A mum who survived the Manchester Arena bombing five years ago completely turned her life round after the attack — and is now helping others do the same.
Julie Edwards, 49, went to the Ariana Grande concert with her now-14-year-old daughter Lily. She remembers the night all too well.
“Lily was so excited, she was only nine at the time and it was her first big concert,” she explained. “We parked at the arena and arrived early, taking our seats five or six steps down from the Concourse in the arena. Lily was absolutely loving it - singing and dancing to every song.
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“When Ariana finished I took Lily’s hand and we started making our way out of the arena, I looked down at her and asked if she had a good night and as she replied there was this huge explosion. The noise was like nothing I’d ever heard before, and we felt the power of it.
“It was like everything froze and time stopped. Then suddenly I heard a man’s voice shout ‘run’ and everyone turned around and started to run. It was chaos, I just gripped Lily tight and ran as fast as we could. We came out of the steps near the taxi rank at Victoria train station, and people were tripping everywhere. No one knew what to do.
“I’d parked my car inside the Arena, but I looked down at Lily and just decided we had to keep running. At one point she looked at me and said ‘I don’t want to die mummy.’ We were both so scared.
“Part of me wondered if I was being overcautious, and should return for my car, but I had an awful feeling inside me that something wasn’t right. So, we kept running until we got to Deansgate and I flagged down a taxi, I still had no information about what had happened.”
Julie and Lily made their way home to Marple, Stockport, it was during this journey that more information started to be released from the night. The pair arrived home at one o’clock in the morning and Julie put Lily to bed.
Unfortunately in the weeks following the attack, Lily started to show signs of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) Julie immediately got her help from the doctors and the Manchester Hub. Julie added: “It was heart-breaking seeing how much it had affected Lily. I am always so grateful that physically neither of us were harmed and we got out alive, but there are emotional wounds that were caused that night.
“The Manchester Hub were amazing and Lily had counselling. After around a year we could see that she was improving, as a mother I’d been focusing on her and so when she was better I really started to feel the impact of the attack which I had private counselling for.
“I can see how much this has impacted us, but in many ways, it’s made us both so much stronger. Lily has gone from strength to strength and she uses her experience to help other people at school who may be struggling with their mental health.”
It wasn’t the only change that Julie made, with the mum from Marple deciding to leave her corporate career and retrain as a support worker and also as a Samaritan, helping people in distress. Five years after she was supposed to run the Great Manchester Run, Julie will run with her son Jack.
It’s all in aid of the Once Upon A Smile charity as it’s a local charity that helps bereaved families of children, which offered support to the family of Saffie Rose, who was just eight years old when died as one of the 22 arena victims. “I feel so sad for everyone who has lost their lives in the attack, but the death of Saffie Rose really shook me because Lily was a similar age as her,” Julie went on.
“As a mum, I just had so much sympathy for Saffie Rose’s mother and family, the injustice of all of the deaths really impacted me. That’s why we’ve chosen to run for the charity so that other bereaved families can get the help that they need.” Julie will take part in the Great Manchester Run 10k the day after her son Jack finishes the Junior Great Manchester Run, her partner Jamin and daughter Lily will be there to cheer them on.
There’s still time to join, visit greatrun.org/Manchester .
