As I sit here in my sofa nest at the end of January still recovering from a nasty bout of bronchitis and cracked ribs, I find myself reflecting on 2024. It’s tempting to label it a year of chaos and – and, to be fair, it absolutely was – but looking closer, it’s also a year that held up a mirror and made me confront truths I’d been avoiding.
Let me take you back to the start.
Last January, life threw a curveball that shifted everything. It was the kind of event that shakes the foundations of your life, Suddenly, I found myself navigating not just my own emotions but also the weight of family tensions and ripple effects that seemed endless and really fucking hard. In 2023 I had taken on a part-time job. It consumed every ounce of energy I had. Even when I wasn’t at work, I was thinking about it. And as time went on, so did role/responsibility creep, so insidious I didn’t notice it happening. It left me so depleted there was zero left for making art. My sanctuary, my therapy, the core of who I feel I am just wasn’t there. The only things created in the studio was thanks to spiders.
My beloved garden got abandoned and before long it became unmanageable. And then there was sweet, troubled Bang, my rescue dog with a heart full of love and a past that seemed determined to haunt us both. Some days training him felt like untangling a ball of string while blindfolded.
Meanwhile, I didn’t really notice that my body was staging a rebellion of its own. It started small – frequent colds, the odd ache here and there – but escalated into a parade of ailments: in the space of 12 months I had three rib subluxations; tennis elbow; a foot impaled on a screw that left me limping for a month; and yet another ankle sprain. Throw in five colds, laryngitis, two UTIs and bronchitis. By the end of the year, I felt like a broken marionette, held together by duct tape and sheer force of will! One positive result, my doctor is helping me to be assessed for HSD, a common issue with ADHD.
It wasn’t until December when bronchitis and cracked ribs forced me to stop, that it hit me like a train: I’m not okay. I’d spent the year in survival mode, trying to patch the holes and hold everything together, but in doing so, I’d lost part of myself. My art, my joy, my sense of who I was—all of it had slipped through my fingers.
So here’s the decision: I’m stepping back. I’m leaving the job and dedicating myself to my art again. It’s terrifying, of course. There’s no safety net, no guarantee, but there’s also no other way forward.
2025, I’ve decided, will be a year of repair. I want to tend to my studio and my garden, but also to the messier, less tangible parts of my life: the relationships, the healing, the rediscovery of who I am. I want to show up for Bang, to rebuild my body and my mind, and to find joy in creating again. And most importantly, go back to making it a source of revenue. I think this will look a little different than before. Ideas are percolating well from my sofa nest. I’ve also rediscovered the joy of a sketchbook. I’m spending many happy hours playing again.
This year was brutal, but it gave me something valuable: the clarity to see what truly matters and the courage to start over. When life knocks you down whether literally or metaphorically, sometimes the only way forward is to pause, take a deep breath (cracked ribs permitting), and begin again.
