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Lived Experience

​​​​​​​I know what it feels like to navigate a system that wasn't designed with you in mind - to sit in meetings filled with jargon, to manage complex documentation while also managing everything else, to feel simultaneously capable but completely overwhelmed.

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I know what it's like to discover that my brain has different strengths and differences, learn about these and develop the skills I didn't even know were missing.  Over five years of studying and developing my own Executive Function skills has been life changing.  Awareness of the impact of underdeveloped EF skills is a huge missing link in our education system.

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I've worked with wonderful, committed, inclusive professionals that set the standard to follow.  I also know that families can be routinely misinformed, judged and let down by the SEND system.  I've been in the 'meetings after the meeting'.  I've witnessed and challenged ableist opinions and unfounded judgement in staffrooms and LA meetings. 

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That lived experience - personal and professional - informs everything I do. It's why SEND Basecamp explicitly recognises and addresses the cognitive and emotional demands placed on parents and carers - neurodivergent and neurotypical - because those demands are real, they matter, and they deserve to be taken seriously.