Community gardens: ‘We all come here to heal’ No wonder more health professionals are ‘green prescribing’
Sunnyside community garden in north London © FT montageDee Holgate spent the first six months of the pandemic locked up alone. When she was 27, she had been told she had months to live, and though a kidney transplant saved her aged 29 in 1976, in her seventies she remained immunosuppressed. From March through September 2020, she had almost no human contact beyond greeting neighbours from her stoop. She says, “It was a killer for me, because I’m a people person.”
When finally allowed out for walks, she discovered her local community garden, Sunnyside in Archway, north London. “It saved my life,” she reflects, a mask pulled up almost to her eyes, basking in the garden’s pale April sun. “I got to know some of the people that volunteer and work here. Then we got the ducks. That really changed my life.”
This story originally appeared on: Financial Times - Author:Simon Kuper
