Walking into a lesson with bare feet and a top splattered with the tomato-based pasta sauce I had for lunch wasn’t my finest moment.

Yet that’s exactly what happened last Wednesday when I slammed shut the front door to my flat, before hurtling down the stairs two at a time to grab the things I needed for my next lesson from the car.

It was only when I got there and the door handles wouldn’t open that I realised I didn’t have my keys and had, in fact, locked myself out.

So as well as having no keys, I had no shoes, no jumper to keep warm, no phone and no money. All I had were the stained clothes I was standing in.

And, suddenly, I felt very vulnerable indeed.

Because when you’ve got nothing, you realise you can’t do much at all, unless kind-hearted strangers see you’re in difficulty and help you out.

Even then it takes someone special to look past the greasy hair – I was planning on having a shower once I’d collected the books, felt tips and photos from the car – and tramp-like appearance as you ask for a free coffee and some bus money so that you can at least get to where you’re meant to be at which point people you know can step in and give you a hand.

As I walked gingerly along the pavement, concentrating hard on avoiding shards of broken glass and dog muck, I was aware that I was being watched. And not in a good way, either.

Although no one had said anything, I felt the weight of their silence while they made all kinds of inaccurate assumptions about me and my lifestyle. It’s fair to say I didn’t like it one bit.

It made me feel ashamed and as if I’d committed a much more serious crime than leaving my keys inside the flat. It also made it that much more difficult to ask for help knowing some people had already made up their minds about me and averted their eyes when I asked if they could pay for my bus ticket.

And, despite my mental discomfort, it was right then that I realised how lucky I was.

That’s because my situation was temporary. All I had to do was get to work (I couldn’t not turn up because I had no way of calling the school to cancel the lesson), laughingly explain to everyone the pickle I’d got myself into, get a lift to a friend’s house and camp outside their front door for a couple of hours until they came back home, knowing that my problems would soon be solved.

Being able to have a hot shower, climb into clean clothes that my friend had got out of her wardrobe, drink the wine that had been opened and munch on pizza that had been ordered as I sank into the sofa that was about to become my makeshift bed for the night was nothing short of bliss.

And I couldn’t help but draw parallels with a similar scene that took place three years ago, shortly after my brother killed himself.

The friends were different but on that occasion they’d run the bath, pulled out my pyjamas, forced a glass of wine into my hand, and plated up a roast dinner, making sure I ate it, before pushing seconds, multivitamins and a pudding onto me in a bid to build up my strength.

It wasn’t a question of asking; I was near mute at the time, nodding or shaking my head before the tears would spill again. They simply understood they needed to mother me, feeding me nutritious meals and reducing any decision-making to a minimum.

I’m also lucky because when I was at breaking point from the stress of Matt’s suicide, I could count on my small group of chore friends to be there day in and day out and to listen – really listen – about the stress I was experiencing.

Not everyone has that option. Why is it so much harder for boys and men? Why is it that I can talk easily about my emotions whereas my brother, who shared 50 per cent of my DNA, could not?

Did he fear being judged, a bit like I did when I was walking barefoot along the road? Was he too embarrassed to speak out about his suicidal feelings? Or was he so intent on killing himself, it wasn’t up for discussion in the first place?

It’s not as if he lacked people to talk to. His closest friends were the people he’d met at college when they were fresh-faced 16-year-olds. Nineteen years later, it was those friends who came around after they’d found out Matt had hanged himself and it was them who stayed behind after the wake and paid for us all to have dinner in the pub.

It’s something I often wonder about as I move out of the fog of grief and back to normal, mundane, day-to-day living in which I’m far more busy balancing my work and social life than thinking about my brother.

As for me, the tomato stains have never come out of that top, despite using every stain remover trick available on Google.

I haven’t thrown it out, though. I’m keeping it for posterity reasons.

Should there be a time in the future when I’m feeling out of sorts, I’ll only have to look at the t-shirt to remember how lucky I am.

I’m walking 30 miles across the South Downs in May 2013 to raise £2,000 for Winston’s Wish. Your donation can really make a difference. Please sponsor me here