Empowered to publish

Meet three local women who’ve felt driven to write

FINDING LIGHT AFTER LOSS

By Linda Goldspink-Lord

My new book, Crawling Through the Darkness, has been nearly 10 years in the making. Although I started writing down the words five years ago, it was 2012 when my beautiful daughter, Molly, died suddenly in an accident, and my world was plunged into darkness.

If you’d told me then that one day I’d be publishing a book about my story – sharing my most secret thoughts and feelings with the world – I would have said it was unimaginable.

But here I am.

After a long journey from darkness to light, I’m retracing my steps in the hope it will inspire and help others who are also facing major losses and grief in their lives. Because this is a book more about life than death, more about hope than suffering.

For me, the lessons I learned on each step of the journey were so powerful and transformational, that every cell of my being told me I needed to share them.

With Molly’s guidance, my journey to recovery was one that didn’t involve self-medication or marriage break-up or complete withdrawal from life. But it did mean allowing myself and my family to feel every aspect of the deep grief associated with great loss.

As clichéd as it may sound, if this book can create positive change in one person, then it has been worth it. If by reading this book someone finds hope, then it has been worth it. If they allow themselves those heart-wrenching moments, to feel the pain and also the joy, associated with grief, then it has been worth it.

And if they understand that the people we love never really leave us, then it is the most incredible gift from Molly to the world.

Visit www.lindagoldspinklord.com

WHY I WROTE A MEMOIR

By Terri Campbell (Ayliffe)

My life has been interesting and eventful. I raised myself and my siblings in the company of addicted parents. My father was an inebriated Peter Pan, who created chaos and comedy in our lives. My mother was an indifferent and intoxicated beauty queen. I guess the biggest challenge of my childhood was survival. The biggest challenge in my adult years is understanding normality.

As a young kid, I manoeuvred my way through the havoc to find resilience. Sydney in the 1960s and 70s was very different. The country felt as though it was an awkward teenager. We kids took risks and relied on ourselves to get out of fixes and we developed our problem-solving skills early and we did so with little input from our parents.

I wrote the memoir for a few reasons. I wanted to understand the people I was born to. My years of psychology studies have been about the same pursuit. I accept them now, but I still don’t understand them. Second, in my short 60 years, life has changed so extraordinarily. I guess the passing of time is more pronounced with a longer view.

And finally and most importantly, addiction in families and the effect on children is a conversation we need to have. We barely discussed alcohol addiction in our culture and because we don’t acknowledge it, children are forced to survive rather than thrive. They are altered and their potential lost to the choice of others.

Buy the memoir at www.terriacampbell.com or Collins Booksellers Thirroul. Save the date for a book launch at Ryans Hotel on 27 April.

THE ‘MAGICK’ OF MENARCHE

By Kari Hill

Waking the Witches: Ruby’s First Blood is my first comic and explores girls’ rites of passage: Menarche!

As a mother, writer, love for nature, the mystics and connections, I felt such a calling to write about menarche; a girl’s first blood, such a powerful ‘Rite of Passage’. I really wanted to change the ‘story’ our society has around our blood mysteries. I feel Waking the Witches will empower us to remember the magick* in our blood.

Book one in Waking the Witches comic series begins with Ruby, a regular 11-year-old until she learns the power of her blood magick!

It is a magickal adventure story, where you journey with Ruby as she meets her spirit animal, Zasha, and wise woman, Hekate, and learns the truth about her Menarche and her mission to wake up the witches.

In 2020 I graduated from The School of Shamanic Womancraft, Four Season’s Journey. This journey further ignited my feelings around women’s mysteries, our cyclic energies, innate connection with nature and its healing properties.

As a former corporate trainer with a Master of Journalism, I wanted to create an adventure story that would captivate both girls and boys and provide a unique approach to sharing stories and teachings about rites of passage.

I’m so happy to have discarded the corporate heels and am diving into my truth and feel blessed to be writing the Waking the Witches series.

The team for Waking the Witches comic series are: Jane Hardwicke Collings (founder of the School of Shamanic Womancraft) and Freya Rose (UK graduate and illustrator).

* Magick: archaic spelling of magic. Magick means actual magic within fiction or real life, as opposed to illusion or “stage magic”.

Find the book at Collins Booksellers Thirroul; Taylors Healthy Grocers or order online at janehardwickecollings.com