Amazing encounters in the wild of Africa.

 Today I am taking you on a visit to see the wild up close in South Africa. Enjoy the ride!

First checking to see if I can be trusted...

Then a kiss!!

I didn't expect this at all and it touched my heart so deeply, that this beautiful giraffe was interested to see who was on the other side of the wall and then kissing me smack on my lips!

Lion cubs are very playful but I will never come this close to an adult. 

Feeding time. This photo was taken from the safety of my car. 

White lions are bred in captivity and kept safe from hunters. 

I don't know if I was taking this young male elephant for a walk or the other way around. At one stage he nudged me to walk faster. 

There is nothing that can compare to riding an elephant!

 I hope you enjoyed spending a little time in Africa getting to know the wild with me. May you have an amazing weekend!
Blessed Be and Namaste!

To be loved...

We all need to be loved, like a flower thirsts for raindrops on its tender petals.

We need to be adored, seeing our beloved's eyes shine with brightness at the mere sight of us.

We need to know that someone's heart sings when we are near, tender notes quivering in harmony with the beat of our hearts.

We need to be adored, our lover's face turned towards us like a sunflower follows  

the sun, worshiping the golden rays that make it burst into vibrant color.

 We need that powerful emotions tearing into our whole being like a hungry wild beast, devouring us with the intensity of it.

Kahlil Gibran says it so perfect and I have never read anything that comes close to describing it; "To know the pain of too much tenderness, to be wounded by your own understanding of love and to bleed willingly and joyfully."

 That is what we all desire with every breath we take, every heartbeat and every atom of our existence.

We require that holy of emotions that makes all our senses come alive and burn like a raging fire.

I hope you have this in your life to treasure every day.

Namaste!

Angels surround us even when life is at it's darkest.

The road is dark and treacherous and danger lurks everywhere. You are tired and terrified, stumbling along with no hope. You feel your feet slipping on wet stones and your hands fly around to find purchase. Suddenly you feel arms holding you upright. A thorn from a bush snag on our clothes and you feel the hysteria welling up in your being. Soft hands loosen the snare and you sigh in relief. A snarl comes from the foliage and a horrible mangled face appears with bloody fangs exposed. A shriek escapes your mouth, but the unseen hands push the monster back to where it came from.

Soft whispers in your ear soothingly encourage you to move forward. “You are not alone, we are with you to protect you”. Suddenly a golden light appears in the distance. You feel dread and hope in equal measure well up inside your torn heart. “We will reach the light, do not despair,” the words fill you mind. You wonder if you will make it to the light, so much darkness and evil surround you right now. You near the light while trying to walk without falling down on the uneven path. It seems so far to go and you feel the helplessness enter your mind again. “Keep going,” the whispers urge you, “it is not far to go now.”

Your foot hooks on a root and you feel your body pitched forward but the hands are there to stop your fall. The golden light is becoming brighter and for a moment hope soars in your heart. Your mind tells you it is just an illusion like all other hopes that died in you. “Don’t give up, it is not far to go now,” the loving voice tells you. Hope starts to swell inside you and you walk faster, determined to make it. The light is right in front of you and you can hear voices singing and praising the creator. The songs fill you with longing and wonder. As if you have taken a huge leap you are in the light. The soft golden love of it enters your soul, mind and body. You feel glorious acceptance and joy and you face open in a smile. You look around for the presences which brought you here but everyone is around you now.

Angels with beautiful snow white wings enfold you and chant the song of love. Your heart wants to burst with the love and joy you feel. God is here and you are safe now. Peace has entered you mind and you know you are not alone in this world. The angels of God is around and guiding you all the way on your path. You know you will have to go back to reality but for the moment you wallow in the beauty of the moment. Never again will you feel alone and loveless, you know the place that awaits you and the guardians who safeguard your every step in life. God will never leave you alone to suffer, no matter what the dark forces tell you. This life is but a moment to endure before eternity. The love, peace and joy of God await you at the end of it.
Blessed Be and Namaste, my fellow travelers.

Beautiful Africa in photos...

Just sharing beautiful South Africa with photos!!

The Palace at Sun City. 

Drakensberg Mountains. 

Kosmos flowers growing wild. 

Good Shepherd Silent Retreat. A wonderful place to restore your soul. 

Richard's Bay. 

Just something I found lovely to look at.

A sunrise near my home. 

I hope your week has been stunning and that the weekend is all you want it to be.
Namaste!!

We need to learn tolerance...

Intolerance – refusal to accept differences, unwillingness or refusal to accept people who are different from you, or views, beliefs, or lifestyles that differ from your own, bigotry, prejudice, narrow-mindedness, fanaticism, small-mindedness. This is what intolerance means and how many people do you know who are guilty of this?

We see this every day and it makes me feel so sad to think we can do this to each other. We are all in this life and world together, and apart from our differences why can’t we accept each other for who and what we are instead of pushing each other away?

I don’t care what you believe in or what your race or creed is, you are my brother and sister on earth. We are all connected in some way or another. There is a saying in Wiccan circles: First do no harm. Why can’t we live like this together in peace in harmony?

Why do we have to hurt each other and offend and criticize our different ways of living?  None of us have all the answers and we can ask questions but not to belittle someone in the process. We should stand together against the onslaught of evil forces and love each other the way we are supposed to.

What is happening in our world that we can’t stand to hear someone else’s view or opinion on a subject. Life is already so difficult and if we can tolerate each other and love one another, it will make it easier for all of us.

Blessed Be

The loss for words in the face of naked pain.

How can anyone ever understand how it feels to lose a child? Not in their wildest dreams can they identify with you. Before I lost my son Emile, I had no idea what parents went through when they lost a child. I try to put myself in their place and this is what I think it feels for them to look at us.

We are their worst fear personified. They feel helpless in the face of your pain. To look at such naked grief touches parts of their hearts they don’t want to know. It must be like looking at someone dying and them begging to help. Have you died before? Do you know the feelings and thoughts that person is struggling with? No, we don’t, and that is exactly why we can’t be angry at people for saying the wrong things to us. They have no clue of your unbearable pain and it will be unfair to expect them to know it. Just like you don’t know how to help someone dying, so can’t you demand understanding from someone who hasn't lost a child.

I am testament to what they dread in life. To have death come for a child untimely is the worst thing to imagine. They have no words to comfort you so they say the first things that come up in their minds. It is not because they are callous or hard and cold to your grief. They just don’t Know what you are suffering. You are their nightmares come to life right in front of their eyes.

If you haven’t walked in another’s shoes you have not felt their pain. Just like I have no idea what it must feel like to be in an armed robbery with a gun to my head, they also don’t know.  We want them to say the right things, but do you even know what the right thing to say is? I can’t tell you what I wanted people to say, because there is nothing to say.

Forgive them if they say things that hurt you, forgive them if they don’t have the answers for you. They are only human and trying to be of comfort, just like you would have done had you not been in this situation. Forgive their lack of knowledge, and pray they never learn it. When they turn away from you, it is not because they don’t care, it is because they fear the unbearable pain in your eyes.

Blessed Be and Namaste!!

Be ready my friend, something marvelous is about to happen to you!!

I'm so excited about the next voyage of this awesome life that is waiting patiently to spring its surprise on me. I know just around the corner something magical is going to happen to me. Even if it’s only for a moment or months or years, I will throw myself right into it. From the smallest almost insignificant event to the most extraordinary surprise, I will grab it with both hands and just let it take me away on a ride of wonderment.

There is something amazing that is going to happen to you when you least expect it and one day you will remember this post and realize I was right. Maybe at this minute you are in that state of joy and I want you to wallow in it and make memories of it you can treasure for always. 

Pleasure is not something to feel guilty about, it is to be enjoyed without restraint.

There needs to be a balance in life that's why it goes up and down in waves like the ocean, to create a harmonious symphony to life. Happiness and pleasure can't last forever because then we won't ever learn to appreciate it when it comes. It will just be something we expect without any meaning. We need to experience deep sadness and struggle from time to time so that when you suddenly find yourself in a state of ecstasy it will be so much sweeter.

We tend to be so closed off and so caught up in our troubles that we don't even register something miraculous that is right in front of us. We are surrounded every day with gifts from the universe to make our hearts lift and curl the corners of our mouths into a beatific smile. Have you ever really looked in the mirror with a smile? See how it lights up your face and puts a twinkling in your eyes. Now imagine how that lovely smile infects others around you. Who wouldn't want to smile back at you? Maybe that smile at someone going through a difficult time, unknown to you, will lift their hearts in turn. This awesome little moment that you share with a stranger can be something life changing for them.

Nothing last forever, everything passes, even the worst of times. There is a miracle in your future that is going to bring so much bliss to you that you won’t even be able to recall this agony you are experiencing now.  

Be ready my friend, something extraordinary is about to happen to you!!

Namaste!

We don't have to let a negative past influence our future...

“What we call our destiny is truly our character and that character can be altered. The knowledge that we are responsible for our actions and attitudes does not need to be discouraging, because it also means that we are free to change this destiny. One is not in bondage to the past, which has shaped our feelings, to race, inheritance, and background. All this can be altered if we have the courage to examine how it formed us. We can alter the chemistry provided we have the courage to dissect the elements.”

― Anaïs Nin

Does it really matter what happened to us in our lives? Some people blame everything that goes wrong in their lives because of the way they grew up, that they didn't have the opportunities others had or that they are the wrong sex or race. We all have tragedy and heartbreak happen to us, nobody is exempt from that. There are a multitude of reasons why we should rise above the bondage from the past. We can recreate ourselves and change our life path to reach the place we know we belong.

Why don’t we use tragedy and a difficult childhood as a reason to be the best we can be? Show the world how perfect you are as yourself, in spite of what went wrong. I believe that setbacks should be the reason to fight hard for what we want and stand our ground. The easiest thing in the world is to give up and let things fall down around us because of our past.  

Just because you are not rich enough or beautiful enough, grew up with only one parent or no parents, was abused and mistreated doesn't mean you can’t be a wonderful loving and caring person. The power lies in our own hands, not how we think circumstances shaped us.

There are valuable lessons to be learned from any unfortunate event that befell us. Take the cards life dealt you and use it to create a new future, instead of using as an excuse to give up. You are not going to get another chance to make this life the best you can.

You are a perfect unique and beautiful human being and you deserve only the best. Use  your life experience to change your life today. You can do it!!!

Namaste!

Our souls have a spiritual knowledge...

Have you ever met someone and felt that you have known them all your life? When the way they speak and act feels so uncannily familiar to you? I think when we sleep our souls travel and meet up with other souls we have known before we were born or are destined to meet. Can you imagine meeting like that in the universe and just being together without the interference of our bodily needs and emotions? Just pure cosmic togetherness and entwined with other souls we connect with in the spiritual dimension.

I don’t believe anything happens by chance or coincidence. The people we meet on this earthly plane are not unknown to us. How can we meet someone and fall so irrevocably in love with each other as if that love has always been there? Perhaps we feel so deeply for that person because on a spiritual plane we have already met and fallen in love.

I have this image in my mind of souls meeting in mid-flight with joy and intense love. Entwined and filled with cosmic belonging. Spiritual adoration is more than just caring about someone because we feel a connection with them that we can’t explain. We know them on a deeper level because our souls have a relationship that has been there for eons.

We make friends with people we feel a deep infinity with and we experience things in life together because that was destined for us. Even if the time we have with someone here on earth is only for a little while we treasure those precious memories forever. The earth is so vast and it isn't always possible to be together forever because of the distance that separates us. We meet people we will never ever forget and we think about them with fondness and longing for the rest of our human lives.

There is a knowing that can’t be rationalized with realistic arguments. I’m sure you have met someone and ask yourself why you haven’t met years ago. With some relationships the only way we can connect is with the life experience we have at that time in our lives. Maybe if we met earlier we would not have had that deep affinity with them. Things need to happen first that can give us a deeper understanding of each other. 

So tonight when you go to sleep you will possibly meet another soul that is going to play a very important role in your life for years to come. Could be that it is not wishful thinking when you meet someone you feel is your soul mate, not only in love but also in friendship.

Namaste!

Desperate internet dating??

Dating sites give me the creeps. I have done some research over the past few months and had some fun with weird people on these sites. Stop me if I am wrong, but is the standard greeting by most men... Hi there sexy!? Or maybe just give their telephone numbers and email addresses out and hope for the best? Is the reason that they are desperate or holding thumbs for an unsuspecting female who will fall for this inane talk?

What about starting a conversation... And what else are you doing? What? Really guys, come on now. What do you think we are doing sitting in front of the computer? I know many women can multi-task but chatting somewhere takes up all my concentration and I can’t be doing something else as well. Maybe they think I am doing washing dragging my laptop around with me. Not likely!

Let me warn you girls these guys are insistent. They want to know what you are wearing for no reason I could surmise at all. They will also keep asking the same idiotic things over and over. There were times I was wondering if the comments were computer generated. However I think some computers have brilliant programmers who could surely think up more intelligent pick-up lines.

There are lonely and desperate men out there. And let us not forget the women. Someone told me there are some who immediately want to know what they earn a month. Perhaps looking for potential support in the future? There are even hookers plying their trade on the sites. That was interesting news to me. How innovative of them. You think we get spam here? Think again, spammers zap around all over the World Wide Web.

One guy couldn't stop telling me what he owns, including 27 sports cars!! Wow, I wonder if he thought that would impress me and cause me to hyperventilate and beg for a meeting. How many cars can you drive at one time I ask you? Sex is one of their favorite topics. They can’t stop talking about it and if you are not charmed by it they feel intensely offended. Obviously it is the only thing their little minds can contain for that moment.

If you are looking for intelligent conversation with someone who is educated, think again. I have chatted to a very few, can’t even count them on one hand, interesting and intelligent men. Another thing that keeps their concentration singularly is private photographs of you. I am sure you can use your own imagination on that one.  Some of them really frightened me with their blatant sexual overtones.

Do men really think about one thing only? There has to be some who are not ruled by only that and have other ideas about finding someone to maybe have a relationship with. It was a very intrusive and invasive experience most of the time and I don’t think I will be doing the dating scene on the internet just yet. But it was great fun to know I am collecting fodder for this blog and not one of the vulnerable females out there who is just looking for someone real.

You will survive the loss of your child.

I receive so many emails of parents who want to know if they are going to survive the death of their precious children. Right at this moment you feel as if the unbearable and excruciating pain is never going away. You are deeply convinced that you are going to die of a broken heart. One thing that nobody knows is that the pain is not only a mental one but physical agony. At this moment you feel that the pain is going to drive you insane. Many parents, as I did, get anxiety attacks because the whole situation is just too much to comprehend. You just can’t wrap your head around the awful truth that you are never going to see you child again. Our children should one day bury us, not the other way around. It is not the natural order of things. I was on a suicide mission after my son Emile died by suicide. I could not accept the hateful fact that he was gone. There was no way I could go on without him. I wanted so desperately to join him.

Today I am going to tell you that you are going to survive. You are facing a hard and difficult path of mourning that at times will knock you off your feet. There will be days that you feel you are making progress and then Bam it will hit you all over again. These days will hit you so hard that you will literally feel weak. Nothing in your life will make any sense and not even the fact that you have other children and people who love you will mean anything to you. Your mind just cannot reach further than the hell you are in.

The only way to get through this to a place where you can live again is to talk to someone about the turmoil and utter hell you experience. Take one day at a time, and sometimes just one moment at a time. Hold on tight because I promise you it will pass. With time the dreadful times will become fewer and further between. I know you don’t believe me and you think I am telling an untruth. But I promise you it will happen. You are not going to go to sleep with the thought of your child every night and wake up with that thought forever. One day you will go through one whole day without thinking about him or her. And that day will be such a shock to you. You will feel guilty that you had no thought about your child. That is only natural. Everything about grief is normal. You are finding yourself in an abnormal situation. Nothing about it can be compared to anything else you have ever experienced. There is no point of reference for this tragedy.

The first few years is going to be the worst you can imagine. I am not going to lie to you and say it will be over soon. However, eventually it will get to a point that you can live with it and accept the fact. Your precious child is always with you and I don’t care what anyone says, that is something I know deep in my heart. And don’t let anyone tell you that you have to feel better or they can’t come to rest. That is utter nonsense. They are in the spiritual realm now and their destiny will not be influenced by your grief. Grief has no timeline and you take all the time in the world to heal.

We can’t do this on our own. For a time I was under the impression that I could get through this without any outside help. But one day I realized if I wasn't going to get professional help I would go completely crazy. The pain was like a cancer eating away at me from the inside. I started seeing a psychologist who used cognitive behavioral therapy to treat his patients. That saved my life, along with regular meditation. The unbearable pain of losing a child doesn't just go away, you have to work at it and feel the need to heal. I know that at this moment you don’t want to heal, the thought of that is akin to being a traitor to his or her memory.

How could you want to live a normal happy life while your child is in the ground or a box of ashes? Well I am telling you that day will come. One day you will be happy again. You will never forget or stop loving you precious child, but you will be able to look back at this anguish and be surprised at how far you have come. That is a promise my dear friend in grief. Your heart will heal and one thing that helped me to this point is that I know, one day when my time is done here, Emile will be at the gates to welcome me home. But for the time I am here I will make him proud of me.

Please know that I am here if you need someone to talk to, and I am not just saying it because I know exactly what you are going through at this time. You are not alone on this journey of grief, I am walking every step of the way with you.

Is cannabis really as evil as it's made out to be?

Legal drugs such as nicotine and alcohol are widely accepted by the establishment as a mild drug but cannabis or also called marijuana, pot, weed, grass, ganja etc is seen as an evil drug that destroys lives. But why does the establishment feel so threatened by the use of cannabis as a recreational drug?

 According to Dr Ernest Wilder-Smith author of “The causes and cure of the drug epidemic”, one often fears what we do not understand. The alcohol problem it the worst drug epidemic civilisation faces and still there is an extraordinary fear of marijuana. The fact is of course the establishment has legalised its own particular drugs alcohol and tobacco, while forbidding the milder social drug cannabis. Alcohol is often given out free as a reward for a job well done, but when someone dares to light up a joint, they are immediately the outcasts.

People don’t get physically dependant or addicted to marijuana as is the case with alcohol, tobacco and other drugs.  It is agreed that alcohol causes not only serious medical problems and personality changes, cirrhotic livers, but also traffic accidents, violence and poverty, but the authorities won’t put it on the prescribed list because it will be against the will of the people.  I once interviewed a travelling judge who told me in the 35 years he was a judge he never heard cases in court such as murder, rape, child and wife abuse as a result of using cannabis, but mostly because of alcoholism.

Cannabis are used as medication for cancer patient to relieve the side effects of cancer treatment as well as for chronic pain, epilepsy, glaucoma, multiple sclerosis, depression, asthma, rheumatic diseases, and Chron’s disease to name a few. I used marijuana after my son died to help with the depression and anxiety attacks I suffered. I was too terrified to take any of the psychiatric medicines available because it intensified the anxiety and depression I had during the acute stages of my grief. I still use this as a recreational drug on a regular basis. Not every day but more like once a week or even only once in two weeks. There are specified doctors who are allowed to prescribe marijuana as medication to people suffering from the aforementioned illnesses. I am by no means advocating the use of pot but there are many benefits of using this instead of other mild altering medications and or alcohol.

"Nearly all medicines have toxic, potentially lethal effects. But marijuana is not such a substance. There is no record in the extensive medical literature describing a proven, documented cannabis-induced fatality...Simply stated, researchers have been unable to give animals enough marijuana to induce death...In practical terms, marijuana cannot induce a lethal response as a result of drug-related toxicity...In strict medical terms marijuana is far safer than many foods we commonly consume...Marijuana, in its natural form, is one of the safest therapeutically active substances known to man." - DEA Administrative Law Judge, FL Young, United States of America 1988

Alcoholism is a social illness.

Alcoholism is just as bad as drug addiction if not worse. Both will destroy your life but is two different kinds of addictions. Whereas street drugs are something illegal and only obtained by cover of anonymity alcohol on the other hand is a legal and most acceptable drug. It is a social disease in my opinion.

When you use alcohol you don’t need to hide it away and it is available at all liquor stores especially for that reason. You can buy as much as you want and you won’t be arrested for it. There is no law against having a whole room full of any kind of booze you can think of and that reason alone makes it so much different from drugs.

It is socially acceptable to have a few drinks and in a public venue. There are many places you can go to drink yourself into a coma and only if you cause problems will you be asked to leave. Now we are clear on the difference let’s get to the real problem of alcoholism. Some people start drinking to dull pain they have experienced in life. If it didn’t make me ill I am sure I could easily have become a serious drinker after Emile died.

A very interesting thing about it that not many people know is that it is also a genetic problem, if it isn’t in your genes and you don’t have an addictive personality you won’t easily become one. But the problem is you won’t know it until it is too late. Most people don’t plan on becoming an alcoholic just like others don’t plan on becoming drug addicts. It just happens and by the time you realise it you are stuck in the claws of the illness.

Only when you can admit that you have a problem can you seek help. Not because your wife threatens to leave you or you can lose your job, because then you will never stop. My brother and his wife are alcoholics and a few years ago he almost beat her to death in a drunken rage.  In order to let him get bail I arranged for him to go to rehabilitation. Only the threat of prison made him go to a rehabilitation centre. He didn’t stop drinking but merely stopped beating her up. They have four children of which three of them have left home at very young ages to get out of the situation of living with drunken parents.

Most alcoholics who haven’t decided to change live in complete denial that they have a problem and are always ready with excuses why they are drinking. There is a great organisation called Alcoholics Anonymous who is there for the support and help of people who wants to stop drinking. It is a fellowship of men and women who share their experience strength and hope with each other so that they may solve their common problem and help others to recover from alcoholism.

There is no easy way out of this and it takes hard work to recover. Alcoholism doesn’t damage you alone who is in the clutches of it. It has an impact in everyone around you, your family, friends, workplace and innocent people who comes into contact with you. Take drunken driving for instance. Many people die on our roads every day because of it, and innocent people.

You will see I call it an illness, because it is an illness in their bodies and their mind. They find reasons for drinking and hide the fact from everyone, become sneaky and if they don’t stop drinking it almost always gets worse.  One fact that many people don’t realise is that is can strike anyone from any walk of life and any age. Most of them have underlying problems that started the drinking in the first place. Alcoholics Anonymous helps them to work through these problems, to identify it and come to terms with it. It can never be “cured” but you can become a recovered alcoholic. Many fight the battle of the need for a drink constantly. It is always at the back of their minds. That is why it is an illness not badness.

If you think you have a problem and you want to change your life contact any AA in your area and they will help you to become sober and live a fulfilling life again. It need not be the end of your life.

Blessed Be and Namaste!!

A mother's pain when losing a child.

A mother’s pain when you lose a child is not something that can be reasoned away, it can’t be explained in words for people to really understand the girth of it. When you lose a child it feels as if you have been abducted and left on another planet where people don’t understand your language and you don’t understand theirs. If anyone has the time they can read up about it. To lose a child to suicide is likened to the suffering of holocaust survivors.  Can you imagine trying to placate those people with all kinds of word of wisdom or advice?

I think not, and that is exactly the way for parent survivors of suicide. The horrific pain you live with every day of your life is the worst thing that anyone can try to survive. If you have never lost a child there are no way you can ever understand what we go through on a daily basis. When you parents die you are an orphan, when a husband dies you are a widow. Why do you think there is no word to call a mother who lost a child? Because to lose a child to death it is not in the natural order of things.

You carry that child for nine months, you give birth to him and nurture him all his life. You take care of him when he is hurt and you kiss the pain away. You pick him on your lap when he is small and you comfort him and make him feel safe and loved. Have you ever seen a mother not help her child when he is in pain? It is an inborn instinct to protect our children and when you find yourself in the situation where you child is dead you feel absolute helplessness. You feel incapacitated and useless as a mother. It is so easy to tell me to think about the wonderful and happy memories I had with Emile, but do you know? That hurts as well, it rips my heart out that there will be no more happiness for me to be had in this life with him.

Your heart never heals and only a scab forms over the wound that can be ripped off by any little memory of Emile. I try to live with this as best I can and be there for other mothers who find them self in this same situation. Because only a mother who has lost a child can really and truly understand what another is feeling. This is not something that can be fixed, nothing can ever fix my heart. I miss him every day of my life. I wake up in the morning with him on my mind and I go to sleep with him on my mind. It is not just that my child died but a whole future I was going to have with him is now a big black void gaping in front of me. There is a bond between a mother and a child that can never be broken, it is so easy for people to say to me that I must think about the wonderful place he is in now. I don’t want him there in that place, I want him here with me.

However, I can’t and I try as hard as I can to live with this. I will always love my son and nothing can ever take that away, so nothing can ever make me feel better about it. I wish someone will understand what I am trying to say here. Nothing you can say will ever make it better for me, nothing at all. Not all the wise words or good advice in the world will ever take my pain and longing for my son away. I don’t like to feel this way, if I had any say in the matter or if there was any way to do it, I would not cry about him and I would be happy and have a great life without him. It is impossible because I have tried for almost five years now and it doesn’t work that way, unfortunately.

My son Emile died from suicide by hanging himself in a weeping willow tree in a park near my home on 5 February 2006, seven weeks before his 21^st birthday.