Tell her that babies are messy and it’s just easier for you to cope if she makes everything milk-vomit coloured. Has the benefit of being true, and fits with your aesthetic.

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He goes to work. He has a lunchtime. While the kids are small, that is his weekday training time. Weekends, if he takes the morning, you take the afternoon and I am afraid that even if all you want to do is sleep, you will have to do it by walking out of your house so everyone gets that You. Are. Not. There. (ask a friend if you can borrow a couch and a blanket, if that’s possible). I didn’t get marathons, I had golf and sailing (why are no boys’ sports ever short???). If your work has an EAP, ring them and ask for tips approaching this conversation. I can’t even begin to approach the overseas trip ….

Probably a bit older than you, but not much because many of these applied. Here goes … no-one I knew flew anywhere except my glamorous great-aunt the career lady. No child I’d ever heard of flew anywhere, ever. You were rich if your car had air conditioning; if you had ice creams with sticks (rather than frozen cordial in plastic tubes); if you got canteen lunch on a day when your mum wasn’t on duty; if the soft drink delivery guy stopped at your house (we only had one bottle of lemonade at a time which mum opened so it would go flat, and you drank it warm if you were sick. Still can’t drink lemonade); your parents were profligate if they made long distance calls before 9pm; if your house had a butterfly near the front door; no-one had dishwashers; and if your family had a bought barbecue rather than the brick one your dad built.