It was Christmas 2018 when I realized I couldnt carry on the way I was living. My anxiety was through the roof, I couldnt read the news from the microplastics found in our food and water to the fact that theres predicted to be more plastic than fish in the sea by 2050 without feeling my stomach drop to my feet. I felt ashamed. I was producing too much waste.

On Christmas Day alone my family and I had produced more than seven garbage bags of waste. Unrecyclable wrapping paper, masses of plastic packaging, used Christmas crackers and mountains of leftover food.

I had already been experiencing eco-anxiety as I became more aware of the amount of waste that we are producing globally. In the last 70 years alone, humans have produced over 8.3 billion metric tons of plastic, a majority of which has ended up in landfills or polluting the natural environment, including the oceans.