From the Ward to the World

Eight years ago, I met my friend Suki in a psychiatric hospital.

If you had told either of us then that one day we would stand together beneath the pyramids of Egypt, wander through the streets of Kyoto, or watch the sun set over Mexico’s Yucatán Peninsula, I doubt we would have believed you.

At the time, our world was much smaller.

We met on a long-term psychiatric ward where both of us would spend years of our lives. Freedom was measured in small increments: a walk into town, an afternoon’s leave, permission to visit a café. The future felt uncertain. Some days it felt impossible to imagine next week, let alone the other side of the world.

Yet from the beginning, Suki and I bonded instantly.

We were both writers.

Or perhaps more accurately, we were people who wrote because we didn’t know what else to do with our thoughts. We spent hours talking about books, ideas and the lives we hoped to live beyond the hospital walls. Suki wrote beautiful poetry. She still does. Even then, in the middle of illness and institutional life, she seemed able to find language for things I struggled to articulate. I was in awe of her talent. I still am.

The hospital reduced everyone to a diagnosis. A patient. A risk assessment. A bed number. But friendship allows you to see the person underneath.

Suki was never simply another patient to me. She was funny, intelligent, creative and fiercely observant. When the days felt repetitive and endless, our conversations reminded me that there was still a world beyond the ward.

Psychiatric hospitals occupy a strange place in time. Life continues, but it also stands still. Seasons change outside the windows. Governments come and go. Friends move on with their lives. Meanwhile, you wait.

And wait.

And wait.

During those years, travel felt almost absurdly distant.

The idea that one day we might leave hospital and explore the world together belonged less to reality than to fantasy. Yet we talked about it anyway. We dreamed. We made plans. Perhaps those plans were acts of optimism. Perhaps they were acts of survival.

Then, slowly, life began to expand.

We left hospital.

Not all at once. Not dramatically. Recovery rarely happens like that. Instead, our worlds widened gradually. More freedom. More possibilities. More confidence.

Then came the first trip.

Egypt.

Standing before the Great Pyramid of Giza, I found myself thinking about the ward where we had first met. It seemed impossible that the same two people who once spent their days navigating hospital corridors were now standing before one of humanity’s oldest monuments.

The pyramid itself was astonishing. But what moved me most was the fact that we were there together.

Years earlier, our freedom had been limited to the hospital grounds. Now we were crossing continents.

Mexico followed.

Then Italy.

Then Japan.

Each journey felt significant for reasons that had little to do with tourism.

Of course, I loved seeing the world. I loved standing before Chichén Itzá, walking through Rome, getting lost in Tokyo’s neon-lit streets and wandering through the quiet temples of Kyoto. I loved Hiroshima’s solemnity and Osaka’s energy. I loved the unfamiliarity of it all.

But increasingly I realised that the destinations themselves were only part of the story.

The real story was that we had made it there.

Together.

There is something uniquely powerful about travelling with someone who knew you when your life was at its lowest point. Most friendships begin after the difficult chapters have passed. Suki and I met in the middle of ours.

She knew me before recovery became possible.

Before publication credits.

Before travel.

Before plans.

Before hope felt reliable.

And I knew her too.

We witnessed each other’s struggles. We saw each other frightened, unwell and uncertain about the future. We also witnessed each other’s resilience.

Perhaps that is why travelling together feels different.

When we stand in front of a famous landmark, I am never only seeing the landmark. I am also seeing the distance travelled between then and now.

I think of the ward.

The locked doors.

The endless meetings.

The boredom.

The despair.

The strange feeling that life was happening somewhere else.

Then I look around and realise that life is happening here.

Sometimes people talk about travel as though it is a luxury. For me, it has become something else. A reminder that circumstances are not permanent. A reminder that the future can surprise us.

The journeys have not erased what happened. They have not transformed our past into something romantic. I would not choose those years again.

But they have shown me that difficult chapters do not have to define the entire story.

Today, Suki and I are planning our next adventures: Portugal and India.

Sometimes I still find that remarkable.

Not because Portugal and India are extraordinary destinations, though they are. What feels remarkable is the simple act of making plans.

There was a time when both of us struggled to imagine a future at all.

Now we discuss flight prices, itineraries and places we want to visit.

There is a tendency, after hardship, to focus on individual recovery stories. We celebrate personal resilience, determination and perseverance. Those things matter. But they are not the whole picture.

Sometimes what saves us is not strength.

Sometimes it is friendship.

Eight years after we met in psychiatric hospital, I think that may be the greatest gift Suki has given me.

Not Egypt.

Not Mexico.

Not Italy.

Not Japan.

Something much rarer.

The knowledge that no matter how small your world becomes, another person can help you imagine it growing again.

And sometimes, if you are very lucky, they will travel alongside you while it does.