Grief, Loss & Change
As a specialist in grief, loss and change, I bring with me extensive personal and clinical experience, alongside a wealth of training and knowledge, to support people in their journey to heal and thrive after loss.
While grief is most commonly associated with death, there are over 40 life events that can cause feelings of grief. Some examples include; divorce or separation, estrangement, moving home or away, changing job/career, natural life transitions, pregnancy, infertility, and changes to identity – to name just a small few!
Grief is a natural response to change & loss but navigating grief alone can feel overwhelming, messy & confusing. We often hear “time is a healer” but unless we are intentional with our healing during that time, we can get stuck in our grief process and life can start to feel like “Groundhog Day”, as we stay stuck in survival mode.
Working with a therapist to support you in your grief, can provide you with the knowledge to understand what is happening for you, both in body and mind. This allows us to develop more awareness of what is happening for us, enabling us to make more intentional choices that support our healing process.
In the same way I believe in Post-Traumatic Stress, I also believe in Post-Traumatic Growth because I’ve lived it too. I understand on a deeper level, the overwhelm, disconnect, anger, confusion and deep sadness that comes with grief, loss and trauma. You can read more about My Story and how therapy helped me to thrive. It is this, that makes me deeply passionate about supporting other people to navigate the depths of grief, loss and change. I will never underestimate the privilege, of watching the people I support, learn to compassionately sit with their feelings, step out of the shadows of their experiences, and begin the journey of rebuilding their lives. Being trusted with their story and walking alongside them, as they begin to live a more connected, meaningful and purposeful life, will forever be one of my favourite things about being a therapist.
For grief insights, please visit my blog.
Young Adult Bereavement
If you have been bereaved as a young adult or you are grieving a past loss while navigating through this stage of life, you might be facing some extra struggles on top of the usual challenges faced in your twenties and thirties.
Young adulthood is similar to school, in that we often compare ourselves to friends and peers as a way to check we are where we think we should be – whether that’s jobs, careers, relationships, children, etc.
If we are bereaved and/or grieving, we are less likely to feel we “belong” in our existing peer groups and this can feel threatening to our nervous system.
We might also have some extra challenges to face, it can feel as if our sense of freedom has been taken away during this time and we may now be grieving a lost future as well as what was.
If you’re grieving during young adulthood, I bring with me personal experience, extensive research and clinical experience, which means I can provide you with a space to safely lean into your grief, make sense of what you’re experiencing (both in body and mind) and learn how to intentionally heal the pain of grief & loss.
The Relational Trauma of Childhood Emotional Neglect (CEN)
Consistently having our emotional needs go ignored, and unmet, as a child, is a hidden form of relational trauma called Childhood Emotional Neglect (CEN). This type of neglect is often unintentional and less likely to be noticed, but it is no less harmful and is most likely to have ripple effects into adulthood. Sometimes CEN can occur when a primary caregiver is struggling with alcohol or substance abuse, mental health difficulties, unresolved or generational trauma or learnt maternal behaviour (Cold Mother Syndrome). Other times, it can be the result of a lack of awareness on the caregivers part or growing up in a large family where individual attention was harder to provide. Often, adults who experienced CEN are likely to say “they had everything they needed” but when digging a bit deeper, this often means their physical and materialistic needs were met, but their emotional worlds weren’t acknowledged or validated in the same way.
If you’re an adult of an emotionally absent parent(s) or primary caregiver(s), you might notice you experience:
☑︎ Anxiety
☑︎ Depression
☑︎ Low self-esteem, which might present as feeling your needs are a burden to others, needing to be the “strong” one or that you’re not good enough/you don’t matter.
☑︎ Being unable to name, connect to, or express your feelings and emotions.
☑︎ Fearing abandonment, rejection and criticism.
If this resonates with you, I can help you to heal from this type of relational trauma and support you to make sense of your experience and grieve the relationship you didn’t have but very much needed and deserved.
I bring with me extensive research, training and clinical experience, which means working at your pace, we can help you to:
☑︎ Explore your inner, emotional world.
☑︎ Give names to your feelings.
☑︎ Get comfortable with having and expressing your own needs.
☑︎ Develop a mind-body connection.
☑︎ Rebuild your sense of self, your identity and your ability to authentically connect with others.
One of my greatest privileges as a therapist, is being able to support you to build self-compassion, trust and inner-safety. Connecting with our emotional world can be a transformative experience and will give you the opportunity to lead a more contented and fulfilled life. Learning to regulate your nervous system, will help to prevent overwhelm and will enable you to tune into your intuition, supporting you to make choices most aligned with you, your needs and your values.
Introverts & Highly Sensitive People (HSPs)
As someone who identifies as an introverted HSP, I understand the challenge of navigating a neurotypical world that leans towards favouring extroverts.
I relate to and understand the challenge this can present and how our differing needs can put us at greater risk of burnout and hold us back from fulfilling our goals and aspirations.
Being introverted and/or highly sensitive is nothing to be ashamed of. When you learn to harness the power that comes with these unique traits, they can become your superpower. Some of the most famous and successful people in the world are introverted and/or highly sensitive and you have the potential to harness your power and thrive too.
Working with me is a chance for you to self-reflect in a quiet space that is free from external stimuli. I work relationally to help you begin recognising the strengths in your own uniqueness and can support you to establish strategies, which help you flourish in the different areas of your life.