Andrew Jeffery

Andy Jeffery is a public speaker, writer and campaigner whose memoir, A Small Boy Smiling, tells a remarkable story of survival and how he has overcome the trauma, guilt and shame of childhood sexual abuse, teenage alcoholism, and complex post-traumatic stress disorder.

When he was eight years old, he was targeted by a group of predatory paedophiles who subjected him to over 2 years of horrific sexual abuse. A Small Boy Smiling was published under the pseudonym Matt Carey.

Since the book was published in 2018, Andy has been busy with public talks for the NSPCC and other national charities. He was the subject on BBC Radio 4’s The Untold (which attracted over 1.1 million listeners) and has spoken openly about his experiences of both trauma and healing on BBC Radio 2’s Jeremy Vine show, BBC 5 Live’s Stephen Nolan show, and many other media interviews.

Andy is a regular keynote speaker at trauma related conferences in the U.K. and (through zoom) internationally. In January 2019, he was honoured to be Pledge Speaker at the White Hat Ball, a major fundraiser for the U.K. charity Childline, which raised almost £250,000 on the night. He has since met with Childline volunteers to share his experiences, and is very grateful for the opportunity to acknowledge the vitally important work that they do.

In 2019, he was invited to take part in a groundbreaking report and documentary, Numbing the Pain, produced by One in Four (a specialist charity supporting survivors of CSA and trauma), and was approached by the Centre of Expertise for CSA to offer an expert, independent review of their excellent report, Piloting the CSA Practice Leads Programme in Adult Substance Misuse Services, published in the summer of 2020. He has continued in his role as a consultant with the Centre of Expertise for CSA ever since.

Most recently Andy was interviewed on the popular mental health podcast The School of Rock Bottom by his friend Oliver Mason.

Alongside his public talks, he co-hosts, with his trauma therapist Sarah Paton Briggs, a 1-day CPD foundation course (designed around the voice of the adult survivor) which equips counsellors, psychotherapists, psychologists and other mental health professionals with skills for working therapeutically with adult survivors of CSA.

Andy has contributed numerous articles on trauma and healing which have been published on the Survivors UK, National Association of Adult Survivors of Child Abuse (NAASCA), Federation of Drug & Alcohol Professionals, and other trauma related blogs and websites. He has also helped facilitate a number of groups offering informal, voluntary support to fellow CSA survivors in the West Country and London areas.

Away from his campaigning work, Andy has worked in the world of entertainment for over twenty-five years, as a theatre manager, organiser of several international festivals, and of large-scale community-based cultural projects supporting children and young people.