I grew up in Hull, in a family where art wasn't a career path so much as a way of getting through, and that's still how I see it. I trained in printed textiles and surface pattern, worked in-house design and as a freelancer for years, and along the way picked up a late ADHD diagnosis and a bipolar disorder diagnosis after postpartum psychosis. None of that sits outside my work. It's the reason the work exists.
Doodling started as something I did next to my daughter, alongside her, no end product in mind. That became Happy Doodles: an emotional wellbeing programme that uses accessible drawing to help children and communities build the language for how they feel, one line at a time. I write and illustrate books too, including Bipolar Blob, because I believe complicated feelings deserve simple, honest pictures.
I don't come at this as a clinician or an expert looking in. I come at it as someone who's lived it, process over product, peer-led not top-down, sitting alongside rather than teaching down to. Working class creativity, to me, has never been about talent as a luxury. It's a human need, and one of the few tools I've always had free access to.