My background
Most of my professional career has been spent as a user experience researcher and design consultant in healthcare and public services. I worked in clinical trials in the NHS, helping people make informed decisions about taking part in research. I also worked on research about sensitive topics such as breast cancer screening and mental health inequities due to racism, and involved people with lived experience in creating solutions.
I’ve navigated these spaces as a neurodivergent woman of Black British and Caribbean heritage from a working-class background. I know what it’s like to be underestimated, and I’ve learned how to advocate effectively for myself and others in these systems.
Why I became a doula
After I gave birth, I told people I could have scaled Mount Everest in a raincoat and it wouldn’t have come close to how incredible I felt. I never expected to feel that way. Before my first midwifery appointment, I was so frightened of birth that my idea of a positive one was being unconscious for most of it.
With in-depth preparation and individualised support from my midwife, I found coping strategies for labour and began to see that it could be positive. But time and again I heard from people left traumatised and demoralised by their births. The trauma wasn’t so much about how their baby arrived. It was the feeling that things were done to them, not with them, and that they didn’t understand why.
I felt a strong calling to learn more and to support people in preparing for this season of their lives. That’s why I became a doula.
Read my full story
Training
- Full spectrum doula training with The Original Birth Connection
- HypnoBirthing® – The Mongan Method with The HypnoBirthing Institute