Guidance and Signposting for Life's Challenges
The anniversary is looming, a week today, and this has been playing on my mind more than I expected. It has been seven years since I was first sexually assaulted. The same year our Mark died. Sometimes people separate those events in their minds. I can’t. They live in the same year. The same body. […]
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Somewhere along the way, we created an impossible standard. The “perfect employee”. Always available.Always productive.Never sick.Never overwhelmed.Never late.Never struggling. And most people are quietly failing to live up to it – because it doesn’t exist. What Does the “Perfect Employee” Look Like? According to people we have been supporting, their workplace culture defines the perfect […]
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There’s something deeply wrong with a system where people have to prove their pain before they’re allowed support. Not explain it.Not share it.Prove it. With paperwork.With evidence.With repeated retelling of the worst moments of their lives. For many people, asking for help doesn’t bring relief.It brings another exhausting fight. The Paperwork of Survival If you’ve […]
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Fatigue isn’t just tiredness. It’s bone-deep exhaustion that sleep doesn’t fix. For people with conditions like ME/CFS, fibromyalgia, Long COVID, lupus, and even some mental health disorders, fatigue can be a full-body shutdown — often triggered by doing too much, too soon. This is where pacing comes in. It’s a self-management strategy that helps you […]
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Mental illness doesn’t always look how people expect. It doesn’t always come with tears, breakdowns, or visible crises. Sometimes it’s a quiet struggle — getting out of bed, masking anxiety, zoning out in conversations, or feeling like you’re carrying the weight of the world and no one notices. That’s the reality for many people living […]
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You can’t always see a disability. But that doesn’t mean it isn’t there. Hidden disabilities — also called invisible or non-visible disabilities — are conditions that affect a person’s day-to-day life but aren’t obvious to others. These include things like chronic fatigue, autism, bipolar disorder, PTSD, sensory processing issues, and many long-term physical and mental […]
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Next week, from 1–7 September, the Mark Hewitson Foundation is running our first ever *Hidden Disabilities Awareness Week.* It’s for everyone who’s ever been told:– “But you don’t look sick.”– “You seemed fine yesterday.”– “You’re just being dramatic.” Because disability isn’t always visible. Pain, trauma, fatigue, and neurodivergence don’t always come with a walking stick […]
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Living with chronic illness is exhausting. Not just the pain, the brain fog, the fatigue, the flare-ups… but the endless admin, the explaining, the guilt, the “you don’t look sick” comments. It’s a full-time job in survival — and most days, it pays in exhaustion. And some of the worst moments? They’re not even about […]
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Some disabilities you can see. Others you can’t. But just because it’s invisible doesn’t mean it’s not there. And if you live with a hidden disability — physical, mental, sensory, neurological, or autoimmune — then you already know how exhausting it can be. Not just living with the symptoms, but *proving* them to people who […]
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At the Mark Hewitson Foundation, we see it all the time — someone comes to us for support after a traumatic event or diagnosis, but the truth is, they’ve often been holding it together long before things fell apart. We know that mental and physical health don’t live in separate boxes. They are tangled, messy, […]
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