 (3.9%) more than the previous month (1,077 families)
4,788 were single adults – this is 66 (1.4%) more than the previous month (4,722 single adults)
2,563 were Children/Dependents – this is up 112 (4.5%) on the previous month (2,451 dependents)
1,111 were Young People aged 18-24 – this is up 21 (1.9 %) on the previous month (1,090) and up 351 (46%) year on year from 760 in Jan 2021.
This is an increase of 2.65% (233 people) in one month* and a 10% increase (236 people) since this time last year (8,313 people in January 2021).”
This does not include people sleeping on friends floors or couches, people living at home, people who for whatever reason cannot declare themselves to be homeless. It does not include people living in Direct Provision. The fact that in 2022, 2,563 children are homeless is a stain on our society.
I rented for over 10 years, so I understand the precarity, stress and expense of renting. I understand how hard it is to get out of renting, and how it simply is not an option for so many people. I understand how hard it is to truly feel at home in a rented property because you are constantly aware of your lack of control and agency; you’re not allowed have a pet, or to decorate or to use that one room that is used for storage space. You live in constant anticipation of a notice to sell or a rent increase. You are hesitant to fully engage in your community because you don’t know when you might have to move.
I know that on the spectrum of our dysfunctional and broken housing system, I am doing ok. The drum that I tended to beat was primarily around the dominant assumption of coupledom for home ownership, the focus on ‘young couples’ and families and the total invisibility of single people or single income households trying to buy on 3.5x one salary. On the majority of discourse around housing, the dominant frame is still a couple -‘a couple will need an income of XXXX’, ‘a couple wanting to buy a 4 bed in Dublin….’. The idea that anyone might be single beyond their 20s doesn’t seem to have made its way into any mainstream discourse, completing ignoring the fact that you don’t hit 30 and automatically get married, or that relationships and marriages can and do break up at any life stage.
The state has boxed us into a very myopic view of what housing and homes should look like; basically, a heterosexual couple with a few kids in a semi-d house. There is no space for considering that apartments and flats are also homes, that communal living (and by this I do NOT mean co-housing) is a valid and often desirable option, or that people have different cultural needs around housing; our failures towards the travelling community in that sense are particularly stark. It also continually overlooks the unique and diverse structures of families and the role of extended families.
Society is designed for two and housing is no different, so I always felt the need to point out that single people also exist and also deserve secure housing appropriate to their needs, be that in renting or ownership. Speaking publicly about something private is not easy, it can feel very vulnerable and left me feeling quite drained at different points. I was speaking about my age, my relationship status, and my finances on public platforms. Society has limited time for single women, and even less so for single women over 40 so I felt I needed to shout to be heard on multiple fronts. But I genuinely believe that the more people who are honest and open about how damn hard it is, the better. Otherwise all we see are ‘here’s how I bought my dream home at age 26’ type stories that make it seem like you just decide that you want a gaff and one appears in your lap out of thin air. We cannot shift this discourse unless people are honest and candid about what is actually involved in buying a home. This includes talking about how much support they might have needed and/or received, how long it took them to save, the gap between salaries and house prices etc. Talking about finances is personal and often uncomfortable, but I really believe it is part of what is needed to ground housing in reality and to counter the dominant narratives of €370k being an ‘affordable’ home and that anyone who says they can’t afford a home is simply looking for one of these mythical ‘free’ houses.
So here I go. This is my own situation and journey, it is not meant to be representative of anyone other than myself although I know there are many in similar situations to me. I am not looking for accolades or for sympathy or for advice. I am simply writing it down here in the hopes that it might guide someone along their own process, help someone to feel less alone and be a dose of reality in a discourse that often feels so removed from how most people live. I’ve written it with bullet points to make it slightly less rambly. This stuff is personal folks, so please be sound.
I went back to college to do my masters in 2009 (aged 29) and was then out of work for a while during the crash. When I started work again in 2011, my salary started at €28k and went to €34k over the course of various contract based roles. My first permanent job in 2015 paid €38k. At that point, I had no savings but started saving €250 per month.
Between 2012 and 2020 I was renting in Dublin. My rent costs were as follows: €550 (2012-2013), €600 (2013-2015 – living with someone, so I moved out once we broke up.), €725 (2015-2016, landlord put rent up so I had to move), €400 (2016-2017 -this house had rats :-)), €575 (2017 – evicted after 5 months as landlord was selling), €800 (2018 – evicted after a year as landlord was selling, even though he actually just re-rented the house out a month later :-)), €833 (2019-2020).
I started properly thinking about buying a place in 2019. I was 38, had just been evicted for the second time in 15 months, and had been promoted in work the previous year. I had taken unpaid leave in 2018 and my related salary adjustment had just about worked itself out. My salary at that point was €54k.
I sat down and worked out what I could afford and what I would need to save. Based on my salary, I could borrow €189k. Taking into account a 10% deposit, I was looking at buying in the region of €210k, meaning I would need to save at least €21k.
I worked out my monthly expenses. These included rent (€833), household bills, commuting costs, health and car insurance, a car loan and general living expenses. I set myself a strict budget for socialising/personal spending and figured I could save €650 per month. I set up a direct debit for that much and figured that in addition to the few thousand I had already saved over the previous 3 years, I would be in a position to apply for a mortgage in 12-18 months. I knew there was no point in thinking too much about it until I had made decent progress towards saving my deposit, so I just put my head down and got on with it. Even if I never ate avocado toast ever again, it was going to take me a while to save €21k.
During this time, an extraordinary number of people asked would I not ‘just get the money from your parents’. This was not an option for me. I got no financial support from my family because they didn’t have it to give. There was no extra property that could be sold to finance my (or my siblings) house buying. I know my parents felt guilty about this and that really bothered me. Every family is different and if there had been financial support available I absolutely would have taken it with both hands. But the assumption that parents can give each of their children anywhere from 20-50k is one of the main problems that I see with the current system. Our own former Taoiseach suggested the ‘bank of mum and dad’ when questioned as to how people are supposed to save a deposit while paying huge rent.
And then in 2020, everything went upside down. I was saving a little bit extra every month, and my salary increased slightly to €58k, meaning that the top of my budget was now €225k. I watched prices rise and rise, leaving fewer and fewer properties in that bracket. I couldn’t move any faster as I couldn’t save any faster. Even though I was saving what extra I could, a few hundred extra saved here and there doesn’t have much impact when prices are rising by tens of thousands. Skipping brunch, not buying coffee, only eating beans of toast – none of it makes any difference when the summit you are climbing towards keeps getting further and further away. It’s like trying to use twigs to build a bridge across a canyon.
In January 2021, I moved home with my parents. By this point I had saved about €20,000 on my own. Being in a position to do this meant I could save my rent equivalent (€833) on top of the €650 so I was saving €1500 per month which meant I could finish saving my deposit plus the additional legal fees, stamp duty and funds to furnish the house etc. I set myself a target of being out of my parents house by June 2021. It is April 2022 now and I am still here. It is not easy to live with your parents as an adult, on many levels. But still, I am lucky that I had the option to do so. I did my research and set my red lines for what I was looking for; outdoor space, 2 bedrooms, within ~30 mins of city centre on public transport, not more than a ~45 min commute from work (in Co Kildare). These were all so I could maintain my social networks and connections, look after my own well being and have at least one dog :-).
I got approval in principle at the end of January 2021 with a max budget of €225k: €22,500 deposit plus €203,000 (x3.5 times my income) mortgage. I started going to viewings (or at least trying to) and quickly realised that this budget would not get my anywhere. Any houses or apartments listed in that range were selling for 240/250k, or else were in need of €80k of renovation work (or both in some cases). My broker advised me that while exemptions are given, and while I was a good candidate for one, they were few and far between at that time as they are issued on a first come, first served basis in a calendar year. She advised that I apply to another lender who will loan you 4x your salary up front. So I did that, moving my budget up to €258k (€25,800 deposit plus €232k mortgage). I very much did not want to borrow that much and take on the additional debt but my options were limited. I had decided I wanted to live in and around Dublin as this is where my job, family and friends are, and had already realised that I was priced out of the areas I had pegged as my preferred locations in 2019. And for the record, I am priced out of my home town by at least €150k. So I was being as flexible as I could while sticking to my bottom lines. I kept an open mind on apartments but knew that a garden was important for my wellbeing. I was only looking at second hand houses as new builds were wildly out of budget for me as most new builds are family homes, or else deluxe apartments. I was €8k outside of the parameters for Rebuilding Ireland and HTB was no use to me as it only applied to new builds.
I thought alot during this process about how the odds are so stacked against single buyers. Alot of the time, you are looking at the same houses as couples (I was generally the only single person at viewings) but there is one of you rather than two saving the deposit. You are more limited in your budget because it is 3.5X one salary instead of 3.5X a combined salary. It felt unfair and frustrating at times, but it is what it is so I tried to focus on explaining this to people who could not understand why I wasn’t sorted more quickly. There is not a bottomless pot of money. My budget did not increase just because prices increased.
I was being outbid pretty consistently, often by €20k+. Sometimes I would arrive at a viewing for a house listed at €240k that already had a bid of €280k on it. It was so disheartening, I felt like I just could not compete. These were mostly 2 beds in Ballyfermot (occasionally in Crumlin or Finglas). I got close to being lead bidder on one house, going €5k over budget (a friend agreed to lend me that amount if it would get me the house), and writing a letter to the sellers telling them how great I am. They went with the other buyers. I pulled out of another bidding process because I was pushing myself over budget for a house I wasn’t entirely sure I wanted (it backed onto a railway line). Agents would consistently say to me ‘if you could just go a bit higher’ – like, with what? There is no bag of cash I could dip into, and I was already stretched to the max. And the fact was, there seemed to always be someone who could go higher than me.
I went to view ‘my’ gaff in July 2021. It was listed at €235k. A two bed house built in the 1940s, nice back garden, needing some upgrading and TLC, bathroom off the back of the kitchen, very low BER rating. I didn’t fall madly in love with it, but it ticked alot of boxes. I wasn’t mad keen on how busy the road was, but at that stage I knew there would always be something not ideal, and the house certainly had good bones. I put in a bid at asking price with the usual sinking feeling, preparing myself for the inevitable disappointment to come. I kept bidding over the coming weeks. I’ll admit that I was starting to feel desperate that I would never find anything. I had been in the process for 7 months at that stage and felt like I was going backwards. So I dug in. The price was going up in small amounts, so I figured the other bidders also didn’t have a huge budget. I put in my last bid at €259 (€24K over asking) fully expecting it to go up to €260k which would put me out of the bidding. But the agent rang me and said the other party had withdrawn and they would present my offer to the sellers, who accepted the next day. I held my breath waiting for a ‘if you could just go another 10k higher’ or to be gazzumped by a cash buyer, but it didn’t happen.
I paid my booking deposit in August 2021. After about 6 weeks of radio silence, it became apparent that the probate process had not been started for the house. So it has been incredibly drawn out and painful and nearly 9 months later I still do not have keys. I had to reapply for loan approval and as my valuation expired after 4 months I had to pay for that twice. Prices on the same road have increased by approx €30k so people keep telling me how ‘lucky’ I am. I know someone who bought a 3 bed around the corner for €240k a few years ago. I know that houses on the same road were about €180k in 2011. So lucky is really all relative.
My monthly repayments will be €1,080. I have a 25 year mortgage. I am solely responsible for that, my salary is the only thing that will cover it. There is no alternative source of financing. That debt is on my shoulders alone. I am also responsible for every bill, every appliance, every bit of maintenance and decorating and renovation. It is alot to take on on your own, and at times it feels overwhelming. But it will be my home, so I have to believe it will all be worth it, and know that I have strong shoulders.
I feel like life has been weirdly on hold for the last year. I am nearly 42, I want to be in my own space and to get on with my life on my own terms away from my childhood home (this is not an unreasonable thing to want). I feel very fortunate that I am nearly there, that I will get those keys, that I will be able to decorate and plant and have that dog I’ve always wanted. I am acutely aware that is something that feels increasingly out of reach for so many people. I have only myself to think about, I can’t imagine how this must feel while wanting to provide stability for a child. This process has been a struggle for me on a decent wage, just imagine how impossible it is for a community worker on €35k or a hospitality worker on minimum wage, or a single parent also paying for childcare?
It took me about 5 years to save my deposit plus extras, including 2 years of ‘hardcore’ savings. I got AIP in January 2021 and am still not in ‘my’ house. I have a well paid, permanent job. I get paid more than many teachers, nurses, healthcare workers, and community workers. There is something very messed up about the fact that we keep building homes priced for people who make over €80k when they make up a tiny % of working people. It shows how the dominant ideology discounts the importance of community and seeks to make invisible all of the people who make a community tick. A thriving community is made up of artists, creators, academics, hospitality workers, students, community workers, cleaners, delivery drivers, tech workers, healthcare workers, teachers, families, single people, couples, young folk and older folk and everyone in between. Our housing system is smothering creativity, severing connection and impacting on wellbeing and health in ways that we will live with for generations to come.
So that has been my journey to date. There are more chapters to come no doubt, the next one being when I finally get those keys in my hand. It is not easy or comfortable to write about things that are so personal, I am already bracing myself for judgement and ‘but why didn’t you/why don’t you/stop whinging’. But this is my truth and my journey and the more we can document and amplify the reality of housing in Ireland, the more we take back some ownership of the narrative. By being brave with our own voices we can break down the barriers that seek to shut us into shame and silence and see that it is not about the individual, but the collective drive for a society where everyone has a safe, decent home, suited to their own needs and wants, where communities can thrive and where no one is left behind.
I’ve been meaning to write for a while. Ideas and thoughts have been swirling around my head, occasionally arranging themselves into sentences that I know I want to shape something around. But I have been stuck. I have not been able to get the words out of my head and onto paper. I have alot to say, and simultaneously very little to say. I have been brewing over a piece about public space for months. Recent health complications have given me new perspectives on it, meaning on the one hand I know exactly what I want to say, and on the other I feel like there is no point in saying it.
It’s not the most fun place to be.
I want to rage about access to public facilities. I want to dissect our weird attitudes to use of public space. I want to rant about housing inequality and the drawn out, painful process I have been in for over a year now. I want to talk about what living at home age 41 does to your sense of self. I want to talk about ageing and love and disappointment. But also the thought of doing any of that makes me want to lie down and sleep.
So maybe, I will just write about sleep.
Or rather, I will write about bed.
I’ve always been a bit allergic to productivity culture, the idea that you have to be constantly doing, creating, producing, contributing. Get up earlier so you can write that book! Go for a run, do yoga, meditate, bake bread, read 20 pages, do your stretches and plan out your day in 15 minute blocks….all before breakfast, and bitch that breakfast better involve kale! I’m sure this works for some people, don’t get me wrong. But also, there are some people (like me) who would sell their grandmother for an extra 15 minutes in bed. I love the idea of going for a run before work, but I also know I will never be that person.
When I was born, it was still common practice for babies to be taken down to the nursery away from their mammies. I was in hospital for a few weeks after I was born, and my mum used to go up and down to the nursery to see me. Apparently all the other babies would be screaming their heads off and I would be sleeping soundly through it all. I slept through the night from when I was about 6 weeks old.
The truth is, I love being in bed. I love sleeping, napping, snoozing, snuggling (a pillow). No matter how turbulent or uncertain things might be, I know I can always take refuge in my bed. I stopped feeling guilty about this years ago. Why should I feel guilty about something that I enjoy, that harms no one and that is consistently comforting and cozy?
If I feel overwhelmed or stressed or sad, I just go to bed for an hour or two. Sure, it may not be the healthiest response but it sure as hell makes me feel better. When things feel uncertain, my bed feels reassuring and safe. My bed is kind when everything and everyone else feels cruel. Taking refuge in bed has got me through heartbreak, housing stress, unemployment, the pandemic, Repeal and countless bouts of anxiety. Sometimes, if I’m not sure what to do with my time, I’ll just have a wee sleep (I can hear the wailing of the parents reading this as I type that. I hear ya……but I’ll have no one to care for me in my old age, so swings and roundabouts.)
On the flip side, I am actually a terrible sleeper. I often struggle to fall asleep, I wake really easily, I often get bad anxiety dreams and I have gone through several periods of not sleeping for more than 3 hours a night, and some periods of not sleeping at all. I seldom sleep well when sharing a bed with someone and it takes me ages to adapt to sharing sleeping space. Apparently I also kick like a donkey. I do reasonably well on very little sleep because I have adapted to my own erratic sleep patterns. So I guess I love sleep but it is inconsistent in how it feels about me. And yet I am unwavering in my loyalty…..I wonder what my therapist would think of that?
Will I look back and regret all those hours in bed? I don’t think so. I don’t think I can regret something that has helped me cope. I don’t think there’s any point in regretting something that is already done. I think doing nothing, in or out of bed, is a perfectly valid use of time.
I doubt anyone really gives a shit about the fact I love napping. It is not an important contribution to human kind. The main purpose of this piece is to get me writing again, to get me unstuck from my own head, to remind me that sometimes I have profound things to say and sometimes I don’t. And that’s ok, because we are all just doing our best with what is in front of us on any given day. Some days our best is a boss bitch killing it from all angles. And some days our best is crawling under the duvet and just surviving.
I’ve had to accept that sometimes, the deep and meaningful thoughts and searing critical analyses just don’t want to come out. Maybe they’re having a nap. Wherever you are today, you do you. Find kindness where you can. It will all be grand, somehow.
Cosa Siúlacha 