Counselling & Psychotherapy

By creating a safe and grounded space, I offer counselling and psychotherapy to facilitate the healing and the creative and personal growth in my clients. I focus on the client and their individuality and uniqueness, working with whatever they bring to our sessions. I work at the pace my client wants or needs to work at, whether that is a gentle, safe pace, or at a more challenging pace that 'pushes the boundaries'. I am very interested in the link between mind, body and soul, how they interact with each other and especially in how sometimes this link can break down due to personal circumstances or life events. I work with my clients to re-establish this link and help them flow more easily through their lives.

I provide short-term and long-term therapy to individuals (adults, adolescents and children), couples and groups, who bring with them a range of life’s problems, challenges and possibilities. Often people will come to me with a specific issue, but sometimes they want to do some personal development work, which can be anything from working out the priorities in their lives, to deeper more transpersonal work.

I am comfortable working with whatever my clients bring to me. These issues include (amongst others) depression, anxiety, stress, sexual abuse, low self-confidence, relationship issues, eating disorders, bereavement, unhappiness with work, home or life in general. I have an interest and have had specific training to work with clients who have experienced trauma, and/or are experiencing Post Traumatic Stress Disorder.

My aim is to encourage a deeper sense of self-awareness whilst focusing on the individual’s whole experience of life (including their thoughts and feelings, and how they react to them). At the heart of the work I do with clients is Gestalt therapy. I enable clients to change their ‘story’ by focusing on their experience of the ‘here and now’, making past-present links as well as bringing awareness to their ‘fragmented’ parts, bringing them together to make them feel ‘whole’. Where appropriate, I help clients to become aware of the link between their mind and body, and how the body can be an indicator of the roots of problems, as well as the key to healing them. I may also incorporate Cognitive Behavioural Therapy techniques, body process work and breath work.

Normally therapy takes place in my peaceful therapy room on the Dartington estate. However, sometimes it is appropriate and valuable to take the therapy out of the room and into the beautiful gardens on the estate, or into the nearby countryside. This can be very healing and often facilitates clients in moving on if they are feeling 'stuck'. I also see clients in Newton Abbot.

Another aspect of my work is working with groups and individuals, facilitating Shinrin Yoku (Forest Bathing) sessions in nearby woodlands, forests and countryside. This well researched technique creates a sense of mental and physical wellbeing.

As well as my private practice, where I see clients and also supervise other counsellors and psychotherapists, I am a counselling tutor, teaching counselling and psychotherapy courses at Heartwood Centre for Counselling and Psychotherapy Training at Dartington in Devon. I also work independently, often alongside my husband James, teaching workshops and diplomas to trainee and qualified therapists, as a partner in Devon Counselling College as well as teaching mental health courses across the UK.

I have previously managed a Counselling and Mental Health Service for The Children's Society, and have worked within the NHS facilitating both individual and group psychotherapy.