On a Thursday morning, while getting ready for work, at the age of 33, I received a phone call from my dad that would change my life forever. My parents lived in Thailand, and my dad told me that my mum was in intensive care. He was a mess and needed me there. The following day, my brother and I boarded a flight to Thailand. Four days later, my mum died.
At the time, I didn’t know that the journey which followed would eventually lead me back to a dream I had abandoned more than a decade earlier.
To understand how I ended up studying for a Cyber Security degree with The Open University, you have to go back much further than that phone call.
My journey really began when I was 13 years old, when chronic back pain started to shape almost every aspect of my life. I had always dreamed of going to university to either study marine biology or palaeontology. My love of aquatic life and dinosaurs remains with me to this day. By the age of 18, when I started college, my back pain had progressed to the point where even the most basic tasks were difficult. Washing the dishes, standing at a bus stop, or carrying my textbooks felt like an insurmountable challenge. I tried to persevere through the pain, determined not to let it dictate my future. Eventually, however, I reached a point where I simply couldn’t continue. I had to leave college and abandon the university dreams I had held since childhood.
From the first time I went to the doctors about my back pain, I felt dismissed. A 13-year-old with severe back pain? It was often assumed I was exaggerating, being dramatic, or that it would simply go away with time. However, as the pain worsened, so did the number of medical appointments. Over the following years, I underwent countless treatments, medications, scans and pain management programmes in an attempt to find both answers and relief. Unsurprisingly, the constant pain and uncertainty began to take a toll on my mental health. Alongside the medical treatments, I also started attending therapy sessions to help me cope with the impact the condition was having on my life.
At 21, after years of living with chronic pain, I finally underwent spinal fusion surgery. I hoped it would allow me to move forward with my life. Instead, it marked the beginning of another five-year battle.
I woke up from the surgery with excruciating pain in my leg. This was a new pain, unlike anything I had experienced before, and I knew immediately that something wasn’t right. Unfortunately, my concerns were once again dismissed. For the next five years, I was repeatedly told that nothing was wrong, despite knowing that something had changed following the surgery. At the age of 26, the cause was finally discovered. The screws from my spinal fusion had been touching a nerve in my spinal column. I underwent a second operation to remove the screws and felt immediate relief when I woke up. For the first time in over a decade, I began to feel like a person rather than a disability. I could move more freely, stand for longer periods, and start rebuilding a life that had been on hold for years.
During all of this, I had moved between various jobs, trying to find work that could accommodate my disability. By the time I underwent my second surgery, I had been working for the NHS for five years. I had recently bought my first house and finally felt as though life was becoming more stable.
Then I was made redundant.
Around the same time, my best friend encouraged me to apply for a job in IT and work alongside them. I had always loved computers and enjoyed tinkering with them, but I never believed I was good enough to build a career around that interest. Despite my doubts, I decided to apply. To my shock and delight, I got the job.
With the worst of my back pain finally behind me and my mental health in a much more stable place, I began to move forward. For the first time in many years, the future felt full of possibility rather than limitation. I quickly realised that IT was where I belonged. I loved that no two days were ever the same and that there was always something new to learn. Over the next eight years, I progressed in my career, learning and honing my skills through experience. Eventually, I found myself working as an on-site engineer for schools across the East Midlands, supporting staff and students with day-to-day issues while also carrying out major infrastructure upgrades. I was able to climb ladders, lift boxes of equipment and run cables through ceiling spaces. I still had good days and bad days, and I remained careful about my back, but things had changed.
I no longer defined myself by my disability. I was an IT engineer who happened to have spinal issues, not someone with spinal issues who happened to work in IT.
Then, at the age of 33, I received the call nobody wants. My dad called, sobbing, to tell me that my mum was in intensive care, on a ventilator, and that he needed me and my brother. I immediately went into “fix it” mode. I locked my emotions into a box and focused on what needed to be done. I called work to explain that I wouldn’t be coming in for a while, contacted family in England, and started booking flights. My partner stayed behind to look after our home, cats and fish, while my brother and I flew to Thailand the following day. When we arrived, we went straight to the hospital.
Over the next four days, we learned that my mum’s condition was terminal. My dad struggled to accept what was happening, my brother was in shock, and I still had all my emotions locked away. Having worked alongside medical professionals for years, I understood the situation and found myself acting as the bridge between the doctors and my family, helping them understand that there was nothing more that could be done.
Four days after we arrived in Thailand, my mum passed away.
There was no time to grieve.
My dad was devastated, my brother was lost, and there was suddenly an overwhelming list of practical responsibilities that needed to be dealt with. We were in a foreign country with no idea what to do, so I did what I do best: I investigated, organised, and contacted the relevant authorities. My mum had always wanted to remain in Thailand, so we arranged her funeral and cremation at a local temple. A close family friend was invaluable, helping us communicate with the monks and guiding us through customs and traditions that were completely unfamiliar to us.
The funeral lasted four days and followed customs very different to those we were familiar with in England. While I could understand the comfort and meaning these traditions held for the local community, experiencing them while grieving for my mum was traumatic for all of us. My brother found parts of the ceremonies so overwhelming that he was unable to attend many of them.
Throughout the funeral and the weeks that followed, my back pain became progressively worse. The combination of long flights, stress, lack of sleep and the physical demands of the ceremonies had taken a significant toll. Once we returned to England with my dad, there was still no opportunity to stop. We had to repeat many of the administrative processes, deal with paperwork, notify organisations and arrange a wake for family and friends who had been unable to attend the funeral in Thailand.
By this point, both physically and emotionally, I was beginning to unravel. The pain in my back had become so severe that I could barely walk and eventually had to borrow a wheelchair. While sitting and talking with my dad after the wake in England, I realised that I wanted, and needed, to be closer to him. I had always wanted to emigrate and had fallen in love with Thailand, just as my parents had. So, while all my emotions were still locked away, I started looking at ways to make that dream a reality. I already had a career in IT and had developed skills that were transferable across different specialities and countries.
As I explored my options, I found myself thinking back to the dreams I had abandoned years earlier, and the hopes my parents had always held for me. I knew that, with my back deteriorating again and the demands of full-time work, attending a traditional university was unrealistic. Instead, I began looking at The Open University to see whether there were any courses or degrees that I could study remotely alongside work. When I discovered the Cyber Security degree, I knew I had found my path. With the encouragement of my family, I submitted my application. After years of setbacks, uncertainty and loss, I once again had a clear goal to work towards.
I attempted to return to work, but with my worsening back pain and reduced mobility, I had to change direction once again. This time, however, there was a difference. I was changing direction with a clear goal in mind, rather than facing another setback and thinking, “Here we go again”. After my dad returned to Thailand and everything that could be done had been done, the box I had locked my emotions inside finally began to open. I returned to therapy to help me process both the grief and trauma of losing my mum, as well as the frustration of watching my physical health deteriorate once more. I bought a wheelchair because I needed one whenever I left the house. The independence I had fought so hard to maintain throughout felt as though it had been stripped away.
Determined to find a way forward, I secured a new role that allowed me to work entirely from home on a four-days-on, four-days-off shift pattern. The flexibility meant that even on days when walking was difficult, I could still work. Just as importantly, my four days off gave me the time and opportunity to study.
What had once felt impossible was now within reach. For the first time since leaving college at 18, I was finally working towards a university degree.
In October 2024, I started my very first module with The Open University. I had no idea what to expect. I didn’t think I was ready, and I certainly didn’t think I was clever enough to succeed, but I knew this was the path I needed to take. I found the module interesting and engaging, and the support from my fellow students and tutor helped me rebuild the confidence I had lost as a teenager when I was forced to abandon my studies. When the results for my first module were released, I spent several minutes doing my best impression of running around the house celebrating. I had achieved a distinction.
More importantly, I felt confident. I felt capable. For the first time in many years, I felt like me again.
Since then, I have continued my studies alongside full-time work, achieving results that would have seemed impossible to my younger self. While my journey is far from over, every assignment completed and every module passed is another reminder that I am capable of far more than I once believed.
As I have written this, I have found myself wondering whether there is really anything special about my story. To me, it doesn’t feel extraordinary. It is simply my life and the path I have taken through it.
It was only through talking to others and hearing their perspective that I began to see it differently. They pointed out that many people carry their own versions of these experiences. Perhaps not the same details, but the same themes: chronic illness, loss, grief, caring for family, abandoning dreams, changing direction and trying to find a way forward when life doesn’t go to plan.
If there is anything I hope people take from my story, it is not that I overcame something unique. It is that setbacks do not have to define the rest of your life.
There will be people reading this who have had to put their dreams on hold. People whose health has changed their plans. People who have lost someone they love. People who feel as though life has pushed them so far off course that they no longer recognise the destination.
To those people, I would simply say this: your journey is not over.
The path ahead may look very different from the one you imagined, but different does not mean impossible.
My path to university was not the one I imagined as a teenager. Chronic pain, surgery, grief and loss changed the route completely. But they didn’t end the journey. The dream I thought I’d lost at 18 waited for me until I was ready to find another way. I am still healing, still learning and still figuring things out, but if there’s one thing this experience has taught me, it’s that a different path does not mean a lost destination. And I think my mum would be proud.
