Each person’s story is unique

In this era of the generic – increasingly AI generated – advice, information and hard sell, the investment in a human relationship where you are seen and respected as a unique individual is important. Every person comes with a history, a cultural and embodied identity, and lived experience that is specific to them.

The stories we have been told, that we tell ourselves, do shape us. Sometimes we know these stories too well, sometimes they are out of our awareness. I aim to help clients piece together, re-shape and flesh out unconscious stories, as well as to create new ones. I am sensitive to how shame and prejudice can influence us to hide or feel alienated and unwelcome. I attend to how difference – whether through colour, sexuality, gender or disability – may impact our being together and how we can talk about this.

I am always curious about your transgenerational story – how did your great-grandparents, grandparents and (step/adopted/biological) parents transmit their culture to you? What and where do you feel your roots are – in your body, your way of living? What do you want for yourself?

People are also unique in how they process emotion, how their minds work and how easy or not they find it to put across their experience in words. I work collaboratively and creatively to get to know each client and to discover what is most helpful.

I don’t give a list of symptoms or issues I work with because people are complex. They are always more than a set of symptoms. I have worked as a therapist for over thirty years, and I recognise that whilst some themes clients bring are common to all eras, others stem from huge social changes and upheaval and current crises.

“The body as a home, but only if it is understood that bodies are never singular, but rather haunted, strengthened, underscored by countless other bodies. The body as a home, but only if it is understood that place and community and culture burrow deep into our bones. The body as a home, but only if it is understood that language, too, lives under the skin. The body as a home, but only if it is understood that bodies can be stolen, fed lies and poison, torn away from us. The body as a home, but only if it is understood that the stolen body can be reclaimed.”

Eli Clare. Exile and Pride: Disability, Queerness and Liberation (Duke University Press Books: 2015)