Hello
Welcome
My breastfeeding journey started 24 years ago with these amazing three children. The highs and lows of feeding them inspired me to completely change my career path and train as a breastfeeding counsellor
with Child Birth International in 2011 and qualify as an International Board Certified Lactation Consultant in 2024.
During the last decade I have learnt so much about supporting families in a variety of settings. After volunteering for a year at a breastfeeding support group, I worked for over 3 years with the health visitors in Kingston-Upon-Thames where we visited families at home and ran breastfeeding drop-in groups. I then set up my private business, ran a breastfeeding support group in a local children's centre and helped them develop a peer support service and chaired the Maternity Voices Partership at Kingston Hospital.
After the children centre was closed, I established a charity (Spelthorne Breastfeeding Friends) which continues to train volunteers who support mother in the Borough of Spelthorne and on the postnatal ward of St Peter's Hospital.
For the last 5 I have worked on the Infant Feeding Team at Chelsea and Westminster and West Middlesex Hospitals and co-ordinated the Tongue Tie service at Chelsea and Westminster Hospital.
Last year I completed the UNICEF leaders qualification and now I am a qualified Lactation Consultant and I am expanding my private practice again.
In my spare time, you can find me in my garden or walking my dog. I dabble in some open-water swimming and I am currently learning more about mindfulness and positive psychology.
I am very interested in the importance of a healthy gut microbiome (a complex ecosystem of trillions of different microorganisms) which plays an important role in many aspects of nutrition and health.
If you are interested in how birth and breastfeeding can influence your baby's gut microbiome and their long term health have a look at this mini course
https://microbirth.teachable.com/p/taster
If you want to find out more about how the food we eat can influence our gut microbiome have a look at this leading research
https://zoe.com/whitepapers/gut-microbiome
Research shows that a mother's diet before and during pregnancy affects the development of her child's gut microbiota. If you would like someone to support you with improving the way you eat head here
Throughout the material on this website, I use the term ‘breastfeeding’. This is because many of the courses I have attended include this term in the title, most of the research I refer to and use to inform my practice has historically been in people identified as ‘breastfeeding’ and this reflects the client group I have served over many years. However, readers can substitute this term for ‘chest feeding’ or any other term they prefer. I offer help and support to all parents regardless of feeding method, including those who are combination feeding, exclusively pumping or fully formula feeding and regardless of whether they identify as ‘breastfeeding’, ‘chest feeding’ or ‘bottle feeding.’
Just launched!
Buy my mini course for tips on how to assess your baby's oral function yourself - have the language and confidence to communicate clearly and get to the bottom of your feeding challenges