Health and Wellbeing Advocacy
In 2014, I was diagnosed with post-viral Narcolepsy with Cataplexy and chronic pain resulting from non-union spinal fractures. Following a serious injury caused by a microsleep episode, it became clear that the life I had been living was no longer sustainable. I returned to rural Australia to focus on my health, raise my daughter, and reimagine what a meaningful professional and creative life might look like within new limitations.

Alongside these personal adjustments, I began using my lived experience to inform advocacy and research in two areas: Narcolepsy and Sleep Disorders, and School Anxiety. While my health remains an ongoing consideration, I experienced a significant improvement in symptoms from 2020 onwards and have been grateful for the opportunity to continue contributing to these communities.

School Anxiety
I contributed to a cross-institutional research collaboration exploring student, parent, and school experiences of school attendance difficulties (“School Can’t”). This work built on my earlier learning and teaching practice, including presentations and professional development focused on supporting tertiary students with disability, chronic illness, and neurodiversity.

Narcolepsy Advocacy
My advocacy work has focused on improving awareness, education, and access to information for people living with Narcolepsy. This has included creating the Instagram platform @narcolepsy.research, which shares accessible summaries of emerging research for the international Narcolepsy community. I also made a submission to the Australian Parliamentary Inquiry into Sleep Health Awareness, which was referenced in the committee’s 2019 report Bedtime Reading. In 2022, I developed Narcolepsy Australia’s World Narcolepsy Day advocacy campaign, which focused on access to Sodium Oxybate through the Orphan Drug Scheme. More recently, I have worked as Consulting Producer on the Australian rural neo-noir film Daydreamers, which features a central teenage character living with Narcolepsy.