I am off coffee. Off standing in a little coffee bar in some obscure coffee shop somewhere in Italy, ordering an espresso with whipped cream and one of those triangular pastries that are a hundred layers of thin crusty sweetness filled with a delicate custard. Off an iced spanish latte on a hot day. Off a hot Americano in a paper cup from a self-dispensing coffee machine which, for the equivalent of £1.75 in this country’s currency, is actually pretty spectacular. Warm, roasted, hints of dark chocolate and a tiny whiff of berry, nutty and slightly butterscotchy, gives you just enough shakes for a one hour weightlifting session during which you gulp down 1.5L of water and after which you have a high protein avocado, cottage cheese and egg toast. Balance.

I am off a small cappuccino with the perfect medium roast espresso, milk whipped till just creamy froth, not bubbly like they always manage to do in the UK. UK coffee is awful. my jet-setting self has learned. But nobody does tea like the UK. A solid mug of English Breakfast with the right splash of milk and on the side, chocolate chip shortbread. ASDA does a great version, and so does Tesco. But if you’re feeling fancy you’ll get the Walkers one because that, my friends, is the original. Custard creams, Fox’s Golden crunch creams – delicious! A digestive if nothing else avails itself. My husband introduced me to his post-gym snack which I fear is heavily Americanised but I cannot fault it. A plain digestive – McVities of course, nobody does it like them – with a smearing of peanut butter and a little dollop of jam. A PB&J digestive! Horror of horrors, but horrifically good.

Anyway I am also off tea.

Speaking of tea, nobody does sweet tea like the Pakistanis. Sweet black tea, I mean. Boiled with cinnamon, cardamom, cloves, ginger, peppercorns, milk, a generous heap of sugar. Some people use evaporated milk and now that is fancy! Chai. Not a chai latte although I am partial to that. But chai, cooked in a pan, strained into a flask and taken to the top of Mow Crop on a cold and icy Christmas day in Cheshire. That is where we were last Christmas. We had homemade pasties to go with it and we saw one other family and the icy wind bit our faces and fingertips but our bodies were warmed with the rich spicy sweetness of chai.

I am off all of it, folks. Because when my body is preparing to grow a child, I become averse to my favourite beverages. And that is what is happening.

Am I OKAY?

No. I am shocked, scared, confused. Crying, screaming, throwing up – literally to the latter. I am not prepared, physically nor mentally. Why, I thought to myself this morning as I walked my two children into school, I only have two hands by which to hold my current kids. Do I have enough love for three?

Of course I do. Of course I do. I have enough love for as many children as I may have. Just right now I miss feeling well. I miss feeling okay. I am just tired and sick. But it will be okay. We will be okay.