Her childhood was marred by abuse from her father, which led her family to disintegrate by the time she was in middle school.

Ikeda studied up to second year of high school before dropping out as she was unable to pay for her tuition.

[2] She worked in the office until 2011, when she moved to Hokkaido to head an NGO focusing on rebuilding the lives of welfare recipients and pensioners.

She ran as an independent candidate for the Hokkaido 2nd district seat with the support of the centre-left Democratic Party of Japan, finishing in the third place.

She narrowly lost her rematch with Wada but obtained enough votes to be returned through the CDP's PR block list.