Co-Founders

Maria has achieved success across all three sectors and after graduating with a Business and Marketing degree Maria ran a successful European funded (£1.2m) training academy, set up and maintained community partnerships in Hertfordshire and created funding capacity within the third sector.

Maria now works as part of the Maternal Mental Health Alliance Everyone’s Business campaign which calls for all women throughout the UK who experience perinatal mental health problems (this includes perinatal OCD) to receive the care they and their families need, wherever and whenever they need it. Maria also sits on the Health Education England Perinatal Mental Health Advisory Group.

She sat on the NICE Guideline Development Group for Antenatal and Postnatal Mental Health and on the National Involvement Partnership Advisory Group focusing on the involvement of service users and carers to contribute to mental health policy development. Maria was chair of OCD-UK for a 4 year term and has worked with POhWER, a key national advocacy organisation, as well as the Hertfordshire Partnership NHS Foundation Trust as a trained Peer Experience Listener.

Maria co-founded Maternal OCD after the birth of her second child because her passion lies in enabling all mothers to be able to enjoy motherhood and believes this can be realised by raising awareness of perinatal OCD and providing resources for prevention and recovery.

To contact Maria directly please email maria.bavetta@maternalocd.org

Diana Wilson is from New Zealand and is an accomplished speaker who presents on Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD) sufferer experience, both to the wider community and within the medical community. She has been working to support those affected by the disorder for the past twelve years.

Diana was a trustee of OCD UK, having worked for and represented the charity for six years. She was an OCD support group facilitator at the Priory Ticehurst House in East Sussex, which she had run for four years. She also facilitated a perinatal OCD support group at the Mental Health Foundation at London Bridge.

Diana has featured in various magazines including ‘Best’ and ‘The Lady’ and national newspapers including the ‘Times’ and the ‘Mail on Sunday’. She has been interviewed by Fern Britton in ITV’s ‘This Morning’ as well as on separate occasions by Dr Mark Porter, Dr Raj Persaud, and Sian Williams on BBC’s breakfast television. She has also featured in an OCD NHS choices video where she discusses her experiences of living with the disorder and her story of recovery. This can be viewed at http://www.nhs.uk/video/pages/ocd.aspx .

Diana spent a year sitting on the perinatal faculty as a lay representative for the Royal College of Psychiatry and in addition, she has spoken frequently on local BBC radio and has appeared on Radio 4’s ‘Short Cuts’ and ‘All in the mind’. To listen please visit:http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b04v3844.

Within the scientific community and most notably to mental health professionals, Diana has delivered numerous presentations to raise awareness of the OCD experience from a patient’s perspective. She has presented at the Priory, Ticehurst House, to the Florence Nightingale School of Midwifery in London, to an audience of psychology students at Guildford University, Surrey University, Nottingham Trent University, Reading University and Cambridge University. She has presented at NHS Trusts, IAPTS, and as a representative of OCD UK to a NICE conference in London. Diana has also participated in Heather Sequeira’s CBT Training workshops in London.

She was invited to be on a panel to discuss the disorder at the London ICA, as well as at the Cheltenham Science festival. She has also appeared in a multi-media recording for the Open University. She delivers talks and discussions at local GP surgeries, and has also featured in an NHS video.

Diana is a fully recovered OCD sufferer who lives in Kent with her husband and four children.

To contact Diana directly please email diana.wilson@maternalocd.org