Psychotherapy

I qualified as a person-centred, integrative psychotherapist in 2006 and spent 9 years of my career in drug and alcohol recovery programmes. I have specific training in adolescent and children’s counselling and have worked with the children’s counselling charity FEGANS.  I also have specialised training in couples counselling. 

I have worked with young people and children in a variety of school environments and outdoor therapeutic spaces. I consider children and young people to be one of my specialist areas as well as couples counselling and adult addictive behaviours.

However, people are not defined by their presenting struggles and this has led me to work in many different contexts of life experiences and personal pain. For example, abuse, bereavement, abandonment and trauma are all reasons for a child or teenager self-harming, having panic attacks, feeling depressed, drinking alcohol, taking illicit drugs or other struggles. This means I have worked with many different life issues.

I have also worked with the first 3 steps of the Minnesota AA 12 steps programme and have witnessed the benefits of people doing these steps.

From 2011 until 2021 I was registered and accredited with BACP (British Association of Counsellors and Psychotherapists). I have changed to ACC accreditation (Association of Christian Counsellors) because I want to offer holistic therapy where a person’s spirituality can be more easily acknowledged. As I am a person-centred therapist this aspect is client led and you are free to explore spirituality in a different context other than a Christian based one or, alternatively, to choose to focus on other aspects of yourself.

I ran a poetry club in London for three years. This was where people of different ages and backgrounds came to share their love of poetry. I found the sessions were naturally therapeutic and I have a particular interest in writing as a way of improving mental health.