DEATH BY DAUGHTER

I am the voice of every parent who ever had a teenage daughter. The softly spoken (for softly spoken read neurotic, panic-stricken) voice of reason.

Please don't ask how many children I have. I have just the one, thank you. It's quite enough. Our Creator, Blessed be He, was laughing at me all the time I was trying for another, saying under his breath "Oh no love, you'll need all your energy for the one you've got. Hold tight - it's gonna be a rollercoaster!"

And Wheeeeeeeeeeeee!!! I'm still trying to hold on … to my sanity! (Who am I kidding, it pissed off with it's packed lunch on Missy Midriff's thirteenth birthday. It is missing presumed dead, probable cause anorexia very bloody nervosa, since it only took one Pepperami and a scotch egg).

One minute we lay on the birthing bed - connected, navel to navel by the cord of umbilical love - the next minute Missy's Midriff was pierced and mutilated and believe me, I felt the pain. She was such a lovely child. Classed as "gifted", in fact. Her manners were impeccable. I remember them well.

I miss those little kiddie days. Somehow stroppy teenagers are not the same as enthusiastic little toddlers. Too soon coochie coochie coo gives way to "Gucci Gucci brand new".

Mind you, we've moved on since I started writing this book. Time, A-levels and driving lessons have combined to all but cure the highly strung nature of the beast, and some days we don't fight at all. It's quite remarkable.

Missy Midriff now has a boyfriend - Al, short for Almighty. She worships the water he walks on. He's at Cambridge University, Lord luv 'im. A good catch - if she doesn't swallow him whole between now and graduation.

And the grandest thing of all about said boyfriend? Missy Midriff has a life's ambition … and (seriously folks) is working hard towards it, between sick days when she gets a migraine from using the wrong mascara and her eyelashes hurt too much for her to go to school. So, what's the ambition? What has changed our lives?

Missy Midriff wants to go to Cambridge University. That sound you hear is the scratch of her pen on paper as she studies hard. She still sharpens her tongue now and again, though … all the better to pulverise parents.

No. Don't mock it. What little Missy wants, Missy gets. So if she DETERMINED to get to Cambridge University, she will get there : By chauffer driven limousine, no doubt!