After a somewhat unintentional four-year hiatus, I’m finally back on the blog and excited to optimise this little corner of the internet as a creative outlet again. Truth be told, I’ve been challenged more than I ever expected since my last post back in 2020… So before I throw myself back into travel articles, it only seems right to catch you up on the headline news, which has led me to this new chapter at long last.
Not a lot of the below is travel or luxury lifestyle-related, so I apologise in advance for being totally off-topic in that sense! This blog originally started as more of a personal journal, so I’m revisiting its routes and am thinking about doing so more regularly. After all, I’m at a transformative stage in my life now I’ve entered my early 30s – a period renowned for big life changes. Without further ado, here’s a rough overview of what’s been going on, in chronological order from where I last left off.
Career Moves
In 2019, I made a professional change from the fashion world to travel. I had hoped to leave behind what can be an incredibly intense and, at times, rather toxic industry (The Devil Wears Prada isn’t all fictional, folks). Unfortunately, about six months into my new role, I began encountering workplace bullying, which affected me in so many ways. On the one hand, I was able to go on amazing, once-in-a-lifetime trips, which I absolutely loved and still treasure the memories of. On the other, I was struggling with the day-to-day office atmosphere and was constantly on edge. One day, I was rather abruptly made redundant, a decision which I still suspect was personal rather than purely business-oriented, but it would have happened eventually as the pandemic hit the travel business early on. In hindsight, this was actually one of the best things that could have happened, as I soon moved into a role where I’m treated with respect and decency. It took a while to find the right fit, but I think the tough lessons learnt throughout my career made me even more appreciative of what I’ve finally found. Though don’t get me wrong, this really is a topline overview; things certainly got worse before they got better! If you’re in a similar workplace struggle yourself, just know there is ALWAYS something different and better out there.
The Pandemic Period
We all went through this, so I won’t state the obvious, but the pandemic years felt like a weird limbo. I was pretty much distracting myself with work as my new role kept me very busy. As many people did, I sadly lost my only grandparent and had a restricted memorial service which, was different to what it should have been but beautiful nonetheless. My partner and I also got a dog, a little Cavapoo named Rocket. He’s the absolute best decision we ever made. Rocket forced us into nature every day, even when it was snowing and awful, but we needed it. He still brings joy to our lives every single day (he’s curled up at the foot of my bed as I write this, like a cute little fluffy croissant). <3
Chronic Illness
By October of 2020, I started exhibiting some alarming symptoms but due to the pandemic, I of course wasn’t able to get an in-person GP appointment. I waited months for an urgent hospital referral. Every time it approached, I’d receive a letter pushing it back again, all the while I was becoming more unwell. In a nutshell, I developed an autoimmune disease called Ulcerative Colitis (great timing). I ended up hospitalised with sepsis in September 2021 as I still wasn’t receiving proper treatment. It never should’ve gotten to the stage that it did, but because it was so bad, it then took significantly longer to recover. Nevertheless, I’m happy to report that as of this year, I’m in clinical remission and hope to remain that way! I’ll likely write a longer post about this particular journey at some point. I hope that talking about my experiences might help someone else new to the disease, as I’ve personally found comfort and strength in speaking to others who’ve been through something similar.
Loss
Many of us lost people and valuable years before the pandemic was over and ‘normal’ life resumed. My family also suffered a great loss last year which isn’t really my place to talk about publicly. What I will say is that we are still working through the ripple effects. It seems serendipitous that it was World Mental Health Day this week, and I just want to stress to anyone reading this who is feeling heavy, burdensome, constantly sad, numb, empty, or any and all of these things, please don’t keep it to yourself. I battled my own demons, particularly during the recovery process of the illness I mentioned above but it’s always possible to make a change. MIND and CALM charities are fantastic resources, your GP, or just letting one person know so that you can begin to chat things through, as hard as it might be.
Marriage
There were a lot of challenges and probably more downs than ups, which led to me retreating to a place of personal hibernation while I tackled them all and tried my best to recover both mentally and physically… but there were also glimmers of hope and positivity. Life always moves one way or another. In August of this year, I married my favourite person in the world after more than 11 years together, and it was so special. It’s hard to explain as even though nothing’s really changed in our relationship, it feels so nice to be in this married stage of our lives and looking ahead to all the exciting moments that await. <3
Now
It has actually felt quite tough writing some of that out! But hopefully from reading through you can understand why I needed to take time away to work through it all and why now finally feels like a good place to come back. In fact, I just returned from an amazing pilates retreat (tell me you’re in your 30s without telling me, right…) and I felt compelled to stop holding myself back. It’s time.
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