Jackie

My earlier career expanded over twenty years of working with children and families - as a Montessori teacher and childminder in my former years. As a mentor in my latter years, I began to see and experience myself how stress levels can play a major role in the workplace and in someone’s personal life.

Seven years following the death of my twenty-two-year-old daughter to an aggressive cancer, I found myself struggling and stuck in my story. I was struggling with life and ended up on anti-depressants for two years. It was during this time I saw what I was unable to do without medication – I was not able to live life with joy, with the freedom to be real, authentic. In seeking resolution and understanding I found myself enrolling in a one-year self-development course in UCC. It was while going through this process that I found an understanding of how important it is to find meaning in the context of my story. It is my belief that in sharing our story there lies within the answer to why we behave the way we do when we find ourselves in a threatening environment.