ANNABEL DU BOULAYMy Story

IN THE ROSE GARDEN

As a young girl, every day seemed to open up before me like an inspiring adventure. I loved playing in the Rose Garden, dancing with the fairies, and swinging from the old beech tree. Until the day the storm came…when I pricked my finger on a thorn and fell into a deep sleep. It would take me 30 years to find my way home. But, one day, I would return to the Rose Garden.

MY QUEST FOR THE MOTHER

On my quest, while studying the Greek Myths and Medieval Mystics during my BA degree, I asked my father “Why is God male?”. Fearing the loss of my mother to cancer, I turned to the Divine Mother and found her in a rural village in Southern Italy, where the Black Madonna is worshipped as the later Gnostic embodiment of the ancient Black African Earth Mother Goddess.

FLYING HIGH IN THE ANDES

Then I found her high up in the Peruvian Andes as the Inca Earth Mother Pachamama, when the naive saviour in me travelled on a mission to save the orphans, only to discover my own Wounded Child waiting for me. An Ayahuasca ceremony in the Amazon opened the doorway to her memories of that first storm, while my situation became increasingly more dangerous.

DARK NIGHT OF THE SOUL

Managing to escape back to the UK, my shamanic initiation catapulted me into a 3yr Soul descent into suicidal depression and addiction, as I struggled to come to terms with my trauma. My saving grace was my feminist Sociology of Religion MSc & PhD research at LSE, exploring the Divine Feminine and the role of women within Paganism, Gnosticism & Christianity.

WISDOM SOPHIA

But another storm came when I gave birth to my daughter Sophia Mary with a rare, life-threatening syndrome. As I nursed her through life-saving surgery and 11 more operations, she led us repeatedly on the Sophianic descent and ascent of the Soul until we became the living embodiment of the Gnostic Myth of Sophia, Black Goddess of Wisdom – my primary deity and guide.

THE SERPENT’S TALE

Forced to relinquish my PhD, I channelled my research into the writing of my historical witch-burnings novel The Serpent’s Tale, set in the Italian village where I had first come to know the Madonna. And, in 2002, I embarked on a 4yr Priestess of Avalon training with the Glastonbury Goddess Temple, weaving its teachings with my prior studies in the Rose and Celtic lineages.

JASMINE, MY BELTANE BABE

My daughter Jasmine was born on the 8 May, the original date of Beltane, when the Michael and Mary dragon lines, upon which I’ve lived my entire life, are in alignment to the direction of the sunrise. But the healing balm of her healthy birth was short-lived when I was plunged into another deep Soul descent with post-traumatic depression and self-medicating with alcohol.

TRANSPERSONAL THERAPIST

Having already completed 8yrs of CBT with a Professor of Psychology in London, I embarked on 6yrs of Transpersonal (Parts) Psychotherapy as part of my recovery journey, eventually qualifying as a Transpersonal (Parts) Therapist in 2006, and beginning my career working in the private & corporate sectors, as well as for the UK’s leading mental health charity for 6yrs.

RETURN TO THE ROSE GARDEN

On my 35th birthday, the day after my divorce was finalised, having finally found the strength to set myself free, I flew to Egypt. On St Catherine’s Feast Day, I climbed Mount Sinai, the sacred mountain of the Rose Lineage. As I stood on the summit, breathing in the light of the new dawn, I knew that I had at last returned to the Rose Garden and come home to my Soul.

ZAC’S TRAUMATIC BIRTH

Except another storm soon came. 2yrs later, on the same date and time that I’d arrived at the summit of Mount Sinai, my son Zac was born with another rare life-threatening syndrome, rendering him unable to breathe, feed, speak or smile. I’m the only known mother in the world to have 2 children with these 2 differing syndromes, whom I’ve nursed through 20 operations.

THE HEALING WOMB

As a creative way of coming to terms with nursing my son, including resuscitating him several times a day, I spent 9 months painting ‘The Healing Womb’ art installation for women struggling with ‘womb wounding’. Then, finding myself a single mother once more, I opened my Shop in Glastonbury in 2014, supporting indigenous artisans and women’s co-operatives.

THE AVALON ROSE CHAPEL®

On Beltane 2018, I founded The Glastonbury Gnostic Centre & Chapel, renamed The Avalon Rose Chapel® when I was forced to move my teaching programme fully online in the pandemic. In 2020, Zac was chosen by Disney as 1 of their 14 Children of Courage & Kindness. Then, in 2021, I finally called in my Warrior King and married him, blending our family of 5 children.

As an Author, Speaker, Coach, Warrior Mama & VAWG Survivor, I weave my academic knowledge with my lived experience to campaign against the patriarchy, and empower other women on their own healing journey back home to their Soul.