I’m lying flat on my back.

On a thin mattress on the floor.

But it’s not just any floor. It’s Brenda Shankey’s living room floor.

That’s Brenda Shankey, best known to me as a celebrity hairdresser. A personality whose name I would have encountered countless times in my long journalistic career.

Brenda Shankey, who styled Eamonn Holmes’ hair. Brenda Shankey who hung out with One Direction when they visited Belfast.

And now I’m lying on her wooden floor. Meditating.

I think it’s fair to say my life has travelled in an unexpected direction.

But then there’s been a lot of unexpected things in my life recently. Since I started writing about mental health issues on my blog, the unexpected has become commonplace.

Among the plethora of messages, offers and calls for help, Brenda reached out to me. She liked what I’d been saying, identified with much of it.

We had both suffered the trauma of breakdowns. We were both workaholics who left a business that we were closely identified with. We both see being a parent as the most important role in our lives. We quickly hit it off.

These days Brenda devotes much of her time to running her own business as a mindfulness and life coach. She invited me along to one of her classes to see what it was all about.

A year ago I would probably have dismissed it as a load of hippy nonsense, but, hey, I’m in a transitional period now and fully committed to trying new things. What the heck.

Mindfulness is a technique used by many to assist with mental wellbeing and to combat stress. It involves using breathing and meditation exercises to improve your awareness of the present moment – of your thoughts and feelings and the world around you.

I remember getting some tapes and trying it myself at home a few years back. But I never got very far. The truth is I just felt a little bit silly sitting there counting my breaths.

Also the meditation tapes I used were narrated by Mike Nesbitt, the former newsreader and political party leader. Every time I tried to empty my head of thoughts, Mike’s face would appear. This didn’t seem a likely path to serenity or enlightenment.

Brenda had told me to wear comfy clothes so I took this as adequate excuse to wear my tracksuit bottoms outside of the house. The pure unadulterated joy of trousers with an elasticated waistband! I could feel my mental wellbeing improving already.

Brenda introduced the students to the class by shaking a heart-shaped snow globe. The flakes represent our thoughts. Plentiful. Random. Always moving. It was simple, clever and effective.

She explained what she hoped we would learn over the coming weeks, how we could be taught to use skills to control our subconscious thoughts. To take a step back from the snap reactions which so often end up hurting us.

But how could this be achieved? Well we started by staring at a miniature fat Buddha statue. An introduction to learning how to focus on and control our breathing.

Breathing is the thing we do more of in life than anything else, yet we never give it a moment’s thought. Concentrating on the process itself helps to centre you. It’s also a technique to push the thoughts you don’t want right out of your head. Breathe in for two, breathe out for four. Count it out.

Then the part I struggle most with. Clearing my mind of redundant thoughts. The wasps in my head are never still. I can’t be reprogrammed as simply as the Arnold Schwarzenegger cyborg between the first and second Terminator films.

I tell Brenda I may be her greatest challenge. How to still this waterfall?

She wants to introduce us to the process of relaxation through deep breathing. We can do this sitting in the chair or lying down on the mattress. All the other students opt for the chair. I figure, there’s a mattress there, I’m in Brenda Shankey’s house and I’m going to use it.

So I’m lying on the floor. Brenda puts on some relaxing meditation music. A piano, a guitar and what sounds like someone playing the wobble board. I get it into my head that it must be Rolf Harris, which makes clearing my mind of exterior thoughts an even greater challenge.

But Brenda talks us though it. Calmly authoritative, the slight hint of a north west accent. I become aware of the sensation of each muscle in my own body relaxing, like liquid metal. Soon I can’t feel the mattress at all. I don’t feel anything other than myself.

I feel like I could lie here for a long, long time. On Brenda Shankey’s floor.

Then she says something which goes deep inside me.

‘What are the three things in your life that you are most grateful for?’

I think of my son. My wife. Myself. Our life together.

‘Remember to be grateful for what you have,’ she tells us.

Of course. It all makes perfect sense now, as I’m lying here on Brenda Shankey’s floor. Why am I worrying about what I don’t have? The person I won’t ever be? The decisions that I got wrong years ago? Why am I not spending every moment enjoying what I’ve got? Living in the moment.

Eventually I have to get up. Reluctantly.

Brenda hands out books for us to read, CDs to listen to. She gives us tasks as well. Be more compassionate to other people. Carry out an act of kindness every day. Practice the breathing for a minute 10 times each day. Wake up with a smile on your face.

Wake up with a smile on your face.

But you can’t keep that smile on your face all day. Life is like the small fishing boat tumbling on the seas. Nobody can totally calm that sea. But as I’m lying here floating on the floor, Brenda Shankey has calmed the ripples a little.

Does mindfulness work? For some people undoubtedly. Others may struggle with it. My sceptical mind will always work against me in processes like this.

I enjoyed my mindfulness session. And that’s probably the most important thing. It was fun. That’s enough to convince me to have another go. 

: Book classes at bshankey@gmail.com

I want to get my hair cut today.

I’ve got an early start dropping the wee man off at school, so I’m at the barbershop a few minutes before opening time.

I don’t like waiting. I want to be first in the queue. Quick in, quick out.

But he’s not there.

So I hang around. Standing outside the shop, peering in the window like the world’s worst robber.

The time which the sign in the door says the shop opens passes.

But he’s not there.

I hang on. It’s his own business, he can be a few minutes late.

People I know pass me in the street. A few say hello. A few stop for a brief conversation. I pass the time but I’m keeping an eye on his front door.

But he’s not there.

There is nobody else waiting. I want to be first.

I nip across the road into a gift shop, just to pass the time.

I make sure I can see the barbershop front door at all times.

There’s nobody else in the gift shop. The assistant’s eyes follow me as I pretend to be interested in candles and porcelain bowls. I peer across the road, to the barbers.

But he’s not there.

The gift shop assistant keeps watching, like she’s onto me. I end up buying a birthday card, just to prove myself. I don’t know anyone with a birthday coming up.

I go back across the road.

But he’s not there.

So I nip to a coffee shop and order a cappuccino. While the barista froths the milk I’m straining to see out the front door. To the barbershop.

But he’s not there.

I get my coffee to go and stroll up and down the street, examining the cracks between the slabs of the pavement.

I look in the window of the barbershop again. For some reason I try the door. It’s locked.

It’s getting later in the morning. I know I have to move my car.

I’m parked on the Main Street. I’m already over my time. A red coat walks past me.

I’m working out how long it will take me to move my vehicle to the car park.

Maybe five minutes. Less if I rush.

I take one more nervous look in the window of the barbershop.

But he’s not there.

I sprint to my car. The traffic’s mercifully light. I’m into the car park and back out onto the street without even having to breathe out.

I go back to the barbershop and look in the window.

He’s there.

And there are six other men there too. All ahead of me in the queue, waiting to get their hair cut.

There’s a large group of us.

Standing behind the steel black gates. Waiting.

It looks something like an industrial picket outside a factory. Except the tensions are higher here, the nerves more fraught.

The school bell sounds, more like a car alarm than a bell. A nasty, horn of a noise. A man with a large ring of keys opens the lock. The parents edge forward like nervous mountain sheep looking to be fed.

The grey void of a sky is melting and a pale sun is trying to break through.

There’s a moment of confusion, nobody really sure what happens next. Then the teachers appear, bringing the kids out into the playground, making them stand in lines.

We see our boy and soon we’re waving furiously. He spots us and his shyness can’t conceal the excited smile.

The teachers let the children out one by one, when they know the right parent is there.

Soon it’s his turn. My stomach leaps like a hungry fish.

He begins to run. I hold my arms out. He runs. I kneel down. He runs….

Straight into mummy’s waiting arms.

She’s drowning him in kisses and I have to content myself with a fatherly ruffle of his hair. But that’s grand. He’s back with us.

The classroom assistant tells us he’s been fine. A few tears after we left and then calm. It’s all going better than we’d ever hoped.

The first day is done. Chalk one off the total.

We take him into town in my car. We’ve promised him a new toy and lunch at a cafe as a treat.

I fire questions at him. I want to know about the first day. But he’s not for sharing.

‘Did you play with your friends?’

‘Mummy’s nose!’

‘Was the teacher nice?’

‘Mummy’s nose!’

‘Did she tell you a story?’

‘Mummy’s nose!’

I feel I’m not getting the full picture.

A few more of my questions are batted aside before he decides to bring a halt to the interview.

‘Daddy, if you really want to know want P1 is like then just become a kiddie again.’

I suppose we’re all a bit worn out. The long build up of emotion. The short release. The weary aftermath. The car is quiet now.

I don’t quite know what to feel. I’m thinking about a poem one of my correspondents reminded me of last night. On Children by Kahil Gibran. One line keeps coming to me now.

‘They come through you but not from you.’

Because I think it’s a reaction to that we’re feeling in our own way. Our desire to claim him. To own him. To stop anyone else getting a stake.

But that’s not the way forward.

I know that he’ll do better with all the other children. With the teacher. With all the questions. With the new world.

The truth is I can’t stimulate him enough. There’s a part of him that’s outgrown me already. A part of him that needs the new challenge. Even if he doesn’t always know it.

And that’s good for me too. I can’t be all of him, just like he can’t be all of me. I know I’ve been hiding behind him for many months. A good comfort, a good reason why I don’t have to engage with society.

It’s time for both of us to show our faces.

We’re in a cafe now. He’s eating chips and playing with his new toy. A dinosaur set.

He’s babbling excitedly. ‘Mummy, you can be the dinosaurs, I can be the hero.’

‘Who can I be son?’ I ask.

‘You can be the tree daddy.’

And that’s it. We move on as before. He wants to go to the lake to feed the ducks next, to jump in the puddles.

It’s a busy day. A full day.

I saw some old style lemonade bottles in a local shop today.

It made me quite wistful. Memories of the lemonade man. Ten bottles every second Tuesday.

The memories of youth. Brown lemonade. White lemonade. Raspberryade. Cloudy Lime. American Cola.

Drinking it straight from the bottle after an afternoon spent picking blackberries. Our legs stinging from nettle stings and briar scrapes.

I held a bottle in my hand. I hadn’t seen one in a while. I examined it.

Then I read the ingredients on the back of the label….

I look out the window.

There’s no sky today. Just a creamy grey void where it should be. Without definition.

The rain’s coming down, steady as a prison sentence.

My son and mummy were awake before me. Already about their business now.

I move to the stairs and see him coming up to find me. We meet in the middle, like the Grand Old Duke of York, I tell him.

We sit there on the stair. Just like that. He’s on my knee and I’m holding him in my arms. Neither of us speaking. No need to.

We sit there. Just like that.

I don’t think any of us slept very well last night. He ended up in our bed again, stretched out horizontally like a barrier between me and mummy. Feet at her end. Head at mine.

I had unquiet dreams. Of being late on the first day.

A friend had told me that the entrance gate closes at a certain minute, and if you don’t make it you have to go in through the front door, past the principal’s office to be marked as late. This is my dream from last night, except in it it’s me who’s late.

We move from the stairs at last. I make the breakfast, cereal and a smoothie. I go to feed him but he takes the spoon and sends me away, slightly chastised. He eats everything.

I can tell he’s a little afraid but he wants me to know he’s being brave. I ask him if he’s nervous and he gives the smallest nod I’ve seen. I hold his hand and we watch some TV.

I ask him if he wants me to dress him but he prefers mummy. That bond is just a little deeper.

The first tears come as the blue jumper is pulled over his head. The tiny grey shorts with a fierce crease. He’s mumbling something soft and I have to strain to hear.

‘I don’t want to go. I don’t want to go.’

Mummy talks to him. Tells him how brave he is. How proud we are of him. How it’s natural to be a little afraid on the first day.

It’s ok so far. Nothing worse than we expected. Just a couple of scratches, no scars.

I make a little snack. The challenge of finding something healthy he will actually eat. I settle on a pancake and some raisins.

I put the plastic lunchbox in his brightly coloured new schoolbag.

There are a few more tears as we put his shoes on. But when we produce our cameras to take photos for the grandparents a performer’s smile is worn.

This troubles me a little. It reminds me of my own capacity to make other people think exactly what I want them to. How I kept the real stuff packed tight inside.

The school raincoat is needed and the schoolbag is hoisted onto his shoulders. It’s so large that it seems faintly ridiculous, giving him the appearance of a snail carrying his home on his back.

I have everyone in the car much too early. I’m worried about the traffic and keep thinking about being late and having to walk past the headmaster’s office.

But it’s not that bad. I get parked right outside the school with time to spare. He walks slowly through the playground, holding both mummy’s and my hand, a little cowed by the presence of older and noisier children.

But we see some of his friends and his face brightens a little. I know he’s doing everything he can to be brave for us, and it’s pulling me to bits.

The headmaster opens the gates and we move to his classroom. Every child has their own manner. Some rush inside, barely looking back at the tearful parent, while others need that little bit more care.

Mummy takes him inside and to his desk. I want to go to but decide to hang back. Two parents inside seems excessive. Staying back seems even harder though.

My face is against the window. He’s fine. While mummy’s with him. Some of his friends from nursery come to play with him and I see signs of animation and excitement in his face.

Some other parents are in the classroom too. I see one little girl who has her arm around her mother’s neck, closer to a wrestling hold than a child’s gesture of love.

Soon the teacher shuts the door and mummy is gently ushered out. The poor teacher has to deal with the little children and the big children.

I can see my boy is crying now. I knew he would. But the teacher’s there to comfort him and so are his friends.

It’s ok. There’s no real distress. No sense of horror.

We retreat to a nearby coffee shop and meet with some other parents.

It’s almost like the aftermath of a funeral as we swap tales and anecdotes. Some back humour about the tears.

And then we’re home again. With nothing really to do but wait until we pick him up.

Mummy distracts herself with some cleaning. I write. We wonder what he’s doing now.

It’s a funny sort of in between time. We’re neither up nor down. 

We’ll find out soon enough. That’s the first morning done.

And so it begins.

Mummy has everything set out and ready for the big day.

Wonder if she intends setting out my socks and drawers too?