From Emma’s Website:-
I started life in Drumchapel, Glasgow, from fairly humble beginnings. We didn't have much, but we had more than some, and we were grateful for what we had.
I moved to Clydebank while I was still at primary school, and what followed was a rather unconventional journey into adulthood.
After a turbulent start to my teenage years, I found myself homeless at fifteen. By sixteen, I had the keys to my first tenancy, and before my seventeenth birthday, I'd been evicted with an ASBO to my name.
Not exactly the foundations of a promising CV.
I went on to find myself in a violent relationship that would fundamentally change the person I was going to become. Alcohol and drugs became an increasingly prominent part of my life, and although I managed to escape that relationship with the support of Women's Aid shortly before my twenty-first birthday, escaping the cycle of addiction proved considerably more difficult.
By twenty-two, I'd reached what I can only describe as an all-time low.
But at twenty-three, something shifted.
A change in perspective, a sliding doors moment, and an opportunity that would take my life in a completely different direction.
I threw myself headfirst into the world of finance, trained as a Bookkeeper and gradually built a business that, over the next seventeen years, would develop into an Award-winning Accountancy Firm employing ten people and serving thousands of clients. I won Professional of the Year at The Scottish Womens Awards in 2018, and business went from strength to strength.
From the outside, it probably looked like I'd turned everything around. And in many ways, I had. But the reality was rather different.
For the majority of those years, I was what you'd call a functioning addict. Monday to Friday was a slog towards the weekend, when I'd inevitably spiral into another alcohol and drug-fuelled binge.
Professional success and personal fulfilment are not necessarily the same thing, and I was living proof of that.
Towards the end of my career in finance, I made the decision to get clean and sober. And with sobriety came a growing realisation that the work I'd spent so many years building no longer fulfilled me.
I'd become increasingly disillusioned with a system that seemed to punish those who worked incredibly hard, and I no longer wanted to spend my life propping it up.
So, in typical fashion, I decided to change direction entirely.
I retrained as a Clinical Hypnotherapist, qualifying in 2023, and opened a therapy centre where I worked predominantly with people experiencing addiction.
And that's where the poetry came in.
Initially, I began writing poetry as a way of supplementing the hypnotherapy scripts I was delivering to clients. It was another way of communicating ideas, exploring emotions and encouraging reflection.
Then, on a whim, I posted one of those poems on TikTok.
Within the first couple of days, it had attracted over a million views.
And just like that, The Wee Glesga Poet was born.
What followed has been something of a whirlwind.
I've since written ten books of my own, including eight poetry anthologies and two children's books, alongside two collaborative anthologies created with people in prison through projects delivered in HMP Shotts, HMP Low Moss and HMP Barlinnie.
I've delivered creative writing workshops, worked with people in recovery, taken my poetry onto stages and into communities, and in 2027 I'll embark on my first live tour.
It's been an extraordinary journey, and I'm here for every second of it.
But perhaps the most important thing I've learned along the way is that our circumstances don't have to dictate our destination.
I've been homeless, I've experienced violence and abuse, I've lived through addiction, I've built a successful business, I've walked away from that business, and I've started again.
More than once. There’s been successes, there’s been failures, none of which have defined the whole journey.
And through it all, I've never lost my curiosity about people, my passion for the things I believe in, or my willingness to speak my mind.
I'm passionate about giving a voice to those who struggle to be heard. I'm equally passionate about listening to perspectives that differ from my own. I don't expect everyone to agree with me, and I certainly don't expect the world to see things through my eyes.
But I do believe that conversation matters, that our experiences shape us, and that everyone has a story worth hearing.
And now you know the story of the woman behind the words….well kinda….
