Practical Parenting expert: Melissa Waring

Mel Waring is a full-time single mum of two girls, Harper, four and Milla, three, and blogger at Life of Lyons. After discovering her partner of nine years, Nathan Lyons,  had been having a year-long affair with a woman from Perth and being dragged through a media circus, she found strength and courage in writing and sharing her journey. She prides herself on being an amazing mother and loves that she can share and inspire others to be true to who they are and prove that when life gives you lemons, make lemonade.

Q. Tell us about Life of Lyons and why you decided to start this blog?

A. The blog started as a bit of therapy for myself then as time went on I was contacted by so many men and woman who were in similar situations. They would share their heartbreaking stories with me and it gave me the strength to share more of mine and let people see that I may have been a happy face in photos yet that was sometimes far from what I was experiencing on the inside.

Q. Do you feel like you have to censor yourself and the full story sometimes to protect your daughters?

A. One day my children will grow up and be curious about what's out there on the internet about Nathan and I. If I had my way there would be nothing to see but unfortunately that’s not the case for us. Because of that I want them to be able to read how they and myself got through this chapter and how lucky we are to have each other. I don’t censor anything because that would be unfair to them and me, the truth will always come out so honesty is the best policy in my book. 

Q. Have you had any feedback? How have your readers responded?

A. Readers have been incredible, I get lots of messages of support, emails of people's stories and encouraging words to keep me going. Heartbreak is universal and I think people need to know they are not alone.

Q. How did you feel going from a WAG travelling the world to feeling like your life had been turned upside down?

A. Cricket gave us some incredible opportunities, travel being on top of the list, my girls have more stamps on their passports than I did at age 25. The girls missing out on those experiences is something I think about a lot but I know I don’t need cricket to do that, we still travel and I plan on doing lots more, the possibilities are endless – not limited to places they play cricket any more. I think the real loss is them not getting that time with their dad rather than the travel itself because at the end of the day that was why we did it.

Q. What do you hope readers, and yourself, will gain out of Life of Lyons?

A. I want people to see that I'm a normal person. I'm a full-time single mother of two, I don’t have help at home, I struggle with my weight, balancing 'me time', our house a lot of the time looks like a bomb went off but we are doing the best we can and surviving. I won't let anything stop me from going on adventures, trying new things and I hope someone who is on the same journey can get some courage and strength from us and do the same.

Q. What has been the upside of this for your daughters?

A. That our situation is like lots of other families and that’s ok. These things in life make up who we are as people and its how we overcome them that defines us. They will continue to do amazing things and have incredible experiences whether with or without Nathan and they are lucky regardless.

Q. Do you worry about revealing too much information about their lives?

A. I don’t feel like I reveal too much, some things are just for us. But it would also be very strange if I didn’t show them at all, they make up who I am, I spend every day with these two people and that’s like a lot of stay-at-home or single mums. There will always be people who don’t like what you're doing or who you are, that’s the nature of social media unfortunately.

Q. Tell us about what a typical day looks like for you and the girls?

A. A typical day is breakfast while listening to some music, then the girls come to the gym with me at 10am, lunch is often out at the park or beach while catching up with friends and then they like to help me cook dinner so I set up a station for them and they go wild. Craft and drawing makes up a lot of our day at the moment too. We are usually out and about, rarely home, gymnastics and swimming are also our actives of choice at the moment.

Q. What would you tell your new-single-mum self (with the gift of hindsight)?

A. Be kind to yourself, cry, feel every emotion you need to because it's ok. See a positive in every day and be thankful for it. Small achievements are worth celebrating, even if it is dinner and the kids are in bed at a normal hour.

Q. What are you most proud of accomplishing?

A. Being true to myself, being honest and without a doubt I can say I go above and beyond for my children and I'm proud of the mother, and at the moment, father I am for them.

Follow Mel

Website: lifeoflyons.blog Instagram: @mel_waring