I’m turning into my mother. No matter how hard I try to stop myself mid sentence I can’t seem to help the words that spill out … “you will never know until you’re a parent” resonates between our four walls just like they did when I was a rebellious teenager clad in leopard print, cut-off denim shorts and cowboy boots with faux spurs!

My delightfully eccentric mother did have a point! History is repeating itself with my son, not in the fashion stakes you must understand, but in that heated ‘I want some freedom’ debate.

When are you going to loosen that vice-like motherly grip! I never realised how difficult it would be.

First came the plea to allow a few days away with some mates, just three nights leave away from the maternal cottonwool wrap. How would I sleep peacefully wondering where my son was, what he he doing, who he was with?

A verbal shake, a few ground rules and one conversation with another mother-in-the-same-boat later I came to terms with letting my son go.

I don’t just mean letting him get on that train and giving him permission to leave home for a period of exactly 102 hours.

No, I mean the big fat realisation that my boy was indeed an adult and was entitled to go away without written permission. What was I worrying about anyway? At least his wardrobe doesn’t resemble ‘Bett Lynch Does Dallas’ like mine did. But another gentle reminder came in the guise of a doctors’ receptionist.

“No, Miss Orman you can’t make the appointment for your son, he’s 18, he has to do it…” “But I am his MOTHER!”…ARGHH! I do extreme parenting – on the other end of the scale is my five-month-old daughter.

Extreme parenting is very hard alone. I discovered this when my Dearly Beloved decided to go in search of a rock festival in Derbyshire with thousands of other hairy headbangers.

He packed up his sleeping bag and waterproofs and left moi in charge. Mmm. Not as easy as I thought it would be since my son needed a lift, the baby needed a replacement nappy, the dogs needed a walk and I needed a cup of tea - all at exactly the same time. I can multi task with the best of them but that was verging on the impossible.

Fortunately, Dearly Beloved returned a few days later a little more grateful for the domestic comforts. A hearty homecooked meal, a bath, and a good night’s sleep later he remarked his thoughts were of home.

Indeed, he confessed he couldn’t wait to get back to Chipping Norton and plumb in our new washer dryer. You see, we’re a team and the absence of that other half leaves the operation running less smoothly. Yes, I do sound like my mother, but for all the right reasons.