1 Year Retirement Anniversary – My World Has Shrunk and Grown in Ways I Never Imagined

A year ago, my world suddenly became much smaller.

Or so I thought.

On 30 June 2025, I officially left PwC after an immensely fulfilling career. At fifty, I simply could not imagine a version of Ben that wasn’t a partner in a major consulting firm. It wasn’t just my job. It had become part of my identity.

A year later, I can honestly say that while my world has undoubtedly shrunk, it has also grown in ways I could never have imagined.

The shrinking is easy to see.

I now rely on a wheelchair. I have a live-in carer. My travelling has almost disappeared; in the past six months the furthest I have been is the forty kilometres to my hospital. Only a year before retiring I held the highest status with the airline I had flown with for years. Today, most of my journeys are between the bedroom, the lounge and the bathroom. I no longer spend my days with clients solving complex business problems, something I genuinely loved.

There have been difficult adjustments that no one ever prepares you for: moving downstairs, accepting help with everyday tasks, shower chairs, incontinence products, and gradually learning that independence is no longer measured by doing everything yourself.

Progressive Supranuclear Palsy has continued its relentless march, bringing fresh challenges just when I think I have adjusted to the last ones. Most recently it introduced severe nerve pain and an unexpected anger that seemed to appear almost overnight. PSP has an uncanny ability to remind you that it still has more surprises in store.

Yet if that were the whole story, this would be a very depressing article.

It isn’t.

In many respects, my world has become far larger than it ever was before.

During the past year I have written four books: on faith, on living with PSP, on my travels and on the weekly Torah portion. I also gathered my blog posts into a single volume that stretched to more than 640 A4 pages, looking remarkably like one of the old Yellow Pages. More than three-quarters of those pages were written during this past year alone.

Even more surprising is that people have actually wanted to read them. Tens of thousands of people around the world have found my writing, despite PSP being such a niche subject. That continues to astonish me, not because of the numbers themselves, but because every reader represents someone who paused long enough to listen.

More importantly, writing has connected me with people across the world. Every day I exchange messages with individuals and families living with PSP, Parkinson’s disease and countless other challenges. Some write looking for advice. Others simply want someone who understands. More often than not, I discover that they help me just as much as I hope I help them.

I never expected retirement to become the busiest and, in many ways, the most purposeful year of my life.

The greatest blessing has been my family. My wife and I are learning, each in our own way, to adapt to changes neither of us would ever have chosen. This is my diagnosis, but it is our journey together.

My three children continue to amaze me. Watching all of them grow into remarkable adults has been one of the greatest privileges of my life. Dancing at my daughter’s wedding this year, celebrating her marriage to a truly wonderful mensch, is a memory I will treasure forever.

My close family, friends and neighbours have carried me in countless ways: through practical help, wise advice, a game of chess, a visit, a message or simply by quietly being there.

I remain deeply grateful to PwC. My departure was handled with enormous dignity, compassion and respect, and I shall always appreciate the partners and colleagues who made what could have been a painful transition into one marked by genuine humanity.

Perhaps the greatest surprise has been discovering that purpose is remarkably adaptable.

For years I believed my contribution to the world came through consulting, building businesses and leading teams. Those things mattered, and I remain grateful for every opportunity I was given. They provided for my family, stretched me professionally and taught me lessons I still draw upon every day.

At one time I thought my career defined who I was. Losing it has taught me that purpose and identity are not the same thing.

Purpose, however, has not retired simply because I did. It has simply changed shape.

Some days it is writing an article that helps someone facing a frightening diagnosis. Some days it is encouraging another caregiver. Occasionally it is making people laugh by recounting the absurdity of driving my electric wheelchair straight into a kerb after my body decided to freeze while my brain remained fully aware of the impending collision.

Not every blessing arrives wearing the clothes we expect.

That does not mean this journey has become easy.

The hardest part has never been losing my mobility. It has been watching the people I love carry burdens they never asked for. Their resilience humbles me every day.

On a more personal and very specific level, giving up my role leading prayers during the High Holy Days has been one of the deepest losses I have experienced. That absence still hurts far more than I expected.

Looking back over this extraordinary year, I realise something else.

The fear has almost always been worse than the reality.

That does not mean the reality has been easy. It certainly hasn’t. The recent episode of severe nerve pain and the sudden changes in my behaviour reminded me how quickly life with PSP can change. Yet each new challenge has eventually become another part of life. The things that once seemed unimaginable somehow became manageable, not because they stopped being difficult, but because human beings possess an extraordinary capacity to adapt.

I also know that PSP has not finished with me. The next chapters are likely to be harder than this one, and I would be naïve to pretend otherwise. I am genuinely afraid of what is to come but I will try to face it with a deep breath and with increased knowledge of my capacit to cope. Whether I will be writing another anniversary reflection this time next year is something only G-d knows. I very much hope I will and I will try my best to make it happen.

As the saying goes, “Man plans and G-d laughs.”

I trust Him completely. That trust does not remove uncertainty, but it reminds me that I do not face whatever lies ahead alone.

If He grants me another year, I hope to keep writing, keep encouraging others and keep finding purpose wherever it appears. If His plans differ from mine, then I pray for the strength to accept them with the same faith that has carried me this far.

My world really has become much smaller.

Yet somehow, through family, faith, friendship and a purpose I never saw coming, it has also become immeasurably larger.

I never wanted this life.

But despite everything, it is still a life that I love.