Posts relating to life, the multiverse and anything.
It’s been a week since the kids went back to school and I’ve been able to resume my ambition to write a complete novel. It’s a running joke among writers that we are world-class procrastinators easily distracted by- ooh, squirrel! And have you seen this hilarious photo… What was I Read more…
Life. We’ve all got one. Until we haven’t. A succession of challenging life events has brought me to a tipping point. The last decade has seen the end of my ambulance career due to back injury, the death of both my parents and my 15-year-old nephew, and most recently the Read more…
Yesterday, Laura Holyland gave brave testimony in Great Yarmouth Magistrates’ Court in the case against her former husband, Karl, who was found guilty of coercive and controlling behaviour during their marriage and harassment in the subsequent months. It was the bitter end of a tragic and deeply painful saga which Read more…
When my nephew Michael died last year, a little over a month after his 15th birthday, the greatest part of the tragedy was the future his fate had stolen from him. In the weeks after his death, I wrote a short story about what I like to think happened to Read more…
Michael was my nephew. He was 15 when he died last year after six years of illness, treatment, and isolation. So when it comes to coping strategies for medical incarceration, he was a pro. Even before he was ill, we always enjoyed playing games together. I wish he was here Read more…
When my nephew died last year, a few weeks after his fifteenth birthday, the resulting emotional storm of torment, frustration and regret was impossible to process. Oddly, like a storm, there was a strange peace to be found at the centre of it all. For me, it was having purpose Read more…
I’d like to think that I’m not a coward, but the school run fills me with dread. Perhaps I’m overstating my reaction, sometimes it’s just mild trepidation with a smattering of frustration. Or general indifference with a dash of bemusement. I think it’s a matter of timing, and perhaps also Read more…
Internet culture is a fascinating, terrifying, distorted reflection of human behaviour. Social media is a House of Mirrors which warps context, subverts emphasis and provokes opinion. I’ve learned from experience that emotionally investing in online interactions is a hazardous pastime which can lead to dark places. It can also be Read more…
My compulsion to stay working within the NHS is largely driven by guilt. As a healthcare professional, nothing I have experienced in the last decade under a Conservative government gives me much hope that things are going to improve in urgent and emergency care any time soon, but I can’t Read more…
I thought being a paramedic would help me cope with my parents’ deaths. Or even prevent them. I was wrong. Allow me to explain. When I first applied to Beds & Herts Ambulance & Paramedic Service in 2000, it was a partly a decision borne of a kind of naive, Read more…