Blurry and out of focus, life this week feels as though I have been peering through a lens smothered in Vaseline. The separation, the moving out of the family home, the dating again in midlife, the moving to a new house once more – what a crazy roller coaster the past two years have been. 

I work from home and days can be long and lonely, especially when the children aren’t home. Rooms fall silent, despite the debris of toys and clothes left behind. How can days be so long and yet months appear to fly by, like watching a film in fast-forward? In the aftermath of all that chaos, including many dates with many men never seen again, I feel discombobulated to say the least.

Am I happier than before, is a question I keep asking myself? Reflecting on my younger self, a woman who wanted a career, a husband, children, close friends and financial stability; a road mapped out so clearly, and yet here I am, stuck in a cul-de-sac without a game plan. 

I came of age in the 1990s, an era when, according to fake-news feminism, as churned out by women’s mags at the time, life was all mine for the taking. Women my age grew up believing we could have it all – a loving partner (extremely hot and clever, obviously), babies, back to work, more babies. Faster than a ladette could down a pint, we drank it all in, but somehow missed the very important memo outlining that, in order to have kids, we’d better find a partner with whom to procreate before we hit the ripe old age of 35. And let’s not even go into being financially savvy and going back to work as a mother. My nerves can’t handle that hot topic today. All I ever craved was to feel safe, loved and secure, to build a home and a future. After only half-building it, why did I tear it all down?

I met the father of my children two months before turning 35, and, nine months later, “fell” pregnant with our first child (the expression “fall pregnant” is ludicrous – a penis cannot accidentally “fall” inside a vagina). Pregnant by 35, tick! It was all on track, and yet here I am, just weeks away from my decree absolute, reflecting on the past with a ginormous knot in my stomach. I feel sick. Have I made a massive mistake? Should I go back? Of course not, any thoughts of “going back” are nonsensical. There’s nothing to go back to – everything that once was has since been dismantled.

Staying up late in bed, listening to my nine-year-old snuffling in the room next door, I scrolled endlessly through old videos of when the children were little. Truly magical times; I wish I’d listened when fathers and mothers of all ages told me these were “the days of my life”. I had no clue what they were talking about, but now I do. 

Overly worried about my career, with an ever-­dwindling sense of identity, I didn’t enjoy early motherhood. Newborn feeding times confused me, the endless paraphernalia of sterilised bottles overwhelmed me, walking into a baby meet-up group with women I’d never met felt insurmountable. I was postnatally depressed; I just didn’t know it. It lifted after nine months, about the time when I went back to work and threw myself into things I could control. Spreadsheets, photographic shoot planning, budgets and travel. Motherhood felt chaotic and unachievable, whereas work felt like ringing the IT department, where there’s a solution for everything. At work, I could fix stuff, sort stuff and make stuff happen. At home, I played at being a coffee-time mum. Truth is, I hated it.

Scrolling through countless videos, I came across first steps taken by doddery toddlers, first words uttered from toothless mouths, first meals spat out and smeared over high chairs. With an overwhelming sense of regret, I felt sick remembering those days; long, tiring days spent cooking, feeding and ­clearing up, before battling a double buggy down steep steps to the world outside. I wish I’d enjoyed it more. 

In recent years, I’ve begun to record things on video on my iPhone, not to post to social media, or share with friends, but to remember how I felt at the time. Think of it as a video diary, one I wished I’d recorded during early motherhood, if only as a way to alleviate my guilt at having not enjoyed those blurry days.

About to give in to sleep one evening last week, I came across a more recent video diary. My face looked drawn and thin. Filmed during lockdown, I’m dressed up, hair immaculate, I’m clearly ready for a day of Zoom meetings. My voice quivers as I talk to camera, describing how quiet the house is when I’m alone and how not being with the children feels “so strange”. It’s the final line that keeps me from sleep that night, “without the children in the house, I don’t know who I am”. The camera switches off, and it’s clear I’m about to cry. 

I lay my head down, remembering the times when the children were little, desperate to return to work, not knowing who I was, and yet how odd, a decade on, the tiny beings I didn’t know how to cope with are the very fabric of who I am. I am the backing of a tapestry, while they are the colourful stitches that bring me to life.

After a sleepless night, I took delivery of 75 packing crates the following morning. This move feels different from the others. Although I’m moving to another rental, this time it feels final. Halfway through my planned moving day, I am to return to my family home to collect the items that remain. My collection of ancient magazines, a wardrobe of clothes, odds and sods from a couple of drawers, pottery made by the children, a 1970s coffee set my grandmother gave me as a student. Silly things I haven’t really missed but can’t throw away. 

If there’s one thing I’ve learnt when it comes to moving home, you can’t escape sadness by chucking things away. Buying everything brand new will not erase a past; regrets linger despite cupboards filled with bright white crockery and brand-new glassware. Now I’m on “happy pills”, as ­everyone jokingly calls them, I haven’t cried for weeks, but the morning after scrolling through old videos, I did. I have no desire to pack up a house for the third time in two years, nor do I have any inclination to go on dates with any more “shiny new things”.

Packing up, I found an old thank you card from a friend that read, in her familiar cursive wave, “I can’t wait to grow old together. We’ll stagger through cobbled streets in Spain, aged 75, drunk as punch on gin fizz.” I laughed, reminded of a conversation had a week prior, when I bumped into a gaggle of Telegraph readers by the baggage carousel at Heathrow. A ­silver-haired woman, who’d sent her husband over to ask whether I was “the redhead Stacey that writes the dating column” said, when I introduced myself, “It’s hard being a single parent, but you’ll rebuild a new life.

“This is my second husband,” she went on to say, pointing at a smiley-faced man. “No children together, we have a lot of fun.” Which reminds me, all cul-de-sacs have a way out. You just need to find it.