Are You Nuts?
We’ve heard this and plenty of other things like it a thousand times! The short answer is yes, we probably are, but let us explain why we took the leap to get rid of nearly everything we own, buy a boat and head off travelling.
Growing Up
Growing up, I had two parents with incredible work ethics.
My Dad was a secondary school physics teacher and Head of the Upper School. My Mum is a Speech and Language Therapist, Head of her department AND a senior tutor for Makaton which she does in her spare time at weekends as well as evenings and occasionally during the week.
I have a lot to live up to!
They showed me that to get anywhere in life, you have to work hard for it. No slacking and no pulling sickies (believe me I tried… and failed miserably when I was forbidden to anything other than lie in bed on what should have been a nice chill out day at home in front of the TV whilst all my friends were having fun in lessons!).
So work hard I did.
I did well in my GCSEs, OK in my A Levels and got a degree to become a Primary School Teacher then dove headfirst into working. I worked hard at building up a good supply teacher reputation whilst also trying to get a full-time job teaching.
I met Dave at the gym (you wouldn’t believe how fit I got trying to impress him!). He was also part of the TA (Territorial Army Reserves) as part of the tank regiment based in Dawley Bank, Telford.
After a recommendation from one of the gym members, he applied to the West Midlands Ambulance Service as an Emergency Care Assistant. Following a series of successful interviews, he retrained in-house and settled into his new job.
After spending time getting to know each other, we eventually moved in together. Life was good.
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Brain Tumour
It was all going so well until December 2012.
Dad rang me one night and gave me the earth-shattering news that he’d been told he had a brain tumour.
We had seen him a few days before and he said he’d been struggling with headaches but didn’t really think much of it. Dad was healthy and fit and it didn’t even cross my mind that anything would be seriously wrong with him. I’d only known him to take one day off work because he’d had a migraine many, many years ago.
I was doing a long-term supply post at the time in one of the schools I’d trained in during my time at Uni and had nearly completed my contract. Work was put firmly on the back foot as I tried to make sense of what was happening.
Dad told me that he was going into hospital to have an operation. I naively thought that they would be operating to take it out but it turns out they were just doing a biopsy.
My perfect bubble fractured when I got the initial phone call telling me he had a brain tumour.
It shattered completely when Dad told me that it was going to be fatal.
December, January, February and March flew by. I tried to spend as much time with Dad as I could whilst also trying to fit in a few supply shifts to pay the bills. Ella, (my sister) and I had a couple of brilliant days out with him at Chester Zoo and going round Liverpool Docks reliving childhood memories. Dad was also able to fit in a trip to the Isles of Scilly with his brother and sister, a place very special to them all having spent many happy summers there growing up.
Then April came.
It was Sunday the 7th and a beautiful sunny day. Dave and I volunteered with the Welshpool Air Cadets and we’d gone with them to their inter-squadron sports day at RAF Cosford. We were having a great time cheering our squadron on when I checked my phone and saw multiple missed calls from my sister. She doesn’t call me much so I knew something was wrong. I phoned her straight back, already knowing what she was going to tell me.
Dad had been taken to hospital in a coma.
He wasn’t going to wake up.
Get there as soon as you can to say goodbye.
Dave drove. I could barely see for tears streaming down my face. This was it. Would we make it in time?
Luckily we did. When we arrived at the hospital in Chester, he’d been moved from A&E to the ICU (Intensive Care Unit) so we went to find him. Dad’s brother, sister and Mum were also there. We all took it in turns to go into the small room he’d been put in and say our goodbyes.
It was one of the hardest things I’ve ever had to do.
I held his hand as I spoke to him and although he was in a coma, he squeezed my hand. Dad was still there. He was hanging on. Fighting for his life. Stubborn as ever.
After that, it was a waiting game. The doctors gave him 24 hours. Dad never did as he was told though. I went back again the following couple of days to sit with and talk to him. After that, I’m sorry to say but I couldn’t face it. I couldn’t watch my awesome, incredible Dad fade away in front of my eyes. I wanted to remember him from all the happy memories I have of growing up.
I was glued to my phone waiting for news.
The news came Monday morning. It was the 15th April 2013 and over a week since he’d been admitted. Dad had passed away around midnight. He was gone. I was heartbroken. I still am.
The following weeks were so hard.
I helped to plan Dad’s funeral with my sister and uncle. All those little arrangements that you never think of having to do so young. I was 21.
The day of his funeral, the church was full. On a day that was full of sadness, there was a glimmer of happiness. He’d touched so many people during his life and career as a teacher, that 250 people showed up to help celebrate his life. Family, friends, colleagues, old colleagues from his previous jobs and ex-students that he’d taught and inspired. There were so many of them.
Dad was only 57.
One lesson that I’ve learned and internalised is that life is far too short. You never know which day will be your last.
I think about life differently now. I ask myself – if I was to die tomorrow or be told I only have so long to live, would I be able to happily say that I was satisfied with how I’d lived my life? Dad could. He was asked if there was anything he still wanted to do or anywhere he wanted to go before it was too late. He said no. Dad had lived the life he wanted to lead. He’d travelled, had a good career and a family. He was happy.
I want to be able to say that when it’s my time. Right now, I can’t.
This adventure is giving me the opportunity to see the world and fulfil my dreams before it’s too late.
Teaching and Depression
Just after Dad died, I was successful at getting a job at a school local to me teaching a year 2 class (6-7 year olds). It was bittersweet. Dad had been so proud when I graduated but he wasn’t there to see me actually doing the job I’d worked so hard for.
I threw myself into my new job. I was doing 60-70 hour weeks (I’m not exaggerating, I kept timesheets to see how many hours I was putting into the job when my contract was 25 hours).
I was up in the early hours working before school, putting in the hours in the classroom before heading home to mark, plan and prepare for the next day until midnight when I fell into bed.
My weekends were spent chained to my desk, looking out the window at everyone else enjoying their lives. I allowed myself half a day off a weekend and even then felt incredibly guilty as I just couldn’t get on top of my workload.
Something had to give.
It was me.
Around a year after losing Dad, I was driving to school and I couldn’t stop the tears from streaming down my face. My fellow teachers took one look at me and told me that I needed to go to the Doctors. I was diagnosed with depression and anxiety and given a prescription to help me.
I rang Dave up and told him what had happened and he was there for me when I got home. The Doctor wanted to sign me off work but I am as stubborn as my Dad and despite their advice and Dave’s insistence that I stay home, I went back. I was SO determined to complete what had been an incredibly difficult year and get signed off (I was still an NQT – Newly Qualified Teacher at this point and didn’t want to have to redo a whole term to get signed off when I was nearly finished).
I wanted to get to the end of the year, leave, and never look back.
And that is exactly what I did. I was so happy to walk out of that job and school for the last time, I practically skipped! Life is far too short to be miserable and be dreading going to work each day.
After a year of trying to get by on supply work, I ended up taking a job with NHS Blood & Transplant and retraining as a Donor Carer.
My job was to work on a mobile team that travelled around North Wales and parts of Shropshire and Cheshire to set up mobile donation clinics where people could give blood donations.
I was trained to screen donors, insert and remove the needles needed for the donation and provide aftercare. I absolutely loved it. I was part of a wonderful supportive team and helping others at the same time. The team was taken over in May 2016 and we became part of the Welsh Blood Service. I still did the same job, just wearing a different uniform.
It was a world away from teaching but it was definitely the right decision for me.
However….
PTSD
Whilst I was dealing with losing Dad and a teaching career that was going down the drain, Dave had been working his way up the ranks in the Ambulance Service. He had done further training and became a Senior Emergency Medical Technician and CBRN (Chemical, Biological, Radioactive & Nuclear) practitioner.
It was a job that he really enjoyed as he was helping people, each day on the job was different and he learned something new every day.
However, after changing stations from a quiet little country town, to a much larger busier town and the being on the receiving end of increasing demands from higher and higher call rates, things started to take a turn for the worst.
The Ambulance staff were put under growing pressure and not given time between jobs to let off steam and deal with what they had just witnessed.
The shift pattern he was used to had also been changed.
Before, he’d work four day shifts together and then four nights together with time off in between to adapt. Now, they were having to work two twelve hour day shifts followed immediately by two twelve hour night shifts.
His sleep pattern became totally messed up and he didn’t know whether he was coming or going.
These small changes all added up and over a period of time.
Dave changed.
He went from being happy-go-lucky and chilled out, to a sleep deprived, complete stress head experiencing near constant flashbacks from past jobs he’d attended. His memory is shot to pieces and he finds it very difficult to concentrate. He’s in a constant state of alert and incredibly jumpy.
I’d be woken up in the middle of the night multiple times from Dave sitting bolt upright in bed screaming and shouting as he’d just dreamt about one of his (dead) patients coming towards him in his sleep.
He’d have to stop en route to work to throw up.
We can’t go anywhere that reminds him of past jobs and he can’t deal with crowds of people anymore without getting incredibly stressed. Even small gatherings with family and friends are a struggle.
On top of all that his temper is short, he snaps very quickly and finds it very difficult to trust people.
There have been some very low points over the past few years.
The job has completely ruined him.
He couldn’t go to work and spent a long time off sick only for the doctors to try and force pills down him. He tried therapy but was only given six sessions which just made everything worse as it brought up some incredibly raw memories. He wasn’t given the right support to process them all. He finds it incredibly hard to talk about it and is quickly reduced to tears when he has to do so.
From trying to speak to a few different people about it all, they have all individually come to the conclusion that he has severe PTSD (Post Traumatic Stress Disorder).
How can you get help for something when you can barely put the words together to talk about it? It’s not like breaking a bone. Other people can’t see what’s wrong so how can you possibly expect them to understand? Living with Dave has exposed me to the effects of the problem but even I can’t comprehend how it feels to actually have PTSD.
When we still lived in Shropshire, Dave tried many different ways to get better; from exercise, forcing himself to go out, numerous pills from the doctors, counselling, meditation, taking Scrappy for long walks, avoiding stressful situations and taking time off work.
However, the problem had built up over a long period of time and all the emotions and feelings are set very deep.
It is an ongoing struggle up a very steep hill.
One of the main reasons we are doing this trip is to give Dave a bit of breathing space so he can try to work through everything and get back to normal.
Whilst we were on the move last season, he felt better than he had done for a long time. However, when we stopped in Jersey over the winter, everything got worse again and it now feels like we are almost back at square one.
It’s been a long, difficult journey so far and it’s not going to get any easier but we are hopeful that we will find something that works to help him get better soon.
Living To Work
For a number of years now, I felt like I was going through the motions just waiting for all the good stuff to kick in and for my life to truly begin.
What I came to realise, was that going to work, eating, sleeping and repeating, day in day out to pay for everything I had around me, WAS my life.
It hit me like a ton of bricks.
I made the decision right then, that SOMETHING had to change. Now. Before I woke up and realised that my life was almost over and I hadn’t even lived it.
It felt like we were on a one way track through life where you have to buy a house, drive nice cars, work hard all your life before you retire and eventually end up being put in a nursing home before you die if you are ‘lucky’ to make it that far.
We bought the house, drove two nice cars, hell, we’d even had a few nice motorbikes. The house had been kitted out with some nice new furniture but do you know what?
None of it made us happy.
It was good for a bit when it was all shiny and new but having a mortgage is stressful (even when you don’t stretch yourself!), especially when you are struggling with your job or wondering if you’ll be able to get enough shifts that month to pay it.
Add to that the payments you need to make every single month for all the bills that go with a normal life in a house: gas, electric, water, council tax, home phone, broadband, mobile phones, TV license, SKY TV… and life gets stressful.
It truly felt like we were living to go to work so that we could afford to pay for this life that we were leading even though we weren’t actually enjoying it. We were paying for cars that were almost exclusively used to go to work in. It felt like we were trying to keep up with the Jones’ and everyone else around us.
Time was hurtling past. We got engaged and were being hounded with questions about when we were getting married. After that, it would have been questions about children. (The answer is yes, we want them, but not yet!) I want to travel and see the world a bit first!
We decided enough was enough.
The decision was made that we were no longer going to live to work, we were going to work to live.
This required for some major changes to be made in our lives. Anything that wasn’t essential went. It was either sold or we ended contracts to stop paying for anything that wasn’t necessary.
Any money we had spare was saved and we tried to find ways to earn extra money that we could save on top of that!
Having something to aim for made all the sacrifices so much easier. We wanted to travel and we were going to make it happen no matter what.
The BIG Decision To Leave
We both knew that there was far more to life than what we had experienced so far. We both had a desire to travel – to get out and see the world and experience it properly.
Leaving to go travelling was something we’d talked about for years. (Here’s the blog post I wrote back in 2015 – even then we’d been talking about it for a while!) Plucking up the courage to actually make the decision to leave it something else entirely.
Seeing Dave suffering so much from PTSD from his job was the kick up the arse we both needed. The decision was made. Putting it into action was the next step and even harder than making the decision!
Slowly we began sorting through everything we owned and started to sell it. The more we sold, the more I wanted to sell. It was liberating. I realised just how much of the things we had surrounded ourselves with was just ‘stuff’ that we really didn’t need.
Dave and I both applied for a career break and when they’d been approved, we really upped the speed to get everything sorted.
We sold both cars, all our furniture, all our toys for our hobbies, basically pretty much everything apart from sentimental things and anything we planned to take with us.
At the same time we went through the process of buying a boat after years of looking around and window shopping.
Last but not least, we sorted out tenants and rented the house out.
It was quite literally a dive into the deep end as after years of talking about it, everything was sorted out in a matter of months.
Why A Boat?
It took us a long time to come to the decision to buy a boat.
We knew we wanted to go travelling, we just didn’t know HOW to do it.
Backpacking, car, motorbike, campervan, motorhome or boat? We went through the pros and cons of each.
We knew Scrappy would be coming with us which ruled out backpacking and motorbike.
A big part of Dave’s job was being on the road so we wanted to avoid that as we wanted to use the trip as a way to help him work through his PTSD and get better. Avoiding stressful situations is a big part of that. That took out car, campervan and motorhome leaving only the boat.
Even though it was the only option left to us, I still took a lot of persuading which is probably why it’s taken so long to actually do it. We are both from land-locked Shropshire, so apart from going on them on holiday, I didn’t have much experience on boats.
However, when Dave introduced me to Sailing La Vagabonde and SV Delos, I was hooked on the idea.
Being able to travel with our home with us. Cheap cooking on board. A ready-made bed each night. Scrappy could come too. It would be a much slower pace of life and we could really get a feel for the countries we’d be passing through. Learning new skills. The community feel wherever you go. Free to drop the anchor in that perfect little anchorage and swim off the back of the boat.
A lot of research later, the decision was made. We would go travelling by sailboat. We bought Baremka in May 2017 and haven’t looked back since!
A New Beginning
A lot of thought has gone into the decision to give it all up and leave. But do you know what? It’s the best decision we’ve ever made. Yes, it is hard work but the rewards far outweigh the negatives.
We’ve met so many amazing people already and really dug down to try and experience the countries we’ve spent time in which is exactly what I wanted from the trip.
I’m a different person to the one that left home in June 2017. I’ve so much more chilled and see things in a completely different light now.
The life we used to lead might work for some, but for us, it was all wrong.
I’m proud that we had the guts to stand up and walk against the grain. We’ve had to deal with a lot of resistance but we listened to other people for too long. Now it’s time to follow our hearts and do what is right for us.
Rebel.
Take Control.
Follow Our Hearts.
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