The Image that Changed Everything
10the July 2025
I’ve been asked a few times: What got you into photography?
Was there a moment it really began? A turning point?
Was there a moment it really began? A turning point?
The answer is the image below.
I took it on April 22, 2021, at 5:52 AM. It was a Thursday morning, a lovely spring morning. This was my secong morning in a row standing on the edge of Glencoyne Bay, looking out across Ullswater, waiting for the sun to rise as the previous days never appeared.
And in that moment, I knew I’d found something that mattered.
But this post isn’t about chasing likes or attention. This is just my story—so far. A bit of where I’ve been, and how I got here.
Backtrack a few years.
In 2018, I lost my dad.
In 2019, I lost my mum.
In 2019, I lost my mum.
It’s strange how quickly life shifts when the people you’ve been caring for are no longer here. From 1994 onwards, my world revolved around raising our three kids. Then, as they got older, I stepped into the role of carer again—this time for my parents.
When my mum moved into a care home, I visited her two or three times a week. She had dementia and Parkinson’s, which meant those visits were often hard. They were important, but not easy. Still, I kept showing up, because that’s what you do for the people you love.
Then one day, there was no one left to visit. No one left to look after.
Except my husband 😊.
And there I was, standing in this big, strange space called time. For the first time in decades, I had to ask myself:
What now?
What now?
That’s when I remembered photography—an old love I’d put aside when the kids came along. I dusted off my camera. At first it was something to fill the space. But very quickly, it became something else entirely.
The Lake District has always had a pull on me. There’s something about it—the light, the water, the stillness between the hills. It's not just beautiful, it's grounding.
I went out more often, camera in hand. The days I used to spend visiting Mum became the days I went out walking, waiting for the light, watching the landscape shift. Not to escape, but to find peace. To think. To heal.
Photography gave me that space. Nature gave me that quiet.
There’s something deeply therapeutic about standing alone with your camera, listening to birdsong, hearing nothing but the ripple of water at your feet