PSYCHOLOGICAL APPROACHES TO HEALING

Psychological Therapy

Individual psychological therapy with me is a safe, supportive, and confidential process where we work together to explore your difficulties, understand their origins, and develop new ways of coping. My approach is collaborative and person-centred, meaning that our sessions are tailored to your unique experiences, strengths, and goals.

Therapy begins with an assessment. This first step gives me the opportunity to get to know you, understand your challenges and past experiences, and hear what you hope to gain from therapy. From there, we develop a shared understanding of your difficulties and create a treatment plan that aligns with your goals.

Throughout our work together, we will regularly review your progress to make sure therapy feels helpful, and we will make adjustments where needed.

● Difficult or overwhelming thoughts and emotions that have lasted a long time and are affecting your work, relationships, or home life.

● Low mood, sadness, depression, hopelessness, or a loss of enjoyment in life.

● Anxiety, uneasiness, restlessness, irritability, worry, or fear.

● Struggles with concentration, decision-making, motivation, or interest in things that once mattered to you.

● Low confidence, self-worth, or self-esteem.

● Avoiding people, hobbies, or social activities you once enjoyed.

● Impulsivity or difficulties managing and regulating your emotions.

● Previous experiences with therapy where nothing seemed to help.

● The impact of a difficult childhood or adult experiences that make it hard to feel safe or trusting in relationships.

● Relationships that feel intense but unstable, or fears of rejection and abandonment.

● Trauma that continues to affect your emotional and relational wellbeing, and a wish to work through this in a trauma-informed way.

● Experiences of racism, marginalisation, or stigma that have caused deep emotional pain, and a desire for support in navigating and healing from these experiences.

I may be able to help you if you are experiencing any of the following:

Therapeutic Approaches

My therapeutic approach is trauma-informed and integrative. I can draw upon different models depending on your needs. I primarily draw upon attachment theory, cognitive-behavioural, cognitive-analytic, and mentalisation-based therapy.

Cognitive-Behavioural (CBT):

A cognitive-behavioural approach aims to support you in identifying any negative thoughts that you are having and understanding how these thoughts interact with and influence your behaviours, emotions, and physical sensations. Using this approach, you are supported to develop an understanding of why you might be behaving in certain ways, how your difficulties are maintained, and how your thoughts influence the physical sensations and emotions that you experience. Through this understanding, you can begin to challenge your thoughts, break unhelpful patterns of behaviour, and create change in your life.

For more information on CBT, click HERE

Cognitive–Analytic (CAT):

A cognitive-analytic approach works with relationship patterns. This approach involves working with me to identify and understand any difficulties that you have, and any unhelpful patterns of thinking, feeling and behaving that you experience. Based on our past, we develop expectations of how others will be towards us. These expectations can cause us to develop unhealthy or unhelpful repeating patterns. Working together, we will explore your early life and past experiences to understand how these are influencing how you relate to other people and how you treat yourself. Interventions utilising a cognitive analytic approach are tailored to your individual needs and therapy goals. In learning to identify, explore, and understand your distressing patterns and the origins of these, you can learn to develop skills in self-understanding and emotional regulation. In addition, you can learn how to improve and stabilise your reactions to distressing experiences.

For more information on CAT, click HERE

Mentalisation (MBT):

A mentalising approach aims to improve your skills in understanding your emotions, thoughts and actions. It can help you improve your ability to mentalise, which means understanding your own thoughts and emotions, as well as those of others. When we experience difficult situations, they can create a high level of stressful emotion, where we may become fixed in our thinking, act impulsively, and make assumptions about the intentions of other people or their feelings. This approach teaches you to be curious and to understand your mind and the minds of others, allowing you to be better at managing difficult emotions and situations. Through a mentalising approach, you will be supported to work through your emotional challenges, which may include trust issues, overwhelming emotions, destructive behaviours and relationship problems. Mentalising can help you to create healthier relationships with yourself and others.

For more information on MBT, click HERE