The Female Principal blog series part 6: The head-peckers

The head-peckers They are like wood-peckers – constantly pecking on the side of your head: “I want to know what YOU are going to do to make MY life happier.”

1. when are you going to give me my allowance? I need money or else I cannot go out

2. I need a lift or else I’ll have to walk, will be killed and it will be your fault

3. when are you going to spend more time at home? You are supposed to be a wife/mother/daughter, not a business owner

4. I need a pay-rise because I cannot afford my lifestyle

5. I need money for a school trip or else I will be the only one of our class who doesn’t go

6. I cannot survive on 45%, I need a 50% contract or else I will have to look elsewhere

7. I need to put my lab fees up

8. I need you to reduce your overdraft or else the bank’s Head Office will withdraw your funding

9. I need my dinner – I’m hungry

10. I need more new patients or else my income will go down

11. I need you to have a word with that associate because he is driving the girls round the bend

12. I need a clean shirt for the office tomorrow

13. I need you to let me have all the paperwork to prepare your accounts or else you will have a late-filing charge

14. I need you to prepare for a big tax bill

15. I need you to go on another post-graduate course or else you will fall behind

16. I need sex or else I won’t feel good about myself

(best personal coaching I ever had – men need sex to feel good, women need to feel good to want sex)

1. I need to go home because I’m feeling ill – you will have to get cover or else I will puke over the next patient

2. Teacher says I need to take in a model of the Eiffel Tower made from lolly sticks by tomorrow morning

(and that was Monday – God knows what Tuesday will bring) The reality is that head-peckers know all about X-Women. They know that X-Women are compulsive helpers and will always pull a magical solution out of the hat – because you cannot live with yourself without solving ALL the problems placed before you each day. So if you make it clear to the world that you are a committed X-Woman – the head-peckers will line up and start tapping. Is it any wonder you wake at 03:00 and cannot get back to sleep? *An excerpt from The Female Principal manuscript by Chris Barrow – to be published as an ebook later in 2014