Life Development - Class C

The life I lived in The Life Development Centre

During the summer of last year, I travelled alone to Nepal. The trip was pre-planned - I spent months working for the man in order to afford it - and was the sort of typical middle-class, gap year rite of passage that I find myself making jokes about. It could have changed nothing but my bank account, my memories and (temporarily) my dress size. For a reason that I still can't quite figure out, it changed everything.

Most of my time was spent working at LDC, a privately run centre housing children and adults with mental and physical health problems ranging from mild to severe. The home was loud, dark, and claustrophobic, and the rooms I was working in even more so. The children were mainly left to their own devices with overstretched staff and limited resources - conditions went untreated and in many cases undiagnosed. The work was both physically and emotionally demanding, and there were a lot of times I felt helpless, frustrated and out of my depth.

For some reason - most likely stubbornness - I carried on regardless, and my experience of caring for the eleven children in the most "severe" group made me realise that actually, this is what I want to do with my life. It took me awhile to work out the implications of this realisation - six months later I found myself quitting my art degree, moving back home and applying for care jobs at my local hospital. All these changes might have happened anyway, but figuring it out now and not somewhere far into the future is really down to the time I spent with the class pictured above.