It’s my housemates who have shaped me, not romantic partners (By Alice Wilkinson)

I’m putting this newsletter together at my dining room table. Nearby my housemate (and platonic coparent) is pottering around putting vegetables and other ingredients into the slow cooker for tomorrow night. We’re both full from the pumpkin risotto I made for us to share earlier in the evening. Simon and Garfunkel is, quite randomly, playing on my Amazon echo.

It’s a scene I couldn’t have imagined just a couple of years ago when I would tell anyone who would listen how amazing it is to live alone and how I never want to live with anyone again (“If I ever get a partner, I’ll need to get one that’s OK with having separate houses like Helena Bonham Carter and Tim Burton,” I once joked.) Never say never, the saying goes. Now I live with not only Tom but also a 7 month old baby. Life is different. Things have changed. I don’t live alone and in fact hardly ever spend any time alone.

Sometimes I miss my life before when I had the house to myself. Sometimes I even crave it and sometimes I alm…