Over the years, I have had the opportunity to work with children and young people who live with Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD). Each person brings a different story, yet one thread that often runs through these conversations is how misunderstood ADHD can feel. When ADHD Is misunderstood ADHD is often spoken about in terms…
A sense of identity and belonging is something many of us wrestle with throughout our lives. For some, this comes through migration, relocation, or living abroad. For others, it arises from experiences of social exclusion, discrimination, or simply feeling different from those around them. Whatever its origins, displacement is not only geographical. It can also…
The recent deaths of young people travelling the wrong way along motorways have brought renewed attention to the relationship between social media and dangerous behaviour. While it would be irresponsible to speculate about the precise motivation behind any individual tragedy before the facts are established, these incidents raise a broader question: why might a young…
The digital world has altered the experience of growing up in ways that can be easy to overlook because so much of it has become ordinary. The thoughts, appearances and experiences of other people are now available to children and young people with an immediacy that earlier generations did not encounter. A child can move…
Over the school summer holidays, the familiar structure of the week would loosen, there is more time for holidays or for simply moving through the day at a different pace, and the distance away from school can allow children and their families to settle into a different rhythm. Then, gradually, the next transition begins in…
Periods of transition can be some of the most demanding times in our lives. Whether brought about by loss, change, illness, relationship difficulties, or an inner sense that something needs to shift, these moments can affect us physically, emotionally, psychologically, and intellectually. At times, it can feel as though we are walking into the depths…
Depression and anxiety are among the most common reasons people seek counselling or psychotherapy. They are also broad terms that can describe a wide range of emotional and physical experiences, many of which can be difficult to recognise, access or articulate. Understandably, most people want relief from the distress associated with anxiety and depression. However,…
When people think about psychotherapy, they often imagine it as a deeply personal journey focused on dealing with emotional pain, improving relationships, or overcoming life’s challenges. While this is true, psychotherapy also has a wider impact. By helping individuals become more self-aware, compassionate, and authentic, it has the potential to contribute to a healthier, more…
One major decision in any adult’s life is choosing whether or not to have children. For some, it can be more a question of when than if; perhaps they’ve always imagined having kids or just known for their entire lives that motherhood is for them. For others, the pull to have one’s own children never…
Attachment theory is everywhere. TikTok, YouTube and Instagram are filled with videos explaining anxious attachment, avoidant partners, fearful-avoidant relationships and the supposed signs that somebody is emotionally unavailable. For many people, this language can be genuinely helpful, offering a framework through which to understand why closeness feels difficult, why reassurance never seems sufficient, or why…
As heatwaves intensify across Europe and wildfires spread through parts of France and Spain, climate change can feel less like a distant scientific projection and more like a reality unfolding in front of us. Images of burning forests, evacuated towns and smoke-filled skies challenge the assumption that the climate we have known throughout our lives…
Loss and renewal Spring has arrived, bringing longer days, sunlight, green shoots, daffodils and all kinds of quiet movement. We begin to move too. We turn away from the still hibernation of winter towards the external world. We shed a layer or two and open our eyes a bit wider to let the light in….
Being in personal therapy is an important pillar of being a good psychotherapist. Psychotherapists registered with the UKCP and BPC, or attached to credible training institutes, are required to be in personal therapy with a senior professional for the duration of their training. Face to face, once weekly, at a minimum, for at least four…
Were you told as a child that you were special in some way? And do you now, as an adult, find yourself still striving for this to be true – to stand out, to be exceptional in some way? While, at the same time, a deep fear tugs at you: that you might simply be…
In psychotherapy there is a lot of focus on patients coming to therapy – the start. Prospective patients will often mull over starting psychotherapy for a long time and it is not infrequent that they have “false starts” where they perhaps research a therapist, only to abandon the process in favour of some less confronting…
It is possible that we have never had as much information and as many opinions available as we have now. We can seek guidance, knowledge and understanding with incredible ease. We can also find ourselves subject to an often confusing volume of opinions. How do we develop and maintain our sense of self, with our…
Hope in uncertain times As an Arab-British woman of Iraqi descent with an Iranian name, whose childhood homes were both Lebanon and the UK, hope is hard to find in these times. Emily Dickinson created an evocative metaphor for hope, ‘That thing with feathers’, described as perching within the soul, a presence that ‘sings the…
Have you ever been struggling with a difficult emotion or experience and tried to share it with someone, only to be told to ‘be positive’ or ‘look on the bright side’? And though it may have seemed helpful or kind on one level, did it leave you feeling shut down and unseen? Even angry? This…
It might be a cliché: the psychotherapist who says ‘tell me about your dreams’. However, dreams are a useful tool many psychotherapists welcome into therapeutic work, inviting the unconscious mind of the client to step forward. Dreams can provide powerful and impactful material as part of the therapeutic process. Dreams in psychoanalysis In the early…
The psychic life of categorisation We live in a moment saturated with the language of categories. Societal hierarchies sort humans into columns of belonging and threat. Political discourse strips complex differences, lives, experiences and humanity into slogans. Social media rewards the most reductive version of any argument. In each of these arenas, something is happening…