What is the purpose of intimate relationships? This is a question I often ask couples who come to see me for couples therapy. Most cannot answer the question beyond the superficial. However, it is an important question to ponder: relationships are not easy for the most well-adjusted of us and so there has to be…
The exploration of sexual preference and fantasy in therapy can be a portal to our inner psychological landscape. Unlocking the unconscious logic of sexual fantasy is one way of casting a light on our internal world and of understanding the emotional and psychological difficulties that may have prompted us to seek therapy in the first…
What is Cancel Culture? This seemingly new trend is one of promoting the ‘cancellation’ of people, brands or television shows as a result of what some (the cancellers) perceive to be some form of offensive comment, remark, view or behaviour. It has surged on social media with various derogatory hashtags, notably #RIP. A recent high…
“Social connection can lower anxiety and depression, help us regulate our emotions, lead to higher self-esteem and empathy, and actually improve our immune systems. By neglecting our need to connect, we put our health at risk.” JS House, KR Landis, D Umberson (2019) Social connection can be difficult to do right now as we find…
What is ‘Manifesting’ and The Law of Attraction? Recently a client, somewhat younger than me, described a phenomenon they called “Manifesting”. They felt excited and disappointed in themselves in equal measure that they seemed to be failing in using this ‘secret’ method of working with ‘the universe’ to bring them whatever their heart desired. Curious,…
Quite a few people this week have asked me about tips for supporting children at times of high emotional stress (e.g. anger, rage or anxiety). For this reason, I thought I would share with you some generic pointers for parents that I use in clinic, but which could apply to most children. These are predominantly…
What a difference a year makes. For all of us the world is an inconceivably different place to a year ago. Not only are we all living with greater uncertainty, we have all had to enormously adapt to living, socialising, relating working, and not least, having therapy in a different way. Almost exactly a year…
Children, like all of us, encounter loss in their lives, temporary and permanent. They may lose a treasured possession, a loved one who dies, a parent who leaves or is imprisoned, a friend who moves away, or a valued teacher in the transition between year groups or schools. Some are unlucky enough to lose their…
Thanks to ever increasing demand for our services, we are now recruiting new associates to join our vibrant and busy practice. Established in 2008, Brighton and Hove Psychotherapy is a practice offering high-quality face-to-face psychology and psychotherapy across the Brighton & Hove area, as well as online therapy to clients nationally. We are interested in…
Schools will soon have menopause on the curriculum. Largely due to the efforts of psychotherapist Diane Danzebrink and her #MakeMenopauseMatter campaign. In 2019 Education Secretary Damian Hinds confirmed menopause will become part of the Sex and Relationships curriculum for teenagers in the UK in Autumn 2020 alongside periods and pregnancy. With the recognition that menopause…
‘It’s not about making the right choice. It’s about making a choice and making it right.’ J.R. Rim Making a decision can be very difficult. Sometimes it doesn’t matter how big or small a decision is: it is the fact that one has to be made at all which engenders an anxiety that can feel…
Nietzsche reflected on and wrote much about the lived experience of human beings. He discussed many things that were seemingly in conflict with the last thing he wrote. I have sometimes heard this used as a reason not to read Nietzsche. This apparent paradoxical nature might sometimes leave you confused and resistant to look again. …
It is not comfortable being told that you are feeling the way you do because of your hormones. This kind of biological reductionism is not helpful to any gender but the extremely severe symptoms of Pre-menstrual Dysphoric Disorder are completely aligned to the menstrual cycle. They manifest during the week before menstruation and end when…
Stress is caused by an existing stress-causing factor or stressor. Stress can be ‘routine’, related to everyday activities or ‘sudden’, brought about by a change or transition, or ‘traumatic’, in relation to an overwhelming event. During stressful events our adrenal glands release adrenaline, a hormone which activates the sympathetic nervous system, our body’s defence mechanism…
We all need sleep, and it is a natural part of our life. On average, most adults need around 8 hours of sleep per night although this can vary from person to person. While no one is entirely sure why we need to sleep, we do know that it is significant for brain development, and…
Of all the problems presented by clients when they first attend therapy as a couple, communication difficulties are often to be found as the most pressing. However, our difficulties with communication is not just an issue within a relationship: it touches every aspect of our lives – which makes the effort of finding out how…
When Covid-19 started spreading, I didn’t instantly move away from working with people directly in the room. Up until that point I had only provided limited online sessions, usually when people moved away from the area or travelled for work. I was slightly apprehensive about that as an option. However, as things continued and lockdown…
The coronavirus pandemic has interrupted our lives and disrupted the status quo – that which confers normalcy and (feels like) security. As we have in recent months reorganised and adapted our lives to halt the virus in its destructive tracks we have been derailed from our personal and collective sense of forward motion (progression). Forced…
It’s easy for psychiatry, psychology and psychodynamic psychotherapy to be confused, so in this article, we will provide definitions and distinctions between them all. As the psychodynamic model is what we do, we may be biased. However, there is research that suggests the effectiveness of therapeutic approaches is pretty equal, and that the relationship with…
When children feel helpless, angry, or scared for long periods of time, it can be remembered in their bodies. This is particularly so in the case of trauma, whereby specific (trauma-implicated) body parts may start to feel somewhat disconnected to the rest of the body (e.g. headaches, neck pain, stomach aches, back spasms, etc.). Body…