When a Robin comes to visit

On Sunday 11 December 2022, eight ‘For Men To Talk’ attendees appeared at the final ‘For Men To Talk… and Walk’ of the year.

Over the previous days, parts of the UK experienced severe conditions, with snow and ice in places across London and south-east England. In Biggleswade, we unfortunately didn’t get the snow, but we got the ice, frost and fog, as well as the minus five degrees in temperature.

But that didn’t stop the eight men, with coats, scarfs and gloves walking the three and a half miles in an hour and a half.

Some of the men on the walk have lost loved ones at an early age, from their twenties up to their fifties, through suicide and illness. 

During the first half of the walk, some of the men, who were behind the leading pack, spotted a robin in a bush. Robins are known to be tame which meant that it was easy to photograph and film close up whilst the robin happily poses.

The well-known phrase, ‘When robins appear, loved ones are near’, is associated with the belief from centuries past that the tiny robin is a messenger from lost loved ones. When robins are seen, some people take comfort that loved ones are at peace, and many believe that their lost loved ones are visiting them.

There is no timeline for how long grief lasts, or how you should feel after a particular time. When I lost my Mum and my sister, like so many others, it took a long time to readapt to life emotionally and the changes involved. Although the pain of losing them becomes less intense over the years, life is and will never the same.

So if someone wants to believe that for that moment, a tiny robin is a sign that our passed loved ones are watching over us and puts a smile on our face of reassurance and awakens happy memories, who is anyone else to deny them that.