I know something is wrong, so we take my friend’s Mum car and as we walk up the hill and around the corner we see two ambulances and several police cars. I run towards the house and am stopped in my tracks by a policeman - ‘you can’t go that way you don’t want to see that’… but I am looking for Dad. ‘He’s gone’ I am told.

The winter sun is streaming through the window, I sit with my coffee and edit the photographs I took at last weekends’ monthly drag show. Each photograph I bring up on the screen is a reminder of the wonderful people that I get to work with, hang out with and call my friends. It’s a reminder of how far I have come

In 2013, we met an awesome woman, C, who was already helping another couple to become parents. And when she had helped them by carrying their daughter, she offered to help us. We had become good friends, and bonded over our love of food, particularly curries.

I spent 11 months in Australia and a month travelling home (via various countries). During that time I heard the term ‘opportunity of a lifetime’ frequently. I heard it from other backpackers, from people I met, from people at home. I never liked the phrase.

A brown skirt suit, Jesus, what was I thinking? I thought borrowing something smartish from my big sister would help, and maybe it did, but it absolutely wasn’t me! I felt like a total fraud. I sat on the coach at Maidenhead bus station thinking it was the start of the rest of my life! That 11 quid fare was my ticket to freedom! It was the summer of 1989.

Candle lit table in an Italian restaurant. The soft glow of the flame creates dappled shadows around our wine glasses - mine, half empty, his, near gone. His hand slowly glides across the table cloth, gently falling on top of my palm. He looks up at me, burning curiosity in his cool eyes, “so”, he says, “tell me about your family?”

Having a side hustle is the first step towards this, but it also gives you something to focus on outside of your full-time job. When I leave my office at 5pm, I leave all the stress, worry and problems of that job behind, and I come home to my side hustle. Its taught me that your job should be just that – a job, and not your whole life.

My Mum died very suddenly in January, 12 years ago. She went to the doctor on the Friday, got taken straight into hospital and died on the Monday. For years before that, I worried about how I would cope when she died, how I would be able to function in a world that didn’t contain her.

I was called from next door where I’d been playing with my best friend, they were crowded around the end of the piano where the phone lived, a space opened up and I was enveloped inside it as the news was told. Dad was dead, drowned.

My oldest, Leo, is autistic; I am his registered carer. I haven’t come across many parents of autistic children admitting that parenting is boring, stifling and terrifying online. Apparently, we are all blessed with special children by God because we are special parents. We are stoical in our “suffering”.