Category: Health and Wellbeing

Stories about staying well in body and mind, from local health services and support to the everyday things that help our community look after itself and each other.

Two trees, eight generations and a view that keeps calling you closer

There are two trees I think about a lot and they sit about five hundred metres apart.

The Witness Tree is a 200 year old plus Moreton Bay Fig

Down in the valley, on another working dairy farm, stands what I call the Witness tree. The tree has watched generations of stock, families and seasons pass beneath it and it keeps doing the same job it always has. On warm days the cows head straight for it, lining up in the shade as if there’s a roster. Farmers know where the herd will be before they even look.

The Witness tree has watched generations of cows come to the same conclusion. That spot. That shade. Case closed.

Up on the side of the mountain is our place. This farm has been worked since 1840 by two families across eight generations. Same land, different times, plenty of early mornings. The volcanic soil is rich but the rock shows itself quickly, which did not stop me fifty years ago from planting a lemon scented gum in the front garden. It took to the challenge. Today it marks the house, scents the air on warm afternoons and gives you a fair idea of what the weather is about to do.

Lemon Scented Gum on the side of Saddleback Mountain

I take photos of the cows in the front paddock the way other people take photos of their kids. Different light, different moods, different characters every time. They never ask why, they never pose, they never complain

The distance between those two trees tells you almost everything you need to know about Jamberoo. In a short walk the land drops from rocky hillside to deep valley soil. The shape changes. The work does not. Cows are milked, grass is managed, and people read the land closely because that is how farming here has always worked.

As I drive down to the road, I can see the Witness tree holding the valley together, paddocks stepping down one by one. Up on the side of the mountain, the sea sits at the end of my view, never the same twice. Some days it looks calm, other days restless, but it always feels like an invitation, come closer, see what I’m doing today. It is all close, layered, and slightly cheeky in how much variety Jamberoo fits into such a small space.\

This is the paddock I see from my front verandah. Well managed farms don’t just produce food, they shape the landscape we all enjoy driving past, walking through, and quietly admiring. The view is not an accident.

Eight generations on one farm teaches you this. The land has its own ideas. Trees know their jobs. Cows organise themselves beautifully. And Jamberoo keeps reminding you that practicality, persistence and a bit of humour travel very well together.

#JamberooValley #DairyFarming #WorkingFarms #LandscapeAndPlace #RuralAustralia #GenerationsOnTheLand #SouthCoastNSW #FarmingLife #SenseOfPlace #SaddlebackMountain

We get 2000mm of rain and still hold our breath every time it falls

What makes this time of year properly exhilarating, and exhausting, is that we are heading into a season where everything can flip overnight. We can go from 36 degrees one day to 20 the next, from cows seeking shade and water to cows standing in pouring rain wondering what just happened.

That swing matters.

In summer, rain is not about volume, it is about relief. Relief for pasture that is holding on. Relief for soils that dry fast on the hill. Relief for animals coping with heat stress one day and humidity the next. A cool change with rain can buy time. A hot northerly without follow up can undo weeks of careful management.

This is why summer rain is watched with such intensity. Not because we expect miracles, but because timing is everything. A storm after a 36 degree day can reset a system. A storm followed by another hot blast can vanish almost before it has soaked in.

So yes, we get excited when it rains, even averaging 2,000 mm on paper. Because summer reminds you very quickly that farming here is not about averages, it is about adaptability. One eye on the sky, one eye on the forecast, and a deep appreciation for every break in the heat that gives grass, cows, and people a chance to breathe.

#JamberooValley #DairyFarming #RainfallReality #AustralianAgriculture #SupportLocalFarmers #ClimateVariability #HighRainfallFarming #FarmingLife

The hero of today’s story is the photograph

Moos in the Mist 

The past couple of weeks have been full on, and my head has been running its own agenda. “The book” has taken over completely. It does not seem to matter if it is two in the morning or two in the afternoon. The scenes arrive when they feel like it, and once they land, I have no choice but to deal with them.

And of course, in a book written by me you can expect strong female leads. That was always the plan. No Tess of the d’urbervilles anywhere to be seen. What I did not plan for was the problem I have now created for myself. I think I have fallen a little in love with the male lead. I am turning him into the perfect man and now I cannot stop thinking about him. If that is not a sign that I need to get out of my own head occasionally, I do not know what is.

And speaking of the male lead, my book might be fictional but it is based on true facts. On Friday I discovered that his first name was far too close to the real man’s name. Too close. A name I had used four hundred times. Thank goodness for Control F. I hit that button, held my breath, and watched the entire manuscript light up like a Christmas tree. Then came the not so romantic part. Control F Replace. Fictional man reborn.

It is much safer when these scenes arrive at two in the morning. Nobody sees me wandering around the house writing and rewriting them, half sentences in the dark. When they arrive in daylight, it becomes a public event.

A few weeks ago I went to Minnamurra for coffee with friends. I got out of the car thinking about a scene and stopped right there in the middle of the road to record it on my phone. Thank God it was Minnamurra and not Terralong Street. I can only imagine the commentary if I tried that in peak hour.

And then there are the drives home. A scene arrives, I need to catch it, and I start looking for somewhere to pull over. If you know the roads around here, you know how unrealistic that is. You cannot pull over. Not safely anyway. Ask the bicycle riders. They could give an entire TED Talk on the subject.

So yesterday morning, when I stood on my veranda, I felt grateful for my little piece of paradise. It gave me a short reset before diving back into all the things demanding attention, including one fictional man who is taking up far too much space in my head.

And that brings me to the hero of today’s story  –  the photograph. I have taken many photos from my front veranda, yet this one sparked something. A couple of people have already asked if they can paint it. I am not entirely sure why this particular image resonated more than the others, but it did.

What do you think, readers?

I am a bit partial to this one

#writinglife #novelinprogress #writersbrain #creativeprocess #rurallife #aussiestorytelling #amwritingfiction #strongfemaleleads #scenesfromtheveranda #lifeonafarm #writinghumour #behindthebook

You Don’t Have to Be Angry to Be Brave

This blog is a follow up to an earlier blog “When Advocacy Turns Dangerous: The Moment You Can’t Stay Silent”

Are you like me, someone who wants to speak up when you see or hear something unjust, but sometimes hesitates because you don’t want to make things worse, or make someone feel small?

That hesitation comes from care. Most of us don’t want to hurt people; we want to make things better. But we were never taught how. We were taught to keep the peace, not to have hard conversations with grace.

I recently watched Sarah Crawford-Bohl’s TED Talk How to Speak Up — Even When You Don’t Want To.

 She shows that courage and kindness can live in the same sentence. You can hold your ground without pushing someone else off theirs.

The Four Phrases That Can Change Any Difficult Conversation

It doesn’t take a big speech. Sometimes it’s the smallest phrases that shift the whole tone of a conversation:

  • Instead of “With respect…”, try “I see it differently.”

  • Instead of “That’s wrong.”, try “Can we look at that another way?”

  • Instead of “You can’t say that.”, try “That might land differently for some people.”

  • Instead of silence, try “I’m not sure that sits right with me.”

These simple swaps are powerful. They keep people in the conversation rather than shutting it down.

Why Teaching Kids How to Speak Up Might Be the Most Important Lesson of All

Even after years of negotiation training, I still catch myself slipping into an overly forceful tone when something matters to me. It’s hard to unlearn. But that’s exactly why this work matters, because if we can teach young people how to use their voices with strength and empathy, maybe they won’t have to spend years unlearning the habits we did.

It’s the same truth behind that short film Justice,  the moment when a teacher unfairly dismisses a student and everyone stays silent

and the playful How to Start a Movement clip, where the brave first follower turns one person’s awkward dance into a movement.

In both, the real change begins when someone chooses courage over comfort.

Speaking up doesn’t have to make anyone feel small. Done with care, it can make everyone in the room a little braver.

#SpeakUpKindly #EverydayActivism #CivicCourage #RespectfulCommunication #LeadershipStartsHere #EmpathyInAction #TeachThemYoung #ChangeTheConversation #FirstFollower #KindnessIsStrength

When Algebra Met Instagram: My Complicated Relationship With Algorithms


Back in school, “algorithm” was the word that stood between me and my dream of Arts/Law. Now it’s the invisible force deciding what appears in my social-media feed. Turns out the maths I once feared has followed me — with a sense of humour.

If you’d told me back in high school maths that one day I’d be voluntarily talking about algorithms, I’d have laughed (or possibly cried).

Back then, “algorithm” meant a set of steps you had to memorise, the difference between passing and finding a whole new life plan. Mathematics was never my forte, and the thought of tripping over a missing x was enough to keep me up at night. It was the subject that would decide whether I made it into Arts/Law or had to find something else to do.

And in the end, I’m rather grateful to say mathematics did, in fact, let me down.

Because that “something else” turned out to be storytelling,  and there’s far more humanity in that than in any quadratic equation. Still, I can’t help noticing that those same mysterious “sets of steps” I once dreaded have followed me all the way into adulthood, disguised in a new form: social-media algorithms.

These modern descendants of my old nemesis no longer live in textbooks. They live in my phone, deciding whether I see my besties’ social life, someone else’s new litter of border collies, a wombat rescue video, or an ad for something I swear I only thought about but never searched.

They’ve taken the old maths problem – find x – and replaced it with find Lynne.

Somewhere inside that invisible equation it probably reads:

Engagement = (Time × Emotion × Ads Seen) ÷ Willpower

And it’s definitely winning.

But I’ve decided not to resent the algorithm. It’s not evil, it’s obedient.
It’s simply doing what it was built to do: predict what keeps me scrolling.

The trick is to feed it wisely.
If I linger on outrage, it serves me outrage.
If I linger on kindness, it serves me more of that.

So perhaps I’ve finally found my kind of maths after all.
A simple human equation that even I can live by:

Joy = (Time spent offline × Actual friends) + (Laughter ÷ Comparisons)

It may not get me into Arts/Law, but it’s a pretty good formula for life.

#Algorithms #SocialMedia #MathsHumour #DigitalLife #Storytelling #AttentionEconomy #JoyEquation

Walking Through History: How Our Gait Tells the Story of Where We’ve Come From

I have always noticed the way people walk. Maybe it is because I was born with club feet. My parents were relieved when, after twelve months in plaster, the specialists announced my legs were fixed and I could walk straight.

Growing up on a farm, you were taught to look closely at legs. When Dad was buying horses or cattle, he studied the way they stood and moved. Sound legs meant sound stock. He would point out faults as people walked by. “Lady-toed,” ( the medical term is “Out-toeing) he would say, or “bow-legged.” It was never said unkindly. It was a way of teaching me what to look for, and I think a quiet reminder of how lucky we were that medicine could fix mine.

Now, travelling in Europe, I have noticed something curious. So many people seem to be lady-toed or bow-legged, far more than I ever see in Australia. It made me wonder why.

The Science Behind the Way We Walk

How we walk, our gait, is shaped by a mix of biology, lifestyle, and environment. Orthopaedic specialists and physiologists agree that posture and leg alignment are not random. They reflect the forces our bones and muscles have adapted to since childhood.

Genetics and early development
Our bone structure is partly inherited. Some families naturally have a degree of varus (bow-legged) or valgus (knock-kneed) alignment. In babies and toddlers, these angles are normal stages of growth. Legs usually straighten by around age seven. If nutrition or muscle development is interrupted, those angles can persist into adulthood.

Vitamin D and bone health
Historically, bow-legs were common in northern Europe because of rickets, a condition caused by lack of sunlight and therefore vitamin D. Without enough vitamin D, bones do not harden properly and bend under the body’s weight. Australia’s abundant sunshine almost eliminated rickets early in the 20th century, whereas in cloudier climates it lingered longer, possibly contributing to more curved leg alignment in older generations.

Footwear and walking surfaces
Podiatrists point out that shoes influence how we use our feet. In cities with cobblestones or uneven streets, people walk differently: shorter steps, feet turned slightly outward for balance, what farmers once called being lady-toed, or what doctors now call out-toeing. In Australia, soft surfaces like grass and sand encourage a longer, straighter stride and stronger foot muscles.

Exercise and body mechanics
Regular movement, especially barefoot play and outdoor activity in childhood, strengthens the small stabilising muscles in the feet and lower legs. Where children spend more time indoors, sitting, or wearing rigid shoes, those muscles can remain weaker, subtly changing gait and posture over time.

Cultural posture habits
Anthropologists note that regional postures, such as how people sit, rest, or carry weight, also shape leg alignment. Years of cycling, hill walking, or sitting cross-legged can influence muscle balance around the knees and hips.

The lady-toed, pigeon-toed  or bow-legged look is not simply genetic. It is a visible record of how our bones, muscles, shoes, sunlight, and habits have worked together since childhood. The way we walk, quite literally, tells the story of where we have come from.

And for me, each step is a quiet reminder of how fortunate I am to have been straightened out, to walk without pain, and to keep walking all these years.

#WalkingThroughHistory #GaitScience #EveryStepTellsAStory #HumanMovement #ObservationAndMemory

Garry Disher’s Mischance Creek Review and Why Crime Writers Keep Getting Farmers Wrong

This review will be a work in progress. I’m a big fan of Garry Disher’s books, but I felt compelled to put my initial feelings down in writing. As someone from an eight-generation farming family, I find it hard to stomach when novels focus on only one element of agriculture. Mischance Creek opens with yet another bleak picture: lonely farmhouses, endless cups of tea, stale biscuits, talk of drought that never ends. The people Hirsch visits are tired, sad, and stuck.

I don’t dispute that life on the land can be tough. In Australia, a drought isn’t a once-in-a-lifetime event. It’s the average year. Every farmer I know assumes it’s coming. That means every year, wet, dry, or in between, we plan for it. Stocking rates, feed reserves, pasture management, water storage: you name it, it’s built into the system.

So when I read yet another story where farmers are painted as helpless, waiting until things are so dire someone has to come and shoot their stock, I wince. That’s not how we farm. It’s not how we’ve survived for generations. Yes, there are bad seasons. Yes, there’s heartbreak. But resilience isn’t just a buzzword, it’s a way of life. Farmers adapt, innovate, and prepare, because that’s the only way you last in this business.

What frustrates me is how rarely fiction captures this side of the story. The quiet pride in planning ahead. The foresight that keeps family farms alive. The fact that endurance in agriculture isn’t about waiting for disaster, it’s about being ready for it, year in and year out.

I have now finished the book and its clear while I’m super sensitive to the way agriculture is portrayed, I also realise that Garry Disher’s books often cast outback Australia, in a fairly depressing light. Yes, he gives you real insight into Hirsch, into what he feels, and even into his mother’s struggles in this book. But for me, it was hard to find someone in Mischance Creek who feels truly likeable and the book was more of the same.

#BookReview #MischanceCreek #AustralianCrimeFiction #LifeOnTheLand #ResilientFarmers #RealAgriculture

When $12 Million Becomes $2 Million, Trust Becomes Zero

This post is the part of a Follow the Money  series shining a light on Kiama Council’s ongoing failure to even interpret its own spreadsheets.

I am not an accountant. I am a community member, like the majority of our residents, reading the same public reports and trying to understand where our money goes. We should not need a crystal ball to interpret basic financial information. We deserve numbers that make sense.

But this isn’t just about numbers. It goes to the heart of governance. Councillors cannot make sound decisions without timely, accurate and complete information.

And it raises a bigger question: are governance bodies such as the Audit, Risk and Improvement Committee (ARIC), the Auditor-General, and the Office of Local Government (OLG) fully informed of these matters – particularly in the context of the Performance Improvement Order (PIO)?

🙋‍♀️If they are, why haven’t they intervened?

🤔If they aren’t, then Council’s failures go deeper than poor spreadsheets.

The Legal Fees Debacle

On 19 August 2025, Council tabled its agenda papers showing the following “quarterly update of current legal matters”:

  • June 2024 – $4.50m

  • September 2024 – $5.01m

  • December 2024 – $1.32m

  • March 2025 – $1.20m

Those four quarters alone add up to $12.04 million. That is the figure residents saw in Council’s own agenda papers.

Even when Council later admitted the reporting was wrong , claiming the total legal spend for 2024–25 was just $2.275 million and that earlier figures were “cumulative since 2020”,  the explanation did not stack up.

If the figures were cumulative, they would only ever go up. Instead, they go up and then down again, which looks exactly like quarterly spending, not a rolling total.

But that is not what the agenda papers said, and not what any reasonable community member would have understood.

🙋‍♂️Why wasn’t this identified earlier?

🙋‍♀️Why wasn’t it raised at the council meeting itself?

🤔Why wasn’t it fixed then and there?

We all look forward to these matters being clarified in the next agenda. But in the meantime, councillors, oversight bodies and the community are left making decisions based on faulty information. This is the very opposite of transparency and accountability.

Without corrected figures, councillors, oversight bodies and the community are left making decisions based on faulty information – the very opposite of transparency and accountability.

The Overcharging Fiasco

Lets not forget December 2024.

Council admitted that, between July 2022 and June 2023, around 20 development applications by developers were overcharged a total of $1.5 million under Section 7.11 because of a spreadsheet error.

  • Refunds totalling $625,000 were proposed.

  • Landowners were to be contacted, consents modified, or payments refunded.

  • The overcharges were only identified as part of a later review of Council’s processes.

This is not a minor slip. It is hundreds of thousands of dollars wrongly charged, only corrected after the fact.

The Pattern We Cannot Ignore

Whether it is legal fees or development contributions, the story is the same:

  • Shifting numbers.

  • Confusing explanations, offered only after the community starts asking questions.

  • Major financial consequences for residents and ratepayers.

Transparency is not about cleaning up after the fact. It is about consistent, honest communication in the first place.

Until Council learns how to read and report its own spreadsheets, the community will keep paying the price. And until oversight bodies such as ARIC, the Auditor-General and OLG demand accuracy and accountability, residents will be left wondering: who is really watching over Council, and when will they step in?

#KiamaCouncil #Accountability #Transparency #LegalCosts #PublicMoney #GoodGovernance #Audit #CommunityTrust #Oversight

Housing, Homelessness and the Courage to Lead. Dr Tonia Gray on the Kiama By-Election

Tonia Gray has built a career on connecting people to place. As an educator, advocate, and environmentalist, she has spent decades exploring how communities can thrive when social justice, environmental stewardship, and public policy work together.

Now, as the Greens candidate for the Kiama by-election, Tonia is bringing that same interconnected approach to housing and homelessness. She sees secure, affordable housing not as a stand-alone issue, but as part of a bigger picture that includes climate resilience, community wellbeing, and responsible land use.

Kiama’s current “hidden homelessness” approach means that residents in crisis are often relocated to Wollongong or Bomaderry, placing extra strain on those already experiencing hardship. For Tonia, this raises questions not just about service access, but about the values and priorities shaping local policy.

In this interview, we explore how the Greens would address the housing crisis in ways that integrate affordability, environmental protection, and human dignity and how Tonia believes those principles can be applied in Kiama.

Housing, Homelessness and the Courage to Lead: Dr Tonia Gray on the Kiama By-Election ——

When Dr Tonia Gray talks about housing and homelessness, it comes from lived experience as much as professional expertise. Sitting beside her mother Jeanette at Blue Haven aged care, she reminds us that how we treat our elderly is a true measure of society.

“We want safety, we want care, we want dignity. Isn’t that the least any society should provide?”

For Gray, the Greens candidate in the Kiama by-election, the challenge is not a lack of empty promises, but a failure of execution. Both major parties have let us down in the delivery phase.

“Politicians make all these wonderful promises… but they are not executed, or they’re done so poorly. The execution is what matters. Promises don’t change lives, action does.”

She argues for embedding affordable housing in existing suburbs, not pushing people to the margins. Safe, affordable homes keep people connected to their communities and make those communities safer and more inclusive. Her vision includes banning short-term rental accommodation (STRA) in new developments, so housing is prioritised for essential workers, exploring intergenerational and village-style models that draw on overseas examples, and embedding design principles such as passive solar, water tanks and walkable neighbourhoods into all subdivisions.

“It’s not what you say, it’s what you deliver. People need homes they can actually live in, not just more empty promises.”

Gray stresses that only around six percent of Australia’s 120,000 homeless people are rough sleepers. The majority are hidden, often couch surfing, in overcrowded dwellings or in temporary lodging. In Kiama, rough sleepers are quietly moved on under the radar, from the museum verandah, the showgrounds or camper vans near a church, making the issue less visible but no less real.

The film Frances, screened in Kiama earlier this year, laid bare this reality. It showed how easily a woman who had once lived securely could end up in her car, too proud to ask for help, terrified at night, and clinging to her dog as her last sense of safety. The panel after the screening reminded us that homelessness is often not the result of bad choices or bad people. It can be bad luck, or a sliding door moment in your life, combined with the absence of safety nets. Job loss, illness, divorce, or the death of a partner is sometimes enough to tip someone over the edge.

Older women are the fastest growing group at risk, particularly those leaving relationships they can no longer afford to stay in. Lyn Bailey, who shared her story on the panel, described going from a comfortable family home to the long grind of insecure housing after divorce at 58. She discovered banks would not lend to her because of her age and gender, and the waitlist for social housing was a decade long. Friends were shocked. They were oblivious to the fact that she had been in crisis. Her story mirrors many others, silent struggles hidden in plain sight.

Gray wants to see practical, community-based responses. She points to the Blue Mountains model where households take turns offering short-term refuge and suggests Kiama could do the same. But she warns that homelessness cannot be solved on yearly funding cycles. “To have a sustainable platform, services need five-year contracts that go beyond election cycles. Promises are easy for our vulnerable populations, but execution and delivery are everything.”

For Gray the issue comes down to political willpower. Developer contributions could be used to fund affordable housing, but councils rarely engage the public in how those funds are spent. Strategic sites like Bombo Quarry or Havilah Place could provide innovative housing solutions if multiple stakeholders were brought together instead of pushed apart.

“Real visionary leadership means making bold choices, even when they are unpopular. It means capping short-term rentals, setting quotas for affordable housing, and facing up to the uncomfortable truth that homelessness exists here in our postcode, not somewhere else. Stop promising and start delivering.”

She adds that this is not only about compassion but economics. Poorly executed housing policy costs ratepayers twice, once when it fails and again when the problem returns larger than before.

Every dollar spent on preventative housing and aged care saves multiple dollars later in health, policing and emergency services. Housing also underpins the local economy. When essential workers cannot afford to live locally, three things happen. Staff shortages make it harder for hospitals, aged-care, schools, and essential services to fill shifts, often leading to higher costs for overtime or casual staff.

Reduced reliability means longer commutes and slower response times in emergencies, whether it is a paramedic or a plumber. And a weaker local economy results when workers spend their wages in the towns where they live rather than in the communities where they work.

Liveability, active transport and walkability are also part of her vision. Walkable communities reduce household transport costs, ease congestion, and keep rates lower by cutting infrastructure strain. They lift local business activity and consistently boost property values.

“When we design villages where people can walk to shops, schools, parks and services, we do more than make life easier. We save households money, strengthen the economy and protect the environment at the same time.”

There are successful models already working. Link Wentworth runs monthly Community Support Hubs in the Blue Mountains, Hawkesbury, Penrith and Ryde. These “one-stop support shops” bring together free services to make it easier for people to know what is available and how to access it. The hubs have seen fantastic outcomes and helped countless people.

Whether talking about her mother’s care at Blue Haven, the stories told in Frances, or the hidden struggles of women after divorce, Gray circles back to the same principle: dignity. For her, it is the marker of the society we want to be.

The Kiama by-election is about more than who fills a seat. It is about whether we have leaders willing to listen, act and deliver, and whether we can find the courage to face what we would rather not see. The Greens have actively been championing for housing and homeless reform for decades.  For more information, visit here 

Dr Tonia Gray emphasises that The Greens have long championed housing and homelessness reform. She points to the party’s 50-point plan and policies as the foundation of their costed election platform and ongoing work in parliament and community.

Dr Tonia Gray (Left) also joins the SAHSSI30 White Sands Walk each year, a community walk along the beautiful Jervis Bay coastline that raises funds for domestic violence survivors in the Shoalhaven and local women staying in crisis accommodation.

It is a grassroots, community-driven event that has grown out of a desire to make positive change for women and children in the region. With hundreds of participants, the walk has already raised nearly $100,000 for SAHSSI Nowra Women’s Refuge, keeping the focus on the urgent issues of gender-based violence and homelessness in the local area.

The funds raised by SAHSSI30 have given families living on or below the poverty line access to activities and experiences they would not otherwise have had. Dr Gray warmly invites the community to support this important cause and donate to SAHSSI here.

#KiamaByElection #ToniaGray #HousingCrisis #HiddenHomelessness #AffordableHousing #EssentialWorkers #CommunityCare #BlueHaven #WalkableCommunities #LocalEconomy