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Four siblings. One childhood. Four very different lives.

RAISED BY THE SAME STORM

Stories, memories, family secrets and unanswered questions from a London childhood that shaped four very different adults.

Begin the Story

INTRODUCTION

The Family Bible

People think childhood memories arrive in order. Mine don't. Mine come back in flashes... I remember it like a box of photographs spilled across the floor. This is my attempt to pick them up.

Read the Introduction

Meet the Family

Four siblings raised by the same storm, shaped by vastly different winds. These are the anchors of our story.

Mickey

The Fighter

Mickey weathered the hardest currents to keep us anchored. Behind his fierce and protective exterior lies a heart forged directly in the tempest.

Emily

The Healer

Emily quietly gathered the broken pieces after every flash of lightning. Her gentle empathy became the emotional sanctuary we always returned to.

Daniel

The Feeler

Daniel absorbed the thunder and translated it into creative meaning. He taught us all that survival requires feeling the heavy weight of the rain.

Angie

The Builder

Angie designed the scaffolding for our future. While the storm still raged overhead, she quietly and methodically laid down the bricks of our recovery.

Chapters from the Storm

Explore the prominent chapters of our shared childhood in 1970s London—a bittersweet chronicle of resilience, memory, and the tempestuous bonds that kept us afloat.

Chapter I

The Rabbit

A silent, soft witness in the overgrown corner of our London garden, holding the unspoken weight of a winter that changed everything.

Chapter II

Pauline

She blew in like a sudden autumn gale off the Thames, bringing both shelter and a fierce, unpredictable current into our quiet terraced world.

Chapter III

The Graveyard Bedroom

With crumbling Victorian headstones leaning close against our bedroom glass, we discovered early on that the living were far louder than the dead.

Chapter IV

Daniel's Penguin Joke

Even when the hallway ceiling began to sag and harsh voices echoed downstairs, his simple, repetitive punchline was the fragile anchor we held onto.

THE UNRESOLVED PASTS

Some Questions Never Leave

Who was Charles Edward?

What secrets did Mum take to her grave?

Why did we flee London in the winter of 1978?

And who sent the unmarked black envelope?

Explore the Mysteries

The Storm's Path

Eight pivotal moments from a childhood shaped by the London gales of 1976 to the quiet clarity of today.

1976

The Gale Begins. Born in the midst of South London's hottest summer and most turbulent storms.

1983

An Empty Hearth. A long winter spent huddled around candle fires, listening to mother's old ghost stories.

1991

The Crossing. Escaping the gray grit of the city for a damp, timbered cottage on the Suffolk coast.

1998

Scattered Leaves. The family splinters across three oceans; letters become our only anchor.

2005

Eye of the Storm. Years of silence are broken by the discovery of an old, locked leather trunk.

2012

The Rebuilding. Translating blurred journal entries and fading childhood photographs.

2019

Unearthing Truths. Meeting after twenty years under a heavy sky to speak the unspoken.

Today

The Quiet After. Gathering the chapters onto paper, letting the tempest finally settle.

Help Preserve the Family Stories

Some stories are fact. Some are memory... Join me as I uncover them.