Post Covid Melbourne was a strange time. Connections were often broken by the lockdowns, and it could be hard to re-establish friendships and contacts when the lockdowns ended. During the second (and longest) lockdown I moved into a new apartment in inner-city Melbourne.

I was introduced to Social Health Australia, in November 2023. As a totally blind person living on my own, I was looking for people I could connect with, both on the phone and in person.

In 2022, my elderly father, Julius Edmundson, who had already been living with Parkinson’s disease, suffered a stroke. It left him unable to walk and barely able to speak.