Finding fresh ground back on country

Pictured: Cheryl Rose reconnected with her Aboriginal heritage, and replenished her mental wellbeing, by take time to go out on country in Tasmania’s north west.

Cheryl Rose is the first to admit camping isn’t exactly her thing.

But after caring for a partner undergoing cancer treatment and a family member battling a severe mental illness, she needed to try something new.

That something was an on country experience in takayna, otherwise known as the Tarkine in Tasmania’s north west, with the Tasmanian Aboriginal Centre and the Wilderness Society.

Her two sons at her side, Cheryl did things she never thought she’d be capable of: climbing up a cliff face, crawling through caves and pushing herself to the limit.

“Throughout the year we just had a lot of challenges thrown at us, but I needed to do this,” she tells Primary Health Tasmania.

“I knew if the boys were there with me I didn’t have to worry about them, and I could just totally unwind.”

“It’s just funny it took a 27 kilometre hike for me to do it.”

Read more of Cheryl’s story in the May edition of Primary Health Matters.

Primary Health Tasmania commissioned the on country program with funding from the Australian Government.