You don't normally wait until some time in the early weeks of March to write a New Year post.

The exceptionally organised and ever so slightly anally retentive side of me had all sorts of plans to write great posts. Posts about recipes to suit those who had over indulged over the holidays (both in calorific and financial terms); comfort food to chase away those winter time blues; kitchen spring cleaning tips to tackle whilst you're snowed in, and many more ramblings that could be filed under 'awesome content', tweeted with the best of them and snapped a billion times with just the right filter for Instagram. But I didn't do any of them.

I had a miscarriage.

I ummed an ahhed about admitting it in print (or pixels, whatever). I think reproductive issues and anything that goes on in a girl's knickers (apart from sex because obviously that's fine to splash about all over the shop) is one of the last taboos, which is weird because we ALL CAME FROM INSIDE SOME WOMAN'S PANTS.

I wouldn't hesitate to be open about a bad day at work; bemoan a heavy cold on the interwebs; or shake my fist and direct a colourful diatribe upwards should my car splutter into oblivion, but telling people that I was closing myself off from the world for a couple of weeks to dash back and forward from hospital; spend an inordinate amount of time wracked with excruciating pain and worry before finally ending up in an operating theater.... no that i'll just keep to myself.

Not being our first reproductive hiccup it was tinged with memories of a pretty gross start to last year so felt all the more raw this time around.

So here it is.

I'm truly sorry if you just come here for the food and don't want to know what's been going on in my pants, but this blog is called Holly Likes to Cook and for some time I have not liked to cook. I have not liked to go outside and I have not liked to talk to anyone. I have not liked to make people feel uncomfortable because I can't remember what day it is and I have not liked the looks I got when I burst into tears in Stop and Shop trying to buy some fucking water chestnuts. I have not liked feeling so very, very sad at a loss of something we wanted so very much, and I have not liked the tinge of dread that a second hiccup might not just be a hiccup, it might actually be a problem.

However, I do like my friends and my family who have gone to extraordinary lengths to bring me back from that sad place; I like my husband who has told me a million times over that I am enough just as am; I like Abraham Lincoln (who I believe decides to randomly yowl at 4am to remind me that a baby would mean less sleep, and I like sleep); I like our house, our cottage in the city that currently has no walls and no ceiling (more of that later);

and I like that I finally feel like cooking.