Inspinayshiaroul

It was a proud and astounding day for feminism in my household today. 

Let me explain. My girl is ploughing her way through a piece of light holiday reading - I Am Malala: The Girl Who Stood Up for Education and Was Shot by The Taliban.

I use the word 'ploughing' intentionally, and I mean it in the sense of back-breaking hand tilling with no modern tractors involved; it's hard labour for her (not only does she read pages over and over again, but she also carries out regular inch-by-inch examinations of the cover, spine and corners of the book for minute imperfections, just to make the process more time-consuming).

She is definitely taking in the story of the young Pakistani female rights activist, though, demonstrated by her suddenly announcing to me that Malala was "inspinayshiarol".

"Do you mean 'inspirational', sweetheart?"
"Yes."
"Do you know what inspirational means?" I asked, suspecting that she didn't. There was a long pause.
"Yes. Women."
"Inspirational means women?"
"Yes."

I beamed at the brilliant definition, but felt I needed to make her expand a little.

"What kind of women?"

There was another pause. Again, I doubted she would be able to follow-up her line of thinking. I shouldn't have.

"Clever. 
"And brave.
"And kind, Mummy."

I miraculously resisted the urge to respond to her amazing womanly wisdom with a loud: "F**k, yeah!", but I was "F**k, yeah!"ing in my head at top volume, I can tell you.

Video is Sleater Kinney - Modern Girl (NPR Music Front Row)

We've been helped hugely over the years by the PWSA UK (Prader-Willi Syndrome UK) - an amazing charity which does tremendous work supporting people with PWS, their families, and professionals who work with them. Like many charities, the coronavirus lockdown is placing them under unprecendented financial strain - with fundraising events cancelled because of social distancing rules and with no government bailouts for charities, they are facing the very real threat of closure if they don't receive donations. Lots of people are struggling to make ends meet at gthe moment, but if you have anything to spare, even just the price of a coffee, please click on the Donate button on their home page, which can be found here .