The power of one: an Aussie woman’s mission to end loneliness

Meet Mea Campbell, the country lawyer and mother-of-two who has brought comfort and kindness to thousands of people around Australia.

In the middle of a restless night, Mea Campbell had a light-bulb moment. Thinking of her late, much-loved grandfather, she realised how much the COVID-19 pandemic would have increased his sense of isolation. “There must be so many frail, elderly or disabled people in lockdown, cut off from the ones they love,” she thought. The idea nagged at her and wouldn’t let her go.

“My grandfather became my inspiration,” says the rural lawyer, writer and mother-of-two with a smile. She is speaking with The Weekly from the cosy home she shares with husband Scotty, 36, and their daughters in country NSW.

Mea is explaining the inspiration behind Connected AU, an inspiring grassroots organisation that was born in Dubbo’s lockdown but has expanded well beyond and now increases connection, community and companionship all over Australia.

Mea, 34, brings out a photo of her grandad. Blind and deaf, Colin McDermid had become invisible to strangers long before he passed away two years ago, aged 95. The prizewinning showjumper’s long and fascinating life – surviving the Great Depression, serving in World War II, building a successful business, sailing in the Sydney to Hobart race – meant nothing to outsiders. Yet Colin was one of the lucky ones, surrounded by a loving clan who cared for him.

“He was fiercely independent but he relied on us – his immediate family – for connection, and we loved seeing him,” Mea says. “But so many people in a similar situation have no one; they’re just completely alone. Even people who’ve had phenomenal lives – it means nothing, and I hate that.”

Mea got out of bed that night in March last year and began researching what she calls “Australia’s loneliness epidemic”. She was shocked by what she discovered. “It’s estimated that 40 per cent of the 250,000 Australians living in aged care don’t receive visits; one in four people live by themselves; and 2.5 million people aren’t connected to the internet,” Mea says passionately. “Loneliness is an equal risk factor for mortality as smoking and obesity. Equal! It’s also linked to multiple chronic health conditions including heart disease, stroke, lung disease, hypertension, depression, stress and anxiety.”

Unable to sleep, Mea couldn’t let the matter rest. By morning, she had teased out the starting points for two novel outreach programs – a penpal program called the Letterbox Project and a series of virtual hobby groups – that have become runaway success stories and are now fostering friendships all around the country.

It wasn’t only her grandfather’s life that gave Mea insight and empathy. From her own recent experience, living at droughtstricken Burren Junction, near Walgett, NSW, she knew firsthand what isolation meant.

Nights were worst, after darkness crept across the parched paddocks. With haulier Scotty away trucking grain and livestock, sometimes for days, Mea had a newborn baby and another lively child to care for, and she was still suffering the aftershocks of two life-threatening, traumatic births. She was at a low ebb.

“It was pretty difficult because I felt so alone,” she admits. “I’m not an overly emotional person, so I don’t talk about it much, but it was unbelievably challenging. The only truthful description is that it was the best and worst of times.

“The community was amazing and I made unbelievable friends – some of the best people I’ve ever met. Parents swam in the school carnivals and everyone would congregate in the pub on Fridays, just enjoying each other’s company. I loved it, but at the end of the day, they didn’t live with me.

“The district was in a seven-year drought and that was crippling for everyone – farmers, contractors, shops, schools, industries, services, families, children. It was so distressing … just dirt and dust, and the social fabric of the town changed. It was hard for everyone we knew. And it was hard for us. As the drought hit harder, Scotty’s work was ever decreasing and he was having to travel further to find it. The situation caused two main pressures – a financial pressure, but also an isolation pressure.”

It wasn’t that Mea was unused to small country towns. She’d grown up in flyspeck-on-the-map Dunedoo, in NSW’s central west, with accountant father Norm, mother Lynne, a nurse, and two siblings, Chris and Kate. She “couldn’t wait to leave” in her late teens, and finally graduated from university with degrees in law and

social science. But in hindsight, it was an idyllic childhood.

Her adult experience through Burren Junction’s soul-destroying drought proved a very different proposition. “The finances went up and down as work went up and down, and that’s tough to manage … Scotty is one of the kindest, most considerate and patient people I’ve ever met, but I saw the financial pressure change him into someone quite the opposite. He became frustrated, irritable, angry, and this turned into a crippling depression.

“I found it really hard, having a new baby and living in an isolated area.

I was alone so much of the time, with Scotty travelling further to source work. He was under constant stress, trying to generate income, but then manage the effect it would have on me being left alone for long periods.”

Mea worried what would happen to her girls, Charlotte and Georgie, now aged 10 and two, if she had an accident or fell ill while her husband was away. It spooked her even more after a severe gastro attack saw her hospitalised for three days in Scotty’s absence. “Luckily, Mum was staying with me at the time, but I was scared after that. Georgie was only four months old, and I was so sick that I couldn’t hold her. What would’ve happened if Mum hadn’t been there?”

By September 2019, Mea couldn’t cope. She loved her old farmhouse, the village, its people and their sense of community, but there were too many tensions sapping her spirit. She made the difficult decision

to move closer to her mother, sister and aunt in Dubbo, while Scotty split his time between there and Walgett.

“I wasn’t lonely at Burren, but I felt vulnerable and isolated. It was tough. I think that’s why …” Mea pauses, momentarily at a loss for words.

“That wasn’t my motivation to start Connected AU, but it wasn’t until last month that I realised I actually did have that lived experience, in common with so many other people.”

Dynamic and driven, she started working on her brainchild immediately after that wakeful night. The following day, Mea registered the business name, wrote the legals, bought the domains and created a basic website. Only 48 hours later, Connected AU was up and running, with the Letterbox Project (a safe, carefully monitored, national penpal scheme) extending the hand of friendship for free to lonely, at-risk people unable to get online.

It started small, but built with extraordinary speed. “Scotty’s been pretty supportive,” Mea grins at her chalk-and-cheese “reserved” spouse. “He just lets me do my own thing. He reckons I get so focused, he knew I was going to run off with it and he was okay with that!”

Today, there are more than 13,000 correspondents sending an average of 500 letters a week to aged-care residents, women fleeing domestic violence, mental-health patients or those living with a disability. Safety and privacy are paramount. Every letter is monitored, and identifiable personal information, regarding both the sender and recipient, remains a closely guarded secret.

Nearly 300 schools are involved, and big companies have joined in. Tetley Tea recently became a sponsor, with generous donations not only funding development but enabling each and every letter recipient to enjoy a free cuppa as they read.

“It’s perfect,” says Mea, who now employs two full-time staff, plus a small army of casuals, contractors and volunteers working across the Letterbox Project and Connected AU’s virtual hobby groups on gardening, books, health and wellness.

“We get lots of feedback, telling us how we’re making people feel visible and valued,” she adds. “It’s changing their lives, making them feel they’re part of a community, which is wonderful. And it’s phenomenal, the effort people put into their letters – beautiful handwriting, kids’ craft and artwork, trinkets, books and magazines – it just blows me away.”

And yes, it still makes her teary to read such heartfelt, thoughtful messages of support. “It’s not until you actually sit down with a pen to write to somebody that you think, ‘What do I say to them? How do I make them feel better?’ It’s really revealing of yourself and it changes you. It impacts the letter writers as well as the recipients,” she muses.

For the future, Mea aims to make Connected AU a household name in the preventative health space, included on the enrolment forms for every aged-care and disability home, involving every one of Australia’s 537 local councils.

And surely she’ll achieve her goals. “It’s been an amazing 12 months,” Mea reflects. “A lot has happened; lots of ups and downs, like everyone during the pandemic. Everyone learnt a lot about themselves with COVID last year, and I was no different.”

For more, visit connectedau.com.au