The following list of qualifications is not exhaustive, though, I do believe they are the most relevant to my role as an integrative therapist allowing me to create a service suited to your unique needs:
(O.A. DIP) Child Psychology
(DIP) CBT
(DIP) Child and Adolescent Counsellor
(DIP) Family and Couples Counsellor
(O.A.DIP) Addictions & Post Natal Depression Therapist
(DIP) Grief, Bereavement and Loss Counsellor
(DIP) Mindfulness, Life Coach and NLP Practitioner
(DIP) Child Attachment
(BA HONS)
Havenings Techniques® Certified Practitioner
EMDR Certified Practitioner
Hypnotherapist Certified Practitioner
Autogenic Training Certified Practitioner
Rewind Techniques Certified Practitioner
ACCREDITATIONS, REGISTRATIONS & MEMBERSHIPS:
UNK (Certified Rewind Practitioner)
CHRTI (Certified Havening Techniques ® Practitioner)
ACCPH (Accredited Counsellors, Coaches, Psychotherapists and Hypnotherapists)
IAHC (International Association of Health Coaches)
IANLPC (International Association of NLP and Coaching)
ICBCH (International Certification Board of Clinical Hypnotherapy)
If you have any questions regarding any of the above please do not hesitate to contact me.
My mission to find the least intrusive, least painful and fastest way to eliminate the emotional hijacking we suffer from meant there were many therapies that piqued my curiosity. Each one offering something different.
Having experienced so much of life's chaos myself I am able to relate to many of the histories my clients share. I also understood the need for un-intrusive rapid results. It's true we often experience the same issues, but we do this from a unique perspective based on what has shaped our understanding of how we view the world and as such your therapy is based on your individual history and circumstances.
Our attachment patterns, conditioning and programming make your circumstances a very personal experience.
Reflecting on my own life experiences as a tiny human living in a very chaotic world I employed the strategy of normalisation. It allowed me to exist in my terror. In effect I found comfort in immense discomfort and my brain became used to that, as did my body. The communication between both became synchronised to the point that if I tried to create a world outside of that familiar communication I would feel like an imposter and soon revert back to the familiar feelings and thoughts which I knew to be my truth, my normal and I would feel safe again.
Like most people I normalised my trauma to the point it wasn't recognised as such.
It was a simple yet very effective survival strategy and one I continued to employ until I recognised I needed to thrive not just survive!
I had remained in its grip my entire life until slowly over a 20+ year span of learning I discovered there was another way of being!
Understanding why we as humans can be so cruel to each other and more importantly to ourselves is fundamental in helping us stop our maladaptive ways of living. It helps us put in to perspective why we have done and said the things we have.
There is no shame in self protection no matter how it presents itself. Our behaviours are shaped by the conditioning and programming we have been subject to growing up so you, like me, have employed your behaviours to navigate life the best you can, and you will continue to do so until you also learn another way of being.
As an abused, neglected child I was in unacknowledged need of help. Had it been available would I still have become a therapist and foster parent? I think yes! I have always been in touch with who I am as a compassionate and empathetic person but lived mostly by default out of fear.
Living by default, normalising your old behaviours and feeling it's pointless trying to change is all part of the normalisation. I was that person. The old coping strategies that had been successful in protecting me, the way yours protect you, did not let me down. After all I was still alive! Alive but just existing. Alive but serving everyone else's need instead of my own. Alive but simply living in survival mode without even realising it! Neglect, abuse and fear on a daily basis kept me stuck but according to my brain it was keeping me safe.
Now? now I am a different person all together. Now I have a tool box filled with just about everything I need to thrive in life. I recognise the changes within me as soon as the thought generates the internal bodily emotional response and I am equipped to stop it in its tracks.
Now I look at what most consider obstacles, as opportunities, every one offering many different outcomes. If I am faced with a memory of my past threatening to interrupt my day; of the tools the many years of self-development and training has afforded is deployed to simply eradicate the emotional component of the memory and carry on with my life.
It can be usual for abused people to be suddenly hit with memories of their past. They can come at any time without warning.
Reoccurring nightmares were one of the clues throughout my life that I was ignoring my trauma at my peril . I couldn't eat soft food. I couldn't bear noisy eaters. I was afraid of obscure things and had no idea why. It wasn't until just last year 2024, 57 years after the events, two memories returned that helped me make sense of what had happened. My nightmares, my eating, my aversion to noisy eaters and my two main fears all made sense. At last!
Had my brain decided to give me the information all at once would I have coped with it? Who knows. I was given what I was given in a very long disjointed and distressing way spanning my entire adult life and. On reflection I was also given clues as a child but was protected by my normalisation and my brain shutting off full access.
I know given my experiences as a therapist there is no reason to suffer the way I did. No reason to continue in life normalising other peoples bad behaviour toward you. Therapies have changed dramatically. Today's leading edge therapies offer single session solutions to the most common mental health issues. Being emotionally hijacked by shame, guilt, self-blame, disgust and every other self deprecating emotion an abuse survivor is taught to feel is a thing of the past, and not a good way to live. Being afraid of talking is not a good way to live. Pretending your'e fine and living in a fog of overwhelm is not a good way to live. Having all of those suppressed emotions manifest as illnesses is not a good way to live! And no longer necessary!
I offer unique packages to suit your needs and I've found by far the most efficient and least intrusive is Havening Thechniques®
I studies with the doctors in New York who developed the technique. I was lucky enough to grab a spot on their annual training almost immediately after witnessing first hand the miraculous eradication of a fear and traumatic encoding on an audience participant at a Paul McKenna event. There was no doubt in my mind Havening® was the therapy all of those past qualifications had been leading to. I was not wrong! I can honestly say it was the most enlightening and intense training I have ever attended with astounding results to follow.
I became qualified in Havening Techniques® in 2019 and I have not had a disappointed client to date. Including myself. This therapy has become my go to therapy for eradicating life long phobias, years of agoraphobia, PTSD and everything in between in just 1 session and in as little as 12-15 minutes!
I've had clients arrive unable to tell me what has happened and after one session - me unaware of their underlying issue - they have for the first time been able to sit calmly and talk about their experience without their emotional attachment to it. This means victims of sexual abuse, physical attacks, car accidents, grieving parents and so many others who have been stuck in their emotional responses to what has happened to them have been able to express what had happened without being emotionally hijacked by the taught emotions of shame, self-blame and guilt. Life changing to say the least!
I have used Havening® on people diagnosed with ADHD who discovered afterwards their life long behaviour was due to trauma. And a woman in her late eighties suffering with agoraphobia who hadn't left their home in 3 years? She began visiting her holiday home again with friends.
My journey of education and personal development over the last two and half decades has led to hundreds of satisfied clients. Many changing their lives in just one session!
Whatever therapy you choose at Therapy1st you can release yourself from the emotional bondage that is holding you hostage.
You can let go of past relationships, rebuild fractured ones and release yourself from the pain of grief as well as all other emotions you have learned to swallow down and internalise as illness over the years.
Just reach out and ask for your free phone consultation below.