Aileen Treahy was educated initially at the Convent of Mercy, Shepparton. She was awarded a B. A. and a Diploma of Education from the University of Melbourne and the Certificat d'Etudes from the Universite de Grenoble, France. Having travelled widely in Australia, Western Europe and Africa, she worked as a secondary school teacher in Victorian state schools. A letter by her to
Paul Grano (q.v.), the Queensland poet who included two of her poems in his
Witness to the Stars : An Anthology of Australasian Verse by Catholic Poets (1946) under her birth name, Aileen Treahy, is held at the Hayes Manuscript Collection of the University of Queensland. Her own book of poetry was published under the pseudonym 'Mara Tressarth'.