Helping those who experienced a difficult, often traumatic childhood.
I began specialising in developmental trauma as I realised that many women with maternal mental illness had experienced difficulties in childhood and had either stressful or negative relationships with their own mothers and parents. Yet they had come to me wanting a different experience for their own child.
So what do I mean by developmental trauma? Briefly, I work with people who experienced trauma in their early development, either from toxic or dysfunctional early relationships, or through traumatic experiences and neglect. There is a link between severe maternal mental illness and developmental trauma. However, this is not the only link. I see many people who have experienced violent and abusive relationships with their parents/caregivers and often continue to experience this even though they are adults. So this type of trauma comes from severe neglect, all types of abuse (emotional, physical, psychological) and also deleterious conditions such as war, famine and migration. People with this type of trauma often have extreme fear. This fear suffuses them and no matter what they do to cope (for example addiction, OCD, withdrawal from society are some coping strategies), the fear is always there, a constant in their life, causing lifelong mental illness, and health difficulties. Some can also be diagnosed with personality disorders, such as Borderline Personality Disorder (EUPD) and Narcissism.
I aim to enable clients to begin to find out who they really are, working with them to enhance their life choices and helping them through whatever it is that has had a negative impact on their lives.
The biggest joy in my work is to see a client regain their mojo and begin to improve their self worth, enhancing the way they feel about themselves and others and also enabling them to achieve greater success in their working lives, their relationships, their chosen sport and their personal lives.