Latest news with #Bellamy
Perth Now
2 days ago
- Sport
- Perth Now
Storm star set to miss Titans after ugly Origin outing
Skipper Harry Grant is set to sit out Melbourne's NRL clash with Gold Coast after his State of Origin shocker. The star hooker was the only member of the Storm's Origin contingent to return to Melbourne from Brisbane, given Saturday's clash is a Titans home game at Cbus Super Stadium. Cameron Munster, Xavier Coates, Trent Loiero and Stefano Utoikamanu all remained in Queensland, with Melbourne players joining them later on Friday. Despite flying home Grant was a notable absence from their captain's run. He went into Origin I on Wednesday night with just 55 minutes game time in six weeks under his belt due a hamstring injury, and turned in his worst ever performance as Queensland lost 18-6. With Bellamy on the NSW coaching staff, the Blues forwards targeted the 27-year-old, forcing him into 43 tackles which emptied his fuel tank, with Grant making only five runs for 23 metres. Bellamy was cagey about his captain facing the Titans before conceding it was unlikely. "Obviously he (Grant) hasn't played much footy," Bellamy said Friday. "He's OK physically ... like the others, he's disappointed in the result as you would be. "He seems OK this morning, I haven't ruled him out at the moment but he's probably doubtful, to be quite honest, especially with the amount of footy he hasn't played. "We're just trying to do what we think is best for tomorrow afternoon but also do what's right by the players too. "We'll see how they are when we get up there ... see how they're feeling." Burly centre Jack Howarth could make a return from six weeks out with a shoulder dislocation after being named in the reserves. The youngster didn't look restricted by the injury but Bellamy said he hadn't done a lot of contact work. "He's (Howarth) got through most of the training without doing a whole heap of contact this week so it's another step up for him today." When Bellamy was the head NSW Origin coach from 2008-10 he spoke of discomfort plotting against his Storm players, including Cameron Smith, Billy Slater and Cooper Cronk. But taking on an advisory role to coach Laurie Daley rather than calling the shots, Bellamy said he "really enjoyed" the return to the Blues' box. "I wasn't in the camp the whole time ... it's obviously enjoyable when you get the win, they're a really good group of guys, staff and players." Both the Storm (fourth) and Titans (16th) are coming off the bye, with Melbourne looking for some consistency after trading wins and losses in the past six rounds. Bellamy said Gold Coast, who have the worst defensive record in the competition, had plenty of strike power. "They probably haven't got the results that they want and they've lost a few close games," he said. "They've come back a couple of times and won close games as well so they've certainly got some guys who can run the footy really well. "We just need to make sure we're aware of that tomorrow night and make sure our defence is up to scratch."
Irish Examiner
2 days ago
- General
- Irish Examiner
How falling deeply for someone could point to unresolved emotional issues
When you fall for someone, even if they barely know you exist, is it all-consuming? Do you ache for them, obsess over them, believe that you are meant to be together? Does an innocuous text from them make —or ruin — your day? Does your nervous system go haywire in their presence, reducing you to a stammering wreck? Do you have an acute need for them to reciprocate your feelings? Do you deify their good points, while ignoring their more mortal aspects? There are two common reactions to the above scenario, says neuroscientist Dr Tom Bellamy : 'That's not normal, these people are neurotic'; or 'That's just love'. If you identify with the second reaction, you could be, like Bellamy, a limerent — someone who falls in love obsessively. 'These people are a broad demographic — 'male, female, young, old, gay, straight, bi, asexual, poly, religious, atheist' — and Bellamy, having studied the area in depth, believes they make up about half of the general population: 'All ages, personality types, genders, sexualities, and ethnicities are susceptible.' Around 25% of those who have experienced limerence have found it 'so disruptive that it affected their enjoyment of life'. So is limerence a fancy word for love-sick? It was coined by psychology professor Dorothy Tennov in her 1979 book Love & Limerence: The Experience of Being In Love, and she defined limerence as 'a mental state of profound, involuntary, obsessive romantic infatuation with another person (termed the 'limerent object')'. For eight years, Bellamy, an honorary associate professor at the University of Nottingham, has been blogging anonymously about limerence, creating a community where others share similar experiences. The 49-year-old has recently published a book Smitten: Romantic Obsession, The Neuroscience of Limerence, & How to Make Love Last. It's dedicated to his wife — here's why. 'When my wife and I first met, we fell in to mutual limerence very strongly,' he says. 'We both had that consuming desire and intimate connection. Inevitably, the limerence wore off, and we navigated through that — we're very compatible, with companionate, affectionate love replacing the fireworks. We got married, had children, and were very happy.' Until Bellamy developed unwanted feelings for a colleague. Neuroscientist Dr Tom Bellamy: "I have a wife and family I love dearly — why was I obsessing about this other woman? By then, I'd found Dorothy Tennov's book, so I was able to tell my wife what I was going through.' 'It was such a shock to me to become limerent for someone else,' he says. 'It wasn't born of dissatisfaction. I was — and am — happily married. 'So it was a problem for me to solve. I have a wife and family I love dearly — why was I obsessing about this other woman? By then, I'd found Dorothy Tennov's book, so I was able to tell my wife what I was going through.' She related, identifying with the feelings of limerence she had experienced during the early stage of their relationship. 'That was transformative,' he says. 'It meant we were solving the problem together, as a team. "Obviously, it was painful, a difficult conversation, but she was able to understand the feelings, because she'd gone through it herself and recognised I was seeking support to deal with it, rather than doubting the marriage. I was being accountable. 'We were dealing with it from a mature and sober perspective. We got through it, the marriage continued, and we are still happy and in many ways stronger. We have a deeper understanding of how love changes and develops over time. It doesn't have to be giddy fireworks all the time.' Bellamy says that 'through benign neglect, you can make yourself vulnerable' to developing infatuations outside of your partnership. But he also acknowledges a 'midlife element' to his experience. 'It's not exactly a revelation that you have to look after a relationship,' he says. Nor did he ever disclose his feelings to the object of his limerence, but recognised them for what they were: One-sided and in his head. 'I realised very early on [these feelings] were a threat to my happiness rather than a thrilling, exciting adventure,' he says. 'But because it was a colleague, I couldn't go 'no contact' — I had to find a way to manage the limerence feelings.' Limerence is a mental state. 'You need to address it at that level,' Bellamy says. 'You're probably not going to be able to solve an unwanted limerence episode by engineering your environment or getting other people to fix the problem for you — it really is down to you to understand why you're responding to this person. They're obviously touching something deep in you to provoke this powerful response, this romantic infatuation.' He sees limerence as a person addiction: 'So it's about figuring out what you're doing that reinforces that addiction, and then disrupting it. That's what I was doing — finding ways to have a good professional relationship, and reverse the romantic infatuation, get things back on track.' The stuff of literature From childhood fairy tales to classic literature to contemporary cinema, our culture is built on stories that capture this intense yearning for blissful union. The foundation is limerence. From Rapunzel to Sleeping Beauty to Cinderella, handsome princes risk all for damsels in distress; from Cathy and Heathcliff to Connell and Marianne, we share the romantic agony of characters who pine for each other — often disastrously, in the case of Romeo and Juliet, Anna Karenina, Madame Butterfly, and Lolita's Humbert Humbert. Limerence drives movies from Brokeback Mountain to Notting Hill, Dr Zhivago to Truly Madly Deeply. The Martha character in Baby Reindeer, played by Jessica Gunning, embodies limerence gone badly wrong. Bellamy emphasises that 'limerence is an altered state of mind'. It is a psychological phenomenon, not a behaviour. Smitten by Dr Tom Bellamy 'Probably about half the population has the capacity to fall in to this altered mental state of addictive desire that changes the way they perceive the world,' Bellamy says. 'How any individual person responds to [limerent feelings] depends on their personality, their life experience, their relationship history, and childhood bonding experiences.' So while some people experiencing limerence may act upon their feelings (anything from instigating a positive relationship based on mutual limerence to stalking), others may pine from a distance, sometimes for decades. Bellamy terms this 'limerence limbo' — spending years stuck in an unrequited obsession, unable to move forward, but not wishing to relinquish hope. 'There isn't an archetypal limerent behaviour; it depends on the person going through it,' he says. 'The universal aspect of limerence is the neuroscience basis of it — our reward system, bonding system, arousal system can get pushed in to this hyperactivated state.' Most remember their first crush — exhausting, exhilarating, all-consuming. Pure limerence. Is it essentially juvenile, something we outgrow? 'Limerence usually first manifests in adolescence, so if you have this capacity, it's when you first feel it,' says Bellamy. 'It's more than a crush. Crushes tend not to flip over in to an involuntary, intrusive state, like an addiction. "Not everyone can self-regulate, because the reward is so powerful — with addiction, the brain's reward circuit gets strengthened, while at the same time the brain's executive feedback, which should be regulating and moderating our desire, gets weakened. 'So maybe people who maintain limerence in to adulthood never adapt, never manage moderation. But if you are emotionally mature and secure, you can weather limerence.' Initially, this was not his experience. 'I wasn't entirely in control — I was in an addiction, and it was a struggle to resist and moderate it. Another contradiction is that you can realise intellectually that you don't want to be with that person and yet are drawn to them with a powerful sense of attraction and connection.' Casual sex or something more? Despite limerence sounding like the drawing-room pining of 19th-century literature, it can be exacerbated by contemporary online dating culture. 'It's a lot easier to connect with people and then ghost them, and that kind of emotional whiplash can make limerence worse,' says Bellamy. 'The thing that drives limerence in to that state of addiction and fixation is a combination of hope and uncertainty. "If you've got hope that the other person may reciprocate, then you'll continue to seek that reward — and if there's uncertainty, you can't psychologically adapt to the situation, because you're never quite sure about the strength of the connection, which can drive you in to rumination.' The hook-up culture is a powerful reinforcement, 'especially if you have sex and all the physiological things happen — oxytocin release and so on', he says. 'But if they then treat you casually or ghost you, you end up in a situationship. Is this a special bond or a booty call? 'You'll be getting periodic hope, reinforcement and reward, but it's unpredictable and mixed with occasional disappointment. 'That's almost the perfect combination of factors to drive you in to a state of addiction — you can't adapt to it, your reward system never habituates, so you feel anxious and uncertain.' So, how to stop developing limerent feelings for others? A third of Bellamy's book is devoted to getting rid of limerence, breaking the habit, overcoming it with a specific person, and moving on. He suggests cognitive behavioural therapy for individuals, and couples therapy if the limerence spills in to your relationship. 'First solve the crisis, then figure out why it happened,' he says. Getting rid of limerence involves remembering that it is happening in your head, not real life; that you are making your limerent object special (it's all about you, not them). So manage your instincts — your rational brain needs to step in and take charge — and don't self-medicate, he advises. You're in charge. Anticipate some pain during the recovery process, and believe that a better life awaits. Remember, it's all in your head. For a deeper dive, visit Bellamy's blog, where you'll find other limerent people, at Or check out or the private Facebook support group
7NEWS
2 days ago
- Business
- 7NEWS
Brooki Bakehouse owner Brooke Bellamy announces new Brisbane and Gold Coast stores alongside international pop-up in UAE
Celebrity baker Brooke Bellamy has announced a string of new stores following plagiarism allegations earlier this year. The Brisbane -based cookie influencer is set to open two new stores in Queensland next month, as well as a new international pop-up store. The new stores in Queensland will be located at Pacific Fair shopping centre in Broadbeach on the Gold Coast and at Westfield Garden City in Upper Mt Gravatt. The international pop-up will open in the UAE by the end of the year, following other successful pop-ups in the Middle East. accused Brooke Bellamy, who founded Brooki Bakehouse, of reproducing recipes from the RecipeTin Eats website and other authors in her book Bake With Brooki. Sally McKenney, the baker behind Sally's Baking Addiction, also accused Bellamy of copying a recipe. Bellamy and Penguin Random House Australia, which published the book, denied the allegations. 'This is a story about a multimillion-dollar cookbook by a social media influencer, published by a blue-chip publisher, featuring numerous recipes that, in my opinion, are plagiarised, given the detailed and extensive word-for-word similarities to mine and those of other authors,' Maehashi said at the time. Bellamy addressed the controversy on Saturday, announcing she was ready to get back to her bakery. 'I've never experienced something like I have over the last few weeks,' she told her two million supporters on TikTok. 'When I was invited to make a cookbook, I was really excited to share all the recipes I've been making since I was small.' Bellamy said while she had been inspired and influenced by bakeries and bakers the world over, her biggest inspiration was her mother, who taught her how to cook and bake. 'These recipes have been written down on paper, handed to me by friends and family, they get passed down by generations, they get scaled up and scaled down in the bakery settings. 'While all of these recipes are personal to me, I cannot say that I have invented the cookies, cupcakes, brownies, or cakes in the recipe book. 'They are all inspired from somewhere and someone before me.' Brooki Bakehouse's celebrated its third birthday on Saturday at their Valley location in Brisbane, with people lining up in the early hours of the morning for free cookies and to snap a picture with Bellamy. There are no known legal proceedings against Bellamy at this time.
Sydney Morning Herald
2 days ago
- Entertainment
- Sydney Morning Herald
He's the angriest coach in the NRL. But Craig Bellamy lightened up for Origin
With a camera crew following his every move, Craig Bellamy last year revealed the game-day angst he has carried his whole career. Despite having coached more than 500 NRL matches, Stan's Revealed - Craig Bellamy: Inside the Storm documentary lifted the lid on how nerves frequently make the hours before a game almost unbearable for one of rugby league's greatest ever mentors. On Wednesday night, clutching a Jim Beam and cola (no Queensland sugarcane champagne, thank you) in the Suncorp sheds, Bellamy toasted the Blues' grinding 18-6 Origin I victory, and Laurie Daley. And for once, a pleasurable game-day experience. Bellamy, Daley's sounding board in the coach's box, made sure he sat largely out of sight of Channel 9's cameras. And revelled in the fact it was someone else going through the emotional wringer only a head coach can truly understand. A coach's burden can be a cruel and unusual punishment. An incredible investment in the 17 players in the middle, so much work poured into them, their game plan and every possible scenario … and then you have to watch on, largely unable to influence proceedings any further beyond interchanges and relayed messages. 'So I was well-behaved,' Bellamy grinned. No blow-ups, he swears. Daley confirms.
The Age
2 days ago
- Entertainment
- The Age
He's the angriest coach in the NRL. But Craig Bellamy lightened up for Origin
With a camera crew following his every move, Craig Bellamy last year revealed the game-day angst he has carried his whole career. Despite having coached more than 500 NRL matches, Stan's Revealed - Craig Bellamy: Inside the Storm documentary lifted the lid on how nerves frequently make the hours before a game almost unbearable for one of rugby league's greatest ever mentors. On Wednesday night, clutching a Jim Beam and cola (no Queensland sugarcane champagne, thank you) in the Suncorp sheds, Bellamy toasted the Blues' grinding 18-6 Origin I victory, and Laurie Daley. And for once, a pleasurable game-day experience. Bellamy, Daley's sounding board in the coach's box, made sure he sat largely out of sight of Channel 9's cameras. And revelled in the fact it was someone else going through the emotional wringer only a head coach can truly understand. A coach's burden can be a cruel and unusual punishment. An incredible investment in the 17 players in the middle, so much work poured into them, their game plan and every possible scenario … and then you have to watch on, largely unable to influence proceedings any further beyond interchanges and relayed messages. 'So I was well-behaved,' Bellamy grinned. No blow-ups, he swears. Daley confirms.
