I am a qualified and experienced humanistic counsellor with an Advanced Diploma in Humanistic Counselling (2007). I am an Accredited Member of the BACP and listed on the BACP Register For Counsellors and Psychotherapists (Reg. No 038577). As such I am bound by the BACP Ethical Framework for Good Practice.
My original training integrated aspects of three humanistc approaches to counselling :
- Person Centred Therapy – which places special emphasis on an empathic, non judgemental and congruent relationship between counsellor and client.
- Gestalt Therapy – which in addition places emphasis on understanding a person’s here and now experience in life and offers an interactive and creative way of working together to build an understanding of patterns in life and how these can be changed when they are not helpful anymore.
- Transactional Analysis – which offers ways to think about and understand patterns in how we relate to ourselves and others. Over the years I have added training in many areas including,
Attachment theory – which looks at how our earliest relationships shape the patterns we adopt in our adult lives and how these patterns can be modified where they have become unhelpful to us.
Developments in neuroscience that help us think about the interplay between body and mind and the role of our early experiences in setting up the basis for our emotional and relational lives.
Body psychotherapeutic approaches which value working holistically, seeing the body and mind not as two separate systems but as deeply interconnected. In particular I value the Relational Trauma Therapy approach, developed by Merete Holm Brantbjerg and Kolbjørn Värdel, which amongst many other things offers very practical ways to work both stress and trauma patterns and build resilience.