Women have sassy aspirational labels cunningly designed to make us spend money on designer accessories, lose weight and wear sexy get ups . . .

wheeling the Mama's & Papa's three wheeled buggy around Sundrive Superquinn whilst hunting for Nigella-inspired ingredients to turn us into Domestic Goddesses. Men's lifestyle labels are just basically terms of abuse. House Husband and New Man . . . however much we might have been relieved by them . . . are just basically male code for a whipped man-slave or Big Girl's Blouse.

Horribly, in my early, impressionable 20s I became enthralled by and infatuated with the lone male journalist on Cosmopolitan magazine who was the individual actually responsible for creating the phrase "New Man" in the late '80s, thus launching a generation of sensitive, caring men not afraid to show their feelings. Several years later, having relieved almost every female journalist in London of her propriety (and thanks to a boastful nature, their dignity too) this man finally confessed to me that being Mr Sensitive and Caring New Man was actually just a quick, cheap route to get a woman into bed. Thankfully the Loadedmen's mags culture put a stop to that in the '90s and reverted men back to neanderthal form . . . where at least we women knew where we were with them again.

Which is more than we can say for where we are with ourselves. Seemingly Yummy Mummies are "out". So having tortured ourselves with highlights, vaginal depilation, fake tan, tits and nails to fit the brief . . . we are now told "Yummies" are scrounging, lazies-who-lunch and what we have to do is become Alpha Mummies. In other words all of the above whilst running Citi-Bank and chair-personing an international charity. Men's modern-media labels on the other hand merely encourage them to remain beer swilling, chest-beating 14-year-old fart monsters (see back page of this supplement). It's a conspiracy. It has to be. We get lured into labelling it as a 'bit of fun'. But actually, it isn't fun at all.

I frequently have a 'morning-matching-moment' where I feel it would be just letting the side down to turn up at my son's school at 9am looking under par . . . in other words in my natural state. So at three minutes to nine I am stressed trying to figure out what to wear . . . in a panic because some mother, who has already seen me looking like dog-food at least 30 times already this month . . . might label me 'slummy' instead of 'yummy'. And I live in rural Mayo where such labels don't exist except in the heads of a few impressionable media junkies (like me, obviously). I am so tired of living up to my own interpretation of these stupid labels, but perfectionism, even (especially) when you fall so far short of it . . . is addictive.

On the other hand I guess there is nothing more annoying than perfection in a person. That's my excuse anyway.