It's been about 6 weeks since my last post - apologies, it has been a bit busy! I'm training to be a solicitor and the busy-ness seems to come in peaks and troughs at the moment. I was also supposed to be going on holiday over the first May bank holiday, but unfortunately our flight was cancelled so I've also been trying to get over the trauma of a cancelled holiday as well as trying to claim everything back from the airline! Nightmare!
Anyway.......so, yes I am a budding solicitor to be. I am 7 months off qualification after a long hard slog - this is my 7th year of training now (including my degree). December is going to be very exciting, provided there are jobs around by then! I did my degree (Law and French) at Manchester, and then moved to Bristol to do my Legal Practice Course (compulsory post-grad course) whilst working part-time for two years to pay the fees - they don't lie when they say it's expensive to qualify - and now I'm three quarters of the way through my training contract (which is basically full-time practical training within a firm).
I think I've said previously (and if not I'm saying it now!) that my parent's separation has influenced very many areas of my life, in particular my career.
We were always a close family. My brother and sister and I always spent a lot of time together, both with our friends and just the three of us, so we were close growing up. We were also close to both our parents. I think from a young age I appreciated how hard my parents worked to keep the family running. As I've said before, Mum suffered from bad arthritis after my little sister was born but she ran her own business, and Dad worked in London during the week and came home at the weekends. Anyway, we were very close and all felt very loved and supported throughout our childhood. The custody "battle" was always going to be bad.......
Mum wanted full custody, and Dad wanted what we wanted. I think I have blocked a lot of it out, because it really was awful. It was by far the messiest part of the divorce, and perhaps the hardest thing for us was being asked what we wanted, when all we wanted was for mummy and daddy to be together and for things to go back to the way they were. I was 11, my brother was 8, and my sister 5 so it was difficult for us to express what we wanted in the future in terms of seeing our parents separately. It was horrendous having to effectively choose between my parents, and even now there are times when I still have to.......I promise there is a positive to come out of this story....
I am not entirely sure what happened in the end or what the court ruled, but our "home" was to be with Mum, and we saw Dad often in the week, and went to stay with him every other weekend. The rules were strict - pick up at 10am, drop off at 6pm etc etc
I remember thinking at the time (and still do think now) I hope no-body else ever has to go through this. Slightly naively, I know, as of course people will, but those couple of years were not pleasant. It was at that time that I started to think about the process of divorce, and custody hearings, and became really interested in them both. I became really driven and motivated by wanting to help people who were going through the same process - particularly, making sure it goes as smoothly as possible, with the minimum heartache possbile. Obviously, again this was somewhat naive, but since then I have been passionate about becoming a family solicitor. I find the subject fascinating. I am interested in both family law (divorce and all that that entails, as well as domestic violence etc) as well as public childcare law, which mainly consists of care proceedings. I hope that when I qualify and start practising as a solicitor I will make my clients feel at ease, and I feel I should be able to relate to what they're going through and therefore become more engaged with their case.
So, who knows what I would be doing now if my parents hadn't got divorced! There is a long history of teaching in my family, so I suspect I would be standing in front of one of those fancy whiteboard thingys a lot and getting agitated with the kids in my class! I probably am one of the few who can say that their parent's divorce will hopefully lead to a high flying career in the law - I am certainly not in it for the money.