Life after Bobby: Grief turbulence

Ding dong! Hello, this is your First Officer speaking, please return to your seats and fasten your seat-belts as soon as possible. As you are aware we have entered a period of turbulence, myself and your Captain today will do all we can to adjust our altitude to ensure a safe and pleasant journey for you. […]

Empathy, pain and action

I’m struggling to know where to start with this blog post, which if I’m honest doesn’t happen to me very often. I’m usually blessed with the ability to sit down at my keyboard, churn out words for a wee while and then sit back and edit it into something coherent. Today I’ve been procrastinating for […]

Mama lions, pain, privilege and justice

The more observant among you will have noticed I’ve been tweeting a bit about #JusticeforLB lately. I kind of figure that if you read this blog, or my tweets, you’re fairly used to me irritating you or over-sharing on things like death and dying. I know that’s not easy for everyone but as I’ve blogged […]

Five things I wish I knew when I offered to give a eulogy

Waking today I remembered that twelve months ago, the 29th November, was an equally drab and grey November morning. Not too much different to any other autumn morning when the sun stays at half light as though its too apathetic to break through the clouds. It suited me, felt like an honest reflection of my […]

Life after Bobby: Happy Birthday Dad

I’ve not blogged too regularly of late, I blame Social Care Curry Club, which has been a brilliant distraction and useful channel of so much energy. That said I felt like today warranted a post, as today is Dad’s 66th birthday. Well it would have been his 66th birthday but he died last year. Do […]

In sickness and in health

Yesterday was my parent’s Ruby Wedding Anniversary, 40 years of togetherness, in sickness and in health, till death do us part….and therein lies the rub, I guess technically it wasn’t their 40th anniversary because my Dad died last November. Do you stop being married when one of you dies, obviously legally you do, but do […]

Life after Bobby: the first 100 days

It’s 101 days since Dad died today, I’d been thinking about this (non)-anniversary all week and was fully aware of it yesterday but couldn’t bring myself to concentrate long enough to write this post then. I’m confident Dad would appreciate the quirk of it being 101 days anyhow. So I’m going to keep this short […]

Fitbit – Jiminy Cricket on a belt clip

I got a fitbit for Christmas, it didn’t arrive until early January, but it was well worth the wait. I absolutely love it, in fact I think it’s one of the best pressies I’ve ever received…high praise indeed. A what I hear you ask? What is it? Why is it so cool? And why does […]

What makes you happy?

Am I happy? Yes. No. Maybe. Sometimes. Rarely. What makes me happy? Depends what mood I’m in. What the weather is like. If I’m hungry. Whether I’m working. Arrrgggggggggggh I don’t know, who cares anyway? I feel like I *should* be happy, I have a loving family,  great relationships and friendships, supportive networks, I’m healthy, I […]

The ultimate recycling?

In Britain, there are currently over 10,000 people in need of an organ transplant. Each day three of them will die because of the lack of donors. Despite this, 15,000 people die each day in the UK. Only three of them will become organ donors. These statistics just don’t make sense to me. This morning I read an […]