Held By The Wild: The Art of Returning Home

Held By The Wild: Art as a Way Back

I didn’t set out to become an artist.
I returned to it.

For most of my life, I’ve worked as an emergency nurse — a world that moves quickly, where you learn to stay steady while everything around you isn’t. It’s meaningful work, but it also asks a lot of your body, your mind, and your capacity to hold things in.

For a long time, I didn’t realise how much I was carrying.

At 47, being diagnosed with ADHD and autism shifted something. It gave context to the sensitivity I had always felt — to environments, to people, to the pace of life itself. It also made sense of why nature had always felt like a place I could finally exhale.

That connection became the foundation of Mantra and Moss — a philosophy grounded in real, lived experience. Not routines or trends, but simple ways to regulate, reconnect, and create moments of steadiness in a busy world.

Art grew from that same place.

Creating as Regulation

My work isn’t about producing something perfect. It’s about creating space.

I work across acrylics, mixed media, and nature-based elements — often incorporating pieces gathered from the outdoors. Each layer is intuitive. Each mark is a response, not a plan.

It’s less about control, more about listening.

Over time, I’ve come to understand that creating isn’t just something I enjoy — it’s something that supports my nervous system. Even small moments of making can shift how I feel, bringing me back to a place that feels calmer, more grounded, more like myself.

Windows, Doors, and the Idea of Home

Throughout my pieces, you’ll often find small windows and doors, sometimes hidden, sometimes barely noticeable.

They represent possibility.
A way through.
A reminder that things aren’t as closed as they might feel.

The idea of home runs quietly through everything I create. Not just a physical place, but a feeling — of safety, of softness, of being able to exhale without needing to brace.

In the emergency department, safety is immediate and clinical.
In life, it’s more subtle.

It’s something we have to create for ourselves.

Held By The Wild

My art, shared through Held By The Wild, is the physical expression of this journey.

It holds pieces of my work in nursing, my experience of late diagnosis, my connection to nature, and the ways I’ve learned to regulate and understand myself.

It’s layered, sometimes messy, sometimes bold, sometimes quiet.

But always honest.

Pieces like You Too Shall Bloom reflect that process — not the polished version of growth, but the real one. The kind that happens when you allow space, when you soften, when you stop forcing and start listening.

A Gentle Return

If there’s a thread that runs through all of my work, it’s this:

You don’t have to push so hard to become something.

Sometimes, it’s about returning.

Returning to what feels natural.
Returning to what steadies you.
Returning to yourself.

And from that place…

Growth comes.