A quote you live by? 

I don’t have a quote, but now I feel that I need a quote! I want a quote. Things that I say over and over again — so more mantras than quotes — are:

Kindness, always.

You can sleep when you are dead.

Happiness is not a destination.

My mum would want me to accept that the grass is not greener, I’m working on it!

Three key values that guide your life choices

Unconditional and boundless love (which is bloody exhausting but exhilarating).

Honesty is the best policy (although not always the one you want to choose!)

How will the other person feel?

Your proudest moment as a practitioner

There have been many, I feel truly privileged. My favourites are definitely when you get to see the realisation from a child or young person that there IS another way, that they DO matter and they are worth their weight in gold (and silver, and bronze and precious stones!) A proud and key moment for me was helping a 12-year-old beautiful young lady become adopted by her foster carers. She had sadly lost her mum, her birth family did not recognise her worth and she was so desperate to belong and be part of a family. To give her what she needed went against the grain of the practice culture, but we took that battle on together, and we won! On the day of the adoption hearing I felt like a spare part, this was confusing for me as we had such a strong and trusting relationship and that’s when I realised my job was done. She did not need me as her corporate parent anymore, she had what she needed, a place to belong and love. Beauty personified. 

Your proudest moment as a trainer

These are still building thick and fast. I love to see practitioners take a breath, think about why they are social workers and realise all the good that they are doing. It makes me so proud to be able to fire up that passion and set them off on a mission of empowerment and hopefulness (even if it only lasts momentarily!) I feel inspired and humbled when I hear of practitioners using our approach and feeling and seeing the difference that they had in that encounter, or how thinking about something in a different way has made a real impact. A comment in an evaluation that made me smile from the inside was “this training has given me my wings back that I thought were clipped, I cannot wait to fly high.”

The things you learnt through working with others

Listen, listen but then really listen. Be curious of alternate views and be open to be influenced by others. Be willing to evolve and learn from those around you. Be brave and courageous, “shy birds get nowt”. I don’t know where I have got this from and I say it all the time, oh look I do have a quote!

What makes you laugh?

Life, like literally I can find humour in most things, its my coping strategy! I particularly love silly humour and being a mother of two small boys you can imagine the current theme of words in our house! I love to laugh, I love to laugh so much that you cant see because your face is all screwed up and the tears are streaming down your face. I laugh like this with my mum, my husband (usually it’s at his misdemeanours), my brother and my best friend and it makes my heart swell!

What makes you get up each morning?

Wondering what I could be getting up to, eating or my children needing me to play mum! I do not have the gift of sleeping in and the older I get I really need it.  

How do you want to be remembered?

Wow she could really dance! Would be my dream….. but a more realistic sentiment would be that I cared, I was kind, I really tried and I loved. I made people feel like they really mattered and I was really good fun!

A piece of wisdom to share. 

Hmm, a hard lesson learnt but something that has helped me time and time again: “You can only do, as much as you can do, at that time.”