We are friends and professional colleagues who found each other online and met in person for the first time in the early spring of 2022. Over the course of one very long, very cold afternoon wandering in circles on Primrose Hill, talking and talking, we realized that we had an absolutely enormous amount in common, both personally and professionally.

When the protections of Roe vs. Wade collapsed in the US on June 24th, 2022, the jarring realities of that long-anticipated political assault on bodily autonomy in the United States catalyzed our commitment to our solidarity and collaboration, working together and in our communities to seed the culture of care and bodily autonomy that we are determined to participate in creating.

Our conversation has expanded and bloomed ever since, weaving our work and our families into a relationship that spans two continents and an ocean between our respective homes in Los Angeles and Oxford.

Pamela Samuelson (she/they) is a Los Angeles-based body literacy and sex educator, a torch-bearer for the feminist health movement, and the founder of the Center for the Advancement of Body Literacy.

She is a manual therapist and somatic practitioner of 25 years specialized in trauma-sensitive pelvic and chest/breast care, a full-spectrum doula, and a writer and organizer focused on issues relating to reproductive rights, human sexuality, and bodily autonomy.

Emily Carson (she/her) is an Oxford-based somatic practitioner (Acupuncturist and Craniosacral Therapist), postnatal doula and somatic-centred educator. She works with an integrative, trauma-informed approach, working with a special interest in gynecological and perinatal care. She co-facilitates the Oxford homebirth group.

She is committed to writing and teaching that supports students, clients and families in relationship with embodied agency.