Torquay United Fans Forum

Burnhamgull wrote:A little bit of both Andy....

I mean if a kid gets a trial with TUFC, can you imagine the stick his mates would give him?

Kid 1: "I've got a trial with Torquay"
Kid 2: "So what, they're sh*t!"

The main point of my post was aimed at the fact that kids don't want to come and watch TUFC anymore and that's down to a number of reasons, two of which are the advent of SKY and also the fact we're so poor currently. Why would you come and watch Torquay on a cold day in December when you could stay at home and watch any one of 6-7 premier league games at home?

I'm bringing my kids down on Sunday for a "treat".........poor sods. I usually stand on the popside but for one game only I'll pay for the luxury of sitting in the blustery cold family stand. Happy Days!

Ironically, my youngest who is five is Torquay mad. Everything has to be "yellow for Torquay"......she loves telling me she hates Exeter and always wants to know if she can come..........

Then I take her and destroy her dreams in one afternoon. The 10 year old has already learned that there is more to life.....

Excellent post Burnham (wish i knew your real name, not for creepiness but just because i hate referring to people as places , i reckon you are a Paul or a Steve.).

I had to laugh at the bit about bringing your kids to the footy for a treat! Raised a few smiles with me as i've had the same problem with my little un. I took my 5 year old to the York home game with Mansfield for her first game and to her credit she sat through it all although their were plenty of sweets and chocolates on the menu plus Yorkie the Lion was very accommodating. "Daddy i'm bored..........." she would say.

"Well so am **** i!!" I'd say having not seen a York home win in all comps for 15 games.


Obviously i didn't say that, i wouldn't swear at children. I have some intelligence (so i'm told).

Then i took her to the home game v Accrington on Boxing Day which was marginally better and for the first 30 she was asking lots of questions and ok until the temperature dropped and the game petered out. "Can we go home yet daddy?" i got a million times. The ref also added 7 minutes of injury time the ****!!! Thank God i brought the technology, the tablet and she was ok for a while longer. She did get involved a bit when York defender Brad Halliday got harshly sent off for a 'lunge' on ex Gull tosser Tom Aldred when she began chanting CHEAT CHEAT CHEAT CHEAT!! along with the rest of the baying Minstermen though.

After the game i had a rant at a chav scally who was clearly drunk and trying to get himself and his bike through the oncoming hordes of Minstermen and over the railway footbridge next to Scarborough Terrace at Bootham Crescent. He was chuntering about how he had rights and was entitled to take his bicycle over the footbridge just like anyone else. I had a look round to see if my little one was in earshot and told him to get a life the sad ****.

Says me having just spent my saturday afternoon at a York game with a 5 year old. Man i'm living la vida babay!!

It is all about perseverance though with young ones. They aren't going to enjoy it. I'm 38 and don't **** enjoy it! They've got no chance but like anything in life if you go often enough and make it a habit then eventually habits become hard to break.

Take me, i can't stop coming on here posting shite.

Take them to Plainmoor. Keep taking them, keep taking them and getting them involved and eventually it becomes 'something you just do' and you are away. The football is guaranteed to be shit whether it's York or Torquay so you have to have other things up your sleeve to keep them interested.

Don't give in and keep taking the little buggers.

I'd also like to mention that when i came down for the home game with Newport last season i was sat in the bench and it was bloody freezing and this bloke had a little lad with him a few rows in front of me who was laid down playing with a toy for the best part of the second half. I felt sad for him as a parent (not his parent unless i've had a drunken affair in the torbay area a few years back ) but as a dad myself i felt sorry for the kid.

Then i thought about it more and realized that the dad had done the right thing. Kids can't always have what they want. Take them to TUFC games every week and they are gonna be bored off their tits. Standard. Just like when you start smoking you think it's shit. I smoked for 3 months before somebody told me you had to inhale. I was just blowing it back out again!! No wonder i thought it was shit!!

Keep taking them and it becomes second nature.

What is there is that is more than football?

If you have a passion then surely you want to pass that on to your children?

When they are older they can make their own decisions. If these 'decisions' involve asking me to take her to see a Premier League club then THAT is when i get on the blower to Supernanny. Some things simply have to be stamped out.

Forgive me if i appear to be a little more intrusive on this forum of late than is desired. I have no intention to continue posting on a regular basis although i do like contributing to forums on the popside which most of you don't read anyway so no bother.

BECAUSE I ACTUALLY CARE


The above is the answer to the question you have just asked youself in your head when you opened this thread.

The question being, "WHY THE **** DON'T YOU PISS OFF!! THIS IS OUR BOARD!!!"

All i wanted to do is post some balance to all negativity that has pervaded YOUR forum lately.

Despite all the doom and gloom i do see plenty to be positive about but i do now firmly believe that the club has to open up to the fans and you all need to start working together in order to stabilize, survive - and flourish.

You're the only club to have bloody palm trees outside their ground for fecks sake!! That honour cannot be allowed to be lost.

Positives first....................

You still have a club with one of the better squads in the conference. You aren't in so much debt that the words 'Hereford' and 'Portsmouth' regularly crop up although the latter got away with murder. You have a young manager and club legend who has the benefit of respect from the fans, you have a core fanbase that some league 2 clubs can survive on, you are well capable of achieving a play off spot and lastly if i urge you to sit back and reflect a while at the predicaments the fans of Darlington, Scarborough, Stockport, Hereford and others have suddenly found themselves in.

There are plenty of positives to concentrate on.

I strongly feel that in order for the club to survive, not grow but just survive is through co-operation and team work. The club needs to open up to the fans and ask for help.

There is little doubt in my mind that the club need help.

Am i that naive that i truly believe that there are many fans out there who are willing to work voluntarily to help the club out in all manner of activities? I think fans are reluctant at the minute because they feel already taken for granted but if those at the club revealed they were struggling and needed help then many fans would plug the gap. The club has to once again become an entity that the ordinary fan can feel connected with and it's unusual to be saying that as you usually associate this with the mega clubs such as Man Utd or Chelsea.

Those that run the club don't have to reveal details of their financial investments and all the rest of it but to just admit that a lot more pairs of hands and fans with different skills and access to different things would help the club with the peripheral but critical elements of running the football club.

Just for the club to admit that mistakes have been made and accept that they need everyone's help to muck in and get the club moving again would be a great start. Is it pride, is it that they don't want to admit they need help? Is it because it may be seen as unprofessional and further accentuate the 'joke club' tag?

It's all about community. TUFC are a community club and at the moment it feels as if there is a clear 'them and us' mentality. The club is for the community and the community can be for the club too. The fans can help and i'm sure are willing to help.

Refusing to work in co-operation and unity with the very people who mostly keep the club afloat makes no business sense.

Again i think it's all about transparency and openness, i don't mean go into intricate detail about the inner workings of the club but for them to say that maybe they are struggling with the social media side of things, are there any fans out there experienced in that side of things willing and able to give up their free time to sort this? Maybe free match tickets as payment or whatever. In other areas they need help in, could they get volunteers to get involved and share the workload of a normal working day?

Could more people help with match day entertainment? Could people be asked about the programme and what they would like in it? Could people provide regular features in it? For example (i've not seen one yet) a page spotlighting a fan and a sort of Q&A about where they are from and why they support the Gulls and other stuff. It seems that most footy programmes are of pretty much the same content and there is nothing different to make them unique.

Could people help selling tickets on a matchday, could people help in the club shop and so on and so forth.

It's down to the club to ask for help and accept that they can't do the whole shebang on their own. Again, it's all about communication and working with the fans instead of treating them as pounds and pence.

As Mark Jenkins from The Hotel said, "I want to work with you, i don't want to battle against you........".

Not the best quote i know but why look for Shakespeare when what he said sums it up perfectly.

I've often accused Torquay fans of being slow to get involved but those running the club may find that fan involvement is imperative to their survival. The fans withj half a brain cell won't swallow the embarrassment that are 'fans forums' anymore. The last one made me piss myself laughing. More wooden than Sylvester Stallone!! Fans want the truth and a way forward, not what they got last time around. Open up , don't cover up. The true fans and decent people will always support you. A club that is 100% united fears nobody. Nothing can't be overcome because everyone knows the score and everyone is singing from the same hymnsheet.

A club that is 100% united should be Torquay United.

Community club?

Prove it.

We get a lot of pointless shite up here in the Derbyshire times.

"Mr Steward was caught leaving the store with 8 packets of fish fingers inside his coat" was one line.

**** seriously.

75% of my local paper is pointless and probably aimed at pointless people. Why do i not find it interesting then?

When you say that kids aren't interested Burnham are you referring to kids coming to watch TUFC or kids refusing to join or to look elsewhere for their footballing development?

If it's kids not coming to Plainmoor to watch games then i totally agree and to a certain extent i have some sympathy with the club on this. When i was at secondary school myself and loads of school pals would often head on down to Belle Vue, Doncaster to watch the Rovers, have a laugh and a kick about beforehand. This was even though some of them supported other clubs and went with their parents a lot (Sheff Wed / Barnsley) mainly. Night games were especially fun, all piling on the bus from near Askern on the south / north yorks border to Donny and then walking the rest of the way past the racecourse and onto Belle Vue. I'm only talking maybe 20 years back.

Even so, in those days there was no internet, no Sky Sports and not many other distractions. If you wanted a football fix you either watched MOTD and Goals on Sunday, bought a copy of Match or Shoot or actually went to a game.

Today kids have football on tap whether it is footage and info on the internet or 24/7 on TV, they have a million and other things to do with their mates OTHER than go to Plainmoor and watch low quality football. Times have changed and it is twice as hard now to get the younger ones in, especially if they don't already have some connection with the club ie their parents are TUFC fans and what have you.

I just don't think the interest is there anymore for young ones and teens and i know the club have gone around schools trying to promote themselves and give out free tickets (i think - correct me if i'm wrong) and also done numerous kids ticket deals for home games which the club have to be commended for. I don't really see what else the club can do on that score. For me they have a HUGE problem holding onto current fans more than they do attracting new ones and it is this i feel that this is where the primary focus should be in future months and years.

TUFC, like many lower league and indeed Championship clubs have become victims of changing times and i feel the only semblance of a chance they have at generating new interest with the young 'uns is through social media now and interactive web stuff. As Bobby pointed out in another thread which was bang on, the lack of social media presence at TUFC is poor.

Listen, i'm not fussed because like njgull, i'd generally speaking rather voluntarily offer myself for unnecessary medical trials involving major invasive surgery than view photos of peoples take aways on facebook or see that some random nobody in Chipping Camden has 806 followers purely based on the premise that he once claimed he had seen an image of Elvis in a duckpond and posted it on twitter.

BUT most people aren't like me thank shit. Most people can't live without a device superglued to their hands or ears or even face! Most young ones can't function without spending half their life on social media so i guess in that respect Bobby has a superb point. Torquay simply need to bombard the social media world with incessant 'stuff'. It is the ONLY way of recruiting new fans in 2015 and beyond. Maybe TUFC don't realise how important it is or perhaps through no fault of their own they haven;t anybody with the time or expertise to nail this sucker down once and for all. I don't know either way but it needs to be done regardless like Bobby says.

If you are referring kids not wanting to come to TUFC to play football then i find that odd. Listen, i know nothing about youth set ups or anything but i do know that Torquay United are a well known club despite what some say and most youngsters with an opportunity to go and play for them and be involved in the set up would jump at the chance i'm sure. I'm talking the first rung on the ladder here and not some kid who has been at Plainmoor a while before finding out that it's better at Exeter or Plymouth (if indeed it is - i've no idea). I can't believe that a kid offered trials or to join the youth set up at Torquay for the first time would say piss off because you're a joke club - i'm waiting for the Greeks to come and get me?

Anyway.

I think TUFC went wrong the most when i forked out £65 on a replica shirt for myself and little one and then a few months later brought out a new one whilst Sports Direct were knocking the old ones out at £7.99. An apology would have been nice. Failing that - some prior communication to save others wasting cash? Surely they knew or did they conveniently 'forget' to tell fans about this? Apologising for things they have done wrong and communication perhaps not TUFC 's strong points. If Bobby has his way then we can add social media to that list too.

Why Scott?

Do you mean because she complained or because the press thought it worthy of a story?

On both counts i'd have to agree with you.

I did always think that the population of Guernsey was 2 though..................... :~D

Anyway the one thing i can truly say is that i tried to get to as many TUFC games as possible in the last 5 years home and away and have been all over the UK (as have many other TUFC fans) and i NEVER booed or criticised the players at games only on the forum after, and i always sang and encouraged the players at every step.

As someone whose heart wasn't 100% in it i reckon i did a pretty good job.

Good to make your acquaintance at the Kassam for the only time Dave and all the best.

Now............................what the friggin' hell happened at Welling?!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Southampton Gull wrote:Andy, for almost all of us the Club is in our blood and whether we attend or not doesn't make us hypocrites. I can't pretend to understand how you can swap allegiances like you have in the past as I just couldn't do it. I've supported Torquay for as long as I can remember but when I lived in Oxford I watched them and likewise I watched Saints when I moved to Southampton. I hate everything about Portsmouth which most people assume is because of a fondness for Saints, it's actually manifested through years of playing against Portsmouth based teams and working the doors of some of the leading clubs in both Southampton and Portsmouth.

As soon as I retired from playing there was only one team I wanted to go and watch. The road network got better, I had the time and could afford to go to nearly every home game. No matter how bad it gets and no matter what league we play in I will always be a Torquay fan.

I just couldn't do what you've done and suddenly decide to support another team. That doesn't mean I think you're a hypocrite, to me the club just couldn't have been in your blood like it is for the rest of us in the first place. I neither like or dislike you more for your choice on who to support, there are plenty of other reasons you're a dick

I think there is perhaps more truth in this than you think and is a very sensible comment Dave.

As for the changing of allegiance i don't think it's as cut and dried as me just dumping one club and picking up another. You are right when you say i have 'watched' a number of clubs including Donny (because it was partly the place i grew up), York and Hull (both who were then in the bottom tier so hardly i can be accused of glory hunting) because i partly grew up around York and played for Hull so i had ties like you did with say Saints and Oxford. I had the best of my times at York and have always had that 'deep rooted' soft spot for a place where you know and you spent many a happy time growing up. I didn't fully realize that at the time. I never have actually fully and commitedly properly been a supporter of any other club other than Torquay so hardly switching allegiance. I watched other clubs as part of social group, not because they were MY club.

Yes during the summer i went to a Derby County match and enjoyed the experience, it was just so different to be sat there with 30 odd thousand people and being overawed by the noise and spectacle. It wasn't right though inside and i had no connection with Derby, just like i had no connection with Torquay. I wanted to watch football again and i wanted that feeling that YOU get when you set foot inside Plainmoor. I went back to York and the football up until Christmas has been worse than Torquay dished up last season but i'm not bothered. I feel happy here. There are a few old and (shocked) faces., i'm a Yorkie and that's it.

This goes someway to responding to Friendlygas too when he said that you support a team because it's where you are from or grew up or had an affinity / connection with.

Maybe i should be thanking the total ineptness of those who run TUFC for pushing me back in the right direction but i've certainly been on the most unusual, turbulent and interesting of journeys these last 10 years.

My last point is that there are many examples of fans switching allegiances and for less excusable reasons as mine. I read about a York fan in one of the programmes who used to support Newcastle United for many years but he got fed up of the money oriented attitude of the premier league and the players and decided to go and watch his nearest lower league club for REAL football. A valid reason you'd think but he has done it. Many have been so disillusioned with their 'club' that they have switched or even formed new clubs like FC United of Manchester.

My example explaining why i couldn't be a hypocrite is EXACTLY the scenario that the FC United fans found themselves in. Unhappy with the owners and board so much that they formed a new club or stopped going to Old Trafford. Not until the Glazers had gone but for good. Obviously i can't form a new club with a breakaway of one therefore i have to do as they have done and view TUFC as failing to exist.

Oh and as for the other reasons why i'm a dick?

Too numerous to list my friend. :na:

Agree with you about Sky as well. I've got BT as it shows lower league but i can't be doing with all that 'top 4' battle stuff. Top 4 gets you more money so it's more important than winning a trophy as you get less money for that. I'd rather go back to supporting Torquay than follow a Prem Club although somebody once said that Man City was a good place to start. :slap:

RussianGull wrote:I'm not reading Andys post because they're normally about 1% content, 99% crap/thanking someone for welcoming him back on to the forum.

Moving on, Hector - what you posted was spot on.

Oh yes, Hectors post which in itself was very accurate but also in it he said that he understood the reasons why fans don't go anymore, falling out of love with TUFC i believe he said.

So you fully understand this but make an exception for me? I'm touched.

Here is a teaser for you to get your head around then, obviously you've learned Russian so you are a very intelligent individual. Hoepfully before you dismiss this as the 99% crap you'll get a chance to work it out and see where i'm coming from. Not fussed if you don't, it's just your opinion and not truth.

Firstly, i know there are many fans who have stopped going to games either because they are fed up with the poor football or the way they have been treated or the way they feel let down by the board. A variety of different reasons has seen fans 'fall out of love with TUFC' so they either don't go anymore or go as and when.

I am not judging any of these fans and have no reason to doubt their reasons for doing this or their integrity, this is their own personal choice but i need to highlight this to make my point.

As superfan Plainmoor Roar and others are oft chomping at the bit to point out, the role of the true supporter is to dig in and keep going even during darkest days REGARDLESS of any factors that would otherwise make them stop attending. If it's poor football, relegation, administration, anything. I 100% agree with this which bizarrely is something he and others somehow fail to comprehend.

So i am fuming with the board and the club for letting me down in a nutshell so what do i do? Do i stop attending until the current board leave thus causing more hardship for the club and then when the new board come in start going again?

I can't do that as i would be a hypocrite.

So i am sick to the back teeth of the standard of football and stop going like Brucie and others have until the club sign some players or performances and results improve?

I can't do that either because when the club needed me during those bad days i bailed out so to turn up again when the going gets good is not acceptable. Again i'd be a hypocrite. Some fans like Brucie are happy to miss games because they are fed up and return when they fancy it again or the results have got better. I can't do that. You either go or don't. Not for a bit. You either go or you don't.

I cannot continue to give the club any more of my money for the reasons you all know about so rather than come back when the problems have gone i have to sever ties and pretend that TUFC is no longer in existence. Why? Because i'd be a hypocrite and want my cake and eat it.

So you see maybe you should be looking closer to home at the ones that stay away until it's all sunshine and roses again and leave the childish remarks for them?

Now do you get it? :ping:

tl:dr :na:

As ever CP, a thoroughly well constructed and reasoned post and i enjoyed reading it.

However

It's gone wrong and whilst mistakes from the past can be lessons learnt they can't be changed.

Torquay United have failed to let the shock of hitting rock bottom wake themselves up i'm afraid.

The future can be shaped but there aren't any sculptors behind the scenes.

The TUST are the only group i've seen trying to make a difference and i reckon they've attracted a few hundred members and why? Because fans who come on here because they pay their money and feel it is their right to have a dig at others themselves aren't interested in getting involved because it is too much hassle.

Full respect to TUST and i wish you all the best. A group trying to make TUFC better for the future and are prepared to do something about it.

The future is this. Fans getting together to try and do something positive. Just join up, stop **** moaning at the stay aways and make things happen yourselves if you are that bothered about the club. I fully expect a further 1000 new members by next week.

If the club aren't interested in tightening the bond between them and the fans then it's up to you guys. You keep telling me it's your club and you can never ditch yellow so prove it. Paying your entrance fee each week is simply not enough anymore with such a silent and inactive board - you HAVE to make things happen for yourselves.

Burnhamgull wrote:I totally agree with much of what Andy has said in his lengthy post......yes I read it all!

The sad reality is that reading through the various posts on this site, there is a slow steady flow of supporters starting to find alternative entertainment on a Saturday afternoon. The marketing side of the club is absolutely terrible and almost expectant that we ST holders will just renew without any need for incentive. I commented last season on the lack of contact from the club with regards to renewing my ST and the only contact I had was when I was offered a tour of the ground. When you been round the Bernabeu, Plainmoor doesn't really have much to offer.

I've said previously that I chose not to renew my ST but the family stepped in and renewed it for me as a birthday present.......I hate them all.

The performances this season have left me so far feeling like I have wasted their money and right now I have no interest in renewing again. I have supplemented my weekend fix with midweek matches around the country wherever I'm working and feel much happier without the burden of worrying about the match result.

I, as will many others, still support the club. We are just choosing not to throw money at what appears to be a lost cause currently. The rot has set in since the shambolic episode involving Ling. The tales of how YTFC look after their fans is a million miles apart from how we're treated. Is there a Junior Gulls?.......Does it have many members?

It's very sobering to read so many fellow supporters reducing their support for the club but it's been coming for a couple of years and how long before Thea wants out and then we're really in the sh*t?

Great post Burnham and i see you have been disillusioned for some time as i have read your posts. The key point i am making that i don't want to be lost is that those that know me know i would be trying to juggle my family life to get to every game i could even in the conference and even if we were bottom. The reason for my withdrawal of support has absolutely nothing to do with what league TUFC are in, what position in the league they are in or how badly they are playing. It is purely and simply a lack of activity by the board. It is like time has stood still. Torquay United are NOT a lost cause at the moment, they are a handful of points off the play offs despite having some atrocious players, shaking off the turmoil of last season and a rookie manager and not much cash. Thea has pumped in some cash as have some other board members but we have no leaders in there. We have nobody like Gordon Ramsay to come in, kick ass, tell it like it is and what the way forward should be. There is no direction. Gordon Ramsay knows that there are two things a business needs to survive - a quality product and excellent customer service / engagement.

Torquay have neither.

Actually, Gordon Ramsay coming into footy clubs and kicking off would be a great idea for a programme. BOARDROOM NIGHTMARES WITH GORDON RAMSAY.

Torquay are like the titanic, desperately trying to stay afloat with stiff upper lip like Captain Edward Smith whilst all around are deserting. A Jack Dawson is needed.

If i ran a football club i'd be that excited i'd actually be urinating myself in the street. Just think how they could be promoted and just think how i could bring together a whole community just because of this one thing. I'd be like a kid in a sweet shop but without any understanding of how to run a football club.

So long as i'm not in control of finances i'd never sleep.

Bird flu, swine flu and ebola are on their way.

Well unless people around Derbyshire are dropping like flies then i'll try and get on with things and not concern myself with them apart from maybe donating to an appeal fund for those in REAL danger of these things.

News.

A load of bollocks.

If there is any news that i haven't heard then i'm thoroughly grateful.

Mainstream news is all depressing and involves something negative and by cutting out watching it, listening to it and not buying newspapers i have relieved anxiety and adopted a more positive outlook.

A plane crashes. Sad obviously but surprisingly unless it is strewn all over Derbyshire there is piss all i can do about it.

Unless it directly affects me or there is summat i positive i can do about it then i'd rather not know thankyou very much.

As a qualified scientist , a bit like in the mould of Professor Branestawm, i have it on good authority (namely science) that the viruses (or virii - man is that even a real word! ) that contribute to the onset of influenza do have a more potent effect on males due to the biological indifferences of the sexes. Obviously males and females are both human, well some women out on the piss in our village on a saturday night could challenge this belief as could some men who insist on purchasing the Daily Sport / Star. THEY ARE JUST PICTURES OF BREASTS!! YOU'RE NEVER GOING TO MEET THEM!! I always shout when passing an offending white van with a copy on the dashboard. (i'm all over equality here brothers ).

No, hormonal concentrations, muscle mass and lots of other interesting scientific factors make blokes get man flu and women get a little bit sniffly.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAACHOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!

taxilady wrote:actually, I still miss you Austrian Andy & think that the forum is poorer without you. You post some valid comments about club involvement; however, our regenerating Trust would have welcomed you much more quickly than in 30 years ! I will still laugh myself silly if York sign Billy Bodin !!!! Hope our paths cross again sometime ......

York won't sign Billy Bodin in a million year Nina. This lot simply won't tolerate a fancy dan with no end product. They'll tell you so and you can't ignore it.

The Trust is a positive step and i would be happy to join and contribute financially in some small way if that were permitted. The sad thing is i'm not sure how many people would be up for joining. The main worry i had about Torquay is if they went tits up would enough be bothered about forming a new club?

It would mean getting hands dirty and some serious dedication.

I'd be happy to help in any way.

As for taxi drivers. ................it was like a scene out of The Thing round here on boxing day with blizzards, cars stranded and 15 cm of snow yet taxi drivers were trying to overtake me!!! Bloody law unto themselves!! :na:

suffolkgull wrote:Good to see you posting Andy. Agree with a lot you say and hope someone from the club reads it.

Means a lot suffolkgull thankyou so much.

If i may use another analogy like Matt did. Did you get a dog in the end Matt?

Anyway, take a mother whose son comes in from school and persistently treats the house like a doss house, he eats the cupboards bare, borrows money off her without so much as a buy your leave and generally does nothing but take, take , take.

The mother is in an awful predicament. Her son is flesh and blood. Her son is in her veins, in her heart but this cannot go on anymore. At some point the son has to wake up and realise how lucky he is and what he has and that he cannot keep bleeding her dry and kicking her in the guts without any remorse or offer of compromise. At some point his mum surely is going to kick him out and wash her hands?

She is in a dreadful position.

There is love in her heart but she cannot continue to be treated with such contempt.

Does she do the right thing for her own conscience and refuse to be treated like a cash cow and doormat or does she continue to give in to her son because he is blood?

Maybe i'm a bad mother and with sadness in my heart having to tell people i have befriended and known that i no longer can see them ever again is the price i have to pay but i know i've done the right thing.

Anyway, Welling away. What the **** happened?!!!