I always keep myself busy. I'm writing. Or I'm creating something. Or I'm doing stuff with the kids. I'm up incredibly early in the morning; I go to bed incredibly late at night.

I feel awful for women who are trying to raise kids on their own, with zero income and no fathers present - that's single motherhood.

I happen to find motherhood a very natural state, but I know a lot of other people don't.

Death is final. No it is not just final, it's worse than that, it's diminishing: the dead continue to decrease, to occupy less space.

Living with very limited expectations is a much more immediate way of living. You really do just make the best of everything you have. I guess kids have that ability; they wait in joyful anticipation of something rather than that sense of entitlement.

I'm very different to my mum. I'm not as beautiful as she is, nor - she probably despairs about this - as groomed. I certainly rebelled against her idea of looking well turned-out. I spent several years with a shaved head in jeans and baggy shirts.

I first met my husband when I was 15. He was very cool, in a band, all that kind of thing, but he took a long time to grow up. Our paths crossed again 10 years later, and after about two weeks I knew that was it. I'm glad I met him when I did, even though I was fairly young. Because I think sometimes you can crystallise into singledom.