No freedom to play or explore outside for children

Let us out! ... Children are less likely to be able to name trees or birds than their parents or grandparents. Photograph: Linda Nylind for the Guardian/posed by models

Ivy and Albie arrive home from school and nursery, and slip through David and Katie Bond's kitchen straight out of the back door. After about 15 minutes, Albie, who is four, reappears, fist clenched. "Guess what I've got in my hands?" he asks. "Is it a worm?" guesses Helen, his grandmother.

"Do you want to hold it?" offers Albie, opening his hand to reveal a tiny, sand-covered worm. "We've made a horrible mess out there."

This hardly seems an exceptional scene, but it may be increasingly rare, and radical, for families today. Playing in the garden as a natural, daily event has only come about because Bond, who is a film-maker, has spent two years studying the declining role of nature in children's lives for a new documentary, Project Wild Thing. The wake-up call, he says, came when he taped a?camera to six-year-old Ivy's head and recorded the time that she devoted to different activities: her days were dominated by playing indoors at school, car journeys and playing indoors at home. She spent just 4% of her time outside.

Bond calculated another staggering fact. His mother, Helen, who is 81 and lives with the family in London, grew up in Hornsea, Yorkshire, and at the age of 11 roamed across 50 square miles. When he was a boy, in the 1970s, he roamed within 1 square mile. His children wander freely only as far as their 140-square-metre garden permits and he admits that they are fortunate to have such a large garden in the capital. "We're so lucky compared with most Londoners," he says. "I?own a tree."

It is difficult to decipher the precise constellation of social and economic changes that have made us afraid of nature, and curtailed a childhood outdoors. They are, however, visible through the lives of three generations of the Bond family. Helen was the eldest of three children growing up on the edge of Hornsea. Her mother was a full-time housewife but the children were left to play on their own – in the garden, the surrounding countryside, the nearby golf course and beach. They were outside as much as possible in all weathers, she remembers. "It was just a fun place to explore because parts of it were a bit wild."

It wasn't idyllic: the sea (where they?swam unsupervised by adults) was brown, there was barbed wire and old pillboxes from the second world war on the eroding cliffs, and once, when she cycled the mile and a half to catch the school bus, a man exposed himself to Helen and her friend. Her friend told her mother, who said, "We all know they've got these things," and that was about it. Bond contrasts this memory with modern overreactions: Ivy's primary school recently circulated an email about reports of a white van seen outside school gates in the area and for three weeks the school run became a?scrum until parents forgot about it.

Bond grew up in Canterbury in the 1970s. He did not roam nearly as far as his mother, but he played outdoors in the street with friends. Their favourite stomping ground was the local hospital. "We used to crawl through air-conditioning ducts and follow the pipes. It was an amazing adventure playground. We'd play dare, and see how far we could walk through the corridors before we were stopped," he says. There was no secure fencing or security guards.

For his film, Bond returned to Canterbury and talked to some children he found playing in his old street. "They were very gloomy about?their level of freedom, talking about how the neighbours complain if?they make a noise or play ball games," he says.

When a few children sneaked into the hospital grounds, the police were called. Computers arrived in Bond's childhood when he was about 13, and were a hobby; now, they are wallpaper.?The children he interviewed?in Canterbury celebrated extreme computer game-playing, in awe of a boy who devoted 10 hours non-stop to one game. "The bedroom was where they talked about having personal space and freedom," says Bond. "I?didn't feel like my bedroom defined me as a child. My outdoor space did. My children will be much more defined in their psyches by their?indoor space than my mum or I?ever were."

When the Bonds moved into their house three years ago, they did something Bond is embarrassed about now – they drained the pond. Everyone told them horror stories about ponds and toddlers. "It felt like we'd been got to, in a way," he admits.

"Peer pressure is very strong," agrees Helen. "You think you can make the world afresh for your children, you think you can make your own rules for your children, but you can't."

Society's fears of the risks that lurk outside for children – from ponds to stranger danger – may be overwrought and irrational, but anxiety (the defining characteristic of British families, according to a Unicef report on child wellbeing) about traffic is more logical. The growth in road traffic is probably the decisive factor preventing children playing on the streets as they once did. The Bonds live on a quiet residential road, but the traffic is still relentless, says Bond. "Until they are a lot older, I don't feel comfortable with them cycling or walking around on the roads outside."

The headteacher at Ivy's school made the news when he asked parents of an eight- and 11-year-old to stop them cycling to school because of road safety fears. There may be new community efforts to close streets for children's play, but Bond fears these once-a-year closures "tie into the idea that outdoor play becomes an event and a treat. So much of our children's world has been turned into a treat by?marketeers."

Irrational fears about risks, rational concerns about traffic, stricter policing of private land and loss of derelict spaces, the rise of computers and social media and the commercialisation of play. "It really is a perfect storm," says Bond of the factors stopping children roaming free.

David Bond and his children, Ivy and Albie.

He is convinced that fears over free-range children are not uniquely urban. Country children can be just as cooped up as city kids, and the latter used to wander in the nooks and crannies of cities as much as rural children explored the wilds. Nor are they a groundless middle-class concern. He found parents in tough urban communities who were equally worried about their children's lack of outdoor play; here, fear of crime was another inhibiting factor. In his film, Bond explores the role of commerce in encouraging everyone to stay indoors and wonders if nature could – and should – be marketed like crisps or computer games.

One insurmountable obstacle for parents wanting to send their children out to play is that all the other parents keep their kids indoors. In this environment, sending your children out to play, alone, without safety in numbers, would be "a lunatic decision", admits Bond. "It's like a Mexican stand-off – all the parents down the road are thinking the?same thing."

So what can families do? There may be a?growing awareness of?the need to provide opportunities for outdoor play, but it?can lead to nature becoming "an activity that is to be boxed up or controlled in the same way as swimming or music lessons", says Bond. "The pressure to work, to earn, to provide, makes you treat the outdoors like a product that you need to get down your gullet quick?and consume, and that stops it being a place where you get what play theorist Bob?Hughes calls 'soft?attention'. You see the children do it – Albie gets lost in himself and the?outdoors."

The National Trust Kids Council tell us what they think we should be doing to help get more children enjoying the outdoors.

After talking to play experts, Bond is convinced that the best thing a parent can do is provide unstructured time outdoors. "It's slightly contradictory, but you have to plan to be unplanned." He began by identifying nearby places for unstructured play: parks, National Trust properties, wildlife parks. The Woodland Trust's website told him of?all the woods in the neighbourhood,?and then he found the ideal safe, wild and interesting place: Nunhead cemetery.

An old cemetery near my home is the place I take my daughters to play and explore the outdoors, but I worry that I will be told off for allowing them to frolic around in such an austere place. Bond has a rule that any tended grave must be left alone, but allows his children to clamber over the grand old graves. He is sure the generation beneath the soil would quietly approve. And he is less fretful than many parents about what others think.

During the snow last winter, he was ticked off for sledging downhill with Ivy too fast. Parents were afraid that he would collide with their children. What did he do? "I just had?to dig deep and keep sledging," he?replies.

Personally, I would struggle with such disapproval, but this episode illustrates nicely something Bond points out – that the battle to get children outdoors is almost entirely a parental one. What if?children simply prefer to stay indoors? "It's mainly about persuading myself," says Bond. "Children left to their own devices will gravitate towards the things they love, and they?love being outdoors. For every really miserable wet week, there's been some sort of amazing experience outdoors that we've had together," he?says.

Children don't really notice the weather, but Bond realised that if he reacts to it, they quickly follow his lead, just as adult fear, of spiders, say, can be quickly transmitted. "I'm very determined that?the children will face the risks and discover them," he?says, although he admits that Katie?is sometimes less relaxed about this?approach.

For the Bonds, there are many fairly obvious benefits of having their children being active outdoors. On a holiday in the Yorkshire Dales, where Ivy and Albie played outside (in freezing conditions) all day, Bond noticed one result of great interest to any parent. "They slept well at night," he says, laughing.

On a recent country walk, Ivy admired some lapwings that "flew like a raggedy bat flapping about in a tunnel", she says.

"They are very good at pretending they are injured to lead you away from their nest," explains Helen.

The outdoors is a wonderful place to learn and Bond hopes to reverse the decline in knowledge that he has experienced – he knows much less about the wild than his mother. Bond struggles to distinguish between a?snipe and a curlew; his mother will always know. She can also identify bones when they are walking the Dales and is able tell the children what is a rabbit or a sheep. When Bond and Albie were recently playing in Nunhead cemetery, Albie found a freshly severed crow's wing. It was still?gooey, but Bond let his son play with it, and when they came home, they looked at the internet to find out how a wing functions.

Ultimately, though, the natural world is fun. Watching Ivy and Albie delight in outdoor play is uplifting. "The only thing that's anything like it is giving them a bar of chocolate," says Bond, describing their joy.

What does Ivy like to do best of all? "Outside play, field play," she says. Why? "There are huge blossom trees where you can run and catch the blossom. It's really fun. I like playing outside because I can meet my friends and today Bella gave me a piggyback – and I love piggybacks."

‧ Project Wild Thing is released in October. View the trailer here

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Burgers and nuggets still dominate UK restaurant children's menus – report

The Soil Association wants restaurants to prepare fresh food for children and offer them the same variety as adult diners. Photograph: Jason Lugo/Getty Images

Children's menus at the UK's leading restaurant and pub chains are often "unhealthy and unimaginative", and are still dominated by nuggets, burgers, sausages, ready meals and fizzy drinks, with little fresh fruit or vegetables on offer, it was claimed on Wednesday.

The campaigning charity the Soil Association, with organic baby food brand Organix, sent "secret diners" to 21 popular high street restaurants and pubs and ranked their opinions of the offerings for children.

Jamie's Italian, launched five years ago by chef Jamie Oliver, Wagamama and the Wetherspoon pub chain were placed highest, while Burger King, KFC and Prezzo came bottom.

Launching the "Out to Lunch" campaign, the charity and its partner are calling for all young diners to be routinely offered the choice of children's portions of adult meals.

They say all food should be freshly prepared in the kitchen and kids' cutlery should be standard.

Research for the campaign also found that 40% of parents say they eat out as a family once or more in a fortnight, yet 66% think that food provision for children in restaurants is not good enough.

The assessments of the high street food venues were compiled after a panel of 40 families surveyed menus, sourcing policies and children's facilities over a three-month period, with further input from another 1,000 families, the charity said.

Researchers said more than half the restaurants and pubs – 12 out of 21 – offer children's menus dominated by nuggets, burgers and sausages. Eight failed to include vegetables or salad in the majority of their children's main meals, while 10 did not serve any fruit in any children's puddings.

Only 11 out of 21 chains were willing to tell researchers if their food was freshly cooked and where it comes from. Of the 11, only four were actually making and cooking the majority of their children's food in the kitchen – Jamie's Italian, Wagamama, Carluccio's and Cafe Rouge.

In the wake of the horsemeat scandal, only one chain – Jamie's Italian – could tell the secret diners where its meat came from, the charity said.

Joanna Lewis, head of policy at the Soil Association, which promotes organic food and farming as well as certifying products, said: "Our investigation reveals that most high street restaurants are not even meeting the most basic standards families should expect when they eat out.

"Most are still churning out children's menus dominated by the usual suspects – burgers, nuggets and pizzas – turning the table into a battlefield for any parents wanting their child to eat well."

She said restaurants made assumptions about what parents and children wanted, "with very little creative thinking going on. We are talking about unhealthy and unimaginative menus.

"It is not simply a choice between turkey twizzlers and a superfood salad. Restaurants need to raise the bar and listen to parents who are saying they want fresh food not ready meals for their children – and the same kind of variety you would expect as an adult."

Fast food chain McDonald's was ranked mid-way at 11th. It came second to Jamie's for its sourcing of British food – 100% British and Irish beef, free-range British eggs and 100% British organic milk – but could extend its healthy options for children, the charity said.

The appearance of Wetherspoons, which has 883 outlets in the UK, in third position may have surprised some, but the chain's senior food development manager, Jameson Robinson, said: "Wetherspoons serves more than 2 million children's meals each year across our pubs and appreciates the importance of sourcing UK ingredients and offering balanced meals.

"We know that there is still more work to do to enhance the menu further, including offering varying portion sizes, and we will be working towards this."

Jamie Oliver said: "Since the first Jamie's Italian opened, we've always kept things kid-friendly … so to come top of the table is a fantastic achievement, and more importantly, confirmation that we're doing things right.

"We believe that the quality of the kids' food should to be right up there on the same level as the main menu."

But companies trailing in the table took issue with the methodology and questions used.

A spokesman for Prezzo, which came 19th, said: "We are disappointed with the findings of the survey and believe it is not a true reflection of the children's meals served at Prezzo.

"We have served almost 400,000 meals from our children's menu in the past six months and the quality of these meals is very important to both ourselves and our guests.

"The children's menu dishes are made in-house, and our bolognese sauce is made using our own recipe, using fully traceable British beef and fresh ingredients."

Burger King, which was caught up in the horsemeat scandal when some of its burgers were found to be contaminated, and which came bottom of the table, said: "We are committed to offering a welcoming environment for families in our restaurants, and to providing parents with a range of options to allow them to make healthy choices for their children. This includes offering them apple fries, milk, water or juice in our kids' meals."

The campaign is the latest collaboration between the Soil Association andOrganix. The twohave worked together since 2008 campaigning for better nursery and hospital food.

Additional reporting by Sam Bogg

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I give R an ultimatum: 'It's the drink or me'

"It's the drink or me. I can't do this any more," I say to R as I lean against the mantelpiece, hand on hip, wondering how I have ended up in a down-at-heel, south London version of Dynasty. "For chrissakes. Do what any more? I'm not drinking," R says.

"I know. I'm just saying. It's something I've been thinking about, and it's important that you know," I reply.

I'm telling him. There. It's been said. But within seconds, this certainty is replaced with a queasy sensation: now that I've made an ultimatum, I'll have to stick to my guns.

The house is quiet, the children are asleep and R and I are standing in the half-light of our messy living room. What is keeping us from holding each?other?

I've accepted that it's hard to trust R, especially since his relapse a few weeks ago, but I really struggle with the notion that I should carry on life as normal and detach with love.

In my support group, a woman once said: "Don't worry about the individual relapses. If an addict tries to hide the fact that they are drinking again, then you won't need to do any sort of detective work at all. Within a short time, it will be obvious. Everything will start to fall apart." The only time I've heard this said before was when someone described the behaviour of a serial killer. Hardly edifying stuff.

Staring at the living-room wall, wondering what to say next, I recall a picture that my sister once had hanging on her wall. It said: "Don't Worry. Everything that happens happens mostly without you." I liked it a lot. I sound the words out in my head, like a spiritual mantra. If R is drinking, then why is it any of my business? No amount of worry or intervention will stop him doing what he was going to do anyway.

In the past when I've snooped into R's private affairs, it's only landed me in one place: misery. R never stooped this low, and it makes me feel ashamed. On the occasions I confirmed my beliefs that he had been drinking again, I would usually fall into a pattern of fretting, shouting and accusing. R would continue to slide further into his secret world that I was no closer to understanding, despite having gathered all the evidence.

This time, I have refrained from doing certain things that I did before: I haven't rifled through R's bag to see if I can uncover a drained bottle of rum, or slipped out all the credit cards in his wallet to see if an empty wrap of cocaine is wedged into one of the pockets. Or receipts: I've been known to painstakingly unfold crumpled pieces of faded till paper, just to see if he's been spending in the pub. I looked for the date, and the amount. Over ￡50 per transaction and I called it a binge, but I'm not sure how or why I set these silly limits.

For now, I go for simple instinct: R's behaviour is the most significant indicator of this, but my changeable moods – affectionate and loving one day, and angry and vindictive the next – won't reveal his best side to me.

As I move to draw the curtains, R yawns loud and wide. I walk quickly over to where he is standing, ready to catch his significant out breath. I go in for a kiss, so my sudden movement has a purpose. And just as I guessed, I can't tell if what I'm smelling is alcohol or something else (he chews menthol gum regularly).

I imagine that the "not knowing" is the thing that is driving me mad, but in reality the knowing might be worse.

R cottons on to what I'm doing almost immediately, and does not fall into the comfort of my kiss. Instead, he places his hands just above my elbows and stands back, eyes directed straight at mine. "You have really got to stop this. When you feel anxious, try to avoid the things that will hurt you. Rather look for the things that will help you," he says.

"I'm trying," I say after him, as he leaves the room.

R goes to bed early and I sit in the kitchen, looking at flights on the computer. I want to take the children to see my parents. I love it where they live: the?countryside, freedom and constant company. I need a break from R – some physical distance – and I know he would relish some space away from me too: time to live without the pressure of attempting to be good and responsible at all times of the day.

When I'm hundreds of miles across the sea, not even my keen sense of smell will be able to detect whether R's had a drink or not, and that will do us all the world of good.

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What's the point of picnics? | Jay Rayner

'Cold drinks are warm, hot ones tepid, the quiche looks like it's already been eaten.' Photograph: Clarissa Leahy/Getty Images

After "Please come to my superhero-themed fancy dress wedding" the most distressing leisure time proposition in the English language has to be: "Fancy a lovely picnic?" No, I don't. Picnics are never lovely. Picnics are where lunch goes to die.

Yes, I know. I'm not meant to say this. It's high summer, a time when, by convention, magazines are given over to gloriously photographed picnic features, many of which I have contributed to. And so a confession: each time I have done so, I have been colluding in one big fat lie.

We dream of a life that echoes the pages of a the Boden catalogue, in which all women look good in a wrap dress, all men look fine with their top three shirt buttons undone, white-toothed children entertain themselves for hours, and the elders of the tribe smile beatifically at everything about them as together we lay into a feast of such largesse the Greek gods themselves would have to invent a bunch of other gods just so they could thank them for their enormous good fortune.

The reality? It's impossible to look elegant while sitting on a sloping hillside or beach, especially at my age. Bits of me are always trying to make a bid for freedom. Sod muffin tops; I'm packing half the cake counter at Greggs. The kids are either punching each other or poking a dead, maggot-infested bird with a stick, and granny's going into advance stages of anaphylactic shock having been stung by the wasp that got bored of divebombing the last mulched-up strawberries that didn't fall out of the picnic bag when it opened accidentally.

Ah yes, picnic food. It's awful, a waste of agriculture. For here is what no glossy supplement will ever tell you: the quality of an eating experience decreases in direct proportion to the distance it travels from its point of origin. Chicken wings are lovely straight out of the oven; after six hours festering in a warm Tupperware box, eating one is as much fun as chewing on one of Gollum's sweaty knee joints. Potato salad – which had bite and a substance while cooling on your kitchen table – ends up looking like it's taken a beating in a cement mixer and is now designed only for those without recourse to teeth.

Or there's worse: the host comes over all ambitious. There's a poached fish which is falling apart quicker than Michael Jackson's face, or a roast rib of beef which looks great but which is impossible to eat because nobody thought to bring a sharp enough knife with which to carve it. The cold drinks are warm, the hot drinks are tepid, the soft fruit is mashed, the hard fruit is bruised, the quiche looks like it's already been eaten and come back out the wrong way, and even the filling of the pork pie has disengaged from the mothership of its pastry shell. Only the grapes look like grapes. This is no consolation.

I like tables. And chairs. And rooms to put them in. I regard these things as progress. The last time us Jews were forced to eat al fresco it was because the Cossacks were coming. If I want the great outdoors while eating, I'll open a bloody window. You want a picnic? Good for you. I'm staying here in the kitchen, where the food tastes nice. Have a great summer.

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Solange Knowles cancels European tour

Solange Knowles … tour cancelled. Photograph: Evan Agostini/AP/Press Association Images

Solange Knowles has cancelled her European summer tour, nixing gigs at festivals in Denmark, Belgium, Portugal, Norway, Finland and Poland. Knowles is "completely devastated" by the decision, she said, but has chosen to focus on her "mental/physical health" and her upcoming third album.

"I wish I could put in words how much of a difficult decision this was," she wrote in a statement, "but between moving part-time to a new city, starting my son in a new school, and writing/recording my new record, I really had to make the best decision for my mental/physical health and provide some stability for my family. I am so so sooooo sorry if I've disappointed, and really hope to make it out to those special cities soon enough!"

Knowles played at Glastonbury just a few weeks ago, and last Saturday at Chicago's Pitchfork festival. But the singer is a single mum to her eight-year-old son, Julez, and only recently relocated to Brooklyn. "[Motherhood is] a balancing act, and it is not at all easy," she said in a recent interview. "We were completely isolated [in Los Angeles], we didn't have any family or long-term friends there, and we didn't have that support system built in there that we have in New York."

Even before this week's announcement, Knowles had called off two English gigs, at London's Koko and Yorkshire's Beacons festival. "My son will be starting a new school … which unexpectedly begins a few weeks earlier than his previous one," she said last month. "It's imperative that I am there [for] his first week to transition him. I really hope that you understand and I promise I'll be back in your area soon enough to make up for it."

Knowles has certainly missed some recent family events: neither she nor her older sister, Beyonce, attended their father's recent wedding. "[They] had previous engagements which made it impossible for them to attend," Mathew Knowles told TMZ. Mathew and the Knowles sisters' mother, Tina, divorced in 2009.

Solange is currently working on the full-length follow-up to 2012's True EP, which included the sleeper club hit Losing You.

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My mum was my midwife

Lena Corner, with her son Ellis and mother Eileen, who as a retired midwife helped to see her through the pregnancy and birth. Photograph: Sarah Lee for the Guardian

When I got pregnant for the third time, I swiftly found myself in front of a consultant as she briskly ran through my birthing plan. They would get me in at 34 weeks, she said, scan me and then book a caesarean section. What if I wanted a natural birth, I said. Not recommended, she replied. I was considered high risk – I was 41, had had two previous (unwanted, traumatic) emergency c-sections. There was a risk of rupture.

I was disappointed. This was going to be yet another birth in which the first few weeks were spent hunched and shuffling about in pain. The baby was due right in the middle of the summer holidays so I'd also have two boisterous boys to look after. I don't mean to moan because I know how lucky I am to have them, but as my pregnancy was progressing normally, it just seemed a little barbaric. Why cut my baby out of me because it happened to be the hospital's preference? I did a little research and discovered that the risk of rupture is just a little over 1%. I was far more afraid of surgery.

I talked to a friend who had had a natural birth following a c-section (VBAC, which stands for vaginal birth after caesarean) and she said I needed to get someone on my side – a midwife, consultant or someone willing to fight my corner. I phoned my GP, but he was dismissive. I thought about getting an independent midwife but discovered they cost thousands of pounds and I looked into getting a doula.

It was while I was on the phone for the umpteenth time to one who casually and irresponsibly told me she thought I should have a home birth, that it slowly dawned that the answer might be closer to home. Why didn't I just ask my mum? Why shell out for a stranger when there is no one else who has my interests more at heart than my own mother?

What's more, she is uniquely well qualified. She was a midwife in the early 1960s and has borne six children of her own. She worked on the district in Preston in Lancashire. She used a trumpet to listen to the baby's heartbeat and her hands to locate the position of the baby's head, just like something from an episode of the BBC period drama Call the Midwife. "Are you sure?" she said when I asked her. "I think my knowledge might be a little out of date."

She was also concerned that she might have been stepping on Jez, my partner's toes. I told her not to worry. Any potential joy that childbirth had to offer him was stripped away long ago. He witnessed my first birth in which, due to complications following the c-section, my blood pressure shot up and I suffered a pulmonary oedema and a near heart attack. They shut him out of intensive care as they tried to stabilise me and he was left outside not knowing if I was dead or alive. Then, 30 weeks into my second pregnancy, he woke to find two litres of blood in our bed. He welcomed all the help he could get.

In my mum's day, childbirth was a lot less intrusive. It was an era when babies were born at home. She would see all her mothers right through pregnancy and birth, and got to know each one so intimately that when it came to labour she would often hop into bed with them. "During night labours we'd both have a little snooze as things were progressing rather than me go home and come back again," she says. "Most of my mothers didn't have landlines in those days so it was easier than getting to the phone box at the end of the street."

Lena Corner, second left, with her five siblings.

She would be on call for five days out of seven. When she went for an outing to the cinema, she devised a system with the projectionist that if one of her mothers needed her, a message would flash up on screen telling her to go. Once, on one night alone, she singlehandedly delivered three babies. "There weren't many emergencies in those days," she says. "Because the mothers were at home they were more relaxed so the labours tended to be pretty quick and usually drug-free." C-sections were really rare, she says, and when they did occur, the baby would be "cot nursed" for 48 hours. That is left lying, undisturbed, to allow them time to recover quietly from the trauma of their sudden entrance into the world.

In the weeks leading up to my due date, I switched hospitals to the Chelsea and Westminster, in London, where a brilliant young VBAC midwife, Emily Boenke, had agreed to take me on. We made a deal. She would let me try a natural birth on the condition that the pregnancy didn't go past my due date and that I agreed to be monitored (tied to a machine that checks the baby's heart) throughout. My baby was due on 12 July and the consultant had already booked me in for a c-section the day after – which was Friday the 13th. As the date approached with little sign of the baby coming, my mum suggested we tell the hospital that I was superstitious and didn't want to have surgery on Friday 13th. It was lucky she did. Labour began the very next day.

At first, as my mum took her seat on the plastic hospital chair at the foot of my bed, I felt worried I'd made the wrong decision. Mum is 74 – what if it all went horribly wrong? What if it went on for days?

In the event, I needn't have worried. I don't think I could have done it without her. Mum may be a little out of date on the specifics, but the fundamentals of childbirth haven't changed. I heard the other midwives and followed their instructions, but it was my mum's voice that I was really listening to. Somehow she knew when my contractions were coming before I did. She gave me gas and air exactly when I needed it and rubbed my back endlessly when the pain was too much. She didn't leave my side for almost 24 hours.

In my eagerness to deliver naturally, I had become obsessed with the notion of active birth – a technique that rejects the idea of being a passive patient giving birth lying down. Tethered to a monitor, I paced the same small patch of hospital floor all through the night, hoping this – and gravity – would help the baby out. Mum looked on, worried that I was wearing myself out. "It's called labour because it's just that – very hard work," she said. Not wanting to interfere too much, she tried to coax me to lie down and relax. At first I would have none of it, but as dawn approached, she finally succeeded. That was when things started progressing.

It turned out the baby was posterior – his spine was back to back with mine. I'm glad I didn't know this as I'm not sure if I'd have had the courage to go through with a natural birth. It took nearly four hours to push him out. Ridiculously, I spent the whole thing screaming for a c-section but my mum breathed every breath with me and carried me through every contraction.

"I can't do it," I screamed.

"You are doing it," she said.

It was all I needed to hear. When eventually I did give birth, I did it the old-fashioned way – lying flat on my back with my legs in the air. Her presence had also given Jez the confidence to believe that it wasn't all going to go horribly wrong too, and he rose to the occasion brilliantly. Finally, he got to cut an umbilical cord.

I'm a firm believer that birth isn't about the mother – it's all about getting the baby out safely. But now, having given birth naturally, I realise that the difference is great. This time we went home and had champagne and were elated. I never felt this after my c-sections. I guess it's something to do with hormones, but at last I understood what people mean when they describe childbirth as one of the happiest moments of their life.

My mum says it was one of the most nerve-racking deliveries she had ever attended. Not because of my medical history or my age – just because I am her own flesh and blood. "I never dreamed you would have asked me to be at his birth," she told me later on.

"But I hated the thought of you going into hospital and me sitting by the phone waiting to hear. I was just so glad to be there and see you were OK."

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My life as a stay-at-home dad

The number of stay-at-home dads in the UK has doubled since 1993. Photograph: Alamy

According to the Office for National Statistics, the number of stay-at-home dads has doubled since 1993, while the number of women staying home to look after children has dropped by a third over the same period. This is not quite the revolutionary inversion of gender stereotypes it sounds – there are a million fewer stay-at-home mums, but only about 100,000 extra stay-at-home fathers taking up the slack.

I am not one of the extra ones. I've stayed at home for virtually all of the past two decades, although my wife is fond of pointing out that being an agoraphobic is not the same thing as being a house-husband. Also, I work from my house, so my stay-at-home status has not, over the years, enhanced my child-rearing skills as much as it has sharpened my ability to type while everyone around me is screaming.

There has been some talk about unfriendly taxation driving mothers out to work, although the proliferation of men staying at home is undoubtedly a function of long-term economic imperatives. It's clear there has been a big rise in two-income households, but if the smaller salary can't cover the costs of childcare – or the larger can't subsidise less well-paid employment – then the lower earner has to stay home. It's not really about who wants to, or who should.

It's nice to be needed, though, and there's is no question that I'm handy. If a child falls ill and needs to stay off school, I am here. If another has ordered a secondhand Xbox game off eBay, I will be in to sign for it. And I'm flexible. I can usually adjust my schedule at a moment's notice, which is why I always happen to be incredibly busy when it's time to feed the dogs.

If I missed anything about working in an office among normal people, with their combed hair and fancy social skills, it was coming home in the evening to little children who were thrilled to see me, like I was when my dad came home. These days it's my children who come home to me, with their ties askew and free newspapers under their arms. I greet them excitedly at the door, while they try to edge past me. I ask them about their day, and they mumble something about the people in charge being idiots. I suggest a trip to the park; they say maybe later. As my children get older I feel less like a stay-at-home dad and more like a neglected pet. It makes me wants to go downstairs right now and chew up something they own.

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The Beano – a happy 75th anniversary

Mike Stirling, editor-in-chief of the Beano. Photograph: DC Thomson & Co Ltd

One of the most significant changes in British family life took place on 25 August last year. That was the day Dennis the Menace's dad changed his hairstyle. Now it is nearly as spiky as his son's. For the previous 50-odd years it had consisted of stubble above a floridly furious face and Hitler moustache as, traditionally, he lost his temper big time on his wayward son's long-suffering bottom. "Historically all the authority figures in the Beano looked the same," says Mike Stirling, editor-in-chief of the Beano. "The simple reason is, they were all modelled on the managing editor from the 1950s." He must have been a riot.

Dennis's dad's hair had to change, Stirling says, to reflect two facts. First, "We are continually told by readers that children get on really well with their parents rather than being locked into an adversarial relationship." So dads, even in the Beano, had to turn into something more than distant brutes with anger management issues.

Second, the editors realised a game-changing truth. Parents were pranking before you (their children) were born. They wanted to see that reflected in the Beano, with images of grownups not as thugs dispensing rough justice but as grownups with pasts as badass as Gnasher's parps.

As a pivotal moment reflecting evolving social mores, that new hairdo was as freighted as the Beano editors' decision in the 1980s that Dennis's dad should no longer slipper his son in the last frame. Dennis had been spanked weekly since his birth on 17 March 1951. And that, despite decades of the Beano suggesting otherwise, wasn't good parenting.

As the Beano celebrates its 75th anniversary this month, Stirling realises such subtle tweaks are key to its survival. After all, the Dandy, the Beano's DC Thomson stablemate, departed our newsstands for good last year and went online to halt dwindling sales, so there's no room for complacency.

Bash Street Kids from The Beano Photograph: DC Thomson Co, Ltd

But what does the venerable comic have to say to kids today? In a recent focus group (my seven-year-old daughter and me), Juliet reported that she liked the Bash Street Kids strip in which teacher replaces a class blackboard with a touch screen. The kids pretend they don't understand the new kit, but really, of course, it's Sir who is technologically challenged – inadvertently uploading his holiday snaps to class titters. Comedy gold.

By contrast, I, who stopped reading the Beano nearly 40 years ago, preferred something more rarefied, The Numskulls (even though the missing "b" appals me). You remember the Numskulls: homunculi who work your brain and attend to the questions of personal daintiness you neglect. But who works the Numskulls' brains, you'll be asking. This is an article about the Beano, not a graduate class in philosophy of mind, I reply airily.

But if the Beano taught me anything (and it didn't) it taught me to have a minimal grasp on reality. As a boy, I modelled myself on Lord Snooty: only the disgraceful truth that they didn't have boy-size top hats in Beatties in Wolverhampton in the late 1960s explains why my manifest destiny as proto-Cameroonian ponce waited on by butlers went unfulfilled.

Lord Snooty, one of the Beano's longest-running characters. Photograph: DC Thomson Co, Ltd

Ever since the 1950s, the Beano's philosophy has been simple: punish adults for imposing funless tasks on kids otherwise filled with joie de vivre. "That's why Walter is Dennis the Menace's nemesis," explains Mike Stirling. "He strangles all the fun out of everything. He doesn't want to be a kid, he wants to be a grownup and he's always snitching on kids who are having fun."

Like much in the Beano, Walter has changed: in the 1980s, he was a weed that Dennis could beat up – hardly politically correct or, more importantly, dramatically satisfying. No longer.

The Beano got into its groove in the 1950s, when 2m rather than a few thousand read it weekly. "During the war, the Beano got a lot of kudos for ridiculing the enemy and showing kids there was nothing to be afraid of," says Stirling. But it was only after the war that the Beano introduced its enduring characters – Dennis, Minnie the Minx and the Bash Street Kids. "They were the first characters who were cheeky and combative against grownups and countered the idea that children should be seen but not heard."

In next week's anniversary issue, celebrity adults get the Beano treatment. David Beckham's pretensions as a lingerie model and his incessant hair restylings are ridiculed. Daniel Craig also makes a guest appearance as – inspired, this – the long-lost twin of the hideous Plug from the Bash Street Kids. And Andy Murray takes on a player more challenging than Novak Djokovic, namely Minnie the Minx.

But look, I say to Mike Stirling, there's one big problem with the Beano. When are you going to bring back Pansy Potter, the strongman's daughter? She, like Ivy the Terrible, is no longer a fixture in the comic. A tiger dad like me wants a role model for his daughter who can duff up bullies and anyone else bent on interfering with her flourishing.

It's the kind of adult moan that, for Stirling, goes with the job. "No character in the Beano ever gets written out entirely," he says emolliently. "She made an appearance last year." True, but she doesn't have a page of her own as she did in the olden days.

Stirling says the Beano can't rest on its laurels. "We've got to do what they do on Doctor Who – regenerate regularly so the Beano means something to the new generation of kids. But we've also got to make sure the whole family gets something from it."

Tough gig, especially in a milieu in which every kids' mag suckers in its audience with a vexing plastic freebie destined to get lost in the vacuum cleaner.

Dennis the Menace and Gnasher, one of Britain's best-loved duos Photograph: DC Thomson & Co Ltd

Stirling, who was born in 1974 (the year, he says, Dennis the Menace ousted Biffo the Bear as the Beano's cover star), admits it's disappointing to go into schools and find that some kids haven't heard of the Beano. "Once they start reading it, though, they love it. It's our problem to make sure that in 25 years' time you're ringing me up on our 100th anniversary asking about the great new characters we've devised between now and then."

If he and the team don't do that, the Beano risks going the way of Dandy, Beezer and those two late-lamented fixtures of my childhood, Whizzer and Chips, and Cor. Or rather, Cor!!.

After school this week, I tried to give my daughter the historical facts that Michael Gove's history syllabuses see fit to omit: how Cor!! ran from 1970 to 1974 and that still I wonder what happened to Frankie Stein the Teenage Werewolf, not to mention the rich-poor double act of Ivor Lott and Tony Broke. I explained how Whizzer and Chips' genealogical tree is more complex than those of the houses of Lancaster and York during the War of the Roses.

It's essential for my daughter to grasp this rich heritage if she is to understand who her father is, but I'm not sure she was listening. She was trying on the free facial hair that came with the Horrible Histories magazine (putrid pirate's beards, RAF moustaches etc). I know where all that's going to end up. Even though my manifest destiny once was to be waited on hand and foot like Lord Snooty, my reality is picking discarded comic freebies from a vacuum cleaner dust bag. It's rubbish being a grownup.

‧ The Beano's 75th anniversary issue is out on 24 July

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Tim Dowling: Dad knows best

We are coming to the end of the heady and?volatile fortnight between the oldest one's last A-level and the leaving party for the upper sixth. Had he asked me, I might have suggested that he fill the idle hours with backbreaking agricultural labour, but he didn't ask. I've barely seen or heard him. His younger brothers are still noisy, but he has learned the art of stealth.

On the day of the leavers' party, however, I hear his unmistakable footfall on the landing outside my office. "You," I say.

The footsteps pause, and his head?comes round the door. "Yo," he says.

"I need to be apprised of your plans," I say, "so that I can strongly advise you against them."

"OK," he says.

"Are you, for example, planning to get arrested or anything?"

"Not planning," he says.

It is not until two hours before the?party that he agrees to try on the?black trousers I have agreed to lend him. On his hulking frame, they become three-quarter-length shorts. He cannot do them up. His?face suddenly tinges pink with?alarm.

"OK," I say, "come with me. You'll need shoes."

We drive to Marks & Spencer, while I hurriedly dole out all the unsolicited advice I have left. "Can I?also strongly advise against you and your friends helping yourselves to the cheap red wine left over from my birthday party that I hid in the shed?"

"Mum told us where it was," he?says.

"Two bottles are missing," I say, "for which you owe me a surprisingly modest amount."

"Have you had lunch yet?"

"It's five," I say. "I eat lunch in my lunch break, at lunch time. I strongly advise you to do the same."

We head straight for the black trousers section of the mens' department. The boy pulls a pair off the nearest pile.

"These look OK," he says, "don't they?"

I examine them from several angles. "There's nothing obviously wrong with them," I say. "The fitting rooms are over there."

He walks in the direction I am pointing and returns almost instantly, the trousers draped over one arm. "They're fine," he says.

"I didn't even see you in them," I?say.

"You don't need to see me in them," he says.

We cross over to the till. Outside the shop, I hand him the bag and consult my phone.

"That took four minutes," I say. It?occurs to me that men should always shop in pairs.

"Which means you have time to buy me a sandwich," he says.

At six o'clock, he appears downstairs, dressed and ready to go, the black of the trousers a near match for the jacket he's wearing.

"You look very smart," his mother says. "I would strongly advise you to tuck your shirt in," I say.

"Are you sure?" he says.

"Trust me," I say.

"I'll need a picture," my wife says. She stands with the boy in front of the kitchen door, on the spot where he posed in his new uniform on the first day of primary school, age four. He also stood there in every Halloween and school play costume he ever wore.

Today, he is harder to squeeze into?the frame. I hold my breath as?I?line up the shot on my wife's phone screen, experimenting with a?horizontal composition before returning to the vertical to get both?heads in. When I finally exhale, a shudder runs through me. My throat closes without warning. I?press the button, and then blink several times to get my swimming vision to hold still.

"I'd better do another one," I say.

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Dear royal baby … some real-world advice

Dear Royal Baby,

When you grow up, you will probably come across the kind of science-fiction scenario in which one encounters men and women who seem to be human, but who occasionally betray the fact that they are actually aliens. It may be by a word slightly mispronounced, a tiny drop of green blood, a tea cup held at a bizarre angle or a chance revelation that they have no idea what unemployment benefit is. At this point in a science-fiction movie, a sinisterly dissonant chord will be heard on the soundtrack.

I'm talking, I'm afraid to say, about your immediate family. Be in no doubt that they will strain every sinew to present themselves as normal human beings. In these democratic days, their survival as wealthy parasites vitally depends on it. They will encourage you to slur your vowels, stick a button through your nose and make endless, tedious visits to homeless shelters. Your real life – puking in posh nightclubs, having your bum wiped by a valet, slaughtering harmless animals in the Scottish Highlands – will be kept carefully under wraps.

If you value your sanity, try not to let any of this fool you. Never forget that those around you are not what they seem. When they try to persuade you that you are just a regular kid hanging around an average-size palace, remember the bitter truth that you are a socially disadvantaged child. Surrounded by boneheaded, emotionally constipated relatives, not least by great-grandparents who seem to have as much inner life as a fruit bat, you will be given the worst possible start in life. You have been born into a class for which social mobility is an idle dream. Years of intensive therapy are unlike to offset the damage of being sent to a failing school where most of your fellow-pupils are the children of dukes and stockbrokers and the fees are ￡30,000 a year. None of your friends will have heard of Les Dawson or Leon Trotsky. Try as you may to break out of this impoverished background, you will probably never travel on a bus, buy yourself a Mars bar or know who Toni Morrison is. I wish I could advise you on how to handle all this, but I can't. It's fated. You're screwed.
Terry Eagleton

Dear Royal Baby,

Greetings and salutations, royal baby! Welcome to the world. As the mother of two-year-old and four-year-old girls, I've spent much of the recent past around your kind, and I'd like to offer you some tips. We'll go in chronological order.

1 If breastfeeding works for you and your mother, great. If it doesn't work for you, you'll also be just fine. Don't let anyone make either of you feel like not breastfeeding is a moral failure.

2 For transportation, I think you'll find the Ergo brand baby carrier most comfortable, and your parents will find it simplest to use. When you're a newborn, you'll likely want to be held as often as possible, and such carriers allow this without immobilising the grownups around you. Perhaps your grandparents can even get in on the?action?

3 As a first book, I recommend Woof-Woof by Sami. What it's lacking in plot and character development – it has only about 10 words, mostly animal noises – it makes up for with its boldly contrasting illustrations: a big-headed dog, a big-headed pig, a big-headed duck … you get the idea. I don't want to give away the ending, but there's also a baby in there, and we all know that there's nothing a baby likes more than another baby.

4 As your literary taste becomes increasingly sophisticated, I can't emphasise this enough: rhyming books are far more tolerable, dare I even say pleasurable, for adults to read a thousand times than non-rhyming books. I'm not sure why this is, but please be considerate. Embrace Dr Seuss. Jamberry is also an excellent pick, as are Each Peach Pear Plum, Barnyard Dance and Is Your Mama a Llama? (I mean no disrespect here; your mama, obviously, is not a llama.)

5 When you're being fussy, as you inevitably will, see if you can get a grownup to take you outside. The shift in environment can be both distracting and calming. I hear the grounds of Kensington Palace are quite nice.

6 Get on a schedule, especially a sleep schedule. Consistency will make you more agreeable, and your agreeability will make your parents' life infinitely more pleasant.

7 Is it too much to ask – and no rush – that at some point as you mature, you can explain to me why we're all obsessed with your family? Granted, I'm an American. And I definitely think your mother is pretty and stylish. But what exactly do you guys do? Again, no pressure – just, if you can figure this out, maybe let me know?

8 Ignore the advice of people like me. You'll be subjected to a magnitude of attention from media and the public that's unimaginable to most of us. You will be admired and criticised, fawned over and photographed. But you're not a symbol. You're a person. Go about the business of growing up, and let the frenzy surrounding your existence be an absurd and distant spectacle.

Best regards,
Curtis Sittenfeld

Illustration by Modern Toss

Hello!

They call you the "royal baby". Not that you have any idea yet of what that means or how you have been singled out, by a pure accident of birth, to take your place in history.

You are an anachronism in this increasingly egalitarian world and there are those who wish you will never take up the role into which you have been born. But I believe that perhaps 50 years from now, you will indeed become the sovereign and head of state of this country.

Your great-granny has played an absolute blinder during the past 60 years or so. You should have seen the crowds who turned out to celebrate her?jubilee! And, although lots of people disagree with me, I think your grandpa Charles will make a decent king – and, as for your dad, he is already a bit of a superstar all around the world.

But I must warn you that this is not going to be an easy gig. That soft, baby skin of yours is going to have to toughen up pretty quickly. Your life, sadly for you, is never going to be your own. People will want to know everything about you and cameras will watch your every move.

Oh, you'll have fabulous wealth and an absurdly privileged lifestyle – but it will come at a steep price. I'm afraid you have no choice about your destiny. Your job description is already writ large: monarch. Not for you the thrill of compiling a CV, chasing a job and finding the career path that gives you satisfaction. Nor, indeed, the character-building chance to fail.

You are already a little king or queen. Your destiny is sealed, you have been born to swim in the royal goldfish bowl and your privacy is practically non-existent.

I knew your grandmother, Diana. She was a feisty, fragile woman and she would have been overjoyed to see you. She taught the rest of your family a lot about connecting with society and making the monarchy less stuffy. She would have picked you up in her arms and given you big hugs. Single handedly she almost brought the monarchy to its knees (one day you'll learn all about it). But she also cared about it deeply and her wish for you, like mine, would have been for you to make sure that the monarchy moves with the times and stays relevant.

Otherwise, you could find that you suddenly do have a career choice after?all.

Best of luck,
Jennie Bond

Welcome Royal Newcomer,

You kept us waiting, but then that is one of the privileges. As you will find, there are many of them. You will learn the family trick of enjoying and making light of them at the same time.

So what is the maelstrom you have been plunged into? Well, it could be worse. Twenty-first-century Britain can be a difficult, rumbustious place and, it certainly has some way to go before all of its citizens can be assured of anything like the kind of life you're going to have. Everyone's a bit nervy right now because a small group who juggled finances for a living dropped them all and made a terrible mess that we all had to clean up. By the time you're reading, you'll be reading all about it. But you've been born into a resilient sort of nation so we'll make do. There'll always be cash enough for Trooping the Colour.

Generally, it is a nation with its heart in the right place. A bit stuck in its ways and still trying to find a guiding philosophy in politics and social affairs, but it tries to do the right thing, and it certainly likes to be thought of as doing the right thing. Churchill – a heroic old guy your great grandma will tell you about if she gets the chance – once said the Americans will always do the right thing, having exhausted the alternatives. Often we're much the same. But that's not to be sniffed at.

There really is no telling what the country will look like by the time you come of age. Your father is 31 now and parts of the Kingdom have changed beyond recognition in that time. We moan a lot about life on our small island and about each other, but a lot of people from countries around the world think this country and its people and its philosophies are worth being part of. When it works, they come, add a bit, change a bit to smooth the transition and the country changes a bit as well; most say for the better.

Generally speaking, your folks – on your dad's side – have coped with this quite well; but then they travel a lot, so the differences don't seem daunting and they live in palaces, so they are protected from the unfortunate complexities. You'll have the advantage of being born into this Britain, and that being so, you may one day be able to nudge those bits of the establishment that yearn for a time that's past; one that was scarcely as they remember it and one that would be ruinous to return to. The cord needs cutting; you might wield the scissors.

And one more thing: should your great-grandad ever proffer advice on these matters, by letter, by note perhaps, don't listen.
Hugh Muir

Illustration by Modern Toss

Your Royal Highness,

Well, I got through that opening without breaking my pencil, so I guess that's something. I've been wondering for months – nay, years – how I would feel on this day, and the truth is, I am doing OK. How are you doing? Are you as svelte as everyone predicted you'd be? Are you ginger? What is your name?

Because I am the bigger person – both literally and figuratively – I'm going to give you a few pieces of advice as you begin your life as the second-most important child in the world. That's right, little Prince, you may have to bow to Camilla, but you are more important than Beyonce's baby now.

Befriend most of the Beckhams. The Beckham boys know how to properly use their silverware, so they won't embarrass you, but Baby Harper is still kind of a mess.

Don't believe your own hype. Sure, everyone is going to fall all over themselves about your clothes and your hair and how cute your father looks when he's holding you. But you are just the future King, so don't get too carried away.

Start dressing yourself as soon as your eyes can differentiate colour. Don't become a victim of poor grownup taste. Never, under any circumstances, take fashion advice from Beatrice and Eugenie. I really can't stress this enough.

In closing, I would simply caution you not to let this whole "royal baby" thing go to your head. I've been here a lot longer than you have, I have a lot of connections, and my tiaras are just as shiny as yours. And they aren't secondhand. Feel free to have your people call my people if you need advice. Perhaps together we can usher in a new era of transatlantic diplomacy, like a modern-day Roosevelt and Churchill, only with better hats.

All the best,
Suri Cruise (via Suri's Burn Book)

Dear Baby,

I'm going to assume you will be ascribed the appropriate flunkeys in posset-resistant periwigs to school you in the basics. The 10 best ways to get in and out of a pram while maintaining regal dignity. Distinguishing between the Iced Gems and the real gems you get hold of during illicit rootles round in great-grandma's handbag. The most winsome way to smile in non-Duchy-holding-grandma's iPhone snaps. The most winsome way to smile after those snaps end up on her Party Pieces website. That sort of thing.

After that, there's some stuff that's really just down to luck. Will you have a profile that comes out well on coins and stamps or should you hope that the Zuckervoss dollarbit has supplanted all lesser currencies by the time you grow up? Will you avoid male-pattern baldness? Will you look patently absurd in dress uniform like your great-uncle Andrew or eternally dashing like your great-grandad Philip?

Time alone will tell.

For the rest of it – dude, I wish I knew what to say to you. You're being born into a family that, as comedian Nick Doody once pointed out, thinks it has magic blood. How you're meant to deal with that in an essentially rational age, I do not know. For the next 60 years or so you will be groomed by them to take over as the constitutional monarch of 16 sovereign states, a process that sent your most of your ancestral line bonkers to one or other degree. (Remember that when Grandpa Bigears tries to swap your rusks for organic Hebridean kale patties and make sure you scream the place down.) When you're bigger track down an old lady called Sarah Ferguson. She'll probably be working at the Tesco where Coutts used to be. She'll tell you some tales that'll make your hair curl.

You've been born into one of the stranger parts of a strange, strange world. The royal family is, in essence, the spleen of the national corpus. You could be removed without any danger to life as we know it, but it might not function as smoothly without you. So unless and until you are irreparably damaged, it makes no sense to excise you.

While you remain, you will be followed, praised, scorned, exalted, pitied, revered, despised – all within the space of a single issue of the Daily Mail. From the moment you are born until the moment you die your every public and most of your private actions will be noted, your every word recorded, every decision dissected, every outfit catalogued, every glance pondered, every smile and every scowl scrutinised and picked over by a ravenous horde of followers to whom you mean something so profound it cannot be articulated or so superficial it's not worth the bother. But the depredations they carry out on your privacy and soul will be the same.

Whether the riches and privileges that also attend the accident of your birth can make up for this, only you will be able to decide. Once you have decided, of course, there will be bugger all you can do about it. It's not worth trying to run. People still think they've found Lord Lucan and that's on the basis of one grainy photo from 1974. Imagine how quickly they'd have tracked down the real thing if they'd had a globally disseminated set of digital images of his first 30 years to go by?

Maybe none of this will matter. Maybe all that matters is that your parents hoped for you, wanted you and now they love you, more than life itself. I hope so. Because otherwise, you poor little morsel, I wouldn't wish your fate on anyone.

I raise a commemorative mug and wish you the very best of luck.
Lucy Mangan

Illustration by Modern Toss

Dear Prince of Cambridge,

Welcome! It's a truly great planet – most of the others don't come within a million miles of it – and I'm sure you'll enjoy your stay here. But that heartfelt hope is not unqualified, is entirely conditional, in fact. The condition is that you abdicate as soon as you get the chance. That you voluntarily renounce all of the privileges that come with the mere fact of being born into the royal family. Your education will teach you that being born is just the start of a life, not its purpose. And it's not enough that you turn your back on the perks of monarchy. No, it's my dream that you'll become the first republican royal. So I hope you won't just say "It's not for me, thank you", but that it's not for anyone, that it's absurd and embarrassing to carry on this farce into the 21st century.

At the risk of seeming pushy, let me add that I hope, too, that you won't just renounce your title and embrace leftish views. Democratise yourself early on and you'll have a much better time of it here on earth. Almost all the happiness in life comes not from exclusivity – and there's nothing more exclusive than being a king or queen - but from inclusivity. Take the tube and use the bus. You won't need a car. Your Zone 1 home, after all, could hardly be more conveniently located. Rest assured, we've no intention of turfing you out – but you will have to pay the market rate.

Going back to cars for a moment, I take pride in the fact that when your grandad and step-grandma accidentally drove into the middle of a demo in London it's the voice of a personal friend of mine – his last name is King, ironically – that you can hear saying "Off with their heads!" on the video footage. He didn't mean it literally but it's a vocal reminder that while we're spoon-fed a lot of pap about the hard-working royals the truth is that a significant portion of the population sees your tribe for what they are: a top-of-the-Range-Rover bunch of spongers and welfare dependants.

Lest we end on a negative note, however, here's some encouraging news. Genetically, you've drawn a pretty short straw. Many of your ancestors have the intellectual and physical appeal of the hillbillies in Deliverance – minus the musical skill. Take your charming great-uncle Andrew, for example. What a stout advertisement for the mental, physical and moral benefits of republicanism! But don't worry about that clodhopper. Everyone has stupid and embarrassing relatives: the great thing about life is that whatever is passed on to you genetically, the shared inheritance of history argues with ever-increasing force that it's what you make of yourself that counts. In America they still cling to the quaint idea that anyone can become president. But we in Britain cherish an equally rousing hope of our own: that even kings and queens might one day become simply?citizens.

Yours hopefully
Geoff Dyer

Dear Baby,

Britain's changed a lot since you all had any real power and it's best not to piss off the natives, multicultural as we are, because we're still hurting from the British Empire. Here's a good thing you could do. How about when you're doing your yearly honours list of footballers, X?Factor contestants and people who have worked for worthwhile causes for the past 20 years, you could come up with a new title for it. Order of the British Empire? That's not a symbolic piece of history we want to retain. We're barely retaining you as it is.

To paraphrase the great Chuck?D from Public Enemy, none of my heroes have appeared on no stamps. So I put this to you … by the time it's your time to be on a stamp, make sure you've done something heroic. Earn your place on that stamp.

Fight the power,
Nikesh Shukla

Dear Heir,

First of all, please allow me to apologise. You didn't ask to be born. You especially didn't ask to be become the newest member of Britain's weirdest family. None of this is your fault.

I sincerely hope that over the next decade or two Britain's obsession with its royals will develop into something a bit less creepy, but that does not seem to be the way things are heading. While it may be a source of great national pride, your arrival serves a purpose that?is neither altogether wholesome, nor in your interest.

Your future has been set in stone – unchangeable – at birth, a fate we have tried in vain to spare our poorest children. To be rich and posh and have such comparatively limited options – you may come to feel you've been singled out for punishment, as revenge. Like any baby, you deserve better.

I can only wish you one thing in good conscience: a lucky escape. Shirk duty, renounce destiny, ignore advice, taste ambition and be whatever you want to be. Remember: your parents can afford to support you through any number of unpaid internships.

All the best,
Tim Dowling

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Now we are three: me, my daughter and my new fiancee

Family ties: Simon Van Booy, his fiancee Christina and daughter Madeleine in their New York flat. Photograph: Reed Young

In the weeks leading up to Mother's Day, I?kept reminding my eight-year-old daughter, Madeleine, to make a card, or at least draw a?picture, for Christina. It was not the first Mother's Day the three of us would spend together, but in the past 12 months there had been a subtle shift in the relationship between Madeleine and my fiancee. They both felt it, and each in her own way had begun to reach for a deeper connection. Some nights at bedtime, Madeleine asked Christina to stay in her room after I'd turned out the lights, to lie with her in the darkness and stroke her hair. When a waiter commented brightly on the physical resemblance between mother and daughter, Christina didn't correct him.

I had observed these moments of trust from a distance but, as we neared Mother's Day, I?feared one of them might suddenly retreat from the glare?of hyperbole that accompanies the commercialism of the date. The greatest danger to?their burgeoning intimacy, however, was not some catastrophic emotional meltdown over the absence of a card, but me, and the habits I had acquired when functioning as a?single parent. Over the several years since the sudden death of Madeleine's mother, I had grown used to directing every?detail of our lives. Close friends and family watched with a mixture of fear and pity as the evil bedtime enforcer swooped down upon unfinished games of Beagle-opoly (a form of Monopoly with dogs). There were few compromises, and I earned a Dickensian reputation with Madeleine's aunts for my complete ban on bubble gum and restrictions on how much television could be watched. I handed Madeleine's doctor's business card to anyone who looked after her, and offered to go over CPR training, or demonstrate the Heimlich manoeuvre on Big Bird.

I had become like Ben Stiller's single father character in The Royal Tenenbaums, who wakes his children in the middle of the night to run fire drills. I had a certain way of doing everything, from loading the dishwasher and preparing school lunches to more important tasks, such as checking the tap water for excessive chlorine and inspecting the smoke, poisonous gas and carbon monoxide detectors that flashed throughout our apartment. These fears seem silly now that everything has changed. But at one point I even considered buying an emergency ladder to unroll from Madeleine's third-floor window as imaginary flames licked our pyjamas.

The most frustrating part of trying to direct everything is not that it alienates you from people who genuinely want to help, but that it's actually impossible. Here is an example of something I?couldn't control: the odour of marijuana in the hallway of our apartment building. The converted shoe factory we have made our home is also home to drummers, photographers, actors and DJs. Although I'm not opposed to recreational marijuana, I don't like smelling it in the hallway as I wait for the lift with my child. I finally decided to do something when Madeleine (then almost seven) said, "What's that lovely flower smell?"

I sometimes see a therapist called Carol (advice:?don't wait until you're frothing at the mouth to talk things over with a psychologist). She suggested that the way we react to something negative can sometimes do more damage than the negative thing itself. So, instead of pounding on my neighbour's doors, I tried to be a normal person and wrote a strong letter to building management that achieved nothing, as strong letters often do. A month later, however, the offending parties (friendly actors in their early 30s) moved out and that was that.

As a single parent, I had become tyrannical in order to survive, and anything I couldn't control caused me enormous anxiety. As a naturally untidy, disorganised man who never made lists or kept receipts, morphing into someone who could take care of a toddler on his own may have caused me to overcompensate a little.

You have to realise that, for single parents, the list of tasks that simply must get done is endless. But, as I was soon to learn after meeting Christina, surviving and living are not the same, and these routine obsessions, which seemed normal to me for so long, would now have to become obsolete.

At first glance, I thought the transition would be easy. Finally, someone to share the burden of worry when Madeleine is up all night coughing, someone to help cook, shop, set up Beagle-opoly and enforce nightly dental flossing.

For the 18 months of our relationship that preceded us living together, Christina's relationship with Madeleine was one of pure friendship. I still had to enforce the rules, or come running as they flooded the bathroom with bathtub waves large enough to sink a Lego fleet. Christina's ideas were?fun and new – but I had no hesitation in dismissing them if I felt they threatened the stability of our routine.

However, after she moved in (and we were engaged), it was soon quite clear that my instinct to take charge and make the final decision was emotionally inhibitive. The single-mindedness and determination that had once ensured our survival was now its biggest threat.

In world mythology, there are countless examples of tragic characters whose greatest strength is also the source of their undoing. But?the ancient Greeks and Romans also held the view that acceptance is the beginning of wisdom. Here's interesting advice from the Greek philosopher Epictetus: "If you think you have free rein over things that are naturally beyond your control, or if you attempt to adopt the affairs of others as your own, your pursuits will be thwarted and you will become a frustrated, anxious and fault-finding person."

Whenever Christina tried to do anything, I?offered "suggestions" on how to do it better, or more safely, or with less mess. The fact that she said nothing for so long is a testament to her love, because this woman is no pushover: a fierce Wall Street litigator for many years, she now runs a?public relations and advertising business. She was simply kind enough to say nothing when, all along, it was me making the mistakes, doing everything wrong – ruining the house. Even if I was technically correct in these matters (it is better to load knives point down in the dishwasher, isn't it?), the truth is she had to learn this for herself, just as she had to flood the bathroom, burn the eggs and bloat the fish by overfeeding them.

Perhaps the most important reason to stop interfering was that if I didn't show complete trust in Christina, why should Madeleine? This all?came to a?crisis point when I had to fly to Paris for a book signing?soon after Christina moved in. The two of?them would be by themselves for several days?and nights.

While going over the logistics of things such as getting Madeleine to school, Christina mentioned she might take her into Central Park on Sunday. I?reacted with horror: "FOR GOD'S SAKE, DON'T TAKE HER ON THE SUBWAY!"

I lay in bed that night wondering if I should cancel the trip. But then my usually quiet father pointed out that any future for us as a family depended on my trusting Christina to look after Madeleine safely. The reality, of course, is that there is no such thing as absolute safety; danger and disease are part of our everyday lives, and if?we manage to avoid them it's pure luck.

Christina was in a difficult position. She had chosen to build a relationship with a?single parent, which meant she was having a?relationship with two people. It takes a very special person to do this: someone who has the courage to speak and let their voice be heard, but also the sensitivity and confidence to know when to let things go. And the emotional risks of getting involved with someone who has a?child are much greater, for in the event of discord you lose not one but two people. You have to negotiate with two personalities at the same time and suffer the loneliness of sometimes feeling like an outsider, because the truth is you are – at least at the beginning.It really takes guts to be a good step-parent, and men and women in these roles deserve more than Disney films pointing out how evil they are.

Madeleine and I cooked together, shared the same popcorn at the movies, went clothes shopping, argued, got the flu, had late-night chats – all part of a closeness that had been forced upon us. It would be a long time before Christina could enjoy a similar level of intimacy, yet she was never discouraged by the countless trials that accompanied her slow journey to motherhood. To?enable their relationship to grow, I would not only have to give up control, but also learn to share the joys of parenting. These pleasures are sometimes subtle. When Madeleine is at school, I?often sit in her bedroom looking at the colourful objects scattered across her desk, and imagine the?child ideas that brought together such a?mysterious landscape. I remember a cool September day in the park when Madeleine was four. I released my grip on her bicycle saddle and stood, breathless, as she wobbled across the football pitch. What can't be remembered has to?be imagined, so picture the round, astonished face of a little girl, realising that her father is far away – a figure in the distance, waving madly from the other side of the field.

This is the first time I've ever told the story of Madeleine's maiden voyage without stabilisers. Similarly, I've never told anyone about the time she glued a Tupperware container to her forehead like one of Isabella Blow's hats, or when?we searched an entire shopping mall for her?missing blue bear. When we eventually found him in the fitting room of Brooks Brothers, Madeleine's relief was marred by two white dots in the bear's eyes, which she assured me were not there before.

Until Christina came into our lives, these joys, sorrows, milestones of development and amusing?anecdotes were all mine to retell, quietly?savour or even forget.

Now, however, the success and depth of their relationship hinged on my sharing not only the responsibility of parenting, but also its joys. If Madeleine was to have any closeness with a new parent, they would have to build trust in their own way, and for that to happen I?would have to?let them share their own moments and have milestones that might not include me. I realised this when I got back from the business trip to Paris. Neither Christina nor Madeleine had been?killed, maimed, electrocuted, bitten, burned?or run over. In fact, the opposite. As?Madeleine blurted out: "It's actually more fun?without you, Dad."

Later, I found out that during a play session Madeleine had taken out the little photo album she?kept, to show Christina. "This is me as a baby," she said, "and this is my first mother."

On my second date with Christina years before, I had shown up very late. Most people would have left, but I found her having a quiet drink at the bar. The reason for my tardiness, I explained breathlessly, was that the air conditioner in my daughter's bedroom had broken and, because of the 30C-plus heatwave we were having, I?couldn't leave before settling her down in my bedroom, where it was much cooler and there were fans. That single sentence, like a spotlight, illuminated her road ahead, should she continue to see me.

About that time, Madeleine asked if I would ever get married again. At some point she must have come to the realisation that, in the Fred Astaire films we always watched, dance partners Fred and Ginger were not actually father and daughter. Like an eccentric aunt, she commanded that I "go to the opera – there are women there".

The strange thing is that the Metropolitan Opera in New York is exactly where Christina and I fell in love.

After we had been dating for several months, Christina met Madeleine for the first time in the?pouring rain outside the Museum of Natural History on Central Park West. Christina had anticipated the rain and bought museum tickets online. In the much smaller line to pick up preordered tickets, I can still picture them laughing at nothing to mitigate the awkwardness. What resembled an average scene to others was for them something unknown, unprecedented, and I would have to learn to stand back and wait?in the wings of our lives, like an understudy, as they found their roles and began to forge what for others had been given.

Madeleine did the right thing about Mother's Day by waving me off like a fly when I stood over her desk making suggestions for cards, eyeing the?crayon into her hand. When Sunday finally came, I cooked their favourite lunches and arranged for an afternoon pottery class for the?two of them. Over lunch, Madeleine gave Christina the card she had drawn in secret. It?was?of a rabbit, Christina's favourite animal.

They looked at it together, all smiles. Then Madeleine said: "But your real present is that from now on I'm going to call you Mom."

‧ Illusion Of Separateness, by Simon Van Booy, is published next week by Oneworld at ￡12.99. To order a copy for ￡9.99, including free mainland UK p&p, go to guardian.co.uk/bookshop.

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Slow life in Tasmania is finally fulfilling

Hilary Burden at her home in a valley in Tasmania: 'I have a sense of place, of being rooted.' Photograph: Alan Moyle

When the psychotherapist spoke about learning to be your own parent, I thought he was talking gibberish. The phrase haunted me for days, weeks, months, years … Now, nearly 10 years on, I think I can say that I am grown up enough to understand what he meant.

There is just you.

We might think that we will die if our loved ones leave us. Or that they may break down if we leave them. Or believe that our lives are meaningless if we can't or don't have children. At times life can be tragic but, most likely, we will not die of a broken heart and our lives are not without meaning without children.

And this is how I know.

I am fiftysomething. I have no kids. I live on my own. Put whatever labels you want to put on me, make whatever judgments you like. I am fulfilled. I know that I do not need to be married. I know that I am not deprived for not having children. Sometimes I find it hard to understand why some women feel they must reproduce at any cost. My biology is different.

This morning I picked golden plums straight from the trees in my back garden. A guilty pleasure; I didn't plant the trees, they require little care, and they are free. But they are loved.

Home, now, after years working in London, is a green valley in Tasmania, a place with a postcode and no shop. I was brought up in Tasmania in the late 1960s and 70s, when it was common for young people to leave the place to experience more of the world. Now, after more than two decades away, and much to my surprise, it is my world.

Having lived a professional life mostly in London, a return to Tasmania came about because of a desire to live closer to food and nature. I'd learned about the slow food movement working on a food magazine in London, but my own life was too fast to live it, and I?ate out more than in. Days were wasted in traffic jams, in queues, on public transport, in long meetings, and in waiting … I felt my city life was over.

So I settled on a simple weatherboard house in the country I knew, no job, and no idea how to sustain a life – just a knowingness that said if I had stayed where I was I would fade like a cushion in the sun. My mother lives half an hour away, and so do my two brothers, with their children. You don't go home for them, but a blood connection is both easier and harder than any other.

My house was built in 1898, and in the 50s and 60s served as a convent school for the nearby Sacred Heart church. Services are still held there: vehicles are parked in the paddock, and at Easter, Christmas and funerals, often overflow on to the nearby lane and down to the main road. I'm not religious, but I love that I live in a?house once called home by single women – nuns – of independent spirit and mindful of temperament.

Despite living on my own, it feels as if I have company. At least five homes within eyesight, a number that seems to double at night when the lights of farms and houses pop out from distant hills. I don't feel the need to make friends, but I sense that we share something, living in this landscape, as if we're all in it together, looking after it. It's not like in a city, where you can shut out the world and disappear, or pass a neighbour on a staircase and not say hello, or look out of your window at blocks of flats and not know one soul living in them. It's not anonymous like that. Here, the country makes you part of it. I have a sense that I belong without "belonging".

I've learned many things here – the most simple being seasonal living; that it's not something you aspire to, more a way of life. I have learned, and the Nuns' House has taught me, that who I am is not my job, my family, or my partner, although all these things are important. I have learned to rely on the world around me and in doing this I look after myself. For example, living on tank water, I've learned to measure my daily usage. When the tank is low, and with no sign of rain, running out is a visible reality. This is not something easily appreciated living in the city, connected to a mains supply.

While the world of commodities strives to homogenise the seasons (we can have anything we want whenever we want it), country life encourages you to respect them. In doing this, I have found a new way to be. A life that you have when you're not busy doing other things. A life that unfolds around you, that moves like the tide, and in sync with the seasons.

I moved here on my own without plans and have met my partner and started a new business. I did this getting lost on the way to visit a friend. I stopped at his property to ask the way. He, it turns out, is also an escapee from corporate life, and now lives across the road. He set up a hobby nursery and when the local market started, we took plants and herbs to sell, and later fresh produce from a local farmer. We put any profits that we made into a tin and spent it on local champagne. One day the market was rained off, so we boxed up our produce and took it to town. We called this our "rainy day business model". It?was so successful, we've been doing it ever since. There's no weekly pay cheque, but I've never been happier.

There are only 72 summers in one lifetime, I remember a London adman telling me when he left the safety of a big job to start up his own business. The line he used stayed with me. If I only had 30 summers left – less if I was unlucky – what was I doing?

During the past eight summers, the Nuns' House has helped me realise that who I am is where I am. With no children of my own, I have a sense of place, of being rooted, of staying not in, but home, although I know I've only just begun to scratch the surface.

The gift of these years is that while my mother, Audrey, is still bright but ageing, I know I will not feel like an orphan when she's gone.

One day turns into the next and each day I follow the seasons. To leave home without a good reason feels like a betrayal, a wanton waste of time. To go beyond my own boundary would be to turn my back on the things I've started and lose momentum. It would be as if those small efforts to take care of my own back yard – the efficacy of untold devotion – had counted for not very much.

A Story of Seven Summers: Life in the Nuns' House by Hilary Burden is published by Allen & Unwin, ￡12.99. To order a copy for ￡10.39, with free UK p&p, go to guardian.co.uk/bookshop or call 0330 333 6846

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Dying with dignity – what next after the Liverpool care pathway? | Elizabeth Dzeng

'Care at the end of life is as active and intensive as any other treatment – just with a different goal in mind.' Photograph: Voisin/Phanie/Rex Features

Controversy and opposition over the Liverpool care pathway (LCP) has prompted the Department of Health to commission an independent review into the end-of-life system. A report released on Monday revealed "numerous examples of poor implementation and worrying standards in care," prompting the commission to recommend phasing out the pathway over the next six to 12 months.

Used correctly, the LCP allows people to die with dignity – surrounded by loved ones rather than machines and in peace, rather than in the violent throes of CPR. But instead, examples of LCP-induced distress flooded the news over the past year.

The implementation of the LCP was so deeply flawed that rather than facilitating a good death, in some cases it worsened the emotional burden and created missed opportunities for proper goodbyes. Much of this can be attributed to a critical failure of communication between doctors and patients and their families.

Communication is integral to successful treatment in almost every aspect of medicine, but nowhere is it as evident as in care at the end of life. As such, no end-of-life intervention will be successful unless doctors fully embrace family discussions as a required component of treatment. The LCP guidelines emphasise communication as part of the pathway, but too often that falls to the wayside.

Most importantly, this is the time for the dying person to say their final farewells and get their affairs straight, but also for their family to begin coming to terms with their impending loss. A family member of a patient on the LCP lamented: "My mum didn't even get to say goodbye to her husband of 51 years because she was too traumatised." Beginning the process of bereavement is impossible if the family is kept in the dark about imminent death and implementation of the LCP.

This failure to communicate with both patients and the public, turned the LCP into a "'barbaric' end of life pathway" where people were "starved to death". These phrases highlight fears and misunderstandings about the end of life, where cessation of eating and drinking is actually a wholly natural sign that death is approaching.

We have an innate desire to nurture and feed the weak, but hydration can potentially do more harm than good. Often the heart is too weak to pump blood, causing water to accumulate in the lungs and resulting in breathlessness and a horrible feeling of drowning. Fluid can also accumulate in the flesh causing pain and discomfort. What should never be withheld in the LCP are pain medications and other therapies such as oxygen that help relieve distressing symptoms.

Palliative care and the LCP should not be thought of as causing death. When the end of life is inevitable, it is (depending on what you believe) God or nature who decides the moment you go, not doctors or families, and it is certainly not determined by whether food or drink is given. Care at the end of life is as active and intensive as any other treatment – just with a different goal in mind. Indeed, a focus on comfort and symptom management early on has been shown to extend life, decrease depression, and improve quality of life. As doctors make the most informed patients, it should be reassuring to know that 90% of doctors would be happy to be placed on the pathway themselves if they were dying.

Many challenges inherent in the healthcare system hinder a doctor's ability to communicate. Time pressures and heavy workloads make it difficult to have lengthy conversations, especially those that address topics the doctor may not be personally comfortable with. A recent survey by the Royal College of Physicians showed that 37% of medical registrars felt their workload was "unmanageable". In a system described as "unsafe" and at a "crisis point," important conversations are crowded out by the need to acutely stabilise other ill patients under the doctor's care.

This is further exacerbated by the taboos British society holds against discussing death. According to one study, approximately 75% of the public and GPs agree that British people are uncomfortable talking about death and dying and only 30% of people have talked to their loved ones about their own wishes.

Future efforts to replace the LCP must include system-wide changes, which address these structural challenges. Medical education will need to intensify efforts to train junior doctors and medical students in end of life discussions and expose them frequently to issues of death and dying. The medical profession will need a shift in mindset to reprioritise the importance of interpersonal relationships and communication into the practice of medicine. Although logistical and budgetary constraints limit the NHS's ability to lighten workloads, alternative programmes could be considered to bring in social workers, chaplains, nurses and community volunteers to improve patient and family empowerment regarding end-of-life issues.

The Liverpool care pathway has met its end today, but the need to promote a peaceful and dignified death has never been more important.

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Nigerian senator who 'married girl of 13' accused of breaking Child Rights Act

Girls at a school in Sokoto state. A rights group said: 'Yerima must be prosecuted for violating the Child Rights Act and marrying a 13-year old'. Photograph: Martin Godwin

A Nigerian senator who is said to have married a 13-year old girl has blocked attempts to modernise the constitution, campaigners say, and implicitly endorsed child marriage.

Nigeria's Senate has voted to keep a law that equates married girls to adults, even if they are under 18, and gives them the right to renounce their citizenship. Critics say that the law could be used to support child marriage.

"This clause implicitly endorses child marriage," said Toyin Saraki, founder of the WellBeing Foundation Africa, one of the groups that is calling for the Senate to change the law.

"I cannot see any justification for the retention of a rule which makes a special status of girls who are unmarried brides and wants to construe them as adults," she said.

"The only thing that every Nigerian has, by virtue of their birth, is their citizenship. Renouncing that is something that should be done by an informed adult, and not a minor – whether male or female.

"Our constitution is moving towards the word 'person' – it remains a huge anomaly to retain a law that is gender specific."

The amendment would not actually legalise child marriage in Nigeria, which is already prohibited under the Child Rights Act. But the perception that Nigeria's legislators are undermining protection for the legal status of children has sparked widespread debate in the country.

Nigerians started tweeting using the hashtag "#ChildNotBride", with tweets such as: "Every self-respecting man and woman should speak out for those who cannot speak for themselves."

The amendment has sparked a particular backlash against the senator widely regarded as responsible for the decision, Ahmed Yerima, who is reported to have married a 13-year old Egyptian girl. Yerima has denied the girl is 13.

One human rights group, Women Empowerment and Legal Aid, has given a 30-day ultimatum to Nigeria's attorney-general, Mohammed Adoke, to prosecute Yerima.

"We are saying that Senator Yerima must be prosecuted for violating the Child Rights Act and marrying a 13-year old," said Funmi Falana from Women Empowerment and Legal Aid. "This is such a sad case. You cannot marry an underage girl in Egypt, so he brought her to Nigeria where nobody will do anything. That has to change."

"Not only has he violated the law, but he is making the law for all the rest of us. There must be consequences," Falana added.

The Senate moved to quell the growing controversy surrounding the provisions, saying that it was not principally about marriage.

Ike Ekweremadu, deputy leader of the Senate, said at a press briefing in Abuja: "I want to appeal to Nigerians to please show understanding, to possibly read this section and understand that the issue has nothing to do with early marriage.

"Essentially, it has to do with the renunciation of citizenship. So you have to give it a proper perspective. I want to assure them that in the future, we are ready to revisit it if Nigerians feel strongly about it.

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