Last year, James was told he had approximately 18 months left to live due to, the absolute b*tch that is, cancer.  So what did he decide to do?  He held his own funeral and #fakewake… an event he simply did not want to miss out on! In one of the most incredible, and weirdly funny, episodes I’ve recorded, James talks me through the emotions he felt when he was told he was going to die, he tells me what we need in the event of a zombie apocalypse and we briefly develop a new reality game show, Cancer Factor, that we don’t think will ever be given the green light! Links from the episo ..read more

Jody, aka the 'Beyonce' of childless women, was just brilliant from the very start.  As always, I knew nothing of her story, her journey or her disenfranchised grief, but she kindly shared all.  Including why she's childless as opposed to child-free and her mission to helps other by creating Gateway Women. Oh if you were born after say 1990 and/or are not from the UK, I would recommend Googling "Lawrence Llewelyn-Bowen" ahead of time! Links from the episode: Jody’s book, Living the Life Unexpected The Full Stop Podcast Selfish, Shallow and Self Absorbed by Meghan Daum ~~~~~~~~~ Watch ..read more

When he was 19, Joe lost his Mum after an 11 year battle with cancer.  He was a bit lost and confused, so googled how to cope with the loss of a parent.  Discovering that there wasn’t a huge amount available for young people, Joe decided to start his own podcast, giving young people a place to talk and share their stories. As much as I love Joe for the good things he’s doing for young people in the grief community, I do question his life choices as I discover during this episode that he legitimately likes ‘Parma Violet’ sweets… shocking!  We also covered our lack of London geogr ..read more

Emma & I ‘met’ on Instagram and I was instantly drawn to how open she was with her story (and how wonderfully aesthetic her Instagram account is, not jealous at all!) Emma was just 15 when her mum died suddenly and far too soon; she was just 42 years old.  Emma, with a very level head on her relatively young shoulders, decided she was going to be strong for the whole family.  This was all going swimmingly until she went to uni and things came crashing down.  Emma took her coping mechanism from drinking to journaling to blogging to starting a podcast and she can now say that ..read more

I’ve known Leslie for many years, but neither of us knew we were both grieving the loss of our parents at the same time back in 2010.  Which just goes to show that you never know what’s going on in people’s lives. Leslie has been a huge supporter of the podcast since the first episode, then one day she says to me “I think I want to share my story”... and what a story it is!  Listening for the first time, I felt like I was listening to a true crime podcast, there were so many twists and turns.  There was also a lot of love; love Leslie obviously has for her parents, love that she ..read more

Chris and his partner suffered a miscarriage in February of this year.  He was looking for answers, for help and support without going down the therapy route, but couldn’t find anything dedicated to men that he felt was right for him.  A few short weeks later, Chris created miscarriageformen.com with the aim of helping “that one person that might need it”. Being, quote “just a lad from the North East of England”, Chris was brought up with the same mindset as most; boys don’t cry and they certainly do not need help.  They are strong and tough and can deal with anything.  On ..read more

Athul’s father passed away four years ago meaning that, in his culture, as the eldest son, he effectively became the head of the family.  Whilst this was considered ‘the norm’, the whole situation affected Athul, who still feels he hasn’t been able to fully grieve his loss, even though he made some pretty big decisions to try and help the process. Once again, without losing the sentiment of the story, we had a lot of fun recording this episode because it’s been a long time since we ‘hung out’ properly.  Athul (aka A2L) is my former ‘work husband’; we used to host weekend shows on sis ..read more

This episode we explore grief surrounding the ‘death’ of a relationship.  I’m joined by Alex Grant who openly shares how she dealt with her nine year relationship ending; how it almost broke her and how ‘moving her body’, a Buddhist retreat and Las Vegas got her through, and not in the way you might expect! We also touch on another aspect of disenfranchised grief following her retirement from competitive gymnastics after nearly 20 years in the sport! Oh and Alex may or may not be best friends with Celine Dion! Links from the episode: Alex’s instagram: https://www.instagram.com/alexgrant.x ..read more

This episode blew me away! I’m joined by Candy Fanucci, founder of Pirates Surf Rescue, a Dubai-based water-sports programme for kids.  Candy has suffered loss… a LOT of loss, yet listening to her story I found myself smiling and inspired.  Her energy, attitude and outlook on life is not only admirable, but infectious. Candy shares that after her losses, she could have travelled down a very dark path, but instead decided to use her life experiences to help others. Pirate Surf Rescue was born.  She also tried to convince me to join the ‘5am Club’ and there were chickens!  I ..read more

Laura & I connected through Instagram just last year; she is the amazing woman behind the Instagram account, @griefhungry, that I spoke about in episode 2. Laura’s Dad, John, died in truly bizarre circumstances.  In this episode, she talks about the day it happened and how she and her family found out details of her Dad’s death through the media whilst waiting for updates in the hospital.  Her family’s ‘relationship’ with the media, including social media, didn’t stop there. We also chatted about ‘grief brain’, the amazing grief community Laura has built online and, of course, ho ..read more