Dusty Wentworth

Resilience is the ability to adapt well in the face of adversity, trauma, stress, or significant sources of pressure, while maintaining or regaining psychological and physical functioning. It is not the absence of distress, nor is it an inherent toughness that some people possess and others lack. Modern psychological and occupational health research consistently shows that resilience is a dynamic process, shaped over time by skills, habits, relationships, and environments. This distinction matters. When resilience is misunderstood as personal toughness, people are encouraged to endure conditions that are objectively damaging. When it is understood as adaptive capacity, it becomes something that can be developed, supported, and sustained without denying reality. This article sets out what resilience looks like in practice, what the evidence says about its effects on health and performance, and how it can be strengthened at both individual and organisational levels. Resi...

One of the hardest parts of my recovery has not been PTSD, fibromyalgia, Functional Neurological Disorder, or even surviving a ruptured brain aneurysm. Those things are visible enough. They can be named, diagnosed, measured, medicated, explained. The real fight has been with masculinity. Not in the abstract, but in my own life, my own body, and my own sense of self. That fight came in two parts. Waking Up in the Future After my aneurysm rupture, I regained consciousness with significant memory loss. Doctors, nurses, and family kept telling me I was fifty years old. In my head, I was still in my mid thirties. I had not aged into this stage of life. I had arrived in it without warning or preparation. It felt less like recovery and more like waking up in the future. If someone had asked me in my thirties whether I would like to time travel fifteen years forward, I would probably have said yes. You expect things to improve. You assume progress. Instead, I woke into a reality th...

There are moments in life that do not announce themselves as turning points until long after they have passed. Others arrive with brutal clarity, altering the landscape of what lies ahead in the space of a single sentence.  Tuesday 13 January 2026 was one of those moments. It was my first medical appointment of the new year, and by the time I left the consulting room, I knew that a door I had been moving towards for the last two years had quietly, decisively closed. The appointment was with my neurologist and focused on my Functional Neurological Disorder (FND). FND remains the most debilitating of my diagnoses, not only because of the severity of its physical symptoms, but because of the uncertainty that continues to surround it. Each consultation carries the same fragile expectation: that a new approach might emerge, a different perspective, or a previously unexplored intervention that could offer some relief. On this occasion, that expectation lasted only minutes. Th...

Resilience is often described as the ability to endure, to withstand pressure, to keep going when circumstances are hostile or uncertain. Yet for those who have had their lives interrupted by illness, injury or profound loss, resilience is not an abstract concept. It becomes a daily practice, a series of deliberate choices, and at times a hard won act of defiance against despair. Over the past two years, resilience has been the central theme of my life. It has shaped how I have faced the consequences of neurological injury, institutional barriers and the quiet erosion of confidence that prolonged dependence can bring. This is a reflection on that period, and on my determination to rebuild. In October 2023, I became an inpatient. What was initially a hospital admission extended into a prolonged stay and then into a neurological rehabilitation centre. From October 2023 through to September 2024, my world narrowed to wards, treatment rooms and carefully scheduled routines. Reh...

The New Year is quietly under way. It is Saturday 3 January 2026, and as I write this, snow is falling steadily outside my window. It is one of those calm, unmistakably beautiful moments that winter sometimes offers. I am thankful that I have nowhere I need to be today. Snow and wheelchairs do not mix well, and what appears peaceful from indoors can very quickly become dangerous outside. This stillness feels symbolic. With the turning of the year has come a change in how I view my life. This is not because circumstances have suddenly become easy, but because something fundamental has shifted. For the first time in a long while, I am not simply surviving. I am beginning to look forward. That shift has been slow, hard-won, and costly. From collapse to survival My journey over the past few years began in October 2023 when I collapsed at home. What followed was not a single event but an extended fight to stay alive. I spent eleven months moving between hospital wards and a spec...

  The Before and After I spent my life working. I joined the Army at sixteen, and for more than thirty-four years I prided myself on discipline, resilience, and the ability to keep pushing through. Even with a diagnosis of combat-related PTSD and fibromyalgia, I refused to slow down. I turned fifty in 2023—still working, still fighting, still standing. Then, in October 2023, I collapsed at home. That single event didn’t just end my working life; it marked the beginning of an eleven-month nightmare that shattered my identity, fractured my body, and left me questioning everything I thought I knew about myself—particularly my masculinity and my role as a father to three young children. The hospital’s initial diagnosis was Functional Neurological Disorder (FND)—a terrifying condition directly linked to trauma and my long-term PTSD. But during the investigations, a brain scan revealed something unexpected: a brain aneurysm. The doctors at Addenbrooke’s deemed it stable, requiring only m...

Two years ago, my life changed in an instant. I had no idea that one ordinary morning would mark the beginning of a journey that would test every part of who I am. October 23rd, 2023 — a date that changed my life forever. It began like any other day, until suddenly it wasn’t. I collapsed without warning at home. When the ambulance arrived, stroke was ruled out, but that was only the beginning of what would become a long and life-altering journey. Doctors didn’t think I’d survive. Yet somehow, I did. ‎ The Eleven-Month Inpatient Battle What followed were eleven long months as an inpatient — three different hospitals, two stints at a Neurological Rehabilitation Centre, and countless challenges along the way. I was fighting battles not only for my health, but for my identity, my independence, and ultimately, my future. Those months were some of the hardest of my life. Every day brought new challenges: learning to move again, to speak clearly, to remember, to rebuild. The neuro...

There are moments in life when everything fractures – your identity, your memories, your body. When you're not just changed, you're remade. For me, that moment was the rupture of a brain aneurysm – a subarachnoid haemorrhage that erased 14 years of my life and reshaped everything I thought I knew about myself. I woke up in a hospital bed unable to walk, unable to remember much of my adult life, and unable to recognise the man I had once been. And so began the slow, gruelling journey of becoming someone new. A Life Interrupted Before the aneurysm, I had been many things – infantry soldier, bodyguard, husband, father, protector. I'd survived war zones, lived with PTSD, managed chronic pain, and kept moving forwards. But none of that prepared me for this. The aneurysm didn't just threaten my life, it rewrote it. Functional Neurological Disorder, fibromyalgia, partial blindness, tremors, and cognitive damage became my daily reality. My body no longer obeyed me. ...

When I was told to “man up” after my subarachnoid haemorrhage, I just looked at my wheelchair and wondered: what does that even mean now? For as long as I can remember, “man up” has been one of those phrases thrown around casually—on parade squares, in workplaces, in pubs. It sounds simple, even motivational. But in reality, it’s loaded with expectation. It doesn’t just ask a man to be strong; it demands silence, emotional suppression, and the illusion of control. After my aneurysm ruptured, I woke up in a body that no longer played by the rules. PTSD, Functional Neurological Disorder, Fibromyalgia, and brain injury became daily realities. Pain, fatigue, tremors, memory lapses—none of it fits the cultural script of “unshakeable masculinity.” And yet, people still said it: “man up.” But here’s the truth: I’ve discovered more strength in vulnerability than I ever did in hiding behind a mask. Real courage has been admitting when I can’t do something, asking for help, or sittin...

It’s the 28th of August already—can you believe it? Where did the summer go? One moment I was bracing myself for six weeks of school holidays, and the next I’m sitting in the garden, basking in the sunshine, kids playing in the background, reflecting on how fast it’s all flown by. Now, to be clear, I wasn’t worried about the usual summer holiday challenges—you know, keeping the kids entertained without requiring a bank balance that rivals Elon Musk’s. No, my real anticipation came from the fact that this was my first summer as a dad in a wheelchair. If you’ve read my earlier holiday blog (Wheelchairs, Lovebirds, and Little White Eggs: A Summer’s Day in the Garden Jungle), you’ll know I had more than a few doubts about how this would play out. Would I keep up? Would the kids adapt? Would I spend most of the summer watching from the sidelines while they ran rings around me? Well, let me tell you—none of that happened. Game Changers and Wheelchair Bandits Early on, my new Quic...