Me Myself & Mental Health: Bill Nichols

This year marks 9 years without Ollie, which seems crazy. We are all missing someone, a brother, son, friend. This year is a reminder that it never goes away no matter how much time passes, no matter what anyone says the pain can still be as fresh, like it was just yesterday. People deal with grief and loss in different ways, my method was to try to bury it and disassociate with reality. Which turned out not to be the best approach but we first go to what is natural to us, I was just running on instinct. But is it possible to notice how bad a situation is getting even when your in it? I'd say its pretty hard to start acting and thinking rationally when your whole world is upside down, however I think that it becomes noticeable in the day to day activities, like when you get angry over trying to make some ikea flat pack and end up throwing it across the room. The bigger the stress or situation feels to you, the worse or longer those reactions can last, if anyone has any tips on that I'm all ears. Earlier in the year I got together with Ollie's friends Kieran and James, although I've got a lot of time for them, and all of his friends to be honest. Since his passing we had never really had a sit down chat about things. With us filming more interviews for DRM, I realised if I was ever asked about Ollie, I would always give my take on him and personal memories. It felt quite selfish, and I knew moving forward to really honour him I knew it was important to get their input as well. I asked some questions and recorded our conversation, to refer back to in the future. I was nervous about the whole thing. I didn't want to dig up any painful memories or upset anyone with certain probing questions. It was nice to finally have this talk, even if it took so many years to come to fruition. It was somewhat therapeutic, nice to hear their stories about him, and we had a good old laugh. Even after 9 years its comforting to know people want to take time out of their day to talk about him, which shows how much he means.