My qualifications and background:

I have a PGDip in Humanistic Psychotherapeutic Counselling from the University of Brighton, and I am an accredited member of the BACP. I am also an Associate Lecturer in counselling and mental health at the Open University.

Before training to be a counsellor, and I worked as a social science lecturer and researcher at the University of Sussex for 12 years.

I combine my background in the social sciences with my training as a counsellor, and adhere to a bio-psycho-social model of mental health. How we feel about ourselves is not just influenced by our personal experiences, family and relationships, but also by the communities and society in which we live.

I adopt an inter-sectional approach. I recognise that how we feel about ourselves and how we are treated by society is shaped by many different aspects of our identity, including our gender, race, class, age and sexuality. If we feel we are discriminated against because of aspects of our identity, this can have a significant impact on our mental health.

What is Humanistic Counselling?:

Humanistic counselling is based on the principle that as humans we give our own meaning to our lives, which fundamentally shapes how we feel about ourselves, how we relate to others, and how we experience the world. Therefore, your experiences, and the meanings you have given them, will be unique to you.

I adopt a person-centred approach, but I am also informed by Gestalt, Transactional Analysis, and feminist approaches to therapy. This means that I work at your pace. Through working together, we will make sense of what is happening, and try and find a way through that works for you. I see counselling as a reflective partnership that helps you become more self-aware.

For example, we might explore:

• how there may be different, seemingly contradictory, parts of you, and how you can become more comfortable with them all

• how you relate to others and how you can break out of patterns of unhealthy relationships

• how the story you tell about yourself might be limiting your awareness and acceptance of yourself

• how you might self-sabotage and behave in ways that block you

• how you feel about yourself and how that is shaped by your experiences

• how you respond to challenging life events and how you can deal with them differently

• how difficult or painful experiences can keep you "stuck" in the past

I have archived some blog posts exploring some of the ideas I use in therapy and reading these will give you a sense of how I work. You can read it here.