I am now retired and no longer offering Psychotherapy.

Psychotherapy and Counselling

Psychotherapy or Counselling is a process of talking, listening and being together. It involves a therapist working with you to create a safe enough space where you can explore things that might otherwise feel overwhelming. It’s a space to explore your internal world, your thoughts, feelings and experiences. A space to reflect on who you are and how you live in the world, so you can begin to live more freely and creatively.

Psychotherapy or Counselling can be helpful if you

want to explore who you are
are struggling to cope with a death or loss
feel lonely, isolated, or rejected
want to understand yourself better
are depressed
have difficulties with relationships, past or present
are anxious, fearful or panicked
have experienced trauma
feel sad, confused or angry
have obsessions, compulsions or phobias
feel stuck and unfulfilled
have experienced physical, sexual or emotional abuse
feel overwhelmed or in crisis
are shy or lacking confidence
behave in ways that are damaging to yourself or others

Choosing a therapist

It’s important that a therapist has completed a recognised training and accreditation (e.g. UKCP). Finding the right therapist for you is key and it is usual to have an initial consultation to see how you find being with a particular therapist.

An Initial Consultation is not a commitment to start therapy and you don’t have to make a decision while you’re there. Some people decide early on in the first session and others need to go away and think about it.

My approach

In childhood and adulthood, relationships are important to human growth and well-being. Secure, consistent, reliable and supportive relationships help us to feel comfortable with who we are and confident of our ability to cope in the world. When our important relationships go wrong, or are disrupted, our normal ways of coping may not work.

Traumatic experiences, whether sudden, one-off or cumulative, can overwhelm us and make it difficult to cope. Trauma in childhood or adulthood causes psychological distress and may lead to Post Traumatic Stress Disorder.

There are many causes of emotional and psychological distress and we aren’t always able to make sense of them on our own. Sometimes, we assume that our experiences are normal, so we can’t see any reason for the way we feel. Or may we feel that nobody could possibly understand, or bear to know, what we’ve been through.

The therapy relationship offers an opportunity to understand unexplained feelings; to mourn what you’ve lost or what you never had; to explore the impact of your relationships on your life and to make sense of unresolved experiences.

As a relational psychotherapist, I believe that creating the possibility of lasting change depends to a large extent on the quality of the therapy relationship. My aim was to provide therapy that respects each individual and is safe, reliable, consistent, empathic, and appropriately responsive.

My approach was mainly informed by attachment theory, relational psychoanalysis and trauma theory. If you want to know more about this type of therapy, you can read more at the Bowlby Centre website and at the UKCP website.

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