About Katy Massey
Multi-award-winning practitioner in trauma, education, and human rights.
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Here's a snapshot of my portfolio career:
Founder, leadership consultant, girls' rights activist, community builder, trauma-informed doula, professional mentor, mental health researcher, playworker, safeguarding lead and teacher.
I have spent my career in the spaces where care and crisis meet.
As a wellbeing educator, I work with children and young people on the foundations of emotional health — not resilience as a performance, but as genuine, embodied capacity. As a trauma-informed doula, I support families through one of life's most profound and vulnerable thresholds. And as someone who has spent years working in safeguarding and youth work, I understand what it costs to hold these realities day after day.
My background
I hold an MA (Distinction) in Education, Gender and International Development from UCL, with research focused on Mental Health and Psychosocial Support (MHPSS), Education in Emergencies, and the nexus of conflict, peace and education across Sri Lanka, South Sudan and Türkiye. My specialist focus has been community-based mental health support for girls, rehabilitation for children affected by armed conflict, and the wellbeing of MHPSS practitioners themselves.
I am a qualified teacher and curriculum specialist, a trauma-informed doula, a playworker, and a safeguarding lead. I have worked therapeutically with children and teenagers for two decades, and I currently specialise in contextual safeguarding, child exploitation, and supporting children missing from care. I attend the United Nations Commission on the Status of Women annually as a virtual UN Women UK participant — the largest global conference on gender equality.
I offer leadership consultancy for charities and NGOs, advising on strategic, operational and organisational processes, safeguarding, programme development and community building. My work has spanned across the UK, Kenya and Zimbabwe. I offer bespoke 1:1 mentoring to people looking for a new or more aligned charity or non-profit role.
My feminist beliefs are intersectional and inclusive of all genders, race, ability, sex, class and culture.
Clients & collaborations
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Why I founded The Joyful Activists
The people I've worked alongside — in child protection, in humanitarian response, in classrooms, birth rooms and communities — are carrying extraordinary weight. And most of us have been told, implicitly or explicitly, that our own needs are less urgent than the work.
I've lived the consequences of that belief. Throughout my career I've experienced burnout, vicarious trauma, compassion fatigue and redundancy, and struggled to know where to process those thoughts and feelings. The Joyful Activists was borne from my wish to have a community of compassionate, friendly and caring people who would understand those experiences without me feeling like I needed to translate my soul.
The Joyful Activists exists because sustainable change requires sustainable people. Because joy is not a reward for suffering enough — it is a practice, a political act, and the foundation that makes long-term justice work possible. Because the world needs people who can last.
Our community is global, our practice is body-based and evidence-informed, and our commitment is to us as whole people, not just the activist in us.
Work with me
Professional mentoring
Supporting you to care for your wellbeing in your workplace, or to find a new or aligned role in the charity & humanitarian sector
Doula support
Support at any stage of your pregnancy, childbirth and postpartum journey
Workshops
Invite me to facilitate a workshop in your organisation or community group