Charmaine Tucker had her hands full – with family life and as chief executive of Lombard Odier Trust (Bermuda) Ltd, a Swiss private bank with offices here. But as she neared 50, her thoughts kept turning to how she might do more.

At the forefront were her female friends and the conversations they had. Ms Tucker started a list – of topics and experts who could speak on them – and sent an invite out to her contacts.

The initial meeting took place in February 2020. The plan was to follow up on the first Friday of every month but when the time came, Ms Tucker was in hospital undergoing surgery for lung cancer. She was thrilled that the meetings carried on in her absence.

“When I came back after my surgery, the world had changed and the first Friday then turned to a Zoom type of thing, which really worked out because then I could speak to friends all over the world,” she said.

Beauty, finance and menopause are among the topics that have been discussed with the number of participants ranging from 12 to close to 100 at a time.

In November, Ms Tucker is opening it up to the public with a talk featuring Laterras Whitfield, an actor, Emmy-nominated film-maker and host of the Dear Future Wifey podcast.

It is the first of many events she hopes to host through Women of Living Water Global Ltd, the company she set up in September.

“What I want to do is to have events, do retreats and trips, those sorts of things. It’s just about getting together like-minded women to talk about various issues.”

Although her plan centres around women, she thought Mr Whitfield an appropriate guest because his podcast is all about relationships.

“There are a lot of over-50, over-40 singles here,” she said. “So he's coming to Bermuda and we will have an event at the Willowbank Conference Centre with a live podcast.”

She has also lined up a panel of Bermudians to weigh in: a married couple, a single over 40, a widow, a divorcée and a relationship coach.

“Many women are afraid or ashamed to share their stories, past or present. They feel unworthy and undeserving of any good thing. Many women put everyone and everything else before themselves. WOLW is a platform where women give themselves permission to be the priority. WOLW is primarily geared for the 50-plus woman who is looking at where she is and possibly, where she wants to go next. She is taking stock of what is the next season for her financially, physically, mentally and spiritually.

“Our mission is transforming and connecting lives in a safe space so that women realise that they are not alone in their circumstance. We want to reinforce and remind each woman that there is encouragement, support and inspiration in speaking and hearing the experiences of others without judgment.”

The name Women of Living Water comes from the New Testament of the Bible that tells the story of the Samaritan woman who had to fetch water from a wall at a different time than everyone else because she had a “cloudy past that people knew about and would talk about her”.

“Basically, what I'm saying through this group is that we may think that we have things that we're ashamed of, or things that we're going through that we think [are happening to] only us. We deal with these situations alone but in actual fact, there are others. There's a community of people that can be there to help you.”

She had seen evidence of it herself. After she shared the story of her lung cancer journey with The Royal Gazette, a man explained how it led him to get tested and “actually saved his life”.

“So, through us sharing our stories, it helps other people in ways you don't realise. I might be having issues with my husband or with my children and I'm keeping that to myself because I don't want anybody to know when in actual fact [when you share a person might say], ‘You know what, I went through that before and this is how I dealt with it. This is what I did.’

“It's really about the sisterhood; sharing our stories and sharing our truth and being able to help one another through those things.”

The topics for discussion are selected at the beginning of the year with a friend, Carmen Adebiyi.

“We meet at the end of the year and come up with 12 or 14 topics and then we find some persons who can help us to support it. So for instance, we talked about beauty and I got Kisha Tyrrell, [the founder of] Enzuri Beauty … I talked with Laurie Shiell, [the executive director of Centre Against Abuse], when we did something on physical and mental abuse of women. It's just been word of mouth. This is the first time we're getting somebody who we have to pay for.”

She does it all because it is something she feels is very much needed.

“We don't talk enough about diversity and women's issues and they are things that I'm really passionate about,” she said in a call while working from Geneva, Switzerland. “And us speaking our truth and us getting things solved together is driving me, so I find the time.”

• Women of Living Water Global Limited presents Dear Future Wifey in Bermuda, featuring Laterras Whitfield on November 18 at Willowbank Resort & Conference Centre. A gospel brunch takes place the next day. Tickets are available on www.gpass.bm. Follow Women of Living Water on Instagram and Facebook