About

My story

Born and brought up in India, with three generations of my family born in India or (what’s now) Pakistan, I felt at home in a country where I looked different to the majority Asian population, but felt an alien when I returned to the UK despite looking like the majority white population. Stories of culture, race and religion play an important part in my family history.

During our early years in India and Africa, my family and I lived with with civil unrest and civil war. I then attended a UK boarding school from the age of 12, started living in England aged 19, and became a single parent at 25. In my early fifties, I was diagnosed and treated for Breast Cancer, and became a mature student, all while working full-time and helping to care for my father at home.

An NLP Practitioner, with diplomas in a range of psychology related subjects, a Mental Health First Aider and MHFA Trainer, I’m a life-long sufferer with depression, so self-care has become more than a hashtag to me – it provides a framework for living well. When I write on these subjects it is with the aim of sharing my knowledge and learnings as a fellow traveler rather than an expert. I’ve spent enough time walking this walk to know there’s no one-size-fits-all solution, so I’m here to share with and learn from my fellow travelers.