Being a mother is hard work. Being a good mother is a lot of hard work. Being a poor mother is a nightmare.

Motherhood. Most mothers can’t tell you enough how it’s a beautiful thing to have a person grow inside you and you get to give birth to him/her, watch him/her grow, call you ‘mummy’ etc. Yeah, it must be and I can’t wait really. But most mothers will also tell that these lovely kids are only adorable until they grow up, have their own opinions [often different from theirs] and want their freedom [they eventually get this]. We all can relate to this and it isn’t always totally bad because some of us still love and respect our mothers though we aint that ‘adorable child’ no more.

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Being a mother is hard work. From taking care of the child when he/she was little to still advising him/her and helping them make decisions. Being a good mother is a lot of hard work. You have to always take your stance on what you know is the right thing. This is far from easy especially when you are dealing with young adults experimenting with everything they can lay their hands on from drugs and alcohol to friends. It is a constant battle if you have stubborn children.

Being a poor mother, [financially challenged] is got to be the worst thing ever especially when you still want to be a good mother. I will give you my reasons with some examples.

Imagine a widow who had lost her job and was finding it hard to pay her daughter’s fees in the university. She literally doesn’t have anyone helping her. She does petty stuff to provide food for the house but tuition fees, books and hostel fees of a university student is quite hard for her to provide. So her daughter began to bring home gifts and large sums of money that paid her tuition fees and settled all her debts in school and settled the home front. This took a lot of pressure off her. The provider was a married man old enough to be the father of her 18 yr old daughter. This came when the school nearly stopped her daughter from writing relevant tests because she hadn’t paid her school fees. So when this man who she had met through a friend offered to pay her fees, she didn’t have choice but to jump on it. The gifts kept coming; expensive clothes and shoes, gadgets and more money. Her daughter, who hardly had clothes on her back when she got admission into the school, was now an IT girl.

A child that looks like you might not necessarily be yours?? Fate plays a cruel game. DNA says it as it is.

I was just telling a friend that fate sometimes just plays weird games with people’s lives. Actually, I say this all the time sometimes as a joke but sometimes, I believe I mean it judging by stuffs that happen sometimes.

This man [let’s call him Mark shall we?] had dated this lady [errr... Mandy] for a while and they broke up. More than a year later, she turned up with a 10 months old baby boy that somewhat looked like the man and told him she didn’t want to tell him that she was pregnant because he had made it clear to her that he wasn’t in the relationship for marriage. In fact, if you knew the man, and you saw the child, you would be convinced it was his. To even make it more convincing, the boy was born with a mole slightly above his left eye and the man’s second son [he is separated from his wife] had a mole there too when he was born. The man didn’t tell anyone this but somehow just believed the boy was his.

Now here is where the problem lies. Mark already has four kids from his marriage and never ‘played without ‘protection’. So even when Mandy turned up with a child that looked a lot like him, he accepted the child but wondered how it happened. Did she harvest his sperm? He was sure that was what she did but why would a woman of her status do that? And you know it means she took a used condom and what? Very very strange isn’t it? Or did she quickly rush to a hospital..... What would that make her? Was she that desperate? Bottom line, it just didn’t make sense. And this drove Mark insane. What was her response when he asked her? ‘Look at that boy and tell me he is not your son’. She refused to talk about it all. So he decided to take the paternity test. Just to be sure. Yes the boy looked like him, had a mole that looked like the one his son has but he had dated this lady for a few months and the few times they had sex, he used condoms.

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So he told her, he wanted to do a DNA test. Was she against it? Not really. She believed he wouldn’t go through with it. It is a rather expensive test. More than a hundred thousand Naira. Why would he waste such funds? He was already taking care of the child. But Mark wanted a DNA test that would prove to him that he was indeed the boy’s dad. Then he can be sure that his sperm was harvested. And probably form an opinion about women. Someone would hear the story and write a circular informing men to dispose their condoms and stuff and pass it round on Blackberry Messenger and Facebook. *rolling my eyes*

Natural beauty products Vs Chemical based beauty products. Which do you prefer?

More and more companies are manufacturing products based on plant oils and extracts and using little or no synthetic contents. This is because it’s been made known that all these chemicals used in products eventually find their way to our liver and are capable of doing extensive damage. Some consumers are now very sceptical about using some cosmetics that contain these synthetic elements. Some of these chemicals like Hydroquinone, found in blemish control and skin lightening products have even been banned in some countries.

Now while natural products pose no risk to your health, some of them can take a while to address a skin problem. Why? They first begin to repair the damage done to the skin by chemical based products. At this period, you might feel they are not doing anything for you but the reality is that it would take a while to see results if you have been using any chemical based product before. It also depends on your skin too. On the other hand, most chemical based products work faster. 

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And example here is lime juice and Hydroquinone in the treatment of spots caused by acne or pregnancy. The after effect of the use of the latter however might make it rather undesirable although when using lime juice to treat spots, you will have to wait at least 6 weeks to start seeing results depending on the severity of the spots. In most cases with Hydroquinone, you start seeing results in a week.

Natural beauty products or products made with organic materials are often more expensive than chemical based products. Some are affordable but known brands are usually expensive. The companies go the extra mile to get natural materials that might not be readily available to them. Oils like Argan oil which is used in the treatment of wrinkles and Aloe Vera, which has over 300 species but only Aloe Barbadensis Miller and other 3 species can be used to treat skin problems, are expensive and hard to find. Yes, I hate to break it to you but the Aloe Vera plant in your backyard might not be one of the 4 useful species.

 

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Chemical based beauty products tend to disrupt the normal pH level of the skin while most natural products tend to function together at a balance with the skin’s normal pH level. 

At Random

Hello dearies, I haven’t updated this blog in two months. I have been recording songs and doing other things. It hasn’t been easy but God has been faithful. And being an artiste is far from easy. I can tell you that. And I still have quite a way to go. So when you see these popular ones do their thing, they did suffer to make it happen. Spent a lot of money, did a lot of hard work and endured a lot of bull crap.  True story. So to all the upcoming artistes, may God bless your hustle, Amen.

Am I the only one wondering why the only things in the news these days are rape and paedophilia? It’s crazy. Rape in troubled zones and domestic rape. Evil boys rape girls and put the videos online. 

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A group of Indian are perfecting an underwear line that is supposed to be rape-proof. I don’t even know how they would do that but hey, it’s worth a try. Some are even talking about reintroducing the chastity belt. That’s how bad the situation is. And these are even reported cases. Most women won’t report cases of rape and we all know why. And the paedophiles running around defiling children? It’s just horrible and I hope all these people are caught, thrown into jail and someone misplaces the keys in the Pacific.

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RIP Margaret Thatcher. I grew up knowing her as that woman that showed men that what a man can do a woman can do a whole lot better. I also realized that people didn’t really like her. Many Britons were ranting on blogs, Facebook and Twitter. And I don’t know if telling her ‘Rust in Peace’ was supposed to be funny or just to match with the fact that she was called ‘The Iron Lady’ her whole life. So now that she’s dead, she’s rusting. Hmmmm. I didn’t even know she was that pretty. Really, all I ever saw was unflattering pictures of her. She was a looker. May her soul rest in peace.

Happy Easter folks!!

To my wonderful readers,

May the love Christ has shown us follow you everywhere you go, open even bigger doors, attract even better people and just immensely bless you all.



Thanks and stay fabulous!

Lily Johnson

Dear Woman: To effectively fight acne, you may have to ditch your soap.

Dr Jeremy Clapp did me the honor of sharing this valuable information on acne, a skin problem millions of people have dealt with or are still dealing with around the world. Many companies manufacture medications, creams and lotions to deal with acne and some of them really leave more to be desired. 

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He talked about natural products and skin health instead of skin care in dealing with this disturbing problem.

Read his article...

Acne is a problem that affects many of us in various ways throughout life. It is not only the acne attacks that are important but the scaring and blemishes that may stay with you for life. So many people think that acne is solely a teenager facial problem but back acne and acne affecting adults into their 30’s is quite common. How can we fight all these aspects ?

The debate, on whether natural, chemical or drug treatment is best, continues to rage. I strongly believe that where there is a chronic problem that nature normally has the treatment and that is the place to start. Natural treatments tend to be far less abrasive on the skin and are just as effective in terms of positive results.

Denrele Edun’s tribute to Goldie Harvey: True friendship is indeed beautiful.

I read Denrele Edun’s tribute to Goldie on Linda’s blog and shed more than a few tears. It is just incredible how you could be with someone right now and a few hours later, you are faced with anguish of bidding him/her goodbye forever. These two people loved and supported each other in everything. They were like Siamese twins. Their friendship was indeed one of a kind. We all knew Goldie, the artiste; he knew and loved Goldie, the person. It is so sad that in this world where death is inevitable, Denrele has to live his life without his best friend.  Life oh life....

Thank God for memories. We get to have that even when you can’t see or hold the person anymore. I pray God sees him through.
 

Denrele’s tribute to Goldie

My super star friend sways away and I stand watching till she fades on the horizon and someone at my side says "she's gone"...Gone where?

Gone from my sight, that is all. She is just as gorgeous now as when last I saw her. Her slightly disappearing figure and total loss from my sight is in me, not in her.

That thin line between Sexy and Sheer Bravery

Taking fashion risks is quite cool and in the world of fashion, you are even considered as fashion forward. Some of these dresses however, make me wonder and wonder. It takes a brave woman who either doesn’t care about what the world says, is very very confident and thinks the world should see why or just simply well fashion crazy. 

You guys know why I chose the word ‘brave’ right? Because I know that there is no way in this world I would be able to wear these dresses. Ever. There is no way you would wear this kind of dresses and expect not to have a 'wardrobe malfunction.

Dresses that make you wonder: Risque or Honey but why??

 I can't even picture her walking without giving everyone a full frontal view of her 'you know'. But she wore this and paired it with heels that high to the Grammys. #Risque

Uma Thurman

So Uma decided to wear her good old panties under this number but we can all appreciate that it didn't do much good. Everything is on display. #Undecided