Mortal And Strong - Voice No. 61 - Josie

Introducing our latest Voice - the lovely Josie who shares a very touching, honest and deep insight into a living a life rife with hospital appointments and the exhaustion of having multiple chronic illnesses, many of which are rare. Josie shares a unique insight into how isolating a life with rarer conditions can be; less support from the charity sector, less community support available and even within the hospitals less understanding and even more barriers through the inequalities in health as a result.

Josie is a research botanist and has spent most of her life living with severe and rare subtypes of autoimmune conditions, before going on to also receiving a diagnosis of Grade 3 aggressive neuroendocrine cancer, with her primary in the oesophagus and secondaries in the liver. After having to learn to eat again and adapt her diet, the cancer is currently stable despite being given only 3 weeks to live (3 years ago).

Another insightful episode where we discuss the impact and stigma of having a rare condition, plus the frustrations of an invisible disability. Josie shares her immense gratitude for the charities who support rarer conditions and her lovely philosophy on life and appreciating the little things. One of Josie's passions is her orchard in which she plants a tree for special moments and people through her journey of life and we were honoured that after our interview Josie planted a tree for the charity. It was this beautiful way of commemorating life with life that as a charity we inspired to plant one tree for every Voice interviewed with a reforestation programme -so thank you Josie for being a voice and also inspiring this legacy.

Scars of Gold is a health awareness campaign sharing the voices of 100 women facing their mortality at a young age with life changing or incurable health conditions, led by Dr Liz Murray and photographer Sammy Weston. Produced by the charity @mortalandstrong (No. 1209448)

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