Roberts was born with a rare bowel condition and spent much of her childhood undergoing medical treatment. For 28 years, she relied on parenteral nutrition – nutrients delivered directly into her bloodstream through an IV – to sustain her.
"From just few days old, I'd already had multiple operations," she tells TTG. "I didn't know a life without medical teams."
Her condition did not stop her from living life to the fullest. "I still travelled. I still went to university. I still lived away – I went to Dublin from Cork," she says. "I even did show-jumping as a hobby."
But by her mid-20s, her condition had deteriorated. In the final months before her transplant, she was connected to her IV for around 18 hours a day, forcing her to step back from normal life, including her studies in psychotherapy.
In November 2019, aged 28, Roberts underwent a high-risk multi-visceral transplant.
"It was just night and day," she says of life afterwards. "Before the transplant, I barely ate anything. I'd think, 'how does someone eat and drink? That's wild.'
"Now, I've discovered I love sushi, savoury pancakes – and that I have a massive sweet tooth."
'I've worked from a hospital bed and a sunlounger'
Roberts completed her psychotherapy training, moved from Ireland to the UK and began thinking about what she wanted her working life to look like.
"I realised I needed something a lot more flexible than psychotherapy," she says. "I had read about InteleTravel online and I loved the way you're kind of your own boss, but have lots of support you can tap into."
Roberts is still closely monitored following her transplant. While she says she is fortunate to be doing well overall, minor illnesses – or "sniffles", as she puts it – can lead to a virus, infection and even hospitalisation in the worst of cases.
"I've worked this job from a hospital bed and I've worked it from sunloungers many a time in any given year," she says.
'I'm quite sentimental after what I've been through'
Roberts, who now specialises in luxury, long-haul travel, enjoys knowing she has created special memories for her clients. "I'm quite sentimental after what I've been through," she says. "You're not listed for a transplant unless it's life or death, and to be hit with that before the age of 30 really changes your perspective.
"So I love thinking I play a part in people's memories and that I'm giving them something that they'll look back on fondly for years to come."
Roberts is a keen advocate for organ donation, with plans to take to the stage at the InteleTravelQuest conference in Krakow, Poland tomorrow (27 September) to raise awareness among her fellow travel professionals.
"I'd love people to stop and think about it," she says. "People are three times more likely to need a transplant than to become an organ donor, which is a scary statistic. So I wanted to do something to get that message out there."
Joining InteleTravel has given Roberts a flexible way to earn a living – and a way to build her business, and life, on her own terms.
While she still has regular medical appointments, and knows that her health can sometimes dictate her plans, she is determined to make the most of the freedom she now has.
"I'm very, very lucky," she says. "That's not lost on me."
