I'm from Carlow, a rural part of South-East Ireland. I always had trouble making friends and my school days were horrible. I suffered from social anxiety for many years, probably because of bullies.
I finished school in 2010 and basically stayed in my house for fours years. I only left to see my grandmother or to go to the doctor.
I started writing jokes on Twitter in 2012 and it was my only source of social interaction. I made wonderful friends online, many of them are based in London.
In June 2014, I decided that I would get help for my anxiety/shyness.
I went to see a therapist a few times and things started getting much better. I used a phone for almost the first time - something which terrified me and I phoned two wonderful women I met online - this was the first step for me. I then went to a shop alone for the first time in many years and all of a sudden, these little things didn't seem so scary.
In August 2014, my friend I had only met online, told me I should come to London - something which I finally started thinking would be possible. She told me that she was going away with her boyfriend for a fortnight and asked if I'd like to look after her house and cats for a couple of weeks, I said yes and it was possibly the best decision I've ever made.
On the 23rd of September, I got on a train for the first time and went up to Dublin - it looked exciting as I had never been in a city centre before. I boarded a ferry from Dublin to Holyhead. I then took a train which went to Chester, Crewe, Milton Keynes and finally Euston. I could feel an overwhelming excitement building up deep inside me as I got closer to London.
I got onto the tube and I was amazing by there being one every few minutes. After 30 minutes of getting lost, I finally found my way. I got off the tube and walked for a few minutes, it was 10.30 and I saw Tower Bridge. It felt like a dream, I couldn't take in how amazing everything was.
I got to the house where I was staying after asking 3 people for directions despite it being a 10 minute walk in a straight line from the tube station.
One of the reasons went to London to see if my anxiety could handle it, I knew if I could, that I'd be able to do anything. The other reason was to meet the wonderful people I had spoken to for months and in some cases, years previously.
I met about 25 people I've known from Twitter. Everyone was absolutely amazing and going to London was probably the best decision of my life as I was independent from my parents for the first time in my life and it was great to realise that I was able to support myself.
I had hoped to get my first kiss (yes, ever!) but that didn't work out as I wasn't brave enough, it doesn't really matter though because I've made tons of amazing friends and I'm now no longer terrified of speaking to women.
I have returned home now and everything seems so dull in comparison to the buzz in Soho every night. I went to Soho seven times and it's now my favourite place in the World. I am now trying to find a job and work hard so I can one day move to London.
Thanks to London, I now feel I have the confidence to do anything and I made my stand-up comedy debut in Dublin on November 28th 2014.
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