“Closed eyes, heart not beating, but a living love.” Avis Corea At first the news is unbelievable, surely it cannot be so. And then it must be wrong, something has been missed, where there is a will, there is a way. And then it must be unfair, inexplicable and random, why oh why us? And then it must be cruel, inhumane…

We think that we all look fine on the outside don’t we? But the builder had to come alone because his mate did not turn up for work that day, because his nerves were so bad he could not bare to face another soul. The lady in the hairdressers was…

Did you know that over 200 Japanese pensioners volunteered to work in Fukushima? After the nuclear crisis in Fukushima, Japan, a group of Japanese pensioners volunteered to face the dangers of radiation instead of the young. Calling themselves the Skilled Veterans Corp, the group of retired engineers and other professionals…

You cannot see despair if you do not look. You cannot hear despair if you do not listen. You cannot feel despair if you do not empathise. You cannot touch despair if you do not engage. And you cannot smell despair if you do not breath. But in the absence…

9 things I have learnt about death I thought I’d cut to the chase as time is so much shorter than any of us really know, so I’m starting not ending this blog, with the summary points, that way if you want to read on you can and if you don’t you will take something from it…

This poem is dedicated to all who experience the depth of despair and in doing so, loose the light of hope. In the moment, despair can trick us into believing that it will be permanent, with no end in sight. An overwhelming feeling of a lack of purpose, of worth…

In one way or another, we are all affected by mental health challenges, whether that be our own or that of our family and friends. It is a modern day epidemic, born from a society, which by many measures has made more progress than any other, but has sadly not…

Right now I have more free time for myself than I have ever had before. I am in plaster recovering from an operation on my Achilles tendon, so I’m pretty immobile, I’m grieving the loss of my physical independence, I cry a lot, I feel constantly agitated, I’m struggling to…

I am becoming increasingly concerned, angered and disappointed by the number of adverts I am still seeing, in this day and age, spouting the hugely damaging narrative that women are only loved when they are: a) thin b) beautiful c) successful All subjective labels and therefore meaningless across a whole…