As The Midults’ popular agony aunt column moves from the Telegraph Magazine to Stella, Annabel Rivkin and Emilie McMeekan discuss the disasters, anxieties and calamities facing British women post-pandemicIt all began, we suppose, when we decided to reject the self-cancelling “I’m fine!” and to treat “How are you?” as a question.Once upon a time, the answer was, “Oh, I’m absolutely fine…” Now, it’s more nuanced.
How are you, Annabel? “Absolutely fine… but I’ve been up since 3:45am and I have a suppurating wound on my forehead from the non-cancerous thing they said they were going to scrape off but actually gouged out PLUS I’ve given up my lockdown smoking habit and I feel certain that, if there are any squabbles today, they will be my fault.”How are you, Emilie? “Well I’m absolutely fine but from the moment I woke up this morning I have been wanting to get back into bed; I’ve got runner’s heel when I don’t even run and every time I say goodbye to someone I truly believe they will never want to speak to me again.”The worm began to turn, one night when Annabel was at a dinner, sitting with four successful, vaguely famous women.
One of them asked how she was. For a moment she forgot the etiquette, and blurted out, “I’m so anxious, I don’t sleep any more.” There was a nailbiting silence and then, suddenly, they all started talking at once: “Oh, my God, me too.
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