Today marks the end of fifteen years of incredible work by Time to Chance, an anti-stigma charity based within England & Wales co-run by Mind & Rethink Mental Illness.

Like so many, I have so many mixed emotions today. And like so many, I have so many reasons to be thankful for Time to Change and the incredible team who worked there.

In early 2018, I was in a pretty rocky place. I was in what on the surface of it should have been my dream life. I was in my dream job, lived in a lovely house with my now fiancé and our beautiful dogs and should have felt on top of the world. But somehow, something wasn’t right.

Then, I stumbled across an email from Time to Change informing me they were looking for Young Champions. At the time, I’d never met anyone else with BPD was wasn’t a patient of mine and whilst I don’t remember much about the decision to apply I remember thinking it might be a good opportunity to meet some like-minded people who have had similar experiences to me.

Fast forward a few months and I’m on a train to Manchester about to undergo the most intense and emotional weekend of training. I met so many incredible people, staff and feel YC’s alike, and for the first time in years I felt like I belonged somewhere. A chronic sense of emptiness and never quite feeling like I fit in has always been a huge part of my life and my BPD yet I remember coming away feeling overwhelmed with feelings I really hadn’t experienced much before; belonging and acceptance.

From here, everything changed.

Initially, I lived a double life. Fear and stigma stopped me from telling anyone about the campaigning work I was doing on the side and every single day I feared someone would stumble across my blog or associated social media accounts. I remember going to Parliament and hearing my story being shared and not even telling anyone I worked with that that was where I had been on my return! I kept all my accounts anonymous and even blocked colleagues, friends and acquaintances from being able to see it.

But slowly I realised that I didn’t need to do this. I recognised that a life living in fear of being found out wasn’t my ‘life worth living’. It hit me that a lot of the emptiness and dissatisfaction I felt was due to my work. The dream job I had spent years working towards in reality wasn’t my dream after all.

The people who truly inspired me, and made me passionate about the world were the Time to Change staff members themselves. There are far too many to name who made a life changing difference on me but every day I got to spend with them, every phone call or email, made me want to ditch my double life and be able to find somewhere I could find the same level of acceptance and kindness Time to Change gave me.

When I say Time to Change literally turned my world upside down I mean it. It changed everything. I quit my dream job. I walked away from a life I had spent years building and hit the reset button. I left the city and headed back to the simple life in my hometown.

Today, I now work for one of the founding charities who created Time to Change (although this still feels like a huge pinch-me achievement). I’ve been fortunate enough to call the people who inspired me (and continue to inspire me) colleagues for nearly 2 years. Even more importantly, I get to turn up to work every single day and feel the same acceptance, passion and belonging I felt all those years ago back in Manchester. A little of two years ago I wouldn’t have even dared tell my line manager I was stressed, but in my current job, I blurted out at interview that I live with BPD because the same compassion and acceptance just radiates like sunshine out of the strange little floor in a fairly ordinary skyscraper in London! I come to work and can tell not only my boss but my entire team when I feel stressed, when I’m not sleeping or when life is just feeling a little too much, even if I can’t quite explain why.

Regardless of the opportunities and memories Time to Change has given me, from the lifelong friends I’ve made, the cringey cornering of Nicola Roberts at the Mind Media Awards and racing for the last train home to being on ITV News talking about my experiences, it’s the sense of belonging and acceptance that truly changed my world for the better, and in many senses, saved me.

For that, I will be eternally grateful.

I am so heartbroken that your work has come to an end before it’s time and to every single member of staff who I had the fortune of meeting and those I didn’t. But I do owe a special thank you to Joss, Jodie, Jenny, Naomi, Jo, Simon, Seb, Ione, Rebecca, Louise, Chris, Hannah and everyone else who has been part of the TTC team since 2018. I hope whatever you do next you continue to use your voices to change peoples lives. Because you changed mine.

Goodbye and ,whilst thank you will never be enough, thank you Time to Change.