About Me

First and foremost, I am a mother of three from Surrey.  However, my career paths have been wide and varied and make for an ‘interesting’ CV. 

As a child, I was always passionate about performing and at 16 chose to follow that path at full time Theatre Arts College.  By 19, I was working as a self-employed dancer, trawling the London audition scene with the thousands of other starry-eyed wanna-be’s.  I’d say the constant stream of rejection was undoubtedly a character builder and I eventually had some success working both at home and abroad. 

By the grand old age of 23, I had met a man who I thought might be ‘the one’ and my ambitions started to evolve into ones that included stability, a home of my own, and starting a family. At 25, I chose to retrain as a chef at Tante Marie Culinary Academy, without much of a thought of what I might do with my qualification but a vague idea that cooking must be a more reliable source of income than dancing?!

As it happened, it wasn’t a bad call.  After completing my diploma, I set up a small catering company and very quickly found myself working as a private chef for premiership footballers, company directors, and entrepreneurs, providing anything from fresh family meals to canapes and buffet menus.  This led to being offered the lease to a café in Knaphill which was by far my biggest career challenge to date. I loved running the café but in our second year of business, I found myself getting married, buying our first house, and becoming pregnant with our first child within the space of three months.  Towards the end of my pregnancy, I sold the café knowing that I didn’t have the capacity to give it the time and energy it needed whilst I had a newborn and so, my journey into motherhood began.

Since returning to work after my first maternity leave, I’ve worked in childcare either as a private Nanny or OFSTED registered childminder.  My children have been brought up alongside countless others and I consider myself very lucky to have been able to work and be at home all at the same time.

The birth of my third child came just before lockdown. I was fortunate enough to receive wonderful maternity care from a case-loading team which showed me that all women could have a better birth if given support and continuity of care from a person or team that they trust. This led me to become part of the team at The Mumma’s Village, who run antenatal and newborn classes providing evidence-based education and support for new parents.

Looking at my life and work experience planted a seed of thought that I could support families on a one-to-one basis, which led me to complete the last missing piece of the puzzle by training with Developing Doulas.  My training taught me so many things that I wasn’t expecting.  I realised that I have been a doula in different senses for a long time now and that being a woman who could enhance another mother’s life and lift her up to find her own strength is just about the most wonderful career I could have.