The Janergy Effect by janijans

As the title suggests, this is a story about going from where I was, to where I am, while making my way to where I am meant to be. And where was I? I was in a very unhappy and unhealthy marriage and finally had the courage to step away. That decision enabled me to start a new life on my terms. I built confidence, faced my fears, helped my son through his addiction, tackled the world of dating and was flying high, till it all came crashing down following my redundancy and I had to begin again. A visit to a fortune teller provided some insight and a prediction that I would meet the man who would become my life partner and with that has come a beautiful love story that is taking me to where I am meant to be. I know most people like to have a book that they can get engrossed in and keep reading, but for me, it was important to begin the story, because I too don’t know where it will end.

The story Chapter 1. The beginning.......................................................................................................... 3 Chapter 2. The beginning of the end .................................................................................... 4 Chapter 3. The writer ............................................................................................................... 17 Chapter 4. The perfect storm ................................................................................................ 25 Chapter 5. The endless months............................................................................................ 34 Chapter 6. Heading south and settling in ......................................................................... 44 Chapter 7. The loneliness ....................................................................................................... 59 Chapter 8. Listen to the signs ............................................................................................... 66 Chapter 9. Let’s talk about the panic ................................................................................. 73

Chapter 1. The beginning Within a short period of time – about five years, I went through a lot of change. Five years might seem a lot or a little depending on your view, but my life has spanned 53 years and the intensity of this period felt allconsuming. Finally, it has begun to flat line in a really good way. The flat line is often associated with the end of life, but for me, I feel like it’s a calm beginning. During that period of turmoil, a wonderful thing happened. I met a man who loves me, encourages and inspires me in ways I never thought possible and when our worlds collided, a journey began that has taken us to the place we now call home. A dear friend of mine once said that no one would ever believe the things you have been through. You should write a book. The idea for a book has come to me a few times, and I always thought I would be writing about something very different to what I am, but my journey has taken me to places and through experiences I never imagined and throughout all of this, there was a constant force –resilience - the thing that enables us to cope, no matter what might be going on around you and the desire for wanting things to be better today, then they were yesterday. I am grateful for these and other qualities as they have helped me weather many a storm. Let’s begin shall we. Once upon a time…… Hang on, that’s a different story. Mine is a story of courage and strength and it starts like this. “I want a divorce!”

Chapter 2. The beginning of the end

"I want a divorce!" Am I the only one who has wanted to blurt those words out of their mouth at some point of their life? I knew that I was in the wrong place, with the wrong man, while trying to live my right life. And rather than saying what I wanted and needed to say, I sat silent, hoping that this would be the last time I was yelled at, or the last time something got smashed – you should have seen the imprint on the fridge from where he punched it - or the last time I had to watch him storm off in a rage when he didn’t get his own way or I did something to annoy him. It went on for far too long. “I want a divorce! I want a divorce! I want a divorce! I WANT A FUCKING DIVORRRRRRCCCCCE! I had practiced those words in my head for many years – even before we sealed the deal with rings and vows that we had prepared to cement our ongoing commitment to loving each other. They were thoughtful, whimsical and simple but they never really lived up to the meanings that we had attached to them; well not for me anyway. In fact, when I look back now, there was nothing right about that relationship, because something always felt off. But like many others before me and many after me, we go ahead with something because at the time we think it is right and deep down we believe that love will make a bed of roses out of what turns out to be a shit show. I should never have married him, but I did and I was slowly suffocating under the weight of his anger and control. The two things that I wasn’t became part of my daily norm and the anger and control eventually became unbearable for me. There are so many things I love about myself and these include that I never get angry and I never try to control anyone and yet here I was on the receiving end of someone else’s inability to own their emotions and how they impacted on others.

I am someone with a very high resilience level and when this relationship started to wear me down, I knew that I had to find my voice and hope that it would be heard. That is hard when you know that a larger and stronger voice was going to power over the top of yours, so you just begin to shut up and go on living a life that no longer feels like it has any spark, until one day you say enough is enough, and you mean it, and more importantly, you do something about it. When we met, he was attracted to my presence. I am a bit of a free spirit and have a very easy-going nature and the things that he initially liked about me, became the things that seemed to eventually annoy him the most. It annoyed him that I would not get worked up about stuff, or I would be forgiving when someone did something that wasn’t right. I was never angry, nasty or sarcastic. I had learnt that it’s possible and okay to let stuff go and move on, rather than milking every last agonising miserable ounce out of a situation. He used to mockingly call me an “enlightened being”, as I had developed a natural way of keeping perspective and looking at life with a freespirited and easy-going attitude and vision. I’m actually chuffed to be an enlightened being, as I think it implies that I have done the work needed to get my shit together and be in touch with life and the things that matter. And what matters to me, is making sure that people feel safe and secure and fill their life with as much joy as possible and here I was with a man who was not making me feel safe and secure. Was there joy? Yes, there was, but it eventually became overshadowed by all the other shitty stuff that was chipping away at my soul. When you live with someone who is angry and controlling, you eventually succumb to the environmental factors. You put up and shut up and even start to shut down emotionally and physically. Towards the end of this union, I had no desire to be in his personal space. The energy he was giving off was all encompassing and I could feel it physically and mentally draining me. But I would always find ways to keep myself going and keep preserving what sense of self I could, so that I could continue to function and put on the happy smile that people would love to see. Throughout my life, I always struggled with speaking up for fear of making others feel uncomfortable. Does anyone else do that? You know that something isn’t right, but you choose to suffer and be uncomfortable, rather than stand up for what is rightfully yours in the first place. And for me, it was my right to live in peace, harmony and to be respected, and I was compromising my own wellbeing and values because of the fear of what would be dished out to me verbally or emotionally. It didn’t matter how many times I begged for things to be better, the message just never got through.

I’d been single for many many years and apart from settling for the first man who came along, I consider myself to be a bit of an explorer. I like to see the bigger picture of life and want to make great stops on the way to my final destination. He used to say I was a squiggle as I could never just go in a straight line anywhere. Who wants to live their life in a straight line kind of way – I couldn’t bear to think of all the things I might miss out on seeing, or all the people I would not get to engage with if I lived my life going in a straight line. I love being a squiggle because it gives me choice, freedom and spontaneous excitement. I remember once we were leaving our local coffee shop and someone said hi, so I said hi back and stayed for a brief conversation. Mr Cranky Pants stormed off (in a straight line) back to the car and I followed moments later knowing full well that there would be displeasure at my breaking rank and not adhering to the rules. And the rules were simple. If we say we are going, we go. Don’t go off the plan. Well, it just occurred to me that straight lines are made with rulers and he was ruling the roost. I was making my way through life with my sparkle, my positivity and my squiggleness and that’s what people would love about me. This aspect that I bought to our relationship made him look like a great guy, but my squiggle was beginning to slowly unsquiggle. My stomach churns as I write this, as it is stirring up memories and emotions of a woman who should have been living a carefree existence but instead was on someone else’s clock and agenda. I was also trying to balance someone’s poor emotional bank balance and I have to wonder how I ever ended up in that union given it was so far from the life I had been living before we met. Actually, I know how I ended up in that union, I was lonely, I was going through some other life events and I was sucked into his charming ways and before I knew it, I couldn’t see a way out and the moments that should have been great and happy, became lost as they were steamrolled with his anger and control. Outwardly, my shine and sparkle were still on display, but the weight of the ruler was reigning supreme. There were a couple of moments early on in the relationship that my alarm bells went off and one was when we were having a celebration at his place and were enjoying some champagne. He had begun washing up and I was just enjoying every sip of my bubbles till he told me to hurry up and finish it so he could wash the glass. I just thought wow, you are a bit of a pleasure thief so I stopped and gave the glass back. I didn’t even bother finishing it. It was an awkward uncomfortable moment and as someone who believes that fun comes first and washing up comes second, I found it very strange and quite a demanding display of unnecessary authority.

Very few knew the daily torment that had snuck into my peace-loving life and eventually, I had the courage to share with some, but kept the depth of my torment locked away from most, who I can only assume had no idea, or had no idea what to say when they witnessed my public belittling or the angry face or words that would be cast my way when his displeasure at me struck. Even something as simple as me not putting something in the right place in the fridge would be enough for him to become frustrated and annoyed. And yet at other times, he didn’t care. This was a true passive-aggressive relationship. My family were witness to his behaviour and were sometimes targets and at one point early on in our relationship they offered to come and pack me up and move me out. I declined, thinking that all would be okay and that my kind, calm persona would eventually rub off and he may start to display some of qualities that would make him a softer human. But no! Not only was I subject to grief by him, but I also had to deal with his son, whose sociopathic and bizarre behaviour was finally confirmed when he was arrested for a violent crime when he was 15. He ended up spending a period of time in a juvenile jail for this, but there was much debate about whether he should have gone to the big house due to the nature of the incident. It’s important that I add a graphic content warning here. He had recently run away from home and met up with some bad eggs and he was obviously getting into some bad business, because one day, we received a call from the police saying they had arrested him after shoplifting and discovered he was carrying a rather large knife – the type of knife that is called a meat cleaver. We headed off to the police station to find out what had happened and to take him back into our care. We hadn’t seen him for some weeks and he claimed he was living on the street and needed the knife for protection and I just sat in disbelief as he stony faced lied to the police about all manner of stuff. The police released him into our care and he was expected to come back home with us. After all, he was a minor, and as we walked out of the station, he just turned and walked off in the other direction and refused to come. We left empty handed and it was only a few hours later that he was arrested again – for carrying another rather large knife, and he was physically bought home to us by the police. They gave him a fairly tough talking to, but once they left, so did he. We found out that he had been living not far from home with a group of troubled kids and there appeared to be one older boy who was calling all the shots and obviously influencing him in really negative way.

During this time, I was working from home and I heard on the news that a group of youths had attacked someone with a machete at a location nearby. I had this overwhelming feeling come over me that he was involved. Later that evening, we started receiving some very strange and threatening phone calls and assumed it had something to do with my exhusband’s son, so we turned the phone off and went to sleep and just figured they were probably drunk kids being idiots. In the morning, we were contacted by the police who said they had arrested a number of boys over the recent attack and guess who was one of them? This boy was charged the following morning for his involvement and was so stupid, that he thought he’d just be allowed out and could get back on the street. He spent the day in lockup whining and complaining and clearly not realising the magnitude of what he was involved with. He was then charged and sent to the juvenile detention centre where he was held until his trial many months later. Because of his age, his details were kept private, so it was something we didn’t have to really deal with publicly. We were the people who were supposed to be keeping this child out of harm’s way, but he would do what he like and didn’t care about the consequences and never ever showed any remorse for his actions. At trial he pleaded guilty and through his cooperation in implicating the other members of the group, he had his longer sentence reduced. A condition of his release was that he had to live with us and had to be in the company of one of us at all times. This meant that everything you wanted to do such as going for a simple morning coffee meant that he had to come, except he would often refuse to come with us or fit into our adult life needs, so it was pretty shit. I was still working from home, so can you imagine how that must have been for me? He was so disregarding of the rules that he would pretty much do what he wanted and he had this wonderful way of making everyone else feel like they were the bad guy, or girl, in my case. The release conditions were very clear – he was not to be out on his own, so that meant at times, he would have to be home by himself, but he didn’t care for the rules and we’d sometimes see him down the street hanging out with his friends after sneaking out. It was like nothing ever happened and he didn’t care about what would happen should the police see or catch him breaking his release conditions. This kid certainly seemed to have nine lives. Eventually, he was allowed to have a bit more freedom and was given permission to go outside alone during the day, but had a curfew at night

and wasn’t allowed out without a guardian. I began to notice that a particular window was ajar when I got up in the morning and at first, I put it down to simple forgetfulness, but this boy was a risk taker and would climb out the window and scale along the edge of the building and go wandering. Although we were only on the first floor, the window he would climb out of was much higher up as it was at the back of the building and due to the way the place was constructed, it was a long way down to the ground. Not only was it unsafe, but he was breaking the law. We then had to begin locking all the windows and doors to minimise his night time escapes. It was a pretty difficult situation as he ensured that everyone was kept as uncomfortable as possible and things came to a head one day when he got into a very bad argument with his father and it became quite physical. I had no option but to call the police because I didn’t know who would come off worse. The police came and this master manipulator spun a story that made him look like he was in real danger, so they him away and put him into a motel for a few nights with a guardian, but he was back after a few days. He also had to do some supervised programs – it was earn or learn after being in Juvie – and he was assigned a social worker who would ferry him to and from these. There was only one day I felt physically scared to be in his presence and it was when he came back home to pick up some identification. Once inside our flat, he cornered me in the hallway because I wouldn’t give him the paperwork directly. I insisted on giving it to the caregiver who was outside, as I thought it would be better as I had no trust in him. He would not let me past to get to the door and was getting agitated and angry, but I told him to back the fuck away and to let me through. Yep, he threatened me, but I stood my ground and was not going to be intimidated anymore by him. I know what this young boy was capable of and I was already going through enough without having to manage him as well. After that experience, I insisted that he was no longer welcome in our home. This boy was king at exhibiting disturbing behaviour and the actions he displayed throughout my relationship and subsequent marriage, were not those of somebody that I was ever used to having to deal with. As it turned out, he was one of the main offenders in this crime he was involved in, and I still feel so sorry for his victims to think that their lives were changed forever due to the actions of a teenage boy. Even before this event, he displayed such strange behaviour. When his father and I began dating, he would go through my belongings that I kept at his place and do things like chop off the tips of my lipsticks, or I’d find that my things would suddenly disappear and I was set up to believe that I was imagining or overreacting to this child’s torment. We have a name for it now folks, and it is called gaslighting. And it was bad.

Not long after meeting my ex-husband, I went out with some girlfriends for a party and bought home a whole heap of helium balloons and put them in the bedroom. He decided to take the scissors to them and cut off all the strings and I thought that was just a disgraceful act, but there never seemed to be any discipline for his bad behaviour. Initially my ex-husband would always side with his son and I’d always have to take a step back and accept the behaviour that I was apparently imagining. We even went as far as to put a lock on our bedroom door so he couldn’t get in and any items I had that were part of the wider home, I packed up and put away so he couldn’t touch them. There were so many things I eventually found that had been thrown out the window by him. Eventually, my ex-husband’s eyes were open to the scale of which this boy would be subtly tormenting me and although he was always a problem until the day I left, he was no longer my problem. I could write so much more about this child, but I am going to park it here, because it isn’t something I really want to revisit. I did feel a great deal of sympathy and empathy for him and did my best to treat him as I would my own son, but no matter how much I displayed my kind, caring, empathetic and nurturing nature, it was clearly not welcome in this boy’s life I guess you are probably scratching your head wondering why I kept going on with this relationship. I certainly got the two for one NO DEAL! If I was the woman I am now, I would have just got up, told my ex to grow up, to stop being such a nasty man and walked away, but at that time, I guess I was also being manipulated in a way that controlled me to stay in that relationship. I would come across people who had such beautiful unions and who talked so highly of their partners and treated them with so much respect, kindness and love and I wished that I was one of those people, but nope, I was the woman who hung her head or snuck off with an excuse when yet another not so subtle dig was directed at me while beers were shared with the neighbours, or any other time when a put down was thrown my way. He would also turn his rage to other members of my family and with raised voice, stamping feet and finger wagging to prove his point, he was like a man possessed and I would stand by helpless, not knowing how to intervene because I didn’t want to make the situation worse. It couldn’t really get any worse to be honest and it was only a matter of time until I eventually said those magic words……I want a divorce!

The weird thing about this relationship and possibly relationships with this kind of abuse is that you find yourself wanting to comfort or make sure the person who is the abuser is okay. Many a time I would chase after him when he had a melt down and try to put things back on track. It was like I had to pick a side and make sure he was okay, even after he had treated me or others so badly. His anger was next level but when he had been drinking, it was off the chart. On one occasion not long after meeting, he had been at a work function for most of the day and when it finished late in the evening, he called and asked me to come and pick him up. I drove the short distance into the city and he wasn’t where he said he would be. I ended up seeing him further down the road sitting at a bus stop. He got in the car and then I was witness to something that I could never in my wildest dreams imagine. First up it began by him wanting to know why I had come to get him. He accused me of stalking him all day and night and said that I was crazy for following him around. I tried to explain that he had rung and asked me to collect him, but it just wasn’t registering. He was so far gone with booze that nothing I did or said would have sunk in. He then started screaming at me to let him out of the car, but I couldn’t stop because it wasn’t safe. He then exploded and proceeded to punch my windscreen with so much force and so many times, that it smashed and I had no choice but to pull over. I was so scared that I was going to be the next thing that got hit or that this situation would cause an accident. When he got out of the car he was raging and then tried to attack a taxi driver who was just standing there minding his own business. As I watched him displaying this kind of aggression, I wondered what the fuck I was going to do. He was out of control and it wasn’t the only time he attacked strangers when he was drunk. I drove home, called a friend and told him what happened and asked if he would go and see if he could find him and check if he was okay. I didn’t really know what his cut of point was in terms of harm as this was the first time I’d seen this side of him. Meanwhile, I hid in the spare room down beside the bed hoping that if he came home, I would be spared any further trauma. He did eventually arrive back, still yelling and carrying on. His clothes were ripped and he was an absolute mess. He fell into bed and awoke like nothing had happened. He wasn’t even genuinely sorry or even embarrassed about this or the damage he did to my car, let alone

concerned about how I felt following this ordeal and that’s because I was the reason he did it. I remember sobbing through most of the day and trying to avoid him and having to face this horrible question…..are you going to be like this all day? So how did I feel after this event? I felt fearful, confused, sick, distressed, embarrassed that the apartment block witnessed his return and continuing outburst. I also felt like I was in unchartered waters and hoped to god that nothing like this would ever happen again. But it did, on many occasions and I just learned to live with it or at times when I did try to break away, I was sucked back in with apologies. He could never take responsibility for his own anger or actions as it was always someone else who triggered his rage. Throughout my story, I hope that you may feel inspired to think about whether any situation you are in is the best one for you or whether you can do something to change it for the better. Even if it is just finding a little more joy in your day, or finding the courage to take a bold step to regain or find your power. I believe we can take control of nearly any situation we may find ourself in and any emotions that come with it. Anger is something that can be controlled, and I believe that if you really want to make a change from within, you have to identify what that change is, and put in the work. Part of his anger stemmed from past hurts and that was apparent when blame was passed on to other people for the actions he was displaying. I have my own past hurts, but I have learned to respond in a way that will not do harm to myself and others. Oh, and I don’t want to look like a giant dick, just because I don’t get my own way. I often wondered how his body coped with the roller coaster of anger that was flowing through it, because all that rage would have to put stress on your organs and towards the end of our marriage, he began to have raw festering sores on his legs. I used to say that maybe his blood was boiling with rage and eating away at him? Doctors could never find the cause of these, even after countless tests, so maybe I was right, maybe his anger was eating him alive. During this relationship, I felt like I was living two lives – the life a woman who never knew what I would do next to trigger an unbearable, unnecessary outburst and the woman who wanted to fly high and shine brightly and be in a happy union where I felt respected, cared for and safe. Regardless of what fucked up event had happened at home, or at the market, or in the street, or at a café, or the local club, or in the car, or

the car park, or at a friend’s place or on holiday, or on the phone or anywhere really, I would try my best to be me – smiling, happy, sparkling me, but it was hard to do when your stomach was churning or your eyes were red from crying or you had to pretend that all was okay, as it would only make him madder if you showed how affected you were by his torment. And whenever I heard that horrible question – are you going to be like this all day? I knew I had better pretend to be the happy wife. Many days would start and finish with tears rolling down my face and what as I can only describe a gnawing in my stomach. It was a horrible feeling and one that was quite foreign to me, until I met him. It’s really hard to just pretend like nothing has happened and you have to go back to being the loving, romantic partner who has to forget the events that have unfolded, because I should just be able to “get over it”, but it isn’t that easy. In times when arguments were happening, another favourite saying was “do you want a divorce?” Oh boy, did I want a divorce, but I didn’t have the courage to say yes. I figured that the fallout from those words may have been even more detrimental to me, so I just said no. Over and over again. It took me a long time to realise that I was in a very emotionally abusive relationship and one that I slowly tried to turn around with my desire to make it work. I had for the most part of the final tough year tried to find new and creative ways that I hoped would connect with his rational intellect. He was intelligent, so I began to thoughtfully initiate discussions about how much I was suffering and shared ways for him to see that anger is a controllable emotion and that if this emotion didn’t get under control, it would eventually bring us unstuck. And unstuck we came. I was so grateful for my work, because it was a safe space. Mostly! And I say mostly, because it was where I went each day to find some respite, but even there, I would often arrive upset or have to deal with angry messages or calls and I’d put on my happy face and get on with the day. It was hard to function, but you just begin to separate those two lives and I think that’s probably where my strong resilience played such a big part. I could still get on with the job regardless and never let my home issue affect my working day. I was also grateful for his work towards the end of our marriage, because he took up a job that saw him travelling up and down the coast which meant he was away a week and then home a week and the weeks he was home, he would drop and pick me up from work.

One afternoon, he came to collect me and I was running late to meet him. I was helping someone in crisis, so didn’t have a chance to call and let him know. I was only 10 minutes late, but that 10 minutes and me not letting him know was like putting a match to a stick of dynamite and when I hopped in the car…..KABOOM. I would never be late again and I knew at that moment that I was done in that relationship. It was only a matter of weeks and following another outburst, that I finally had the courage to say those magic words - I want a divorce, and I was ready for the fallout. Thing is, there wasn’t any big hoopla or aggressive outburst at that moment. It came a while later and he was shocked, which is strange given that he seemed to be happy with this “normal” and when he suggested counselling, it was a no from me. I had suggested counselling so many times and it was always met with resistance. I had released the words I had wanted to say for so long and we were done. Actually, we weren’t quite done. I remained strong in my decision, took my wedding rings off and wondered “what next”. It was a while before we publicly shared our separation, and people were genuinely surprised. From the outside we looked like a solid couple, but from the inside it was a mess. We also had to live together for a long period of time, as there was no other option easily available for us to live independently. A clean break would have been amazing, but it was about nine months till I was finally on my own and starting my new life. Talk about a rebirth. But during this time, I was still at the receiving end of his tantrums, but the great thing was, that I was no longer going to put up with his shit. Shortly after I had said the magic words, he went overseas to visit his family and that gave me some breathing space. And even during this time, I was subject to ongoing drunken messages and calls about how I had ruined his life and how I would be responsible for something stupid he might do when he was drunk and in a rage. I wasn’t going to own his guilt. In fact, I don’t think I ever owned his guilt, which is a good thing, but I was certainly a verbal punching bag and at times very afraid of his anger and that was more than enough weight to carry. There were some good things in this relationship and I think it had potential to be a solid union, but it wasn't growing and growth in a relationship is so important. We did a lot of amazing travel, threw great parties, we did have lots of fun, but it was always overshadowed by the turn of events that could be triggered by what I consider to be nothings, but for him were somethings. In fact, he had planned to propose to me on Sugarloaf Mountain in Brazil while we were on a work trip that he had qualified for. His boss knew of this and knew of how important is was that he qualified but that didn’t

stop him from having another almighty meltdown leading up to this trip and his excuse this time was stress and the worry about not being able to give me the proposal he’d hoped for. What a lot of nonsense. He was just an angry man who couldn’t control his emotions and used excuses to make it seem okay. We did go to Brazil and he did propose and I said yes. I knew all along that I was deserving of more and already knew that the future was not going to be a great one with him, but I was stuck in this situation not really knowing how to get out of it. Ten years is a lot of time and energy to give to someone else whose changes only seemed to be for the worse and me and my total being were investing in something that didn’t and wasn’t going to give a good return. Some people are of the belief that our path is laid out for us and others believe that we make our own destiny and I think I have a foot in either camp. Our life is made up of experiences both good and bad and they are sent to challenge us and help us grow. How we react and respond is also essential to our growth and it didn’t matter how I responded to events in my relationship, I knew I was never going to be free to be me, or more importantly, I’d never be truly happy. I stopped looking for ways to help fix an unfixable situation and began looking at ways to help fix me and to take back ownership of my own life. It was a choice. I either put an end to my suffering and stopped investing, or I continued to pay the price of trying to repair something that for ten years was just going in the same unhealthy direction and was wearing me down. I couldn’t stand to be around negative, angry people and here I was dedicating my life to one. The fear of living in fear and in this shitty marriage was now worse than the fear of stepping into the unknown and at 48 years of age, taking back my life. And with that I: 1. 2. 3. 4.

Acknowledged that I deserved better Took control of the situation Made the decision to end it and did something about it Had faith that all would be okay and asked the universe to work its magic 5. Congratulated myself for taking this ginormous step and kept moving and forward focussed. When was the last time you did a stocktake of your life and made a list of what is working well and what isn't? Whether it is your job, a relationship, a friendship, or something as simple as opening the cupboard to see what's in there that you may not have used for a while and could be out

of date. I think we are in a time where we realise how life is so precious and it's okay to take a moment and think about whether the people or things we are spending our life with or what we are doing is serving us in a way that is best. And if it isn’t, then it’s okay to let them go, because they are not meant to be there. I am proud of myself for initiating the beginning of the end, because I, like everyone else, deserves to live a life of peace, happiness, freedom and one that should have unconditional love with so much respect. It was never going to be the relationship that I truly wanted for the rest of my life and thankfully, I took the steps to find a way out.

Chapter 3. The writer I never imagined that I would love to write, let alone be writing a story about where my journey in life has taken me. But that’s the beauty of continual personal growth and the desire to keep exploring. It opens the pathway to discovery and my writing was a pivotal tool that helped make the decision to leave my marriage a lot easier for me. At some point in our life, the contemplation of our purpose begins to surface. We realise that our time on the planet is limited and the need to live it in the most meaningful way pushes us to seek out experiences that will make us feel fulfilled. Whether they be work, personal or relationship choices, we begin to reflect on whether what we are doing in these areas of our life is actually good for us and is bringing us joy. I certainly thought about this when I was first on the quest to find my sweet spot. There is another other sweet spot we might be in search of, but that discussion might belong to another chapter. The sweet spot I'm talking about is the place where our passion and purpose meet to give us profit. Initially I was so determined to find this sweet spot because I wanted to receive financial reward for doing something I love, but as time has passed, my thoughts about the sweet spot has shifted and what is important is that my profit doesn’t have to be monetary, it can be the profit that comes from the feeling of doing something that I love.

The Sweet Spot. Where purpose, passion and profit collide

What is my passion and what is my purpose? What is it I love doing and how do I share it with others? What is it I do that excites me and I can happily do for hours on end without feeling like it’s a chore? What I have discovered, is that there are some things that we might instinctively have

a passion for that we go on to develop throughout our life. And there are others that we uncover on our life journey when we decide to push fear aside and open ourselves up to the world of possibility. Many of us still struggle with the desire to feel fulfilled by doing something other than what we are doing. Our purpose and passion can go hand in hand and yet they can remain hidden for years or possibly our whole life, leaving us to wonder what we were truly put on this earth to do. I know in the past, that fear has dictated a lot of my decision making. Leaving a shitty marriage is a case in point and I know that fear has stopped me from doing many things I wish I would have done, but I can’t go back and change those things, but I can go forward and be open to all possibility. If I was asked what things could help you to build a richer life, I would say…. 1. Be open to opportunity 2. Say yes to everything (within reason) 3. Don’t let fear control your life. There are others I spruke as well, but for now, let’s stick with those three. I know we are in difficult times and some opportunities may not be as prevalent as they were, but we can still consider exploring things that may unexpectedly present and we should have the courage to give things a go. They say that fear is just an acronym for False Evidence Appearing Real and I had an experience recently where I felt fear of the unknown and the strange part was, that it was in my imagination. I was doing a meditation and the meditation asked us to close our eyes and imagine we were on a beautiful beach. We then had to walk into the water and enjoy the feeling of the water around us. Next, we had to go beneath the surface and swim around. We didn’t have to worry about being able to breath, we just had to freely explore what was beneath the surface. I was seeing all the beautiful fish and coral and I then began thinking what if a shark comes, or some other sea monster comes. Forget that fact that humans can’t breathe underwater, but in my imagination, it didn’t matter. The meditation asked us to go deeper into the water where there was no natural light coming through. I was feeling fear. It was the unknown,

but I was in charge of the thoughts and imagery that was coming and I had to remind myself that I could make this an enjoyable, or frightening experience. The meditation then asked us to swim towards the surface of the water and fly out like a bird and begin soaring in the sky, looking down at the water and the wider earth. We then had to fly higher above the earth, where it became darker and the earth became smaller and smaller, and again, I felt fear. The unknown was upon me, but I kept at it and eventually, the meditation took me to a place beyond our earthly presence. I was calm and yet there was still this part of my brain that was in fear and it was because of the unknown. Research has shown that our brain cannot tell the difference between real and imagined experiences. That’s why visualisation is such a great tool and the meditation was a great example of visualised irrational fear. I was feeling fear about something that wasn’t a real touchable experience and when I finished the meditation and opened my eyes, I was really surprised about how I felt through what was supposed be a relaxing meditation. I felt really uncomfortable and I hadn’t even left the room. I’m not likely to do this mediation again, because it wasn’t very relaxing. Making change is fearful for most, but the reward of taking a little or a big step into the unknown is so satisfying when you have the courage to embrace it and discover something that you love, and through my writing, I began to build the confidence that eventually helped me take a big bold step. My writing eventually became the place where I could begin to let out all the thoughts and feelings that were inside me and a place where I subtly tried to let my ex-husband know that things were not okay. Nothing else seemed to be working, so I decided to tap into his love of reading. The writing bug hit back in 2010 when I was inspired by my nephew, who on his sixth birthday proceeded to get up and set his day up for celebratory success. My sister shared with me that at breakfast time, he had decorated his chair with streamers and balloons and then wrote the number six as many ways as he could and finally wrote his name on his plate. This little bit of self-love joy and golden confidence, got me thinking about how we don’t celebrate ourselves or life in general enough, and how when we do things that show us off or make us stand out, then people can be quick to put us in our place. But when you are six, people don’t judge. They think it’s cute and probably deep down wish they still had some of that spark.

Now, with the excesses of social media, there has been a big shift in this way of thinking, because pretty much anyone is able to use the platforms to share whatever makes them feel good and stand out, and if someone wants to make unsolicited negative commentary, then you can just block those motherfuckers. My birthday falls two days after my nephews, so with him as inspiration, I decided to start a project and set up a Tumblr account. At that time, Tumblr was the only thing I really knew in the blogging stratosphere. I originally wanted it to be a place where I shared happy things and lots of smiles, but within a week I had decided to take and post a picture of my face every day and apart from a couple of days over the year, I was true to my word. My photo a day project had set me off on two journeys. The first was a deeper journey of self-love and confidence and the second was my discovery and love for writing and storytelling. Back in my late 20’s I had begun my journey of inner work, when I was plagued with panic attacks and to this very day, my desire to want to live a life of peace and calm is still at the foremost of my mind, even though it was compromised during my marriage. In my 30’s I was trying to figure out who the person was I wanted to be. To others, I must have oozed confidence, but deep down inside, my little being was faking the fuck out of life. I was someone who never ever believed I was attractive and as the year went on with this project, I began to see the beauty in me that others also did. It was a very powerful thing. I did feel like a bit of a weirdo at first sharing my pictures, but my sister assured me that the young folk were all about giving themselves exposure and here I was having just turned 44 and I was doing the same. I called this project “My journey to over exposure” and decided that if I didn't blow my own trumpet, then who would?

My journey to over exposure. Left is September 2010 and right is a year later.

The self-confidence part of this project was also great as I discovered something I was really good at, enjoyed doing and developed a passion for. Writing excited me, but I guess my one regret was that I never shared my stories beyond a small group of friends on my Facebook, because I never believed I could command a readership beyond that, even though the feedback I was getting was so positive and encouraging. I was making people laugh and feel good. I am someone who never likes to follow the crowd and do what everyone else is doing and for most aspects of my life, I usually just do what I want without giving it a second thought, but I had never written anything before, the selfie peak was still a few years away and here I was sharing two things that I could be critiqued on so easily. After that year of over exposing myself, I continued on with more of a blogging theme and set up my own dinky di domain and blog page. I blogged about food, travel, fashion and anything else in between. A friend even said that it was so good, I should have my own TV show. I have to say, fear stopped me from widening my circle of experience in that regard as well until about 2018 when I discovered the love of sharing videos on my Instagram.

The name janijans was given to me back in about 1998, from a girl who worked at a coffee shop I used to frequent. The name has stuck with me and now has its own variations for which different people associate with me. I am janijans, janni, the janergizer and janergy, the name I have used for the title of my story - The Janergy Effect. The Janergy Effect is what I like to think is the magic within me that has helped me through so much and maybe for people who know me, it’s been a bit of magic that has helped and inspired them as well. Now here I am, 10 years on and my passion for writing is still very much alive and my desire to do more storytelling continues to burn deep within me. Although it was still a few years till my marriage would be over, I had my writing to keep me company. I became engrossed in another writing project at the start of 2014 when I was in the shittest time of that relationship. I could only describe it as being truly FUCKED UP.

Many years ago, I had read a book called Don’t sweat the small stuff. It’s a super book with 100 chapters of things we can do to stop all the small stuff from taking over our life. Small stuff had taken over my life back then and I needed to try and find some balance. For me, the book was a game changer because when I began to identify the things I was giving my energy to and worrying about, I was able to begin to let them go and decide what and how much energy I wanted to give to perceived problems. With the escalation of things at home, my inner peace was rapidly declining and I didn’t like the feelings I was feeling. My life was so far away from calm that I had no idea how I could restore it. I was coming up with any possible idea to try and help bring peace back to my life and to my marriage and I remembered that book – Don’t sweat the small stuff. With my take charge attitude, I decided that I had to be the one to manage my part of this situation - or shituation as it was - so I went and got another copy. Actually, I got two. One for me and one for my ex. It was my intention to just read it and be reminded of the things that I had put into practice when I read it the first time, but when I finished it, I had the hair brain idea to begin writing about all the chapters in the book and how they were relating to my current reality and to begin to use the book as a way to restore my zen. A quote from the book really summed up the situation I had found myself in. "change the things that can be changed, accept those that cannot, and have the wisdom to know the difference" I knew what I had to change and it was the way I was responding. I had no idea how long it would take to finish the project, or whether I ever would, but I eventually reached chapter 100. It did take a few years to complete, as a lot of other stuff began to fill my live feed and many new experiences became part of the writing journey. Completing the project became a project in itself as I knew I wanted closure and to acknowledge this mammoth undertaking. I had people reading and responding to my writing, which felt fantastic and the writing journey had been instrumental in my decision to make change.

I guess we can always ask the “what if” question. What if I hadn’t started that photo a day journey? What if I never let it evolve into something that helped me to discover this “thing” I call a gift? What if I had of been content to live the life which was weighing me down, what if, what if, what if? I don’t want to think about the what if, because all I did was take one unexpected, unplanned step after being inspired by someone else and that small step not only opened the pathway towards finding a true passion, but also helped me to take bigger steps towards creating a better life. Words seem to come to me and in 2018 I did another writing project, which was a word a day. I ended up with a wall in my apartment that was full of coloured post its containing words that had meaning to me and were significant for what was another big year of change.

The word a day wall

In 2019, whilst in India, I started spending time just writing quietly and beginning to flesh out what my story might look like if I were to go ahead and start tapping away on the keyboard. And in 2020 more change has come and I don’t just mean the global pandemic, which is one of the most incredible things I have ever witnessed in my lifetime, but change that has bought me to beautiful New Zealand where I have found the inspiration to continue on with my story. As I think back, I know I was always quick witted and good with words, but I was the girl who couldn’t find the words to use in the high school debate, or the words to tell her she was good enough till much later in life, or the right words to tame and quieten that roaring Leo who would be

ready to pounce on me should things not go his way. But I eventually uncovered an unexpected gift and found a way to use written words to guide me through the turmoil of my marriage and make it to the other side and to a moment in time where I could speak the words I needed to speak, and those words were…..I want a divorce. I certainly don't have the answers on how to find your passion and purpose, but it starts with trying something new, doing something unexpected, following a gut feeling or in my case, being inspired from a most unusual source.

Chapter 4. The perfect storm I had lived in Brisbane for most of my life and wasn’t unhappy there and the thought never really struck me to move away. I had a great job, had cemented a fulfilling career path and was content to continue calling Brisbane home. But I think the universe had other plans for me. Brisbane was known for its powerful storms and sometimes they were unexpected and struck with ferociousness. It was common place to see vision of people’s homes on the news after they had been devastated by wild storms, but I never thought that I would find myself in the path of one. As the Brisbane storms build up they are usually visible as they roll in across from the west and on this particular day, we could see the clouds building and knew that a storm warning had been issued, but it didn’t look very nasty from where we were. Sometimes even the darkest of clouds turned out to be nothing more than a rain storm, but you could never tell so I decided to head home just in case. I was pretty confident that I’d make it home with no issues, as I didn’t live too far. I’d got just over a kilometre from work and it started to rain –but it still wasn’t looking like all hell was about to unleash, so I took my usual scenic route down along the river thinking it would just be a quick heavy shower and a great way to get the car washed! Then out of nowhere, the rain took hold and the wind picked up. It made visibility really tough and it was now hard to see, so I stopped on the side of the road to wait for the rain to pass. I noticed that the wind was getting so strong and there were tall gum trees around me that were beginning to really sway so I decided that I’d better try and get to a safer spot in case a branch came down. I began driving again, but it was near impossible so had to stop. And then the hail hit. There was nowhere to go and I wasn’t even able to find a driveway with a carport that I could pull into. I had been in a car when small hail had hit or safely undercover when I had seen bigger hail, but this was something else. This hail was the size that would sit nicely in a glass of whisky, while you sipped it slowly, waiting for a storm to pass. I was expecting my windscreen to smash, or the ragtop of our convertible to be shredded, but thankfully those things stayed intact. I don’t think I have ever been so frightened. The sound was incredible and the car was being beaten to a pulp and all I could do was wait it out. The hail began to slow and I felt relieved that it was passing. But it wasn’t slowing, it was

just taking a breath and getting ready to unleash a second more intense and more ferocious delivery than before. I really hoped that this time, it didn’t smash what was probably an already fragile windscreen or roof, in which case I’d be fucked. As I was sitting there, I noticed that the water around me was starting to rise on the road, so decided I should try and move the car so water didn’t start to come in, or worse still, it floated away with the flash flood that was approaching. I managed to drive to a higher spot and waited for the storm to pass. There were trees literally ripped out of the ground, branches everywhere, debris across the roads and water too deep to drive through.

Flash flooding

Eventually it all calmed and the sun began to peak through and I was able to begin my very long and stressful journey home. What should have been a 10 minute drive home, took over two hours. It all felt very surreal and I remember driving on and feeling so overwhelmed with what had happened and what I was seeing, so I pulled over. People were now coming out of their homes to survey the damage and some people near where I was parked came out to see if I was okay and invited me in. I was probably in some kind of shock and I guess it wasn’t surprising, given what I had experienced. It was truly terrifying being in that storm and I thought I was probably going to be injured. But thanks to my super strong Volvo, I was protected, unlike other cars I was seeing around me. There wasn’t a chip on the windscreen and the ragtop roof was impeccable. The rest of the car though, was a mess. I continued on with my journey home but the traffic on the main road was at a standstill and it just wasn’t possible to get through. The power was

out, cars were stopped everywhere, so I decided to stop at the service station near home because I was really busting for a pee. I was literally 500 metres from home, but I was not able to go anywhere.

The road home and our car before I knew how damaged it was

There were lots of people like me, just stranded and waiting and waiting and waiting. The service station attendant very kindly let me use the bathroom and I navigated my way through in the pitch black to find it and he also very kindly began giving water to people who were outside. As I stood outside waiting, I suddenly felt like I was going to collapse or worse still die. I know that sounds very dramatic, but I had experienced panic attacks before, but this was something more intense. There was no way an ambulance would ever be able to get to me if something happened. It was chaos all round. I found somewhere to sit down and took a lot of deep breaths. I had learned many years ago how to deal with anxiety and panic, so I did my best to go into relax mode and just kept breathing and talked myself through it. It eventually became possible for me to drive the short distance home and see all the houses in our street and surrounds suffering major damage and ours was included. The storm that hit was a supercell storm where two storm fronts merge and cause an almighty fuck up. It was one of Australia’s worst storms and the worst one Brisbane had seen since 1985 and our suburb was one of the hardest hit. The clouds we could see building from our office, were nothing compared to what others were seeing and this storm was so bad, that a year later they were still talking about it and even gave it an anniversary. If you were to google November storm Brisbane, you would get an idea of what had hit us. Here’s a video someone took in our suburb to show how wild it was. https://youtu.be/HdpvU945AyY

During the afternoon, I had been trying to call my ex-husband to let him know that storms were approaching and asked if he could close the windows, but he was at a movie and we never got to speak until shortly before I got home. He had made it home safely but was witness to the unfolding devastation and when I arrived, my son met me outside and warned me about what I was going to see before stepping inside our house. The damage outside our home was enough to tell me that inside may not have fared well either. I was now one of many people who had been in one of the worst storm disasters in Australia and we had no idea where to begin the clean-up.

The side of our house where it was impacted by the storm

It was a long time before we had power back on and everything that had been touched by the storm was wet, including my newly found single woman bed. The storm had hit the back and side of our house and hail had smashed over 50 windows – yes, we had a lot. There was a lot of louvres and they were mainly downstairs where many of our things were being stored awaiting the reno, that was now no longer going to happen. There was no need to shut the windows that day, because most of them ended up gone. The hail and wind were so strong that it smashed holes through furniture and other personal items in three rooms. I no longer had cupboards, drawers, clothes, shoes, sewing machines or computers. But I had a lot of water, glass, leaves and an almighty mess to clean up. Furniture was literally thrown around inside the house and what wasn’t damaged by hail was affected by water.

Our office - nice breeze

This cupboard was where I stored many of my clothes

The sewing room didn't fare well

This outdoor table belonged to my nana. It held fond memories for us but was no match for the storm

The clean-up was pretty traumatic. The council arranged a kerbside collection and we began piling our damaged possessions out onto the street. At one point a man called out to ask if something in the pile was still working and could he have it. That was a distressing moment as I guess it felt a bit like looting, even though we had to part with these things and it was a kind of heartless feeling to think that people were ready to pounce on your possessions that had been destroyed in such an unforgiving way.

More than one load of our possessions had to be thrown out due to water and glass damage

The hail also damaged the roof and caused a number of leaks inside our home. One was in our study, which I became aware of after I awoke to a drip drip drip sound in the middle of the night and the other leak was a biggie in our kitchen. This drip was the mother of all drips and eventually required us to call in the state emergency service to put a tarp on our roof. There was little that could be done to fix this one, apart from a new roof and our insurers weren’t willing to do this. They said our roof was too old and no evidence of hail damage could be found on the outside. They sent out numerous investigators to try and find evidence of hail damage, but each time they denied its existence. One day there is no rain coming through the ceiling and the next day there is rain coming in and the only common factor was an almighty hail storm. They ended up offering us “goodwill” payments as a gesture for the stress we were enduring with the roof. This went on for months and our kitchen became home to numerous permanent buckets needed to catch the summer rain. We eventually got an independent review of the roof and the inspector actually climbed into the ceiling cavity and discovered incredible pitting that could have only been caused by severe hail. We hoped this would be sufficient for the insurance to cover the repair or replacement, but nope, the insurers stood their ground and maintained that there was no damage

was from hail. We took our case to the ombudsman who also sided with the insurer, so we were left with no choice but to arrange a costly repair ourself. Thankfully, the insurer did agree to pay for all other damage and repairs that had occurred and for that we were grateful. The beautiful car which had kept me safe during the storm was written off. The hail damage was shocking and the force of it actually threw the car off its foundations.

This amazing car kept me so safe in the midst of the storm, but pounded by the hail

In the midst of going through this separation and having to live with my ex-husband, I had to deal with the effects of the storm, but I did it with the best way I knew how – with grace, humour, acceptance and an umbrella that I would wear on my head inside to keep me dry.

I decided to wear this umbrella inside. Behind me are the windows that we had to patch up

We had bought the house in 2010 with grand plans of renovating what would have become a great home, but even before ending my marriage it was necessary for us to sell. We had a couple of offers, that would have set us up financially, but at the time, it wasn’t meant to be.

I took a couple of days off work to deal with the clean-up and remember going out for something and caught sight of myself in a mirror. I didn’t realise that I had mascara all under my eyes and when I stopped to try and wipe it off, I discovered it wasn’t mascara, it was black bags pretending to be mascara and no amount of wiping would make it move. What that told me, was that I needed to stop and do a check in with myself, and after acknowledging that within the space of a few weeks, two very significant life events had happened, I booked a ticket to Fiji to go and see my family and flew out the following morning.

A quick coffee before I headed to Fiji for some much needed R&R

Actually, I nearly didn’t fly out, because after waiting for an hour and a half in the check in line, I got to the front of the queue to discover that my passport was out of date by ONE day. Can you believe it? One freaken day. After some frantic calls to the Fijian authorities in Suva I was given permission to travel and made it to the gate after taking my shoes off and running the length of the airport as my name was being called over the loudspeaker to alert me that I was about to be offloaded. I arrived to the plane and burst into tears. The flight attendants gave me a box of tissues and I cried nearly the whole way to Fiji. Yeah, I needed that release. After a wonderful break, it was back home to the reality of living in a situation that was not likely to change until we were able to sell our house.

A storm is the way that the atmosphere releases energy and with it comes change. Change from the preceding heat to the welcome coolness or in my case a change that was bigger than just the damage to my home and possessions. It was a change that paved the way for me to follow an opportunity that I never would have seen on my horizon. I guess my take away for this time is: 1. Make sure your insurance is in order 2. If you are going to buy a car, consider a Volvo, its ability to keep me safe and do its duty exceeded its safety rating expectation 3. If you are going to book an overseas holiday make sure your passport is current 4. Don’t wear high heels at an airport, in case you have to run to catch your flight 5. Recognise when to stop and take a break, if it’s all feeling too much and know that it’s okay to down tools. Perhaps forget number three, because who needs a passport in 2020 anyway?

Chapter 5. The endless months So, how does it feel to have to live with your ex for a period of time when you really don’t want to? Well it isn’t great. We put on a brave front for a long time, not easily finding a way to share our split and luckily, he was the travelling salesman and that meant he would come and go for a week at a time and I had some space. We were living mostly civilly even with his ongoing tantrums and we still did things together such as breakfast with friends, dinners and occasional outings, but there was no love to be shared. We became a one car, nonfamily after the beautiful Volvo was written off and that meant he would still drop and pick me up from work when he was home, but eventually his need to travel became less, so his staying home became more. He claimed I was still his best friend and even when our living arrangements came to an end, I tried. I tried to be his friend, but it’s hard when you have so little respect for the person you had spent the past 10 years of your life with. One of the things we had done over the past few Christmas breaks was to go camping and we would pre-book a site for the following year. It was nearly the end of 2014 and it was definitely the end of the marriage, but we were going to spend Christmas and New year at the beach, because one, it was already booked and two, who doesn’t love the beach. Part of my camping requirements included some luxuries. And by luxuries, I don’t mean a comfy beach chair or an esky full of champers, I mean an espresso machine, a full-size fridge and laminated Mariah Carey Christmas decorations that I hung around the perimeter of our campsite. It was Christmas after all and I wanted to be in the Christmas spirit. He kindly got me a comfy blow up bed and we cohabitated in the small space. Him mostly outside drinking and me inside reading. This man was a time bomb and from moment to moment I never knew if he would be in a happy or angry mood. If he was happy – great. And if not, then run for cover. We had friends who wanted to come and visit but things were so tense, I begged them not to come. Even my mother wasn’t welcome and when I said she wanted to drop in as she passed through on her travels, he was very threatening and said she wasn’t welcome. So be it. It was a miserable old Christmas, but I knew it was the last one I’d ever have to have with him.

It still blows my mind that his need to “punish” was at the top of his values list. For some reason, we decided to pack up and left to go home from our camping trip a day earlier then we had planned. I was still carless and had been searching for a replacement Volvo for some time and found one at the Gold Coast and we stopped in to have a look on our way home. It was exactly like the one that had been written off, but in shiny silver. I knew I wanted this same car, so with part of my insurance money, I agreed to buy it, gave them a deposit, arranged to get the car checked over by a mechanic and planned to come back during the week to pick it up. I was finally going to be on the road again. (Also with our insurance money, I thought we would split it 50/50, but the car that I helped pay for over the past few years, suddenly became his and the ratio of the payout shifted considerably. Thankfully, I did have enough to buy my car and had some left over to replace items that had been damaged). On the day after we got back from camping, we decided to go to lunch at one of our favourite Indian restaurants and during lunch my ex-husband kept saying that he was having trouble swallowing. I gave him my medical opinion which was that maybe he was feeling stressed and it could be causing tightness around his neck area. What I really wanted to say, was, stop being such an angry white man and relax, but I didn’t. He continued to have this feeling for the remainder of the day and I suggested that we go to the hospital if it was really bothering him. He said he would wait till the morning to see if it had improved. My holidays were now officially over and it was time to head back to work. My ex-husband said he was still having the same funny feeling in his throat and the next day as I was getting ready for work and about to get in the shower, he asked me to help him with something. I said I'd just be a few minutes and would help when I was finished. He was annoyed that I didn't drop everything for him' but figured that what he needed could wait a few minutes. After showering and getting dressed, I went to help him, but couldn’t find him anywhere. I searched the house, the yard, called his phone, but he was nowhere to found. The usual interactions when he didn’t get his way was to storm off in anger and avoid speaking to me, or sometimes the opposite, confront me and yell at me, but this time, there was radio silence.

It was very strange and I figured he’d surface after he calmed down, so I left for work and continued to call throughout the morning but wasn’t able to reach him. I then reached out to my son and asked if he could try and make contact. My son eventually connected with him and told me that my ex-husband was at the hospital. In his annoyance at not getting my attention, he called a taxi and went to the emergency department to get his throat looked at. He had spent the morning in emergency while they did some tests and was admitted later in the day with a mystery illness. Of course, as soon as I found this out, I went to the hospital to support him. He had no other family to call and regardless of how horrible people can be, you don’t like to see them suffer. By the time I reached the hospital in the afternoon, he was in a very bad condition. His inability to swallow meant that he required a hand held machine to suck out the saliva and fluids that collect in the mouth and throat as part of the normal functioning. His condition worsened rapidly and paralysis was setting in and with that, he became bedridden. The speed at which he deteriorated was quite scary. He was given more tests during the day to try and find a diagnosis and a switched-on doctor decided to test him for something called Guillain-Barre Syndrome. This is a very rare illness where the body’s immune system attacks the sheath surrounding the nerves, and messages from the brain to the body get blocked, making it difficult to perform normal function. Although it hadn’t been confirmed, they began what was a very expensive and probably lifesaving treatment. This illness normally begins with tingling in the feet, but in his case, it started in the throat and the doctor was spot on with deciding to treat him for this. As the paralysis took hold, they decided the best place for him was in the Intensive Care Unit. It was likely that he would no longer be able to selfmanage clearing the fluids from his throat and being put into a medical coma and onto a ventilator was the likely outcome if he continued to deteriorate. It is an illness that is rapid and fatal if left untreated He begged me not to call his family who lived overseas as he didn’t want to worry them, but eventually decided that this was the end and managed to make some calls to people telling them that it might be goodbye. There was definitely a level of fear that had overcome him. He spent four nights in the ICU and for anyone who has had been in one, or had friends or family there, it is a very confronting place if you visit.

And if people do leave the ICU, they often require a long period of rehabilitation. When he was well enough, they returned him to the neuro ward where people who had brain injuries or strokes were cared for. This was a really challenging place to be, because the patients were people who found themselves there after either an illness, or through an acquired brain injury. One of the patients there – a middle aged man - had been out with a friend and after a few too many drinks, they got into a physical fight and his friend king hit him which resulted in him hitting the concrete and getting a brain injury that was likely to keep him in the ward and to never resume life as he knew it. Another patient was a young man who was just out walking and decided to have a bit of fun and stepped up onto a brick fence that he was going past and as he walked along it, he fell and hit his head and his injury was so significant that he required 24-hour monitoring and care, and for his own safety had to be restrained. He was always trying to escape the ward and was continually yelling and screaming. It was pretty hard to see and to hear. There was a car accident victim and another man who decided that he didn’t want an operation that might save his life and then, there was my ex-husband who after having a sore throat, found himself in a place that neither of us would have ever imagined and he still had quite a road ahead of him. I ensured I visited him before work, lunch time and after work every day and when friends were allowed, they came to support him. This did take a bit of pressure off me, because apart from showing care to another human, I had no obligation to help him, given we were no longer a couple. I helped with everything from feeding, showering, to holding his hand when he thought he might die. After a period of time in the ward, he was sent to a rehabilitation unit at the hospital for a few weeks. He had to learn how to eat, swallow, use his arms and legs again and be able to cope at home independently. Did you know there is such a thing as thickened water? I tried it and it was nasty.

Hospital issue water

People do recover from Guillain-Barre Syndrome but it does take a period of time. He was very weak, so I did everything possible to ensure he was looked after and comfortable. We were even able to have some small periods away from the hospital and I took him to our local coffee shop and he was allowed a short visit home dependent on whether he could walk up and down the stairs to get there. But these things were so tiring for him. It was another few weeks before he was allowed home and his recovery went well and quite quickly. That was kind of amazing, considering the state he was in when I first saw him at the hospital. He also said that this life changing event had a very profound effect on him and I thought it might have been one of those moments where you hear about people facing death and deciding to implement life changes to their mindset and way of living. In a weak moment, I even thought that if he is capable of making some great changes, then maybe we could consider trying to rebuild our relationship. Oh that was another “what was I thinking” moment. He wasn’t one of those people whose visit to deaths door had any impact. If anything, I think he became more frustrated and angrier. What struck me about the day when he went to hospital, was that he chose to be angry because I didn’t give him immediate attention. If he had of said, hey, this is an emergency, please take me to the hospital, then I would have dropped everything to help. Even in that moment, the ego was bigger than ever. One great thing about this time, was that I picked up my car and that gave me the freedom I needed.

As the months went on and my ex made a full recovery, life became a bit more independent for both of us and he would spend more time with our mutual friends and obviously was bad mouthing me in ways that saw most of our friends drop contact with me. And I think I became a bit of a joke between them because he told me how funny they thought it was when he shared with them that he had lost 80 kilos – meaning me. Maybe I was 80 kilos, maybe I wasn’t, but regardless, it isn’t and wasn’t a funny joke. The reality is that none of our friends knew the shit I had been going through in this relationship and maybe our friends might not have thought it was so funny if they had. I had been showing grace under pressure. I was pretty occupied for the first six months of 2015 which was great and I wasn’t really mourning the loss of my marriage - apart from the moment when he was sick and I wondered whether I had made a wrong decision when I saw a sliver of change come over him, but there wasn’t much idle time for my mind to wonder about the what ifs, and the freedom that came with this decision was starting to bring life back into my soul. Isn’t it funny how our mind plays tricks on us and tries to keep us connected to the things that we know aren’t good for us. For me to be having even momentary feelings of wanting to reconnect with the man who I knew wasn’t right for me just didn’t make sense, but the level of guilt that was showered upon me when I ended it may have had something to do with it. Although I had checked out of the relationship a long time ago, I was now starting to think about dating, in between all the other things I was doing. Our living arrangements weren’t really conducive to this, but I did share with my ex that I was ready to move on. He wasn’t too happy about this, but what to do when you had spent so much time trying to fix something that the other person didn’t want to fix. I didn’t actually go on any dates because what I wanted from dating and what my capability was, just didn’t align. I did join a couple of dating sites and did the messaging ping pong, but I quickly learnt the ropes of dating when I went into the next chapter of my life. I did manage to have some more time away from this shitty environment, as one of my sisters suggested a few years earlier that we to do a collection for Fiji Fashion Week. We did our first one in 2012 and it was so much fun and so much hard work. We collaborated from afar and designed and sewed our own collections for the shows we did. Sewing

has been in our family for generations and my mum went back to college in her 70’s so she could do pattern designing and help us with the technical elements needed to create our own designs. We wanted our clothing to be for the everyday woman so we stepped away from the smaller models who have always been the norm in the fashion world and we did a collection that was inclusive for all. Although we weren’t able to show clothes to the full range of sizes we would have liked, we did have a platform to show something different.

Our first very colourful collection

We showed collections in Fiji Fashion Week for four years and during this time also had the opportunity to take part in some other plus size events. One was called Full Figured Fashion week and was held in New York in 2013. My passport has lots of Fiji stamps in it and I was there relaxing on a gorgeous tropical island when we got news that we had been accepted into this event. I remember my sister screaming with delight as she ran to tell us that we were off to New York to take part. This event also included my other sister who lived in New York and between us all we put together a collection and headed to the big apple.

Full Figure Fashion Week, New York, 2013

Our next real plus size fashion show was in Melbourne in early 2015 and it was called Curvy Couture. We got our creative juices flowing, put a collection together and had a ball in Melbourne showing our styles to an audience of people who would appreciate that there was an event in Australia that embraced the diversity that was so lacking in the fashion scene.

Curvy Couture in Melbourne

Our great collection for Curvy Couture

A highlight of this event was getting to meet Tess Holliday, who has forged the way for plus size women in more ways than just fashion.

Meeting Tess Holliday and gifting her some clothing

I loved having a change of scenery in Melbourne and catching up with my family who flew in from Fiji. It was a nice breather away from life back in Brisbane where things were still chugging along, and now, our house had a giant “For Sale” sign out the front. We continued to showcase at Fiji Fashion week until 2015, which was our last event, and I took another trip to there in early June for what was to be the final collection we would show. It was here that I got news that we had a serious buyer for our house. Now this wasn’t just any house, it was a renovators delight and even though we had a thorough inspection on the property by a reputable firm before we signed on the dotted line, they failed to pick up not only severe termite damage that eventually required us to prop our house up with scaffolding, but actual live termites chewing their way through our money. It was a horror. There had been a few offers on the house, all of which we had to turn down, but we got an offer that we decided to take. It was going to be a relatively quick settlement and one that would leave us both without any financial gain from the property, but we had to move on and be free of the chains that bound us. As this change was unfolding, I was thinking about where I would move to and what I would do. During a conversation with a friend at work, I was told of a job in Melbourne working with some people who I had previously worked with. I thought what the hell and applied for the role. I received a call from the manager of the team asking if I really wanted to make the big shift and when I explained my situation, she agreed for my application to go through the merit phase of recruitment. The house was due to settle, I was looking for a place to live, my exhusband had now moved out and in amongst it all was a dream job working with people I liked and living in a city where I had always wanted to live. I was right in the middle of another perfect storm whereby I literally had a small window to either find a place to live or hope that I was successful with getting the job in Melbourne. The waiting and anticipation of what was to come kept my head spinning and it was the strangest feeling to have a foot in two places – one keeping me in Brisbane where I was planning my next steps and the

other so close to the biggest adventure of my life. I kept wondering why it was taking them so long to let me know about the job and had come up with the decision in my head that they had chosen someone else. As I water cooler talked this out with my colleagues at work, a friend said “don’t kill it before it is dead”. Those are words that stick with me all the time now, as in my mind, I was literally of the belief that this job wasn’t going to happen, even though I had no idea what was going on behind the scenes with the recruitment. As it turned out, I was the right candidate for the role. There were so many takeaways during this time and on looking back, some of mine were: 1.

When you make a major life decision, and you question whether you've done the right thing, to remember that you made the decision for a reason. Don't look back and don't second guess yourself. Kindness matters. Would you rather be right than kind? I could have easily chosen to step away from the man who was in need, but kindness mattered. And as always, if an opportunity presents. Take it. Whether it be to follow a passion or apply for a job that is at the other end of the country. Know that it has presented for a reason. If you are going to buy a house, make sure you get the best inspection possible to ensure that termites aren't using your house as a buffet.

It was now my time. I was free from my husband, free from the house, still had some money from my insurance and took the leap of faith and moved to Melbourne at 48 years of age, with only a job to go to, a few weeks accommodation and no network of friends outside of work. And that didn’t matter, because I was FREE….. the free spirit was finally free to start the next chapter.

Chapter 6. Heading south and settling in In preparation for my new job, I was flown to Melbourne for a day to meet the team, and the excitement of that was something I’ll never forget. I felt just like a character out of a movie and the whole experience felt pretty surreal. I was going to be the new girl in town and open an exciting new chapter. My arrival into Melbourne was also pretty exciting and that was partly due to the wild weather that was making its presence known – it’s always fun in a cross wind when landing. I caught the bus to the city and loved watching the skyline unfold in front of me. It was only a few months before, that I was in Melbourne for a fashion show, but this time it was different and the skyline was going to become a permanent fixture, not just a passing scene. I would only be going back to Brisbane temporarily and that felt great. And my arrival to the hotel for this flying visit was somewhat comedic. My rookie move was to catch a cab from the bus to the hotel. If only I’d known that the hotel was literally two blocks away from the bus stop, I would probably have walked, or caught a tram. But in my own defence, I had not spent a lot of time in Melbourne, so I didn’t really know where me or the hotel was, plus the weather was wild and I might have frozen or got blown away in those two short blocks. Next morning, I headed off to the office and it was so wet and freezing cold. Melbourne was in the middle of one of the worst polar blasts, but the city looked so beautiful and I was excited to think that in a few short weeks this would be home. I WAS MOVING TO MELBOURNE and happy to let everyone know…… Did I feel any fear? Not really, as I just take everything in my stride and like to think I live with the belief that everything that is meant for me won’t pass me by and it now seemed that I was about to go in a very clear direction. The settlement on our house was very fast – thank goodness – and by now my ex-husband had found a new place to live and we were doing the final deciding of who gets what. I packed my belongings into two moving pods ready to be delivered once I was settled in Melbourne.

Nearly ready to go

I had arranged a small farewell at our local coffee shop and it was lovely to spend time with people who had been part of my life for many years. There were memorable moments shared, laughs, hugs, photographs and many “I can’t wait to see you again”. With the final tidy up done and the keys handed back to the agent, there was a definite parting of the ways with my ex. I went to stay with my son for a few days before we set off on our two-day drive to Melbourne. I had everything I needed packed into my cute car ready to drive off into the proverbial sunset, but as I’m not one to go with convention, I drove off into the sunrise, well it was just after sunrise, but this day represented a new beginning. I had one final coffee at my local, gave my ex-husband a goodbye hug and I never looked back. Ironically my relationship with my coffee shop lasted longer than my marriage. We drove from Brisbane to Melbourne on the inland highway and most of the time had the roof down on the convertible. It was the perfect road trip and a few hundred kilometres into the journey, I asked my son to stop the car. I needed a moment. It was here I got out of the car in the middle of nowhere and yelled “FUCK, FUCK, FUCK, FUCK, FUCK”. I had learnt this technique from a woman in Fiji who told me that doing this was cheaper and better than therapy. She wasn’t wrong. This was a great release and I yelled at the top of my lungs with only the mountains, the wild animals and my son to lay witness to my thundering voice and the freedom this brought.

The time I stopped for roadside therapy

Inland Australia is very beautiful and apart from the occasional photo stop I was enjoying the ride in the passenger seat. My son did a lot of the driving and all was well until he seemed to zone out and I noticed we were veering off the road towards a rather large pole. Thankfully he responded when I called his name. It was a scary moment but he assured me he was okay to keep driving and we made it safely to our first overnight stop. We hadn’t planned where to stay for the night but stopped in Coonabarabran – the stargazing capital of Australia. We found a hotel, checked in and then went to a most amazing Chinese restaurant for dinner and the owner told me that all the interior of the restaurant had been transported from China when it was originally built. After dinner and after such a long day I was ready for bed. My son complained that he had a headache and said he was going to go and get some headache tablets. Fair enough I thought, it had been a long day and he’s done a lot of driving. I had no idea that the headache tablets he needed were the ones feeding an opioid addiction that I would come to find out about the following year and one that would nearly cost him his life. Maybe you are wondering how a switched on, loving mother didn’t know her son was an addict? Well, he never presented as you expect an addict to. He was still holding down a job, was in a relationship and living a life that I knew as his “normal”. He was hiding it very well. The weather inland was also very cold and when we came out the following morning from our toasty room, the Volvo had iced over. I used to call my car VOVO and I guess at that moment, she was an Iced Vovo – which is nothing like the Iced Vovo that we know and love as the delicious Australian biscuit.

An icy start to the morning

Taking this route to Melbourne meant I got to see some parts of Australia that I had never seen before and the landscape is ever changing. As night began to fall, we were edging closer to Melbourne and when we got to see the twinkling lights of the beautiful city that lay ahead of us it was the best scene of all. I had only been to Melbourne a handful of times, but I knew it was the coolest place ever. My employer had arranged accommodation in an apartment block across from our office and I was to meet a representative of the relocation company to give me access to the building where I would be staying. First stop was South Yarra where my son would stay with his father and the second stop was my new temporary home. I had to have my first drive in Melbourne and made sure I avoided trams at all cost. The Hook Turn is something that one masters after a while, but my first night in Melbourne was not the time to try. I had no information about my accommodation. I only knew that I was to go to a location called Freshwater Place in Southbank and meet a man who would give me the keys. Doesn’t that sound dodgy. Before I got to see it my apartment, I had to park the car. My car park was on level 8, so it was a dizzying drive to get to my spot and the entry routine was a bit like a scene out of Get Smart. I had to go down a narrow lane, drive down a ramp, go through a boom gate, drive to a roller door, go through it, then wait for the roller door to shut, then wait for another boom gate to open and then, finally, I could start the journey upwards. And what goes up, must come down, because I had to repeat the same process to get out. This building was obviously fancy, because the net worth of all the cars alone, would pay for a penthouse apartment. It was full of Teslas,

Lamborghinis, Ferraris, Aston Martins, Mercedes, Jaguars and it now had one happy little Volvo. If the car park was anything to go by, then what must the apartments be like? It was hard for me to gauge the height of the apartment as I was only looking ahead, not upwards as I arrived, so wasn’t sure what I was walking into. But wow, what a surprise. We had to take the lift to the 46th floor of what I quickly realised was a 60-story building. OH MY GOD, it was soooo fancy. When the door opened to my apartment and I saw what lay ahead, my jaw dropped. I was in an ultra-modern apartment with the most incredible view of the city. I was mesmerised by the lights and how beautiful the city looked around me. He hurriedly showed me around the apartment and gave me all the instructions I needed. I actually only needed the instructions to get me back to the balcony so I could take in the view and feel the cold fresh air embrace and welcome me. From my balcony I could see the beautiful buildings glistening, the Yarra River just below, Flinders Street Station looking so alive and I could slowly make out people on the walkway below. If this was night time, then what would daytime bring? I do remember getting one other instruction and that was to make sure I didn’t set the fire alarm off. Apart from the whole building possibly having to evacuate and walk down 60 flights of stairs, it would cost me $3000 if it was a false alarm. I can confirm that no toast or anything else was burnt during my stay. This apartment and the whole complex was amazing. It had two concierge desks and was set up in a way that you took a certain set of lifts depending on which floor you lived on. If you lived on floor 40 or below, you caught one set and took another set of lifts for the those in the higher altitude. Floor 40 was the segregation area and if you lived above this floor, you had the keys to the executive washroom, so to speak. It took me a while to find out about floor 40 but once I did, there was no turning back. The main pool and gym that any resident could access was nothing to sneeze at, but floor 40 was amazing. It had a sauna that was positioned on the corner of the building so while you were steaming away, you could look out onto the city from the floor to ceiling windows. There was a gym, library, cinema and an indoor infinity pool which could be seen glowing neon blue from the ground below and I had the key. Well for six weeks at least.

Freshwater Place, Melbourne

So, what did I do on my first night in Melbourne? Well, it was late and I was starving so after lugging all my belongings from my car to my apartment, I went downstairs to try and find some food. I introduced myself to the lady at the Concierge Desk and she suggested I head off across the road to the Crown Casino Complex, where there would be an abundance of choice. Over my time at Freshwater Place, she also shared lots of other suggestions of things to do and gave me one other piece of advice which was to make sure I wasn’t out walking alone after about 2am. Noted. My first meal in Melbourne was a delicious Margherita pizza and a glass of wine from one of the many restaurants in the casino complex and it would become a regular spot as I navigated my way around the many amazing food haunts the city had to offer. What I loved about arriving at night is that you have a different perspective of what the city may be like, so beyond what I could see in the darkness, everything else was going to be a surprise. It was three days till I started my new job and with my son staying in Melbourne for a short while, we decided to do some exploring and arranged to meet at the “clocks” the next day. The clocks are at the entrance to Flinders Street Station and are an iconic landmark where many people arrange to meet before they go about their business in the city. The clocks also became the place where three and a half years later, I would meet the man who a fortune teller said would be the one I spend the rest of my life with.

After the long couple of days travelling, I was ready to climb into bed, but not before I stood staring for a while at the beautiful view that was so captivating. On my first day in Melbourne, I remember waking up, lying in bed relishing the moment and wanting to pinch myself to ensure I wasn’t dreaming. Here was me, having taken some big bold steps into the unknown and feeling excited about this amazing new life change. As I lay there, my attention was drawn to something reflecting on the mirror, so I jumped up, raced to the balcony to see the most beautiful sight of hot air balloons floating by as the sun was about to break over Melbourne.

Balloons over Melbourne

Melbourne is one of the few places in the world where you can take balloon flights across the city and this became one of my favourite things to watch on the mornings that the wind blew them in my direction. I decided there and then that this was something I wanted to try and make happen and before I left four years later, that dream became a reality. As planned, I went and met my son under the clocks and we went off exploring. We only had a few days together, but it was spent wandering the city which was so different to the one I had just left behind.

Meeting my son at the clocks

Our exploring did take us in search of good coffee and from my previous trips to Melbourne, I knew of a couple of coffee shops that would serve up the good stuff but I have to say, it took me a long time to find a coffee shop that I was drawn back to everyday. I think it’s important that I address this very serious issue of Melbourne coffee right now. As I mentioned, my relationship with my coffee shop in Brisbane was longer, happier and more stable than my marriage and I was hoping in time that I would form a long-lasting relationship with not only a man, but with a Melbourne coffee shop. I eventually found a place that was able to deliver my coffee the way I liked it as soon as I walked in and took a seat, but that took a few years. Melbourne is the coffee capital of Australia – allegedly, but sadly, it wasn’t the coffee capital for me. There was a very high bar or should I say a high Bar-ista to be met in regards to my coffee and I struggled to find it. For the time I was in Melbourne, I found it very hard to have a consistently good coffee at many of the places I frequented. It was constantly changing and on any given day, it could be a goldilocks moment whereby one coffee was too hot, one too cold and one may be just right. Maybe! My coffee struggle was real. The people who worked in the coffee shops were always lovely and friendly, but I’d often leave with a bitter taste of bad coffee in my mouth, and that hurt my coffee loving heart and my wallet. No matter where you went, people lined up to have what I considered at times to be ordinary

coffee and this was very apparent near where I worked and I had to suck it up. Thankfully I was eventually able to get my coffee machine sent from Brisbane, so at least I could be guaranteed that I’d have the perfect brew at home. Sorry to hurt your feelings Melbourne, but I have to say it – sometimes your coffee sucks. Apart from that, you are the best. I had my favourite places in the city and they were Brunetti, an Italian institution in Melbourne that sells the most delicious cakes. It’s a must visit, even to go and just drool over the sweet things, and my other favourite was Degraves Espresso, which is a quirky coffee joint in one of the cute laneways. I would often arrange to meet my dates here, because there was nothing cosy or romantic about the place. It had wooden benches and old cinema seats to sit on, so if any of those dates had hanky panky on their mind, this wasn’t the place for it. I did invite “the one” for our first meeting at the uncomfortable coffee shop and it soon became a regular place for us to have a coffee and share a croissant on our lazy Sunday mornings. We always made those uncomfortable seats feel romantic. I was conscious that I had important work to do and that was to find a place to live. But I did spend a lot of time staring at the beautiful city from my 46th floor balcony. I’d race home from work each day to watch the city buildings glisten when the afternoon sun shone on them and many a morning, I’d enjoy a cup of tea as I watched the city come to life as it was bathed with the morning sunshine. And of course, there were the balloons.

The view from the 46th floor

It was the middle of winter and it was bitterly cold and I wasn’t prepared for the icy winds that blew in the area where I lived and worked- it wreaked havoc with my outfits and my hair, but it didn’t matter, because here I was in this gorgeous city. Taking daily photos of my outfits was something that became a ritual for me. I had started this a while before I arrived in Melbourne and continued up until the time I left. I’d been blogging for so long and sharing stories and thoughts as I was navigating my way out of my old life into my new one and was doing a little fashion writing project called “What I wore”. I do love a good project and for the remainder of my first year in Melbourne, I set about sharing my outfits and my stories of what my new life was like. I know people still blog about fashion, but I feel that social media has saturated and taken away some of the simplicities of life and made this pond so big that it’s hard to swim in, so I wound down my fashion blogging and continued writing more about life and working towards finishing my Don't Sweat the Small Stuff Journey, but it took a bit of a back seat as I began to explore Melbourne life.

Sharing my fashion on my blog

The Melbourne weather was something that was always fascinating to an outsider and was often described as having four seasons in one day. The one thing that really surprised me was that it hardly rained, but when it did, it was often torrential and during my time in Melbourne I was involved in another flooding event. The weather did sometimes make me laugh as you would find yourself being blown away as you went about your business and the first time I experienced the wind, I didn’t know what to hold down first….my top or my hair.

The wind was always wild

The weather is also a legitimate topic of conversation and one that used to amuse me as I listened to people talking about it at work and various other places. One afternoon, we were expecting a very bad storm to come through the city and the office I worked in was on the 24th floor and faced out towards the bay, so we could see the storm rolling in. I was talking to my colleague about the weather we were expecting and he looked at his watch and said, I think it will arrive about 3 o’clock. Wow, that was some prediction and sure enough it arrived right on time. I was given a beautiful umbrella as a farewell gift when I left Brisbane but the irony of this gift is that it hardly rained, but if it did, you didn’t want to use your umbrella because the wind could destroy it in a few seconds. The weather was surprising to me as Melbourne has always been known as the city that has four seasons in one day. I actually found the weather to be amazing even if a few umbrellas were lost along the way. At the time of my arrival to Melbourne they were beginning to remove the love locks from one of the main walkways between where I lived and the city. None of these are my love locks, but I did get to put one on a bridge before I left Melbourne.

Love locks on the bridge

The six weeks in my work accommodation flew by and I contemplated all the suburbs I could live and decided to base myself in the city. One of the great things about Melbourne is that the inner city is so accessible that it wouldn’t have mattered where I chose to live and I eventually found an apartment on the 18th floor of a building which was literally a block away from my work at Southbank. In hindsight, I probably could have made a better choice of location to live as there were so many great lively suburbs, but this place I chose served me well and was so close to everything. With the money I had left from the insurance, I was able to relocate my things from Brisbane, pay my bond and get some of the things I needed to set me up for this new life. My new apartment had so much room. It was two bedroom – making it perfect for me to eventually set up a sewing area and have space for when people came to stay. The lounge and bedroom had floor to ceiling windows giving me uninterrupted views out to the mountains. I loved that bedroom so much as it was bathed in light all the time and with no curtains, I had unlimited views of everything going on outside and people had unlimited views of everything going on inside. I would tell people I lived in fishbowl because that’s what it felt like.

I loved sleeping in a fishbowl

Upside of this great place was that I was so close to work and the city, but the downside was that I could see work and they could see my apartment. Not a great place to be if you wanted to chuck a sicky. Some of my colleagues thought I was crazy to be paying inner city rent, but when I did the sums, it made perfect sense to me. I could pay lesser rent in the burbs, but I’d still be paying public transport, or parking and when I sold it like that, people were on board. Plus, I was a city slicker. I don’t do well in the burbs, so I was paying for the convenience. I had come out of a situation where there was joint income and even while we were cohabiting, we split the living expenses and now, here I was on my own with nothing but a car, a few possessions as assets, and a lot of sexually transmitted debt. So many women find themselves in this very same situation after making the decision to free themselves in order for happiness – or having that decision made for them and if I was to have my time again, and knew what I knew now, I would have definitely done many things differently around how I managed my money and how I would have progressed that relationship. I, like many others is/was/is a spender and this new lifestyle meant that I had to be totally responsible for myself financially and as the old saying goes, cut my cloth accordingly. I was being paid monthly in my role in Brisbane and also being paid monthly here in Melbourne and this was also a challenge and here’s how I managed to navigate my way through the new financial chapter.

1. When I got paid, I would pay off or contribute the required portion to all the bills that were due – rent, phone, electricity and the sexually transmitted debt… 2. If there was anything essential I needed to get, I would go and buy it. 3. I would then divide the remainder of my money into how many weeks till the next pay and transfer it to a separate account. Each week I would then transfer the amount for my weekly living expenses back to my main account to use until the following week and then repeat the cycle. 4. I had a mindset shift as to how I spent my money. Before I bought anything, I really weighed up whether the purchase was going to cause me hardship later on and that really did mean turning some things down because it just wasn’t financially practical. 5. Treat yourself when you can. We all deserve to feel like we are living, not just existing. I followed this formula for my time in Melbourne and I eventually got into a good habit and routine whereby I was able to still do some fun things but also knew that I wouldn’t have the bailiffs knocking at the door, but it was always a struggle financially knowing there wasn’t much in the kitty. This might seem like a no brainer of a budgeting solution, but for me it was the only way I knew to ensure that I had enough. Money scarcity has always seemed to be a theme in my life and one that I have recently been able to overcome. I kept myself occupied with work, my writing, exploring the city and local surrounds, finding anything free or super cheap to go to, and exploring all manner of wonderful places to take my outfit of the day photo which I now only occasionally post on my Instagram. Melbourne has no shortage of locations for this and what I do love about social media is that it documented precious moments of my time there and when I look back, I can relive some of the good and not so good times. And yep, more “not so good times” were coming. Melbourne also has a good bike sharing system and one of the perks of my job was that we had a subscription for these. That meant that staff could borrow bikes when they pleased and I would often arrange to use one on the weekends so that I could go exploring, and that became a really nice way to see the city and surrounds in the first few week. I found the inner city also very small and when I looked on the map, I didn’t realise that the places I wanted to explore were ever so close and was kicking myself when I realised that I could have had many more adventures in the fascinating surrounds. The other thing I would do is walk. And walk a lot. Melbourne is the perfect city for walking and if you didn’t want to walk you could just jump on one the free trams that traversed the city and enjoy the ride.

I soon discovered one of my favourite places in Melbourne, called Lord of the Fries. It’s a fast food vegetarian and vegan burger franchise that my taste buds just loved. I would make it my Saturday morning ritual. I had no friends to hang out with, so kept myself occupied looking for places where I could have my Saturday treat of good coffee and vegetarian food. I had my little routine of walking over to the city, eating a big fat burger with fries, savouring a coffee and then just exploring all that Melbourne had to offer. Even when I left 4 years later, I am sure I hadn’t even scratched the surface of this beautiful city but I always felt like I saw the city through fresh eyes. I was living very lean, and toast and dahl became a staple for me. It was cheap and nourishing and tasted great. I would go exploring and look at all the wonderful things at the markets but was realistic that some things were just out of my financial reach and weren’t deemed as essential, so I kept things super simple, but still made sure I had my weekly burger treat until I found other more interesting things to do on the weekends. It certainly took a while to feel really settled and I began to feel one with this beautiful city and start to build my new life. It was still so cold and I remember my sister telling me that when I felt the first warm winds of spring, it would be a beautiful moment. The warm winds did come and the trees began to come alive and along with that, so did the city and so did I. I began to feel like I was free and just like the spring buds, I was ready to blossom, but there was still some healing to do.

Chapter 7. The loneliness One of the great things about being in a new city is that there is so much to explore but the downside can be not having anyone to explore all the wonderful things with. Now it was just me. My son was in Brisbane, my family were overseas, I had no real support network of friends around me and here I was feeling so excited to have this opportunity to explore a new horizon, but I was lonely even though I had so much wonderment just outside the door and the relief of personal freedom. The transition from coupledom to singledom is never easy regardless of how happy or unhappy the relationship may be. We have routines that help keep us secure and grounded and when they all disappear, you can find yourself looking into what seems a very empty and lonely life even though there are so many good things that await us. Many nights I would cry when I was sitting home alone and it’s a normal part of dealing with big change and letting go. Leaving a relationship is big change, moving to a new city is big change, starting a new job is big change and as exciting as those things were, when I got home, it was just me and I really did feel the loneliness of not having someone to greet me, or to cook for, or to chat with about my day and that was because I chose to want better. Being lonely is an emotion in itself and separate to all the other things that were making their way to the surface as I was going through my reboot. I was also dealing with grief, loss, uncertainty, joy, peace, excitement and happiness – what a mix. I would really work at a conscious level on changing my thinking and reminding myself that this was only a temporary feeling and situation, and it would pass. Of course, doing something to not feel lonely is also so important, but my feelings were real, and I validated and accepted them and reminded myself that I am in charge of the action or inaction needed to change my loneliness factor. Millions of people were feeling what I was feeling at this very same time, and I was determined to overcome this, just as I had overcome so many other obstacles. I was also very accepting that what I was feeling was perfectly normal and would then go about doing something to change my outlook. Making the decision is what makes the difference to how we can feel in any moment. Being alone and loneliness has in some ways been a big part of my life. I had always felt like it was a bit of an outsider. I had a child at a young

age and devoted myself to raising him after my first marriage ended, so I felt alone for a very long time and was craving the desire for another union, but just didn’t know how to make it happen. I was actually a single woman for 15 years. After the breakdown of the relationship with my son’s father at 22, I just never felt worthy of love, I felt an incredible sense of rejection and I certainly didn’t feel like people actually liked me or that anyone would want to love me, so from my early 20’s to my late 30’s I was letting life slip by in a way that I didn’t really know how to change. I am not implying that my life was an empty shell, because I did lots of great things, but there was always a sense of loneliness attached to them. I found it hard to connect with myself, let alone men and maybe that’s why I ended up in that last shitty marriage. I was given attention and I liked it, apart from the other baggage that came with it. The marriage did give lots of opportunities to be engaging with others and it certainly helped me to feel like I had something to offer. Maybe all those feelings I had of not feeling friend worthy or lovable, was because I wasn’t actually loving myself enough and being a good friend to me. I guess one of the reasons my personal development path is so important, is because it helps peel off the layers that creep over us through our life and stop us from finding and being our true self. I worked really hard to deal with all of the feelings I had about me, so that my inner self would align with the outer self that people loved and it has paid off. I put in the work to uncover this diamond that I feel is sparkling in this world. People did and do gravitate towards me because of my colourful and fun personality, so on the exterior people would see a woman who was confident and looked so self-assured, but inwardly, there had been a massive sense of self-doubt, lack of self-worth and self-esteem which I addressed. The person I am, who you might see in real life, or on the pages of my social media is the true blue, dinky di, authentic me and I love her to bits. I really loved Melbourne and all that it had to offer, but when I left Brisbane behind, I really thought that the people who I believed cared about me would keep in touch. Of course, there are some friendships that weather all storms and I knew that those people had my back, but as for the others – the people I had helped when they needed help, the ones who were at my place regularly for meals or parties – who were seeing me at my finest even when I was being dealt the most torment, the ones who said “I can’t wait to see you again” – never ever checked in to see

how I was doing. My ex-husband seemed to have made sure that he was the victim and I was the cause of all his misery. This really made me feel hurt, but I have had an opportunity to speak with some people who were in my life and share some of the things that I had been through in my marriage and there was certainly surprise on their part as people genuinely had no idea of the life behind closed doors. On one particular night a few months after settling in Melbourne, I was feeling quite lonely, sad and a bit meh and I was laying on my couch and a ladybug landed on my leg. I was now living in my new apartment on the 18th floor of my building and in that moment, I felt a shift in how I was feeling. That ladybug had given me a little reason to smile and a joyous moment to think about. It had made its way 18 floors up from the ground and had found me and I felt that it must have been a sign of good things to come. Of all the buildings, and all the people it could have landed on, it chose me. A Casablanca moment if ever there was one. So, I googled what it meant because I thought it must have been auspicious. The ladybug is a messenger of promise, the ladybug reconnects us with the joy of living. Fear does not live within joy. The need to release our fears and return to love is one of the messages it carries. The ladybug teaches us how to restore our faith and trust in great spirit. It initiates change where it is needed the most. When a ladybug appears, it is asking us to get out of our own way and allow great spirit to enter. It felt like a powerful moment for me and I took notice of the interpretation. Whenever I felt those moments of loneliness, I reminded myself of the ladybug and how she too was making her way through life alone and she seemed to be okay. I made a commitment to myself to be more aware of those feelings when they entered my thoughts and to let them pass through.

The beautiful ladybug

Our pathway in life is meant to keep evolving, we are meant to keep evolving and although one ladybug didn’t change my whole life, it’s the little bits of the puzzle that lead us to become stronger, happier and content in our life. My ex-husband would keep in touch and occasionally we would chat on the phone and in a way, it was nice to have some familiarity. We were still friends on Facebook and he still said I was his best friend. Before parting ways, we agreed that if ever it came time for either of us to want a divorce, we would have the decency to tell each other and do it civilly and respectfully. Given that I had ruined his life and he was never going to marry again, I figured it would be a long time before we had that conversation. But it wasn’t too long before I smelt a rat. And this dirty rat really stunk. The people who I worked with were very kind and understanding of my situation, and one day as we did our round the table in a meeting, I blurted out that I was so lonely and began to cry. Being vulnerable is also such a powerful thing as it is what helps to peel off those layers. I am very much about being my authentic self and from that moment, people began to look out for me a bit more. I began joining my colleagues for Friday drinks and there was one lovely lady who had moved to Melbourne from overseas and she knew exactly how I was feeling in terms of arriving in a new city, being single and having no friends, so one night after our drinks, she suggested we go to dinner. Her shout. By now my financial deficit was beginning to hit and that also compounded my loneliness. When you have money to burn, it’s always possible to find something to do – even if it’s just going to a movie, but for me, I was making sure that I spent my money wisely and that really limited some of the experiences I could take part in. But Melbourne is a city where even walking around the art filled laneways is satisfying enough, so that’s how I spent a lot of my time - wandering. It’s amazing how just being out and around other people can make you feel like you aren’t lonely. I agreed to go to dinner with my colleague and as we worked near the Crown Complex in Melbourne, she suggested we go to Nobu – a lovely and very fancy Japanese restaurant. Well, that night was fantastic. We were already a bit tipsy when we arrived and enjoyed a ridiculously expensive meal, including a flight of sake which cost about $45 per person and she was determined to make sure our night was a hoot. We laughed our way through dinner and more drinks and I finally felt like I

had a connection and was letting my hair down. It doesn’t sound much, but some moments, including an $18 lettuce salad stay with you and it was so nice walking into work the following Monday having something wonderful to talk to and connect with my colleagues about. One of the other really lonely moments I encountered was Christmas Day. It was the first Christmas I spent without family and I didn’t know what I would do. I figured I’d just pick up something simple to eat and spend the day at home or go wandering – I was good at that. I also looked at volunteering opportunities, but surprisingly they had to be booked months in advance. I ended up taking myself to Federation Square in the morning for breakfast with all the other people who didn’t have a place to go. I had gone from enjoying champagne breakfast and festive feasts in years past to having juice from a squeeze box, a cold croissant from a packet and a piece of fruit. It was certainly different, but it was okay, because even this was better than where I had come from.

My first ever Christmas alone. Federation Square Melbourne, 2015

My Christmas day afternoon was much better because I had in fact made a new friend a few weeks earlier and she invited me to a group lunch. It was a fantastic afternoon and she continued to include me in so many things and we cemented a very firm friendship. She also invited me to a new year’s party just a block away from my home and I went along, danced and had a heap of fun, but as midnight drew near, I decided I just wanted to go home and enjoy the fireworks from my balcony and say goodbye to 2015 and all that had happened and welcome the new year with my own company. I may have been alone at that time, but I certainly wasn’t feeling lonely.

New Year's Eve, Melbourne 2015

If you look at the concept of introversion and extroversion, I am a definite extrovert and that means I get my energy from being around other people. Introverts can feel lonely but can go for periods of time in their own company. They need their own solitude and peace to recharge. Not the extroverts, we need to be one with the people. Loneliness comes and goes and as mentioned, some people are very happy to be in their own company, but for others the feelings of aloneness can be very overwhelming even to the point where it has severe effects on one’s mental health. I made sure that I acknowledged that loneliness is a feeling, just like other feelings we have, and I had the choice to change how I felt about it. Things I did to overcome my loneliness during this transition were: 1. I shifted my mindset to be accepting that my loneliness was temporary, and it was because of a huge positive change that I had initiated in my life and it wasn’t always going to be like this. I switched off the “poor me, I’m all alone” recording and replaced it with a more positive one. 2. I kept bringing myself back to the moment and stopped my thoughts when they were racing to far ahead or back in time and accepted them and let them pass. 3. I distracted myself by changing my environment or doing things that filled what felt like an empty space. I would go for a walk, sew, write, pick up my paint brush, or watch a funny movie. I spent time doing unfinished business. For example, I spent nights compiling all the recipes I had collected over the years into a single book and that gave me a great sense of achievement and kept me distracted. I even made a list of things I wanted to do, so that at any time, I could pick something off the list and do it. Many things were even free and that was even better.

4. I reached out for help. I contacted our employee assistance service to go and discuss how I was feeling and that helped me to employ strategies and remind me that what I was feeling was perfectly normal and manageable. Sometimes another person’s perspective can make a huge difference. 5. I recognised that even though I was a single woman and felt alone, I was enough and I began to work on redefining me and rebuilding my pillars in a way that I wanted to, not in a way that was expected of me and that was an empowering journey in itself. Let’s touch on number five for a minute. Recognising that I WAS ENOUGH was a key part of overcoming my loneliness. We can still be in a relationship or friendship and feel terribly lonely and if like me, you make that bold move to end something, there is a massive sense of relief, but there are also feelings that come with no longer having someone in your space, no matter how challenging it may have been. You have to change and break patterns and get comfortable with doing things on your own. This is the time that you can do whatever fuck you want, whenever the fuck you like, and you don’t have to answer to anyone. And how good is that. That might sound scary to some, as we are so often tied to the beliefs of others, but power and your true sense of self comes when you are free to explore life on your own terms. Unravelling after a relationship can make us feel pretty miserable and affect our self-esteem, so recognising that we should never be defined by another person’s company is a big win for team YOU. I began using my time to face the demons of not feeling ENOUGH – and these were feelings that had been deep rooted. I started forming a new relationship with myself. When you feel good about yourself and decide that you aren’t defined by another person’s presence, it becomes very empowering because you take charge of your life and begin to build strength and enhance your confidence and with confidence comes our ability to just plough through some of those thoughts and feelings that can hold us back. I also decided to explore the dating situation and put myself back online and then offline and then online and there was no shortage of unsuitable suitors that’s for sure. But more about that ridiculousness later. The loneliness was still there in the background, but the good thing was, that I knew how to respond to it in a much better way. I chose this new life and that made it much easier to accept.

Chapter 8. Listen to the signs Do you ever consciously listen to the signs that are sent and meant for you? Or do you brush them aside even though they may continue to present time and time again? I try to make a conscious practice of listening to the signs, even though at times I wonder what the fuck the signs are trying to tell me. Signs are a universal gift that are consciously or subconsciously telling us things we need to know and all we need to do is listen to them and choose to follow if we wish. Sometimes signs continue to present, until you have no choice but to listen. Along with signs is the power of synchronicity and serendipity. The feeling you get when you meet a particular person, or feel an alignment that brings you a sense of peace and wonderment as to whether it was a weird coincidence, or something that was meant to be. Both signs and synchronicity are things that have played a part in my life for a very long time even though I did begin to question their existence when my life started to take what I thought were backward steps. Here’s some of the signs I have had. I had the “this might save your life” sign, when I refused to return a video to a store because I suddenly felt really ill. This really annoyed my mother as she had to take the video back to the store herself only to find that there had been a robbery. I would have been right in the middle of it if I had made the detour. My body was sending me a sign to keep me safe and avoid something that could have had a terrible outcome for me. I had the “this is gonna change your life” sign, when that horrendous storm gave me the financial means to make the big move to Melbourne. Oh that storm – if it hadn’t been for that storm that cut through a very narrow pathway in our city, I may not be on the wonderful pathway I am now on. I had the “I really need help to find this “thing”” sign, when I have been wanting something in my life and have been led to exactly where I could find it. I remember many years ago I was looking for a particular book and I went to every second-hand bookshop I could find in Brisbane and no one had this book. The internet wasn’t a thing back then, so there was no way to google it, but one day, I was on holidays in Gosford, a small town in New South Wales and I happened to be walking along a street and walked past a second-hand bookstore. I kept walking, not even

acknowledging that it was a bookstore and then I had a flash – I had to go into that store. The pull was too strong, so back I went and guess what, they had a copy of the book I had been searching for. The universe didn’t deliver right when I wanted it to, but it did deliver. I’ve had dreams which have also been signs to alert me to things that I need to take notice of and I had a sign a few days before I found out about my son’s addiction. Call it mother’s intuition if you will, but I remember vividly that I had an overwhelming sense of something being wrong. And I had the “what are you doing with this idiot” sign which I should have listened to when it first presented shortly after we met. Sometimes you listen to the signs and sometimes you don’t….. and for the last one, the combination of signs and feelings became blurred until the point came that once I made a conscious decision to take action, the signs began to flow. Now what about those themes that keep popping up and you wonder why. I have always had a love of hearts and even bought my special heart rocks with me to Melbourne and as I began to tune back into my own wavelength again, I would discover that I would see hearts everywhere.

Written in the sky when I was out for a walk.

On the ground as I walked by

Even the end of a dying leaf and a puddle of water were in the shape of hearts. There was no escaping them.

And hearts weren’t the only thing that were presenting themselves in my path. Playing cards became a thing I would begin to stumble across more and more. They were everywhere. I initially thought that because I lived near the casino that they were used cards that had been thrown away, but generally their cards will have some kind of hole punched through them to show that they had been used. When I picked up a card, I would always go home, google what it meant and then pin it to my board. They, like the tarot also have meaning and on one particular day, I put a call out to the universe telling me that it was time to send me some love and when I was in the most random place in the city, I found the biggest playing card ever….the 5 of hearts and it was twice as big as a normal card. I told the universe it wasn’t quite what I was asking for, but it was on the right track.

The cards I was finding were random cards in random places and I always stopped to pick them up. Unlike Jack Berger from Sex and the City who was hoping to find a full deck of cards as he collected them from all over New York City, I was just enjoying the happy accidents of finding random playing cards and turning them into a piece of wall art. By the time I left Melbourne, my card board was quite full and all the cards are still packed safely away, waiting for the time they will show their hand again. Pick a card, any card!

With my fluctuating feelings of “have I made the right decision to leave my marriage, have I made the right decision to move to Melbourne”, I was given a very clear sign that I had done the right thing. In fact, it was the street signs that were forcing me to take note, even if I didn’t want to. On this particular day, I woke up feeling that same sense of frustration. There was loneliness, I was financially struggling, and once again, I was wondering If I had made the right decision to pack up and move. The best way I knew how to move through these feelings was to get moving and change my focus, so I did just that. I headed out to find a place to take my outfit photo and there was never any shortage of fabulous spots. I drove around the local area for a while and then took a wrong turn. Now this wasn’t just any wrong turn, this was a wrong turn onto the Westgate Bridge in Melbourne and from that, there was no turning back. I hoped there wasn’t too much traffic and I hoped the first exit wasn’t too far away.

My first thought when this wrong turn happened was to panic, because I used to be very good at that and I was exceptional at panicking especially when I was in heavy traffic. But to my relief, it was a free road ahead, so I just calmly drove to the first exit. Once I made it off the freeway, I decided to just meander along the road and let it take me wherever. I had actually stumbled into a very beautiful part of town and I eventually ended up at the beach and decided to stop for a while and embrace the lostness. As I was leaving, I took the drive back further on in the other direction and when I found a place to stop, I walked over to the pier to find a place to take my outfit of the day photo. That’s what I had set out to do after all. After taking my snap, I stayed on the seat and just enjoyed the scenery. I hadn’t been paying too much attention to the bigger picture of what was around me but certainly noticed the sun reflecting on the water, the boats bobbing up and down and then I saw it, the full cityscape, and for that moment, I felt like the ladybug who may have seemed lost, but in reality, had probably landed where she was meant to be. As I looked at the city in the distance from this wonderful angle, I was so glad that the wrong turn happened. It was a sign. A sign to clearly remind me that this was home.

Whether it be moments of coincidence, synchronicity, or full-blown signs that flash like neon in front of your face, they are out there waiting for you and you just have to be open to them when the present. Here’s some ways to listen to the signs that are meant for us. 1. Ask the universe for a sign. Whether you call it your higher self, the universal law or divine intervention, the universe is constantly sending the messaging and direction for us, even though at times, we mightn’t realise it. 2. Pay attention and be open. Is there any themes or feelings that keep coming up for you? Numbers, random hearts or cards or a yearning to follow a path that you are being called to for example. Follow that gut feeling or the spark of a thought, as it may lead you to exactly where you are meant to be or to what you are looking for. 3. Believe to receive. I was never a believer in miracles, but miracles happen every day – whether it is getting the carpark outside the door to the shopping centre or like me, getting a job at a time I thought truly impossible (more about that later). 4. Are you dreams telling you things? Are they giving you hints and messages of things to take note of? Write them down and see if there are any patterns. 5. Encounters - do you run into random people and find that they have an answer that you were seeking? Does the phone ring when you are about to call the person who is has just called you? Are you humming a song and suddenly you hear it on the radio, or in a shop? Listen to the signs, they are all around us and what may seem like coincidences, synchronicities or serendipitous moments are a way of telling us that we are on the right path. At times I have felt the frustration of not getting what it is I think I want when in fact I seem to be clearly heading to where it is I am meant to be and even as I sit in this here right now typing away, I am happy in the knowing that all signs were sending me to be in this very place at this very moment.

Chapter 9. Let’s talk about the panic I wasn’t going to write about my panic attacks in my story, because this is really about my later life, but panic attacks in my teens and early 20’s were no doubt the biggest obstacle I have had to overcome, because they were so debilitating and had the potential to totally limit my life in ways that I didn’t want. But this is me today, cool, calm, collected, confident, resilient and most importantly happy. I am eons away from the time of my life when I was living with a condition that once diagnosed, gave me peace of mind and started me on a path that made me fiercely protect my mental health and ensure that my wellbeing was always at the top of my priorities.

Me today, 54 and eons away from panic

Our mental health is so important and learning to manage our stressors seems more vital than ever given the current uncertainty we are facing globally in this time of the pandemic and my ability to “cope” makes me feel so empowered. I hope that my ability to cope with stress, anxiety and overwhelm with what I am about to share may encourage you to know that having a happy, healthy existence, is possible even if you think it may not be… I am a bit on the fence about how I felt my childhood was. There were some great aspects and some not-so-great ones. On the down side, I had a split family and don’t have a very strong relationship with my father. He went on to marry another woman and

have more children, and their lifestyle was so far removed from anything I have ever known. The separation happened when I was quite young and I didn’t see my father much, but a scary moment happened during this unsettled time when we were holidaying at the beach. I was playing in the park and a man came over and said he was my father. When I recall this moment, it still makes me cringe to think that this is the way he chose to approach me. He asked me to go and get my sister so I took off back to where we were camping and alerted my mum. By the time we got back, he was gone. Did he just want to see us? Was he going to take us? How long had he been watching us? I will never know, but I do know it was a messy divorce. We were eventually allowed to have more formal contact with him, but on the rare occasion I would see him, there was always some kind of drama surrounding his wife. She didn’t seem to like us around and would have all kinds of crazy “turns” that usually resulted in a quite dramatic frightening event. Following one particularly volatile incident, we begged to go home after she threatened to kill herself with a gun she was holding and tried to put in her mouth. It was very traumatic. We were hundreds of miles away from home and I remember being taken to the airport and put on a very small plane and flown to safety. I never had any desire to go visit again until much later in life. I never really felt a sense of abandonment or wishing that he were around and I made the decision at a very young age not to pursue a relationship with him. Anytime we have met, the same old record keeps playing. I love you, I miss you, and for me it’s bit blah blah blah….. All I can say, is that he could have and should have done better. I have no doubt it was hard on him not being able to see his children, but he never supported us financially or emotionally and I am grateful to have grown up in an environment where I always had food, clothes and a roof over my head. I do feel like I have managed to make it to adulthood with some sense of power and without too much of the hurt that people carry around from their childhood. I also had time separated from my mother as she was a nurse and worked odd hours and she moved away for some time so she could build her career. In some cultures, not having both parents around is a very normal thing, but for me, it didn’t feel normal, not that I really knew what normal was as a small child, but I guess you see other families and wonder why yours isn’t the same, when at one point there had been a family unit.

We moved home a lot and didn’t settle into one particular long home stretch until I was about eight or nine years of age. I counted up living in about five different towns before finally settling in Brisbane. Five towns doesn’t seem much, but when you are a small child, it’s a lot and the moving seemed endless. We seemed to settle into one place and then it was time to move to another and that meant another school and a whole new routine and that was sometimes even in the same town we were living. Maybe that explains why I am not so great with routine now and have at times not felt like I was able to maintain connections. I applaud my mother for having the courage to leave an abusive, alcoholic man and for her determination to progress her life and career. She has never shared much of this time as it is too upsetting for her, even now. But I do remember fights and things happening that clearly showed it was not a happy or healthy environment for anyone. Before the split I lived at times with my parents and at times I was living with my nana or even other relatives. Thank goodness for my nana, she was the most wonderful woman who provided the grounding and stability that has no doubt helped me to be the person I am today, even though at times I might not have seemed so grateful or ready to learn some of the lessons of life. She was truly my rock and our relationship is something that I miss terribly. But even my nana couldn’t protect me from a sexual assault that happened when I was a child. I’m not sure that going into details is necessary, but I was assaulted in her back yard by an older boy who was a neighbour. I was about six at the time and wondered what the heck was going on. There was another person there - and they were someone I idolised and felt safe with and happy to be around, and I remember looking at that person and wondering why they weren’t stopping this. They weren’t enabling the event, but on reflection, I think they were probably just as shocked as I was and perhaps didn’t know what to do. I have never had the courage to talk about that day with this person and I’m not sure that I ever will. Maybe they are carrying their own uncomfortable memories and regret about what happened. I never shared this moment with my family until I was about 50. It was something I always kept to myself and not because there was guilt or shame, but because I just got on with life and didn’t want a label. Although it was a terrible and terrifying experience, I never let it stop me from doing anything that I wanted to do and I have never let that person’s actions take anything away from my ability to fully live and live with authentic joy and happiness. I accepted that it happened and kept on moving, albeit with level of caution and shyness in my younger years.

Any other reasons for discontent or unhappiness in my life was never due to having a victim mentality or blaming another person for what was wrong. I remember a friend in high school telling me it was amazing that I never blamed anything or anyone for things going wrong and I still maintain that stance now. Blame doesn’t help solve a problem. Taking full responsibility for your life is what gives us our power. I look back and think it was a very mature thing to do, as you can see day to day how people’s lives get consumed by events of their past and they stay stuck and unable to find peace or joy because of something that may have happened way back when. I appreciate that not everyone finds the tools or knowhow to move forward, but I was somehow able to. Preying of a sexual nature was also a common theme as I grew up. My mother ended up marrying again and although the man was a bully, he was never a sexual predator. He had suffered sexual abuse at the hands of his own father, but was unaware that his father had been targeting me with his requests for kisses on the lips or hugs whenever I was alone with him. It was always disturbing, and as I grew up and wised up, I found ways to keep my distance. Such horrible things to deal with when you should be enjoying your childhood freedom. My teenage step brother was also a major creep who would touch inappropriately and comment in ways that a young girl would never understand and it just kept happening and I just kept moving on with my life. He used to tell his friends how much I liked being touched. Really? How does one make a judgment that this behaviour is okay when you are targeting a young girl who is afraid to, and doesn’t know how to use her voice? I wonder if perpetrators ever think back to their actions and feel guilt or remorse. It’s fucked up that this kind of behaviour was and is still so common place and women are still to blame for men’s bad behaviour. As I look at my relationship with men, there was always a fascination and a fear that I had towards them, but like everything else I do, I just worked on finding a solution to this awkwardness. One of the most incredible things we can do in our lifetime it to claim or reclaim our power, even if it does take years. And that means never letting anything or anyone’s actions or inactions hold you back from finding the happy place we deserve in our life, no matter what shitty things may have happened. As for the good aspects of my childhood, I really got to do things I loved and maybe they were the things that held me together.

My first love was the piano and I would use any table, bench or chest of drawers and pretend it was a piano and would spend hours hitting pretend keys and making music in my head. My dream of learning piano came true after settling in Brisbane, when I arrived home from school one day to find a piano gracing our loungeroom and I was enrolled to take lessons. I can’t really explain the most sensory feeling I had when I would touch a sheet of music but to this day, I can almost feel the music emanating from the paper and that gives me joy. What a fantastic day it was when I got to bring this untapped passion to life. My piano teacher was an old man called Mr Learmonth. He helped me learn and develop my piano playing skills which are still with me today. Even though going alone to a room at the back of his very old dark house seems kind of creepy when I think back, it was a wonderful experience for me. Strange how the people closest to you can be the ones who take advantage and thankfully my piano teacher gave me a safe environment to follow a passion that was built into my soul. I discovered that I was also an excellent swimmer and swimming became my other love. I was obsessed and would go training nearly every morning and evening. Rain, hail or shine! But not lightning, that would be just stupid. I would make my way to training in the dark and swim my little heart out. I would swim competitively in the interschool competitions, and my Friday nights and some weekends were then spent waiting to get on the blocks to dive into my next race. I never thought I’d be a swimmer, as my early introduction to swimming was not a great one. My father would take me out into the ocean and throw me into the water and I would scream for him to help me. I was oh so small. Before I could really swim, I would also go and play at the pool in the town where I lived and one day two girls held my head down under the water for what seemed such a long time. Bullying isn’t a new thing folks, it was alive way back in the 70’s, so how I became a water baby, I will never know, but being able to let go of negative experiences probably helped. And fuck those bitches, they never held me back either. During my time in Brisbane, apart from the predatory behaviour, I did really enjoy my childhood in terms of having fun, friends and stability, even though it wasn’t all roses. And then it was time to move. We moved from Brisbane to a very isolated place halfway to the Gold Coast where my mother and stepfather opened a tourist attraction. This move affected everything, as this life was away from everything I knew and loved. In one way it was good because we couldn’t really get into too much trouble, but on the other

hand, there wasn’t much to do. My swimming dried up, I had to find a new piano teacher and life just seemed one constant effort of travelling. There was now another new school and the prospect of high school was only a short while away. When it was time for that, I was enrolled in the local high school and perhaps my mother thought that the school was not going to be the best place for me – it was a rough school and I was quickly put into a right proper girl’s school back in the city and I didn’t flourish there either. School was a chore, study was a chore, taking the long trip each day was a chore and I was flunking out. Eventually I was asked to leave – not because of bad behaviour, but because of bad grades. I wasn’t happy at home, I wasn’t happy at school and it was agreed that I would go and live with my grandmother and continue my schooling in the town where I was born. I was excited about this as I already had friends there and I loved my grandmother, so I thought it was going to be a match made in small town heaven.

My gorgeous nana

Deep down I guess there was something going on inside that prevented me from wanting to conform, because all I was interested in was anything but school. I did go to school, but I had no focus, no interest and yet I now had the security of a solid home life to support me. No doubt there was a lot of "stuff" bottling up inside that eventually would have to come to surface. Life for me then, was all about FUN and that is still my motto now, but thankfully I did eventually find the pathway to knuckling down and becoming a responsible and somewhat mature adult.

I believe that the school of life has been the right one for me as I have had so many experiences. Even though they haven’t all been great, they have helped to build my resilience and over time, my sense of self. Now, let’s talk about the panic. My first panic attack happened when I was 17 and to this very minute, I can still recall exactly when it happened and how they feel. Back in the early 1980’s, I didn’t even know that panic attacks existed and what I experienced was a feeling like no other. If you have had a panic attack, then you would know how scary they are. If you haven’t had one, let me explain how they feel – well for me anyway. Mine began by getting a very subtle sign somewhere in my body. It could have been a really insignificant muscle twitch for example and following that, I would feel a wave of “something” – a feeling - wash over me. I would feel spacy, foggy, not okay and then start to panic and want to escape from wherever I was at that moment. My understanding is that this is adrenalin which has begun to release through the body. I would then begin to feel dread and I needed to run to try and escape whatever doom was coming. My chest would tighten, I felt like I couldn’t breathe and I would feel like I was going to faint, or collapse and die and there was fear. Lots and lots of fear. And then, the cycle would start over and the fear of having another one these would take control. At the time they started, I was in a teenage “relationship” with a boy just a bit older than me. He was controlling, he was off the rails, he was constantly threatening or stalking or doing any other thing that is unacceptable in a relationship and when I was finally able to break free from it, I vowed I’d never put up with such bad treatment from a man ever. And that was the case, till I found myself in a marriage with another emotional abuser. It was hard to break free from this boy’s hold, and at times I was so frightened that I had to have people intervene or come and rescue me from a terrible situation he had put me into. But we continued to go on in this unhealthy relationship/cycle that saw me sneaking out at night and going for rides on his motorbike, wagging school to be with him or doing any other thing that I was doing under the power of his control. The level of control and guilt tripping was something that no person, let alone a naïve teenage girl should ever have to put up with. When he called, I jumped. Before the panic attacks started and in amongst the chaos with this boy, I got my driver’s license and I’ll never forget the excitement of passing my

test and having the freedom of driving. One of the things about living in a small town was that things happened pretty easy and everyone knew everyone, and that included knowing the police who did the driving tests. I remember the day of my test. It was exactly my 17th birthday and I had been very diligent with my learner’s permit, practicing all the things I needed for the test. I could do a hill start, reverse park, threepoint turn. I could even clutch start a car if I needed to. I’d driven on the main highway and through the back roads in the area where I lived. I was able to drive on all terrains and I was ready for this test. On the morning my test was booked, I rang the local police station to check if they were ready for me to come by and do what I expected to be a very rigorous test. They said there had been an accident they needed to attend to and asked me to come down a little later. I could barely wait, but when I arrived, the officer clearly didn’t have much time or interest in my ability or the importance of letting a 17 year old girl have sole responsibility over a vehicle, as the test was a no brainer. All I had to do was drive up the street, go around the block, drive back past the police station, do a three-point turn and deliver the officer back to the cop shop. That was it. I passed the driving test in all of about 10 minutes. I used to think it was hilarious, as my friends all had to do the stuff that nightmare driving tests are made of, but not me, it was pretty much wham, bam, three-point turn and thank you mam! The car I got to drive on the weekends was a Gemini station wagon that belonged to my nana’s business. I would earn my petrol money by helping my nana do cleaning at their office. I was ace at cleaning toilets, and doing dunny duty gave me rights to use the car and have petrol as well. I just loved driving and I would be allowed to use the car from Friday to Sunday afternoon. On the first weekend I had my licence there was scandal, as I had spent $40 on petrol as I was having such a great time driving here, there and everywhere. My nana’s business had an account at the local service station, so I would just roll back in when the fuel gauge was getting low and top it up. I never went that crazy again on the petrol but imagine with inflation how much my excessive petrol use would cost now. The driving rules seemed pretty lax in those days and although this car only had two front seats, it was pretty normal to have a few people in the back of the wagon just hanging there as we drove around. Seatbelts were mandatory, but some safety rules didn’t seem to exist.

My nana also loved that I had my license as it gave us freedom to go places. I would take her to the nearby towns so we could go shopping, or just take her for drives. She never drove, so having someone on tap was a great pleasure for her. When it came time for my son to get his license, I was the one who gave him most of his lessons and I put him through the ringer. It was a different time to learn to drive and I wanted to make sure he could handle everything that the big city might throw at him. I think the hardest test I gave him was when I asked him to drive to the steepest hill in West End where we lived in Brisbane - it was called Sankey Street and it is a monster. As we drove down the street, I told him to stop and made him do a reverse hill start park. I could literally see the sweat dripping from his armpits, but he did it and then went on to do all the other stuff needed to be a competent driver and he passed his driving test on the first go. On the day he got his license, I asked him to stop at my work and when I got out of the car, he was like, where are you going? I said you have done the necessary and you are free to drive off as you have earned your stripes. I never did check the petrol gauge at the end of that day and for all I know, he could have wagged it and gone driving all around town. As a free and easy teenager and one who now had wheels, one of my favourite things to do, was to drive to the next town from us. We’d order pizza, go and get stoned on the headland and sit in the back of the car and watch the waves roll in as the sun set. After that, we would sneak into the local club. In those days it was easy to get into a club. There was no door bitch and there was barely a door man and we could always bluff our way in. That was pretty much my Friday night when I got my license. And yep, I did drive stoned, but I would never drink and drive. My first drug experience was at about 16 when I smoked pot. The first time I felt nothing, but the time after, I did feel the high and I kinda liked it. I loved how it made me laugh, and made me funny and made me confident, even though I was a gawky teenager. My friends and I would smoke pot and it wasn’t an everyday thing for me, but in the small town where I lived, it was the thing. At that time, in the early 80’s pot seemed to be pretty harmless. I never really heard of people in my peer group who lost their minds from smoking pot. Now though, drugs are next level and it’s even hard to believe that my own son had an addiction to something that is legal. And *gasp* during this time I also tried hash.

I had a friend who lived in an amazing house down on the river in the next town. They were the cool family. They had a public phone in the house and you had to pay to make calls. They were so cool that when it came time for the final year of high school exams, they hired a cabin at the caravan park just nearby so study could be done in a quiet, undistracted environment. That was clearly code for party time, as we would go visit and smoke pot. It was at the cabin in the caravan park that I tried hash for the first time. I do remember feeling really stoned, and I also remember seeing a grey fuzzy vision similar to what you see when a tv isn’t tuned into a channel and it looks just grey, fuzzy and makes a weird buzzing sound. There was definitely fuzziness to my brain and a little while later I had the urge to throw up. And throw up I did and that was my experience with hash. I still smoked weed, but never bothered with hash again. I never saw myself as someone who would take their drug use to the next level as I was mostly sensible and probably scared of what could happen. After all, I did read Go Ask Alice and I didn’t want to be the girl who developed an addiction and then ran away from home. Actually, I did run away from home. Twice. The first time I was about 4 years old and I packed my little suitcase and ran away to the garage. I was adamant that I was leaving. And the second time was in my teenage misfit years. It only lasted a few weeks and I was back home in the safety and security of my perfect little pink bed. Oh my goodness, when did this chapter become all about drugs, driving tests and cleaning toilets. It’s supposed to be a chapter about panic attacks, but I guess those three things could make you panic a little and it was after my experience with some magic mushrooms that my panic began to take hold. One New Year’s Eve, a group of us decided to have some magic mushrooms. Like really, what was I thinking. I hated mushrooms and I still do, but I had them anyway. I always say I’d rather suck a dick then eat a mushroom. The gag that comes from the mushroom is much worse and both make me spit. The group I was with (including the crazy boyfriend) cooked up a big batch of magic mushrooms they had picked from a nearby field and we were having them on toast as an afternoon snack. Because I don’t like mushrooms, I only had a little, but that was enough to ruin the rest of my night.

Before the effects set in, we drove off to get our place at the local golf club where they were having an outdoor event. We stopped for some beers at the pub, because having an hallucinogenic journey just didn’t seem enough, so why not add booze and for some, probably pot! We headed to the club, parked and just hung around our car for a while and eventually decided to go and get amongst it. I remember being out with the others and trying to have a good time, but it all just got too much. Too much noise, too many people and I just wanted to run. I never hallucinated, but I felt unwell and spent the rest of the night in the car thinking I was dying. And that’s the same feeling I would get when I was having a panic attack. It was fucking terrible. After that night, panic attacks became part of my new normal and drugs were no longer on my to do list. My panic attacks would strike anytime, but initially were most severe when I was driving. I would need to pull over to the side of the road until they passed and sometimes, it could take so long as they would come in waves. They then began to show up at anytime and anywhere. I’d have them on nights out when I should have been having so much fun, and people would have to make sure I got home safely – because I thought I was going to die. I’d have them at work and remember one time having to be taken home, because I had an attack in the bathroom – and thought I was going to die. One occasion I even asked for people to call an ambulance as the feeling like I was going to die, was so strong. What the hell was wrong with me? These horrible things went on for 10 years and at times beyond and during one particular attack, I did actually call an ambulance when I was having one at home. I had been feeling inspired by my aunty who was visiting and she was going crazy with the housework. The things she could do in a day would earn her the title of domestic goddess for sure the washing, ironing, folding, cleaning and cooking all looked effortless, so I decided to do as much housework as I could and then when I stopped – BAM. The worst of the worst panic attack arrived and we called an ambulance. Moral here is that too much housework is dangerous stuff. How do you explain to the emergency service call centre, that you think you are dying, but maybe not dying, but are really scared and can you send help? They arrived (without the sirens) and checked me over, but couldn’t find anything wrong. They suggested I visit a doctor and off they went. I had mentioned my symptoms to other doctors over the years, but nothing was ever investigated.

After the ambulance ordeal, I did see a new doctor to talk about what happened and to see if he could help. We had to find out what was wrong and he could see that I was in a lot of distress so offered me some Valium to help me relax, and after taking half a tablet, it confirmed to me that I just can’t take drugs. Valium is supposed to relax you, but for me, it just made me feel more anxious, but the Valium incident aside, he was the one who I attribute to helping me get some answers. In order to get a diagnosis, I needed to have some tests to make sure there wasn’t actually anything wrong neurologically. I was sent to a specialist who wired me up like a lab monkey for an EEG to look for anything that may be amiss in my brain. I also underwent a serious of other tests where the doctor asked me to do things such as follow a pencil with my eyes or walk in a straight line, and he banged my knee with the reflex hammer thingamyjig. The knee isn’t anywhere near my brain, but they did every possible test to rule out some underlying issue. I think it was in this appointment when my mum was with me, that the magic mushroom incident came up. We kind of laughed about it, but could they have been the reason for how I was feeling? Was I having some kind of flashbacks? Time would tell! When my results came back from the EEG, I was in for a shock. I was told there were lesions on my brain. What did that even mean and what would it mean? I remember that night being in a bit of shock, and as a young single mother, wrote a makeshift will on a piece of paper in case it was needed. I didn’t have anything of monetary value to leave, but I would be leaving behind my young son, so needed to make sure that he would have someone to watch over him in case things were looking grim for me. After further investigation, it turned out that the lesions were nothing to worry about and when all the results came in, I was diagnosed with panic attacks. I’d never heard of them before and after 10 years of living with this constant demon, they now had a name and it was time to rid myself of these fuckers. In the process of learning to overcome them, they actually became much worse and turned into agoraphobia. Agoraphobia is where you avoid or fear situations that can cause you to panic. They call it fear of open spaces. The fear intensifies when you feel there is no place to escape or get help if needed, so you then begin avoiding places or doing things that might cause an attack to happen.

It was the most debilitating period of my life and although I still tried to do as much as I could, the fear of impending doom would continually plague me. Even now, some 25 years later, I still occasionally feel the need to flee if I am in a crowded place or find myself in certain environments. I can now rationally talk myself through it and tap into the things I learnt all those years ago to be able to move on from it. But even when you know what it is and what to do about it, it is still scary. Another thing that still occasionally happens to me is when I am driving. I can still get that feeling of panic. I hate being in heavy traffic and at times it has caused me to stop on the side of the road and wait it out while trying to push myself to keep driving. It certainly was a challenge and my brain would know that there was nothing to hurt me, but my body would just not move. The fear is irrational, but the feelings that come with it are real. I would even avoid certain roads, to avoid having an attack as there were definitely triggers that happened if I had to drive in a place where I had had an attack before. It’s amazing how a 10 minute drive home can turn into an hour or more, just so you avoid any perceived triggers. One day I could drive along a certain road without any problems, but the next day, forget it, it was torture. My first step towards recovery was being referred to an amazing psychiatrist. I credit him and his very holistic treatment plan that enabled me to learn to manage, live with and eventually pretty much eradicate the panic attacks. My treatment consisted of three very simple things. Thankfully, no medication was required to control these, but a lot of brain rewiring was. I was helped firstly by talking to my doctor and talking a lot about anything and everything. He wanted to know all my family history and all the things that could possibly be causing me stress. Hmm, that was quite a long list when you put it on a piece of paper. Along with the previous things I have shared, there was also the stress of becoming a mother, ending the relationship with my son’s father, more moving, more uncertainty, lack of confidence and self-esteem and the panic itself. Stress is a major contributor to many of the main things that can kill us and I was seriously stressed. Secondly, I was reminded that I needed to just slow the fuck down. The world wasn’t going to end because I didn’t fold the washing, or I was running late for something and any other self-imposed pressure I was bringing into my life.

And thirdly he asked me to go to the Department of Health and buy a relaxation tape. Yep, in those days, we had tapes, but I didn’t understand how a recording of someone talking was going to help. I went to get the tape and it cost five dollars. I only had 10 dollars and the lady at the shop didn’t have change, so she kindly gave me the tape and sent me on my way. Oh the guilt I felt about getting this tape was over the top, because back then, I wasn’t really in touch with my gratitude capability. I’m glad I wasn’t prescribed any kind of medication which in hindsight seemed surprising, as making my way through this time in a more natural way has no doubt helped to strengthen my coping mechanisms, as I had to really use my own self talk and clarity to see me through. This was resilience building 101. As I mentioned before, things got much worse before they got better. When people have panic disorder, their body is so wired up to the stimuli of this continual cycle, that when they start to change their thinking and habits, the desensitisation process seems to really exacerbate the whole situation and my panic symptoms seemed to ramp up. It was relentless. I hated being alone, I barely slept and when I did, I would wake up through the night and would constantly be checking my pulse to ensure it was not slowing down. I would hold my hand on my heart feeling each beat and hope that the next wouldn’t be the last. I would feel so much fear that at any moment I felt like I would go crazy or worse still, would collapse and die. I tried to do many of the things I needed to do in my day-to-day life, but the thought of leaving the house became hard. I didn’t know from moment to moment when I would have a panic attack and if I did, where would I escape to. In my mind there was nowhere to escape to that would be the right place, so I began to avoid places that I knew might be triggering. That’s a common symptom of Agoraphobia, you avoid places or situations that might cause you to panic and make you feel trapped, helpless or embarrassed. This is a severe mental illness and unless treated can have lifelong implications. Even though the rational part of my brain was living in the free world where I had things I wanted to do, the irrational part of my brain put the brakes on things before I even got to leave the house. Can you imagine how strange it must feel to try and step outside, but having this feeling of being stuck in quicksand in both your body and mind and being unable to move. There was a chocking sensation in my body that just kept me frozen.

This whole experience was just terrible and one day I was talking to my brother-in-law and telling him how I really thought I was going crazy. His wise words were that if I was going crazy, I probably wouldn’t even realise it. Wow, that was really true so I quickly took the going crazy feeling out of the equation and with that I was able to bring some more rational thoughts back into my mind. I would have regular visits with my psychiatrist who constantly reminded me that this was just panic and it can’t hurt me and I would use the relaxation tape over and over and over again. I had a beautiful rocking chair that my grandmother gave me and I would go and sit in it at all times of the day and night and just listen to my tape. I really learnt the art of full body relaxation. I knew that I did not want my world to become smaller – it felt small enough already, so I worked really hard to understand this disorder and do my best to overcome it. I would continually push myself to rationalise the fear I was feeling and how it wasn’t really real and that I would be okay. Afterall, it was just panic. I really began challenging my thinking and instead of thinking about why I couldn’t do something began to think about why and how I could. I would continually remind myself that I would be okay and I would set small goals. The weird thing about panic disorder is that on any given day things could be fine. I could go anywhere, do anything without a thought of panic, but in a moment, it could all change and sometimes even food, or other stimuli would trigger an attack. My thoughts changed from “what if I panic”, to “so what if I panic”. Panic could never physically or mentally hurt me. It was just a giant fucking inconvenience. And the symptoms of panic are something that you can’t actually create no matter how much you try. I don’t think people really understood the very real feelings I was experiencing from this illness and they couldn’t understand why I sometimes just couldn’t do things that others were doing – but I did try. I really felt sorry for my son who was always witnessing these terrible moments and worrying what might happen to me, because at any time I could be overcome by sheer panic and that was scary for me, so it must have been horrible for him. I can’t recall exactly when the turning point towards serenity was, because it was a healing journey that happened in small steps. As the state of desensitisation began to subside, the attacks became more manageable and eventually lessened. But even then, there always felt a need to remain on alert.

I continued on with my very simple treatment plan and would at times force myself to take the routes or go to the places where I felt most uncomfortable. I would then cheer myself on when I had achievements that to others must have seemed strange, but to me were massive milestones. The techniques I learnt have certainly remained with me and cemented the ability to tune into an ultra-relaxed state. This has no doubt helped me cope with just about anything. I don’t ever want to go back to that level of distress and being chill makes life much easier. Another wonderful technique I used which I guess was my entry to the world of self-awareness or mindfulness was to learn to pay attention to my body. And the trick I used was to set my alarm every hour during the day and when it went off, I would stop what I was doing and pay attention to how my body was feeling. If you were to stop what you are doing right now, in fact stop what you’re are doing right now and take notice of where your shoulders are. Are they feeling nice and loose and relaxed, or are they up so high that they are brushing against your ears and so tight that it is restricting all the blood from flowing freely throughout your neck, head, chest, arms and every other part of your body? Acknowledging how I was feeling every hour was one of the best things I ever did, as it became a natural reminder to check in on how my body was feeling and this mindfulness began to grow. I don’t know when the last time was that I had a full-blown panic attack but I do know that during my marriage when my stress level was so high for so long, I always felt something bubbling under the surface, like a pressure cooker that could blow at any time. I had to be really conscious of remaining calm and finding ways to minimise stress because I knew what was at stake and believe me it was hard in that environment. I would never wish panic attacks on anyone, but the good thing is that they are totally treatable and they can go away, and if like me, you manage to do it in a really natural way, then great. But if you find yourself going down the pathway of using medication to help you alleviate them, then so be it. The main thing is to do what it takes to be able to live with normality and without the fear that panic brings. I never in my wildest dreams thought that doing something as simple as full body relaxation could provide a result so life changing and freeing for me. It was the happy ending I needed.

To this day, I still have the tape and have even converted it to an MP3 and keep it on my phone. Although I don’t use it to manage my panic attacks any more, I do use it to just enjoy the beautiful blissful feeling of being so relaxed that your body feels light and free and I think it’s a really great practice to do. It’s different to meditation as you aren’t focussing on your breathing and stilling the mind. With relaxation you are just purely focussed on relaxing every muscle in your body to the point that you feel as light as a feather. We have so many wonderful wellness tools available now that I didn’t have back then – google for one, and I am so glad that I learned grass roots skills to deal with stress, anxiety and overwhelm and could rise above the odds and navigate my way through that period and many others in my life On reflection, that time certainly helped to build my resilience and gain perspective on what I should invest my time and energy into, but I wouldn’t say I was grateful to have gone through it, but it certainly helped to give me invaluable skills that helps make life easier. As I said goodbye to my panic, I began to say hello to a brand new life and one that enabled me to start my journey of healing, self-love, and making my world bigger as I took the steps towards becoming me. Now let’s get back to the journey that is taking me from where I am to where I am meant to be. To be continued….