I'm an electrical engineer, and I'm originally from Portgannon in County Antrim.

Hello, I'm Sam Haywood.

I'm a science teacher from Uttoxeter in Staffordshire.

[applauding]

Now, what first sparked your interest in her work?

Well, I'm a science teacher, so obviously I try and teach about the history of science as much as I can.

In general, women don't get a- as much credit as they deserve, but she in particular just didn't seem to get any credit.

I mean, I studied a similar topic that she did at university, and I'd never heard her name till recently.

Mm-hmm.

And they are not having your experience, but their experience may have a reflection that you need to hear, that you need to sort of feel, and that can show that you are not alone, which I feel is something that in the depths of the experience you can get stuck in.

I definitely found moments where you feel as, like, I felt as though I've only ever felt this.

Like, there's nobody else who could empathize with what's occurring right now.

And doing that monthly ritual of coming back to this space and sharing opens that up, opens the aperture of your own lens up a little bit so you can go, "Oh, okay, the experience, I'm part of, like, a much bigger experience." And you know, like, yeah, we're going along together in parallel, but their parts of the story kind of will fit into what you're experiencing at the same time.

Yeah.

Um, but I think there's something else in these experiences that is not just personal, and that's why I brought up the initiation part.

Because Francis Weller, who's a well-known grief worker and psychotherapist over in the States, has this essay in his new collection of essays called In the Absence of the Ordinary.