I don't know how much you love nature as a teenager, but then your lungs aren't playing ball with you.

Yeah.

16 years old, which is a really important part of, of life rights where you, there's puberty, there's social groups, there's your schooling, your education, like 16 years of age is such an important time of one's life.

I lost my health.

So my right lung just wasn't playing ball, it continuously was collapsing no matter what the medical world was trying.

My lung was going from the size of this beautiful balloon down to the size of a tennis ball.

So not only does it make it difficult to breathe, it was also incredibly painful.

You wrote that in your mid twenties, early twenties, right? Has, has your definition or understanding of your purpose changed in the 20 years it's been since you're writing that? It's matured,

Are we having these conversations? Are we looking at that?

Absolutely, we are.

So this is a multi-agency response.

So it's not just the Department of Conservation on their own.

We're working with Emergency Management Southlands, NEMA, councils and others, including those concessionaires, businesses who operate in Pio Pio Tahi and our host, Manaaki, their customers there.

So we have, in the last couple of months, really gripped that up in terms of our consistent messaging.

We've got messaging that goes out to visitors via those concessionaires especially.

Where do you get gone to?

How did that happen?

My surgeon told me that I'd never be able to physically exert myself ever again after that surgery.

And for five years, I lived with pain.

I lived with fear as well that anything that I would do would stick me back into a hospital ward.

So I was scared.

And as I mentioned, I couldn't even carry a backpack on my back.

But then I was reading about a remarkable woman, her name's Tracy Richardson, who was raising money and awareness to assist the fibrosis because she had two kids with CF, and she did that through the sport of Ironman.

Do you have to revisit those mental health techniques and things that get you through or is it, or are you, is it plain sailing these days?

How did that happen?

My surgeon told me that I'd never be able to physically exert myself ever again after that surgery.

And for five years, I lived with pain.

I lived with fear as well that anything that I would do would stick me back into a hospital ward.

So I was scared.

And as I mentioned, I couldn't even carry a backpack on my back.

But then I was reading about a remarkable woman, her name's Tracy Richardson, who was raising money and awareness to assist the fibrosis because she had two kids with CF, and she did that through the sport of Ironman.

Do you have to revisit those mental health techniques and things that get you through or is it, or are you, is it plain sailing these days?

What role can it play?

I know from my own experience that when I get out into nature, I can hear the birds, I can smell the fresh air.

It just makes me feel good.

Uh, and it makes me feel even better when I'm giving back to nature, and that could be as simple as doing some trapping, could be backyard trapping.

It could be getting involved in our current Garden Bird Survey.

It's a real fun thing to do with kids, by the way.

Uh, so real simple actions that can actually make you feel really, really good.

Well, I mean, we're all guilty, aren't we, of sitting inside and, and maybe scrolling on the phone, but who, who's the focus here?

What, what do you think makes you so good at that? You were so effective in just sort of putting people's minds at ease.

Yeah.

I, I suppose, um, uh, in, in my, in the real world I've had a, a wee bit of, um, training in that regard in terms of trying to, uh, manage myself in, in difficult situations.

You know, I've had quite a bit of media training over the years.

So I think I just draw it on all these things which I've had from my real life experience and, you know, I don't wanna, again, put...

Uh, this is a game, as you know, where everything you say and everything you do gets over-analyzed.

Uh, so if you can just go through there and be yourself and not change too much, 'cause that's the other thing, if you change it also draws attention to yourself.

How honest were you being there? Were you just trying to play it cool, and, uh, or were you secretly desperate to get that double vote?