Soph Quill, a dynamic advocate for Equality, Diversity, and Inclusion (EDI), whose journey into the field stems from a diverse background and a passion for making a difference. Soph’s path to inclusion work was anything but conventional, shaped by experiences ranging from studying philosophy to navigating mental health challenges. Initially uncertain about her career trajectory, Soph stumbled into teaching before embarking on a transformative journey that led her to the realm of corporate EDI. It was there that her advocacy for LGBTQ+ rights and mental health awareness ignited, propelling her towards a purpose-driven mission of using her own story to empower others. Passionate about embracing diversity in all its forms, Soph’s dedication extends beyond traditional EDI boundaries to encompass issues like accessible communication and neurodiversity. With a commitment to fostering inclusive environments for all, Soph’s story serves as a beacon of resilience and empowerment in the pursuit of equity and belonging.

1. What was your background which led you to work in inclusion?

I was one of those people who when all the adults start asking you seriously what career you are going to pursue, didn’t know the answer. I did a degree in philosophy because it interested me, but short of teaching philosophy, there’s certainly no direct career path from it. In my final year of university, I knew that I was again meant to be thinking about what I wanted to do career wise. But, and as I no doubt will mention later, my mental health during that time was so poor that being aware of my surroundings was a success. I simply didn’t have the capacity to be thinking about or planning anything that wasn’t trying to finish my degree. There was no plan.

After I graduated I fell into teaching, like my mum. First a teaching assistant role and then doing my teacher training. I loved teaching others, but ultimately it wasn’t my passion. And teaching is really a career path which should be a passion. So I dropped out, and moved to Australia for a year.

When I returned to London, I got a job with a corporate. It was there that I found the world of Equality, Diversity and Inclusion (EDI). I was open about my sexuality and a colleague asked if I would be willing to represent the site from an LGBT+ perspective. At that, a fire was lit. I started small, sharing my story being LGBT+ and my mental health story on our internal social media and then it grew. And so did I. Suddenly I knew. I knew what I wanted to do. Using my story and my learnings to help others.

Looking back, the philosophy, the mental health, the teaching – it’s all part of what I do now.

2. What programmes are you passionate about?

EDI is so broad that it’s always hard to narrow things down. For me, EDI isn’t just about the protected characteristics stated in the equalities act. It’s about everything. From the experiences of refugees and abuse victims (which I personally feel should be legally protected to also) to body shape, hair colour and tattoos. And I want to do all of it.

One topic I have done a lot of work in is accessible communication. Communication is, and should be, at the hub of everything we do as human beings. Neurodiversity is a big part of this. Approximately 20% of the world’s population are neurodiverse. So by communication in ways which aren’t accessible, that’s 20% of the population which we are neglecting. 20% of people that our communication isn’t positive for. From personal lives, to small businesses to global companies – it’s relevant to everyone. I won’t go into everything here, but my five top tips are as follows:

1. Use capital letters only for titles and names
2. Background colour should be darker or coloured
3. High Contrast between background and text colour
4. Avoid the colour red
5. Make it visually appealing

1.  Use capital letters only for titles and name

 When text is in all capital letters, some neurodiverse individuals feel as though they are being shouted at. Aside from that, when we are taught about text in all caps, the words used are things like “STOP” and “HELP”. These are negative words. We all have that negative connotation about text in all caps because of this.

2. Background colour should be darker or coloured
   Some neurodiverse individuals can find it difficult to read text which is on a white background. It can make the letters appear to move around and the centre of letters have black spots appear in them. This makes the text harder to read. While different people will have different preferences in terms of background colour avoiding white, yellow or red are the main things. I personally try to use cream colours – but that’s personal preference.

3. High Contrast between background and text colour

This helps everyone. The higher the contrast, the easier it becomes for individuals (especially neurodiverse individuals) to differentiate the text from the background. This makes the text easier to read.  For example cream background and black text or dark grey background and white text.

4. Avoid the colour red

The colour red can appear as fluorescent for some neurodiverse individuals. This can make anything in red harder to see. It also makes judging distance more difficult if there is a large amount of the colour. Red is also one of the most common colours where those that are colour blind are sensitive to. In addition, as with the use of all capitals, red can have negative associations. Use other colours instead.

5. Make it visually appealing

This point can cover a whole host of things. Text without images/text breaks or there are long sentences can appear overwhelming for a neurodiverse individual. To address this, adding images, using bullet points and trying to use 20 words or less in sentences can really help.

While these aren’t the be all and end all of neuro-friendly communication, they’re certainly things to bear in mind.

3. You mentioned being out at work, can you tell us about your coming out story? 

When people ask me this, my first response is “which time?” Once you start coming out you never stop. To everyone reading this, I am coming out right now. So hi, I’m Soph Quill – I’m non-binary and I like women. 

For me, when I write or give talks about my experience as being part of the LGBT+ community, I like to talk about what I call “coming out to myself”. I think this is something which perhaps isn’t talked about enough. Really the first person you come out to is yourself. That step is a massive one. Part of the reason I think it can be so big is because it encompasses your whole life until that point. Heterosexuality is, unfortunately, somewhat a default. It takes a lot of courage to separate yourself from that default. For me at fifteen, as part of accepting who I am, I started doing a lot of exploration into the LGBT+ community. I watched TV shows and films from ‘The L word’ to ‘Lost and Delirious’ and ‘But I’m a Cheerleader’. I read books like ‘Sugar Rush’. I started looking up LGBT+ music ‘She’ by Jen Foster was a particular favourite here. I was completely absorbing myself into this new culture that I was finding that I am a part of. For me that representation really helped with that journey. I think that’s part of the reason I like to share my story, because then I get to be that representation for others. 

Really though, I know when people ask about your coming out story, they’re asking about telling your friends and family. Most prominently, your parents. Coming out as gay and then later as non-binary, I did have to go through that process twice. But here I’ll talk about coming out as gay, purely because that came first. My parents were divorced at this stage and I chose to come out to my mum first, because I knew she’d be the more difficult of the two to come out to. I like to refer to my dad as a modern day hippie and I knew he’d be okay with it. My mum was a little different. Unlike some people have to face, I wasn’t nervous about her kicking me out of the house, so for that I am grateful. What I was nervous about is that I think my mum has a more structured view of life and the life she wanted for me. I thought that my being gay was something not included in that plan, so I was very unsure of how to react to it. So I chose to come out to her via text message. Advice to anyone coming out – whatever you do, don’t come out via text message. It meant that after sending a carefully crafted text message, I had to wait an hour for her to see it and respond. When she did, it said simply “it’s okay, I still love you.” While that was a nice response, it is surprising how little that helps. I think mostly because it seems like an answer that is what you think you are supposed to say at such a moment, rather than something that expresses genuine thoughts and feelings. 

I get asked a lot about what individuals can do to make others, especially their children, feel safe to be themselves and, if they are LGBT+, come out. For the record, I am not myself a parent. But I am 17 years older than my brother. For him, I try to integrate ideas of homosexuality, non-binary and moving away from stereotypes as being the norm. So rather than asking “do you have a girlfriend?” (being asked if I had a boyfriend before the point I came out made me feel rather uncomfortable) I ask “are you in a relationship?” so all genders are covered. For me as a child, clothes shopping was a big thing, because I didn’t like the clothes in the girls section. I didn’t want to wear anything pink or purple, nothing with glitter or sparkles, nothing with phrases like “shopping queen”. I ended up wearing football kits and a lot of the colour green. I think giving children the freedom to choose their own clothing ignores the idea of there being a “girls section” or a “boys section” of shops. While both of these examples involve children, the same principle can be applied to adults within our lives. Starting your own pro-nouns (even if you are cis-gender) when you meet someone knew, not making assumptions about the gender of a person’s partner and educating yourself can help with this. I find “The Gender Unicorn” a particularly good resource for learning about sexuality and gender – especially for those who feel very overwhelmed by the amount there is to know. So definitely look that up. 
 

4. You also mentioned your journey with mental health, can you tell me a little bit more about that? 

For everyone, I see mental health as a continuous wave which has its ups and downs throughout the course of our lives. Each individual, though, has their own baseline. Just like how people have a baseline for things to do with physical health like blood pressure. And over time, I do think this baseline can change. I believe that that person’s baseline will be influenced by a number of factors falling under both the “nature” and “nurture” categories.  My personal baseline I’d say is below average and, reflecting on moments from my childhood, likely always has been. There are a couple of moments in my life though, which have had a dramatic negative impact on my mental health and where that baseline sat over a certain time period. 

Firstly, while I was at university, I was sexually assaulted by a friend of mine. I think it’s important for me to say that was the cause as a means of raising awareness for sexual assault. But specifically for sexual assault, based on reason of sexuality – which this was. I’d gone out with friends, had a few drinks and started to feel a little gone. I had only had a couple of drinks and I wasn’t expecting to feel drunk. I do want to say that I had just been put on medication that was likely the cause of this, I don’t believe I was drugged, but I can’t say for sure. Feeling how I did, I went home. And I think one of the things which hit me about this story was that I had acted safely. I felt strange, so I went home. I should have been okay. But I wasn’t. 

After I got home, my friend (for the purpose of this, we’ll call him Alex) called me. He apologised for not escorting me home to make sure I got home safely. Alex admitted the reason for this was that we both had feelings for the same woman, and without me there he could spend more time with her. He asked if, to make up for it, he could come and check on me then because he knew I had been feeling funny. I agreed. 

When Alex arrived, as you do as a student, we lay on my bed talking. The topic of conversation moved to my sexuality. He asked me if I were to have sex with a man would my body still enjoy it. I explained that I wouldn’t. To which, Alex responded “shall we try it?”. My response: “no.” “Come on, we have to, it’s for science.” “no.” As you’ve probably gathered by now, Alex didn’t stop there. After that everything went black, with flashes of memory in between. I don’t know if the blackness was because of the unwellness I was feeling before, because I fell asleep, or because my brain didn’t want to remember those moments. What I do remember is being frozen with his hands down my underwear. I remember him moving my hand to where he wanted it to go and thinking “just do what he wants. The sooner you do what he wants, the sooner it will be over.” I remember him leaving the room, the moment of relief, then him coming back in and staying the night. 

The week after this everything is black. For years I had know idea how I had survived that week, how I managed to feed myself. It wasn’t until five years later that I found out I’d called a friend of mine (Emily Dennett) and she’d come and stayed with me during that time. She made me eat, drink, wash, and sleep. She completely looked after me. But I hadn’t remembered it. 

The first thing I remember again is walking to lectures. It was like waking up. The world didn’t feel quite right though, it felt hazy. Like when you’re tipsy and you know everything around you is real, but it doesn’t feel quite like it is. Then in that lecture, I got this sudden feeling of reality slipping away from me again. Of returning to the darkness. So I was taken to hospital. It took a long time, and some strong medication for me to stop have symptoms like: believing strangers were specific people I knew, thinking people on TV were talking to me, not understanding what was real or not. It was like a horror show. 

Five years later, I had another trigger. My relationship. I was married. And I was scared of my wife. Everything was my fault. Once she drove through a red light and got mad that I hadn’t told her. Another time I went to the shops, bought everything on the shopping list and was told off for not getting her a surprise. I turned around once to see a deodorant being swung at my face – she paused with it a few centimetres before I knew it, as though she couldn’t go through with it now I was looking at her. I repressed all of it. To the outside world I was happily married. My wife was a bubbly, happy person. Everyone liked her (With the exception of Emily and another friend called Jess Codling). Nobody would have thought she could be anything but that. But, because of some insecurities, she was. 

All that repression came to a head on my birthday that year. I had a party with my friends. Drank in modesty. Suddenly I was on the floor, screaming in agony. I have never thrown up so much in my life, I couldn’t stay conscious, and an ambulance was called. When paramedics arrived, they believed I was having an overdose and asked what I’d taken. In truth I hadn’t taken anything. I wasn’t even on any prescription medication at that time. My heart rate was dangerously low and I kept screaming. I was whisked off to hospital. Sure enough, I’d drunk so little my blood test showed I could legally have driven a car. I wasn’t drunk. What I was, was mentally exhausted. I had been repressing so much, for so long that having a small amount of alcohol lowered my inhibitions enough that everything I’d been holding back came out. That was enough to encourage me to go to therapy.

Therapy isn’t a click of your fingers and your better kind of help. Mending your mind doesn’t work like that. It takes work and time. It took five months of therapy before I was in a place where I ended my marriage. During those four months, and the months prior to the party mentioned above, I’d been having hallucinations and personality switches. Occasionally, these still occur now. The hallucinations were brutal – they were always angry people. The worst of which was a man standing over me, having broken into my house. I knew he wasn’t real. I couldn’t see him in the way you see corporeal things, but I knew what he looked like. Regardless, it was terrifying. The personality switches were worse. The way I explain those is that your main personality – the you that you are most of the time, is like a tree trunk. But there are lots of branches off it. Lots of different personalities that are more submissive. All the personalities play a role in protecting you – the self – but in different ways.  The first personality switch, I was mentally – for about two hours – a six year old. I was looking at objects as though it was the first time I was seeing them. I grabbed some socks from the floor and started to throw them above my head and catch them, my language became very child-like. I was a six year old in an adult body. I also had a personality that I named Bruce. (For the purpose of this I will speak of Bruce as though Bruce is it’s own thing – but Bruce is me and a part of me and I know and accept that). Bruce is what I consider the last line of defence for my brain. Bruce is the point where all other means of self-protection have failed. So Bruce appears. Bruce’s aim is one thing – keep me alive. Bruce channels qualities which I can neglect to use and uses them to look after me. It’s a strange feeling when I “Bruce”. I’m told my voice changes, my eyes look different, I speak in a way that isn’t like me. It’s like I am a different person in my own body. But I know that Bruce is me.

I’m doing better than that now, I’d like to add. I went to therapy and went back on medication and that really helped. I will add the caveat that those things aren’t easy either. The NHS in the UK is an amazing thing. But it is designed for physical health and is underfunded. I paid more than I could afford for my therapy, because I couldn’t afford to be placed on a six month waiting list. Medication helps, but if you ever want to adjust your dosage – especially to lower your dosage – you’re fighting a brick wall. That is not the fault of our amazing NHS workers. It is the fault of the system, those who have control of the system and those who choose not to fund our NHS.

When I was struggling, I came up with my own mental health tips to help me get through each day. Here they are:

. Have something to look forward to every day – this has to be something that isn’t reliant on others. That you are in control of.
. Complete others
. Use your favourite things for the worst days – favourite film, food, music
. If everything feels hopeless – just go to bed
. At the end of the day, list five good things about it.

These five things are what I came up with while at university to help me get through. I hope they can help others too.

5. What advice would you give a member of an underrepresented group being themselves?

There’s definitely not any set to guide here. It will depend on both the person and the environment surrounding them.

Safety is the most important thing. As much as I want everyone to be themselves, if they are at risk from doing so, that changes the dynamic. Safety incorporates a lot of different aspects; from when to speak out, to what you as an individual are ready for. So those things should always be a factor.

As long as it is safe to do so, and you are in a place where you are comfortable – I think being yourself can be an amazing thing. For anyone who wants to trigger change, storytelling is the biggest part of this. This doesn’t have to be standing on a stage in front of hundreds of people. This can just be having conversations with those around you, talking about your own experiences and sharing that with them. Those little ripples which everyone can create have the biggest impact as they grow.

6. Are there any people or organisations in the UK and Ireland that you have admiration for?

Honestly, too many to count. But there’s definitely a few highlights:

•  Mohammad Koheeallee

Mo is honestly one of the most amazing people I’ve ever met. Even now we are friends I am completely in awe of him. Mo was the first wheelchair user in both their Field Sales and Supply Chain function for Coca-Cola Europacific Partners. He uses the sharing of his personal experience and insights into promoting inclusive recruitment and employment processes. This helps disabled colleagues to feel that their needs are being considered by the business. Part of this is making all of Great Britain’s Manufacturing sites fully accessible. I believe that the way in which Mo tells his story to open the minds of leaders is what makes him so special. For me, Mo is revolutionary in what he is doing within the disability space.

•  Aurora medical alert bracelets 

These are bands people can wear (they are also available in other forms), where you can upload your medical information. On mine I have my name, emergency contact, medical conditions, medications and allergies. The purpose of these is that you wear these so that if you ever need medical help or support and you aren’t able to communicate, someone can scan the tag in the band (using any smartphone) and view your information. Medically there is so much that needs to be known about a person if something goes wrong, that emergency services having this information can save a lives. I wear mine when going to events. But I think they’re also great for those with medical conditions, children, people that live alone, hirer risk working environments, athletes who might injure themselves through sport – endless possibilities.

• Snowball

Snowball is an app where you can rate places from a disability perspective. If you are a person with a disability, anywhere you go you can add to the app (if it’s not already on there) and then give a rating and comments about the place. This then means other persons with disabilities can read reviews and use this to help them understand which places are accessible for them and which aren’t. I tried to book dinner for a friend and I once and he is in a wheelchair. But online I found little or no information from most restaurants I was looking at as to whether they would be accessible for him. Short of calling everywhere, it was apparent very quickly how little information is online in relation to that so I am glad Snowball is trying to fill this gap.