This week's Sunday Profile comes from the Humans of Lismore Facebook page and was written by Denise Alison.

Patrick Healey - “ My dad was a Sand-miner and we grew up in lots of places along the East coast of Australia so I don’t really have a home town per se. The place I loved most was Port Stephens. It was very beautiful. My dad’s family is originally from Ipswich and my Mum’s family is originally from Lake Macquarie.

I went to lots of different schools, really small schools. Back then we lived in these tiny towns so your grade would be your desk rather than a big classroom with 30 kids all in one grade. I think that had a major influence on my life because it made me really cooperative. 

I ended school in Raymond Terrace High because Nelson Bay only went to Year 10. I did Agriculture in my last years. My dad was quite conservative. He was a real fishing, hunting, traditional sort of bloke and he was quite pleased I studied Agriculture.

When I graduated high school I moved down to Newcastle for a year and worked at BHP Blast Furnace No. 4. The guys there were amazing and I was really young but on my first day they sent me off looking for fallopian tubes. I walked all over BHP that day asking…Do you have any fallopian tubes? And they didn’t (laughs).

They were really protective older guys and at the time kept saying… Don’t stay here so I didn’t. After a year I’d saved enough money to move to Canada which was to be my one or two year big adventure but I ended up living in Canada for over 20 years. I lived in Banff then I moved over to Vancouver and I worked in the Arts.

HIV AIDS came along and I ended up the General Manager of the Pacific Aids Resource Centre, at the worst time, when people were dying and there were no drugs. I worked in that role for 10 years from 1980 to 1990. It was really small when we started. We had about 20 food banks and it grew to 750 food banks. We had trouble keeping up.

That kind of politicised me in a lot of ways because we had a conservative government in British Columbia who were very anti doing anything about HIV AIDS. I became good friends with Edoud Lavalle who was the President of the NDP (New Democratic Party of Canada) and I ended up the official agent of it.

I got really involved in the community, worked for a magazine and the NDP and after 10 years I was burnt out so I went and worked for a union where I became Chief of Staff of the Labour Union. I did that for the next 10 years in Canada and the United States. I built the Member Resource Centre in Pasadena which was the first one ever built in the States. 

I was asked to come to Australia which was kind of ironic because that’s where I started. I came out for one year which turned into two. All that time I had a lover but when I came out to Australia I ended up with an Australian lover I took back to the US with me and he hated it there. After a couple of years he wanted to come back here so we moved to Melbourne because he was a research Scientist with CSL. I got a job two weeks after landing in Melbourne with the Melbourne Theatre Company as Director of Finance.

My lover and I decided to separate and I wasn’t sure what to do, whether I go back to America or what so I decided to go on a big trip to Africa. I went to Botswana, Zambia, South Africa and Zimbabwe and the day I returned to Australia I saw this job advertised at NORPA in Lismore. I applied and a month later I was living here in Lismore.

I managed NORPA for 5 years and then Dad became ill. He’d been sick for a while but it was nearing the end and my Mum’s elderly. I had been driving down every weekend for months to Newcastle but it was becoming too much so I decided to quit my job and move down to be with them. My dad died two months after I got down there. I have an awesome sister who was very close to my parents. She took it really hard when Dad died. 

I got a job as the General Manager of Regional Arts NSW. I operated out of Newcastle and Sydney. A month after Dad died I had a stroke. Actually I had two strokes, a small and a large one. I had been here in Lismore for New Years. I went back to Newcastle and I didn’t know I had it.

I went to work and my assistant said …You’re crazy, there’s something horribly wrong with you. I felt no pain and I went to a doctor who after CT scans said..You’ve had two strokes. That’s when I realised I couldn’t remember the days before. I had no memory.

I had to leave my job because basically my job was writing grants which is important in the Arts. I thought I would have to retire, what with no short term memory. Twenty percent of people who have strokes don’t have the facial features with it. It depends on where it hits the brain and mine was deep where the memory is. I have no recollection of three whole months.

They gave me drugs which helped a bit. 6 months into it my Doctor suggested antidepressants, not for depression but to help my brain. That startled me.

I read all the literature and decided against that because I didn’t want to get addicted to them. I decided to get fit. I decided to walk. It was right in the middle of COVID-19 so there was no gyms open, the world was in chaos and my Mum was really sick as well. I walked 10kms every day and I lost weight and felt better.

The gym opened in Newcastle so I went along. After a couple of months I felt good. Prior to the stroke I was a smoker, a heavy drinker, all those things that can lead to a stroke, I did it all.

Mum got really sick so we sold her house and it took some time to find it but we found her a great place and she loves it there. I decided to come back to Lismore and found this job here at CASPA before I moved up here. I feel like this is my home town.

I was nervous because I was worried about my mental capacity and my short term memory but I started here three months ago and it’s worked. It’s been a year since my stroke but I feel like I’m 98 percent here. Essentially I recovered. 

I’m single now. I was Mary Poppins my whole life. I was with the American for 20 years and the Australian for 12 years so I decided, there’s only one life so I’m going to have some fun. That’s part of my main mission. (laughs).

I also used to have a house here when I was working at NORPA which had a lawn and a garden which I loved but I came to resent the mowing and the work because I never had the time. Now I have a three bedroom apartment at Lismore Heights so when I go to Hervey Bay this week I can just close the door. I kind of got the life I wanted. I have a lot of friends here in Lismore. It’s a friendly town. I love that. It doesn’t matter who you are or what you do, it’s friendly.”