Tshidi's Reflections on Black History Month
Standing on Soga’s Shoulders: A Journey Through Black History, Veterinary Medicine, and Belonging
By Dr Tshidi Gardiner, BSc BVSc PG Cert SAS MRCVS
Black History Month is always a moment of pause for me — a chance to reflect on the past, honour those who came before, and recognise how far we’ve come. As a Black woman who began her veterinary journey in apartheid South Africa, I grew up believing that the history of our profession was written entirely by others. At the University of Pretoria, I was taught that Arnold Theiler was the first person to qualify as a vet — the father of South African veterinary medicine. It wasn’t until much later that I learned this wasn’t the whole story. Hidden in plain sight was Jotello Festiri Soga, a Black South African who not only qualified as a veterinary surgeon but also became the first Black member of the Royal College of Veterinary Surgeons (RCVS). His name, his contribution, and his legacy were quietly buried for generations.
That discovery stopped me in my tracks. I’m talking 2022, recently. It made me think about how history is shaped — and how easily voices like ours are erased. It also deepened my sense of responsibility to open doors and tell the stories that deserve to be remembered. And I haven’t walked this journey alone. I’ve been privileged to learn from and work alongside incredible colleagues — from my fellow Ethnic Diversity Scholarship Board members and Affinity Futures Co-Founders to my peers within BVEDS, where I now serve as a Trustee. Together, we are rewriting not just history, but the narrative of belonging in veterinary medicine.
Roots and Resilience: My Beginnings in South Africa
I was born in 1976, in the middle of apartheid South Africa. It was a system designed to separate, suppress, and control. Broadly speaking, apartheid divided life into two levels: petty apartheid, which dictated where you could sit, learn, or socialise, and grand apartheid, which determined where you could live, work, and belong.
The Population Registration Act classified every South African as “Black”, “White”, “Coloured”, or “Indian”, and that label decided the course of your life. From the schools you attended, the jobs you could hold, even where you could live. Over three million Black South Africans were forcibly removed from their homes to live in racially segregated areas called bantustans. My family was amongst those.
As a Black girl, my path was not laid out with opportunity. Apartheid laws restricted nearly every part of life — education, land ownership, jobs, and even movement. For Black women, this created what many now call a “triple oppression” of race, class, and gender. It meant being told, in both words and laws, that you were less.
By the time I finished school, South Africa was only beginning to talk about change. The first democratic elections took place in April 1994, after I had already completed my schooling. We were called the Rainbow Nation. I belonged to a generation carrying both the scars of apartheid and the hopes of a new South Africa.
Resilience wasn’t something I learned later; it was forged early, in the quiet defiance of my parents who insisted on education, they were among those quiet revolutionaries whose phones were tapped for decades. They sacrificed everything to send me to a non-Bantu education school, one of the few places where a Black child could receive a better education. If you have ever heard Trevor Noah, the comedian speak about Model-C schools, that is what he means and honestly that decision changed my life.
When I began studying veterinary medicine at Onderstepoort, South Africa was still finding its feet as a democracy. The laws had changed, but hearts and minds had not. Many of the adults around me — lecturers, professionals, even neighbours — were not yet ready to support this new vision of equality.
Walking into university felt like stepping into two worlds at once. On paper, we were the “rainbow nation”, but in practice, the divisions remained. I was the only Black woman in my cohort — visible in every lecture, every lab, every photograph. That visibility came with both pride and pressure. While my classmates were focused on academics, I was learning how to survive in a space that was not designed for me.
There were moments of deep isolation, but driven by quiet courage. Every exam passed, every small success, felt like a personal victory not just for me, but for those who never had the chance to stand in that space. When I graduated in 2003, I walked across that stage carrying more than a degree (my proud family whooping and cheering so loud I couldn’t stop smiling) I now realise that I carried a legacy of resilience and the belief that change often begins with one person daring to show up.
Why Representation Matters — Then and Now
After graduating, I was offered a post at Kruger National Park as a wildlife vet. Honestly, this is a true story. I wanted to be a wildlife vet, a dream for many. But when I learned that keeping a dog wasn’t allowed, I took it as a sign that my path lay elsewhere. Okay, maybe a bit of a well-timed excuse. So, with two suitcases, a degree, and a heart full of hope, I boarded a plane bound for London.
That decision was my leap of faith. I arrived in a country carrying little more than determination and hope. Truth be told, I was “ignorance on fire.” My first job at the Donkey Sanctuary in Devon taught me about compassion and patience, not just for animals, but for myself. From there, I moved into mixed practice, embraced motherhood, locumed for flexibility, and eventually ran my own small animal practise. I learned, often the hard way, that ownership and leadership begins with humanity.
If you looked at my career on paper, you might think it was a little chaotic — from welfare work to mixed practice, out-of-hours shifts, practice ownership, and now leadership and wellbeing education. But every turn has had purpose. My path has never been straight; it’s been squiggly but full of lessons, pivots, and growth.
Those long days and nights taught me endurance but also revealed the fragility of that pace. Burnout wasn’t a single event; it was a slow unraveling that forced me to rebuild my relationship with the profession I loved. That rebuilding became my transformation. I came to understand that wellbeing and inclusion aren’t luxuries — they’re lifelines. They were my lifelines.
I learned that leadership isn’t about authority; it’s about creating environments where people can bring their authentic selves to work. That insight shaped the work I do now, combining wellbeing education, inclusive leadership, and advocacy to help others thrive in a profession that once nearly broke me.
Learning about Soga, the first Black member of the RCVS, changed how I viewed our profession’s story. Discovering his legacy reminded me that history isn’t just what’s recorded — it’s also what’s forgotten, and who is left out. Representation matters because visibility shapes possibility. When we see someone who looks like us or shares our story, it expands what we believe is possible. That’s why my work with Affinity Futures, the UK’s first veterinary consultancy dedicated to equity, diversity, and inclusion, feels so personal. Through our training and partnerships, we’re not just raising awareness — we’re building a culture of belonging.
Leadership, Wellbeing, and Belonging
If there’s one thread that weaves through every chapter of my journey, it’s that leadership, wellbeing, and belonging are inseparable. True leadership isn’t about hierarchy, it’s about creating space where others can thrive.
In my current roles within the Royal College of Veterinary Surgeons (RCVS), I’ve had the honour of serving as the first Black Treasurer and first EDI Lead. These roles are more than titles — they’re opportunities to help shape the culture of our profession. Representation at leadership level matters; it reminds every young vet, nurse, or student watching that they belong here, that their voice matters, and that they too can help shape the future of veterinary medicine.
Alongside my governance work, I channel my passion for wellbeing through my coaching practice, where I support colleagues in finding balance, building resilience, and reconnecting with their purpose. Inside the Wellness Warren, this is an online wellbeing hub I created for the profession — I provide free and low-cost resources to help veterinary professionals manage stress, prevent burnout, and cultivate sustainable wellbeing. It’s my way of paying forward what I once needed most: practical help, hope, and community.
Ultimately, all of my work in wellbeing, inclusion, and leadership comes back to one truth: people need to feel that they belong. When we feel safe, seen, and valued, we can bring our best selves to the table. Belonging fuels innovation, connection, and care and that, to me, is the heart of both veterinary medicine and humanity itself.
As I look back on my journey, from a little girl in apartheid South Africa to a veterinary wellbeing and inclusion advocate in the UK, I see the power of possibility. I stand on the shoulders of those who came before, and I hope my work helps make the ground a little firmer for those who will come after.
Claire's Reflections on National Inclusion Week
I graduated in 2000 from the RVC and, after 6 years in mixed practice, accidentally became an equine-only vet. I spent the next 12 years developing my interests in equine medicine and stud work, gaining my CertAVP (EM). In 2015, life as I knew it suddenly changed; I went from someone who travelled, danced, biked and climbed to struggling to get through a working week, spending all my downtime sleeping and sometimes barely able to walk up my stairs. I had a month off work before returning to a life that was simply work and rest to survive, ultimately crashing again at Christmas. In a way, I was one of the lucky ones; I had a GP who listened and believed me, and I was relatively promptly given a diagnosis of Chronic Fatigue Syndrome (CFS) or Myalgic Encephalitis (ME). Life as I knew it changed and I had to reevaluate everything if I wanted, redefining what ‘normal’ was and finding a way to balance work and life, and not just constantly run in survival mode and a boom-bust cycle of doing too much when I felt ok, resulting in no energy and complete collapse after.
I spent 2 years struggling to get my head around what was happening in a body that regularly let me down on the simple stuff, mostly everything hurt all the time, and I was permanently exhausted regardless of what I did and how much rest I took. Unsurprisingly, this meant I couldn’t be a good version of myself. I also didn’t know what I needed to succeed as this new version of me, and there was little to no obvious support. I reduced my hours, changed things in my personal life, and ultimately realised that the world of equine vetting was no longer sustainable. At the age of 42, I retired from equine vet. I pivoted back to small animals, a transition that surprised me and would have been much more challenging 10 years earlier, when free, easy access CPD was less available.
2017 saw the launch of vet-specific Facebook communities such as Vet Voices and VSGD. Here, it became apparent I was not the only one whose health issues had altered the path of their career and had struggled to find community and support. Together with a colleague, I met in an online chat, we launched Veterinary Spoonholders, a Facebook community for those in the profession with chronic illness, disability and neurodiversity. The community grew rapidly, and in 2024, we had +3,000 people from all areas of the veterinary profession. What became apparent very quickly was that people’s experiences were very similar. Too often, a lack of understanding and awareness around physical health, and more recently, neurodivergence, meant people were struggling to stay in jobs despite desperately wanting to find a way to succeed. Lots of conversations were being had around mental health and wellbeing, but very little around physical health, chronic illness and disability, neurodivergence wasn’t even being discussed. So in 2018, a few of us got together and launched what became British Veterinary Chronic Illness Support (BVCIS), an organisation that aims to provide support, advocacy and education on chronic illness, disability and neurodivergence within the veterinary sector.
The last 7 years have been a fascinating pivot that has taken me in a direction I could never have predicted. I have delivered webinars, spoken at conferences, sat on BVA and RCVS working groups and become a sector expert on disability support and inclusion. Along the way, I sat on panels with colleagues from BVEDS and BVLGBT+ talking about our personal and communities’ experiences within the profession and how a lack of awareness and understanding led to poor feelings of inclusion and belonging, often resulting from incidents of discrimination. We started to deliver conference sessions, combining our voices as the ‘affinity groups’ and bringing together individuals from BVCIS, BVEDS, and BVLGBT+ to discuss our different experiences. We realised there are many common threads to our individual experiences of ableism, homophobia and racism and that most of us have intersectional identities, existing in several marginalised communities at the same time. In 2022, six of us came together to formally launch an umbrella organisation to sit above all three and Affinity Futures was born to provide comprehensive EDI support and training to the profession.
I am beyond proud of what we have achieved in a relatively short time. We have developed and delivered unique, industry-leading training that focuses on improving understanding and awareness of the experiences and challenges of those in our communities. We have worked with some fantastic people and progressive organisations that recognise good workplace culture starts with understanding the diverse nature of the humans that work with us. That equity means understanding people’s unique needs to succeed, and inclusion and belonging come when people are properly supported and allowed to be their authentic selves.
Ten years ago, I thought my life was over; I felt stuck and trapped with no idea what I was going to do. On the journey to today, I have learnt to better understand my body, recognised previously unacknowledged ADHD wiring and step proudly into the many facets of who I am, embracing identities I would have previously shied away from. Labels matter to me because they are a way to explain how we move through the world and give others an idea of what they might expect. Even if we avoid self-labelling because we don’t like the idea of it, we get labelled anyway by others, and these are rarely positive – lazy, chaotic, too much, too quiet, rude, stupid, disorganised, difficult. Disabled and neurodivergent are labels many shy away from because, for the most part, we were raised in a society with very fixed, medicalised ideas based on a deficit model that puts the onus on the individual for not meeting societal ‘norms’. There are many models to describe disability, and none are perfect, but for me the closest is the “Social model of disability” which talks about individuals being disabled by a society that is not designed with them in mind, identifying society as a whole rather than the individual as the cause of the disability. Someone who uses a wheelchair is not prevented from accessing a space because of their disability, but because the building wasn’t designed to accommodate their different needs, e.g. step step-free access and accessible bathrooms.
Today, I stand confident in my intersectional identities as a bisexual, ADHD, disabled, perimenopausal, cis-woman who was the first in their family to go to university/ further education. If you told me in 2015 what I would be doing today, I would not have believed you, and I can not wait to discover what we can achieve together over the next 10 years.
Issa's Reflections on ESEA Heritage Month
The theme for ESEA Heritage 2025 is “Reframing Resilience,” promoting conversations on shared strength, vulnerability, resistance, and mental health across generations.
It feels right to therefore honour my mother, a Thai immigrant who came to the UK in the 1970s, found love, and remained here until she died in 2009.
1970s in Britain
The 1970s were marked by racial tension, rising anti-immigrant sentiment, the emergence of far-right groups such as the National Front, and the tightening of immigration rules, which significantly restricted entry for non-European Commonwealth citizens.
I keep this in mind whenever I hear modern anti-immigrant rhetoric; it’s one of the reasons I started campaigning for migrant rights around the referendum. For two generations of my family to exist reflects her resilience, bravery, and quiet determination living as a migrant in the UK, where hostility to migration can be easily stoked by politicians using migrants as scapegoats for economic and political failures.
Thai migration to the UK
At that time, she was one of the rare few Thai migrants who would have entered the UK through marriage to a UK national. Until 2001, the UK had only around 16,257 Thai-born residents, growing to nearly 39,800 by 2011, and reaching approximately 49,700 by 2021. A large portion of Thai migrants during the 2000s arrived via marriage routes. This marriage-based migration surge has led to a widespread community across the UK rather than clustered in large urban hubs.
Reflecting on when I grew up in 80s-90s Surrey, this explains why we never knew other Thai people in our area, also, why I was always delighted to see (and still am) families that looked like us at the airport standing in the queue for a plane to Bangkok.
Interracial marriage in the 1970s
1–2% of all UK marriages at that time were interracial, and East/Southeast Asian women marrying white British men would have been a tiny fraction of these. Like many interracial couples, my parents faced discrimination, from family disapproval to harassment in public.
I’m aware that newer generations of ESEA heritage might not be aware of the challenges faced in the past by interracial couples; it seems so normal these days.
The UK now has one of the highest rates of interracial marriage in Europe, especially among Black Caribbean, South Asian, and East/Southeast Asian populations. These early interracial marriages contributed to shifting public norms over time and laid the groundwork for today’s more diverse, multicultural Britain.
When I look at younger generations of ESEA heritage, I see myself reflected in them. There is often talk about providing racial mirrors to young people in the profession, but it works both ways. For those of us who grew up and started working in isolation from racial mirrors of our own, the presence of more diversity in the profession makes us feel like we also belong.