Psychotherapy

“People need people - for initial and continued survival, for socialization, for the pursuit of satisfaction. No one - not the dying, not the outcast, not the mighty - transcends the need for human contact.”
― Irvin D. Yalom, The Theory and Practice of Group Psychotherapy

Therapy is a collaborative process starting with a shared understanding of your current challenges and what you would like to be different. This often takes the form of information gathering, screening questionnaires and observations. Although individual psychotherapy can provide much needed space to explore difficulties, there are immense benefits to be had within group therapy.

Regardless, we always start with a conversation, and we can consider what would be helpful. These are always offered via Microsoft Teams and offer us a chance to meet before we make any commitments.

Although seeking therapy for a specific problem is appropriate, and usually what people look for, it would be in my experience that most mental health problems share common themes. It is these common themes I am often curious about and looking to better understand so we can be as aware and sensitive to the origins of, the functions and forms of and the alleviation of your difficulties.

This can often lead us to meeting with the undesired or shadowy parts of ourselves, however it is here that the richest learning and opportunities for transformation can be found. If you're not certain what the difficulty is or know what would be helpful feel free to get in touch.

Specialities

I specialise mainly in Maltreatment Associated Psychological Problems, which can commonly include problems such as:

Post-traumatic Stress Disorder
Complex Post-traumatic Stress Disorder
Attachment & Relational Trauma
Anxiety & Depression
Problems that may attract a 'Personality Disorder' diagnosis
Attention Deficit Hyper-activity Disorder
Conduct, Oppositional Defiance and/or 'Behavioural' problems, including risk-taking
Problems with relationships, emotions and self-identity

I have also been fortunate to have specialised training and experience working with children, young people and families where experiences of maltreatment has occurred and where they're are overlapping neurodevelopmental concerns or differences, such as Autism and ADHD.

However, I would argue that most of my work, regardless of cause, is relating to and working with forms of Shame, Guilt and Fear, which are often accompanied with forms of Self-attacking and Self-criticism.

Although I offer and maintain one to one therapy options, my specialist interest and experience has been via Group Work either as support groups, psycho-educational groups, skills focused and/or process driven therapy groups. I have experience of working in groups with parents, professionals, adolescents and adults.

For this work I have training in various therapy models, practices and at varying degrees, however my expertise is in the delivery of:

Compassion Focused Therapy
Compassion Focused Group Psychotherapy
Eye Movement Desensitisation and Reprocessing Therapy
(14+, Under 14s EMDR Therapy will be offered soon)
Cognitive Behavioural Therapy, with a key focus on Trauma Focused-Cognitive Behavioural Therapy