About Me

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I am a fully qualified Relational Counsellor (BACP, Level 6). I have completed 3 years psychotherapy training with the Welsh Psychotherapy Institute (WPI), registered with The UK Council for Psychotherapy (UKCP). 

 

I have had 3 years experience as a practitioner, both on placement at Merthyr MIND and in private practice.

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To be honest, it never occurred to me to be a counsellor. Pre-pandemic I was happily running a busy cafe, MCing a comedy night and providing a meeting place for climate action groups.

 

One of my regulars, a psychologist, noticed people seemed to want to talk to me. I shrugged, wasn’t it just part of the job? Then the pandemic hit and it was no longer possible to run the premises and make money. My friend offered me a job at his organisation, as a trainee providing therapy to children and young people in care (13-17yo).

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Here I developed Life Story projects as a form of therapy with both adults and children. I have seen it to be especially beneficial in working with anxiety, trauma and identity. Exploring stories and writing is a really creative and exciting way of working with the added benefit of making a lasting document of the work. 

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I love comedy and have worked both on stage as an MC and run comedy workshops with children and young people. I have not yet met a person without a sense of humour. Possibly it is an innate feature of being a human being? Perhaps it's evolutionary, we need wit and a sense of the absurd to survive? I see how a well-timed joke can bring such joy and sudden lightness and laughing can feel so very good. Where possible, I encourage clients to bring their sense of humour to their situations and use comedy tools for increasing self-compassion and shifting perspectives. 

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I run maternity projects. Starting in the later stages of pregnancy the mother-to-be explores her experiences of pregnancy and child birth and the nature of motherhood. I record and transcribe the sessions as a lasting record of a time that can be both utterly life changing and so easily forgotten. This work can be printed and bound and often includes photos/pictures. 

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What is Counselling?

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Counselling is where you get to speak about your thoughts and feelings to someone who doesn’t judge you.

Counselling is an opportunity to face complicated or troubling feelings in the hope of gaining greater understanding of them and being able to manage them more effectively.

Counselling offers the possibility of getting to know yourself better, to make sense of thought and relationship patterns and ways of acting in the hope of shifting and changing if you wish to.

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Why Counselling?

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It could be any number of things presenting themselves …

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Love, sleep, drink, anxiety, children, climate, sexuality, grief, depression, money, partner, beliefs, break-up/divorce, death, existence itself...

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…or perhaps it’s not clear but you know, you instinctively know, things need addressing.

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Areas of Expertise

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• Anxiety & Depression

• Break-up / Divorce

• Climate

• God / The nature of existence

• Grief

• Motherhood

• Sexuality, sex & sexual relationships

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​​​Anxiety & Depression: We scope out and explore the nature of your presenting issues, concerns, anxieties, including any obsessive compulsive processes, spiralling thoughts. Anxiety can manifest in many forms, for example around a particular person or practice, such as cleaning, eating, drinking, prayer, or the security of oneself or loved ones. We explore underlying causes. We reflect on depressive thought patterns and feelings, and look at developing and consolidating the sense of self and proactive ways of coping. 

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Break-up / Divorce: We look at love, hate and the many feelings between. We look at guilt, shame and the practicalities of learning to live without the person you created a life with and possibly had children with. We reflect on the work of building from a new starting point in new ways.

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Climate: We have entered a time of climate breakdown, it has implications at every level of existence. Perhaps unsurprisingly, it causes many people great concern. What are we to do? What world will we leave to those who come after us? We can explore the myriad aspects of this subject in compassionate and creative ways. 

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God / The nature of existence: I have had a lot of experience with those who struggle with overwhelming beliefs and religious fundamentalism. We can explore the transpersonal realms, archetypes, the nature of existence and ways of being. This can be a poetic and beautiful process. 

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Grief: I’ve worked long term with those who have lost people suddenly. I've also worked with people who live with and support someone with life changing/threatening illness such as dementia or cancer. In our sessions, it has led to explorations of the big questions of existence and meaning and what it is to be a human being, what it is to love and to lose. 

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Motherhood: I have worked extensively with women who are mothers. This tends to affect us deeply in many, different ways. Perhaps the child is adolescent and irritable, or they’re moving out, coming out, falling ill or have received a diagnosis for ADHD, autism or they are struggling with anorexia. Whatever part of the life cycle the child is in, there is usually much to process as a mother.

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Sexuality, sex & relationships: I have worked with those grappling with their sexuality and their sexual relationships. We look at how this affects them in the many aspects of their lives, including coming to terms with being queer and coming out.

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​I have also worked with people with ADHD, anorexia, autism, obesity, post-natal depression, PTSD, schizophrenia and suicidal ideation.

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I work with adults and teens. 

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Summary

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In all my work with clients we consider how relational themes and patterns are affecting them in the here and now. We also consider trauma, shame and why things can go wrong and how to deal with and heal from them. 

 

Counselling can also be about coming into awareness of feelings and parts of the self for the first time. This can be deeply challenging and difficult work, it can also be illuminating and lead to profound change. 

 

Essentially, life can seem very different to what we thought it would be. 

 

I believe counselling is a creative, compassionate and courageous way to work through whatever life is bringing us. I am also waaay better than AI. I know I've checked.