Dental problems are not “just cosmetic”, and depression is not “just in your head”. When the two meet, they can feed each other until ordinary life starts to shrink. That is the point I think gets missed far too often. Bad teeth can affect confidence, work, relationships, eating, sleep and self-worth. Depression can make brushing, booking appointments, answering letters and facing treatment feel impossible. Then the damage gets worse, which makes the depression heavier. I kno

I do not think anyone should get to decide, quietly and on my behalf, whether I am allowed to grieve. That is what this has come down to for me. My grandad died on Tuesday, and I was not told. I found out without the basic courtesy that most people would expect from family. Now I am left asking the next painful question: will I be told about my grandad’s funeral? Part of me already thinks I know the answer. If I was not told he had died, why would I suddenly be told when the

Yes, I think my dad avoided telling me. I do not think this was a misunderstanding, a missed message, or one of those awkward family moments where everyone assumes someone else has passed the news on. Yesterday, I found out my grandad had died that morning. Not from my dad. Not from anyone on my dad’s side of the family. I found out through my mum, who had been told by my brother, who had been told by my dad. That chain of information says everything. My dad has my contact de

No seventeen-year-old should have to give up education because the adults and systems around them fail to provide what they are meant to provide. Work can build character. Work can teach discipline. Work can even rescue you when everything else falls apart. But there is a big difference between choosing work and being pushed into it because the money is not there. In my previous post, I spoke about having to leave education and start working at McDonalds. That did not last lo

Dropping out of college at 16 can look like failure from the outside. In my case, it was not rebellion, laziness, or a lack of ambition. It was what happens when a young person runs out of options before they have even had a proper chance to start. That is the part people often miss. When someone leaves education early, the easy story is that they did not try hard enough. They made bad choices. They threw away an opportunity. But in 2007, my life did not feel like a list of c

Queer solidarity with Gaza only makes sense if it is rooted in one idea: human rights do not have to be earned by having perfect politics. That does not mean gay people must ignore anti-LGBTQ laws, excuse religious extremism, or pretend they would be safe in Gaza. It means many queer activists separate the rights of civilians from the actions of governments, armed groups, and conservative social systems. That distinction is easy to state and hard to live with. For an openly g

I haven’t posted in a few weeks because life got hectic with work, and I took a little holiday to clear my head. But before I dive into why the school I attended in Fareham was the worst experience of my life, I want to share something more personal. It’s about my home life, the house where I grew up, and how the cracks in my dad’s behavior started to show. It’s about how my siblings and I began to see what he was doing behind closed doors—his secret activities that my mum ne