About Amir, Senior Video Producer at IMPRESSIVE Film
[ Who is Amir ]
My name is Amir, and I am the Senior Video Producer at IMPRESSIVE Film.
My life has been shaped by loss, trauma, migration, illness, rebuilding and love, and these experiences guide how I communicate for healthcare organisations today. I create video communication with empathy, clarity and purpose because I understand these stories from the inside.
A Life Shaped by Loss, Resilience and Understanding
When I was nearly five years old, and my brother was just one year and four days old, our father, a fighter pilot, gave his life in the war. His sacrifice changed our lives long before I understood what loss truly meant.
At that time, trauma and childhood grief were not recognised the way we understand them today. We continued life carrying emotional weight we did not yet have the language to describe.
My mother was only 23 when she lost her husband. Yet she found the strength to protect us, raise us and create a sense of safety within circumstances that were anything but safe.
Early Life, Loss and the Foundations of Resilience
Years later, my mum remarried, and her new marriage brought warmth, stability and healing back into our lives. Her husband stepped into our world with humility and kindness, not to replace the father we lost, but to help rebuild what had been broken.
The man she married became one of the kindest and most genuine people I have known. He entered our lives with humility and love, not to replace the father we lost, but to bring warmth and stability to the silence left behind. He supported us, guided us, and healed parts of our family that had been broken for years.
New Chapters, New Hopes!
What began as the idea of a stepfather became the reality of a true father, someone we trust completely and someone we proudly call Dad. Their marriage also brought a sister into our lives, a gift who completed our family in ways we could never have imagined.
Alongside my family, another person has shaped my life profoundly, my wife. We have been together for more than 22 years, and she has stood beside me through every trauma, every migration, every challenge, and every moment of rebuilding. Her kindness, strength, and unwavering support carried me through moments I could not have survived alone. She is one of the greatest blessings of my life.
But trauma does not disappear simply because life becomes beautiful. It travels quietly through the years.
When I left Iran for my first migration, travelling through Malaysia to study filmmaking before building a new life in New Zealand, I believed I was simply following my passion. I did not realise that I was carrying unresolved grief, emotional strain, and the silent impact of childhood trauma.
Then life changed again.
The Diagnosis That Transformed My Life
In 2011, as I was completing my Master’s in Filmmaking, I was diagnosed with Hodgkin Lymphoma. My wife was by my side, supporting me with strength that still humbles me. We were overseas alone, far from our families. Overnight, everything we had built came to a stop. We returned to Iran so I could begin surgeries, biopsies, chemotherapy, and a long period of fear and uncertainty that reshaped me completely.
Cancer did not only affect my physical health, it revealed the emotional and mental layers I had carried for years. It showed me how deeply connected our emotional world is to our physical health.
I learned how it feels to be a patient, physically.
I learned how fear settles into the body.
I learned how families struggle quietly while trying to stay strong.
I learned how hope and fear can sit side by side in the same moment.
Rebuilding Life Through Migration and Healing
After surviving cancer, my wife and I rebuilt our lives once again, this time in Australia, our second migration.
Migration itself is mentally and emotionally demanding, but migration after illness becomes something deeper. Starting again in a new country taught me resilience, empathy, humility, and a more profound understanding of human vulnerability.
And today, life continues to teach me.
I am now supporting my father as he faces stage IV Lung Cancer. This time, the weight is different. My father is in our country,Iran with my mother, while each of us, his children, are in different parts of the world. My brother lives in Italy, my sister in Germany, and my wife and I live here in Australia.
We are far from home, far from our parents, trying our best to support them from a distance. We struggle every day to balance our lives with the emotional burden of not being able to stand physically beside them during the hardest moments.
This completes a full circle in my life, at least up until today, and none of us know what life will place in front of us next.
I know the experience of being a patient, physically.
I know the experience of being family to a patient.
I know the experience of being traumatised mentally, and
I know the lifelong impact of that trauma on the mind, the heart, and the body.
Why I Am Sharing This Story With You?
I do not share this story for sympathy or to turn hardship into qualification. I share it because every chapter of this journey shaped the way I see people, the way I understand fear, and the way I value life.
Filmmaking has been my anchor since I was 19 years old. Today, at 43, it remains my language, my purpose, and the way I make meaning of the world. Through every trauma, every migration, every illness, every moment of rebuilding, and every fear my family continues to face, storytelling has been the way I breathe and the way I connect with others.
My personal journey and my professional journey shaped each other.
They taught me to pay attention to what people feel but cannot express.
They taught me to respect silence, struggle, and vulnerability.
They taught me that in healthcare, communication is not just information, it is humanity.
I understand three realities from lived experience:
I understand patients because I have been one.
I understand families because I am one.
I understand trauma because I have lived with it since childhood.
I understand healthcare professionals because I see the emotional weight they carry and the responsibility they hold for human lives.
You as a healthcare and clinical professional, support people in their most vulnerable moments. You bring comfort, clarity and care. Your message deserves to be communicated with the same humanity you offer every day.
I am here to help you share it with clarity, dignity and heart.