MEET THE EXPERTS

I’ve been fascinated by human behaviour for as long as I can remember, and, like many therapists, had a childhood that left me with more questions than answers, damaging core beliefs, deep emotional trauma and a decades-long relationship with anxiety, depression, self-sabotage and high-functioning co-dependance.

As a typical people pleaser, my own wants, needs and beliefs were entirely off my radar until well into my thirties, and, unsurpsingly, piece by piece, decision by decision, by then I had lost connection with my true self almost completely, trying to be what everyone else wanted and needed me to be. I shape-shifted myself to within an inch of my life, until my body and mind held a meeting I was clearly not invited to and forced me to stop.

My first therapy sessions felt like a warm blanket on a cold day – although it took me a while to be fully honest with her,. This was partly because the idea of saying what I truly felt about people and events and there being no punishment, judgement or consequence felt like an emormous trap and partly because I was so disconnected from myself that I didn’t really know how I felt; I knew what I wanted to feel or how I thought I should feel but not my true feelings.

This is a very common place for people – especially women - to find themselves in. What a life changing process it is to beging to realise that so much of our “stuff”, really was never ours to begin with… and in my case, like many others, to learn to accept the health issues this has led to, when our bodies have tried so desperately and for so long to tell us we were living a life that wasn’t aligned with who we truly are.

I knew in my core that this was the kind of space I wanted to hold for others, and began to search for courses that covered the type of therapy approaches that felt truest to me.

After moving back to the UK, it finally felt like the time had come to pursue this lifelong passion and I spent three years training to become a qualified integrative counsellor at the Heartwood Centre of Cousnselling and Psychotherapy and I am now an Accredited Member of the UK's National Counselling and Psychotherapy Society.

Now, after working with clients from many walks of life, with a huge variety of issues, the honour and privilege of recognising, nurturing and celebrating both the uniqueness of every person and the divine nature we all share, is something I absolutely love.