My mum has recently been diagnosed with a life threatening illness and yet she remains the strongest and bravest member of our family.
My mum and my dad have been together for 57 years and their love is as strong today is it ever was.

My older brother shows strength, patience and caring like I’ve never experienced before and all of this is teaching me so much (he’s always all of these things, but I’m witnessing it for myself at an important life moment).

We are not a Walton-esque family by any means. We all lead fairly independent lives and I live a distance away, but we are a family that cares for and about each other.

My parents can be trying (more so as they have aged) because I’ve not been as patient as I could or should be. This I have learnt in the last few days and I’m grateful for the lesson.

When horrible things happen, I firmly believe that there must be something positive to take from it and in this case I’m still learning to be a better person – with the help of my family and friends I’m a better man today than I was yesterday – or at least this is my hope.