Therapy

I think my clients would describe me as warm, impassioned, and caring. I don't have any chill, really, and that's a strength! I care about my work being affirming, and I'm a good cheerleader and passionate advocate. I take things seriously, I give them weight, I'm not scared of big feelings. I'm tenacious and robust. I use humour and metaphor a lot, and I think this lightness and storytelling facilitates us in the work of therapy. I'm enjoying entering into an elder position within our fat community. I love recommending books and Tiktok wisdom.

I've been doing this work for a while now - nearly fifteen years. Prior to this, I worked in victim support services and charitable therapeutic services. I have valued seasons cooking for a service for our local insecurely housed community, and running a local sling meet and national sling library for some years. And prior to all this, I was a chef!

I love to sing, I love to cook, I love to swim, I love to walk in the forest. My favourite words, since childhood, have been tangible, palpable and visceral: at first, because I enjoyed saying them but, through adulthood, delightedly realising I might always have been called to working with the body.

I love food, I love cooking, I love gathering people around my table. I believe food connects us to our community, our ancestors, our own selves. I love cherries, instant noodles, and very spicy food.

‘If you want to prevent or treat eating disorders, you must make it safe to be fat’

- Dr Deb Burgard

My work focuses on walking with those who want to heal their relationship with food and body. Often, these people have experienced weight stigma, or faced the trauma of oppression.

My work is concerned with being in community with clients as they deepen their tolerance of what it is to be deeply human. Unfinished, work in progress, wild and playful. 

My work is politicized, and we take time not just to consider your individual experience, but also how that is shaped and influenced by systems and structures. My work seeks to be actively anti-oppressive, and I centre marginalised voices in my ongoing education and training.

My own positionality as a fat person who has healed from an eating disorder gives me vital lived experience - I know what it's like to seek to say whole in a world that wants you to stay in pieces.

Honestly, I'm not a neutral therapist; I don't believe we can be neutral in the face of oppression. Some bodies are more vulnerable in our culture, and I won't just be a bystander in that system; I've been called to be a disruptor. Body justice, and all anti oppressive work, requires active resistance. I'm not here to participate in the social lie that only some bodies deserve to belong. This work is liberatory, and we're here to imagine a new way together. I'm your advocate, and I work alongside you as you come home to your body.

Our culture encourages us to disconnect from our bodies, to be obedient little floating heads. But we are holistic systems - head, heart, body, nervous system, spirit. We can rest in our power and deep humanness, when we inhabit our full selves.

I might be the first person who has said that your body is not a problem. I know, in my politics, in my head and heart, that your body is not the problem. Your body is your partner, your protector, and your ally.

I think your body is wise. I think your body is trustworthy, and brave, and holy, and tenacious, and playful. I think your body holds answers. I think your body wants to be in community with you.

My work is care work. You are not a problem to be fixed. You deserve care. Seeking therapy is seeking care, and it is a privilege to offer this care to you. My work is community care, village work, eldering.

I love my work. I love being in relationship. I love my clients, and I think that when we build a safe, trusting, loving relationship, we can facilitate real healing, restoring the safety and joy that you deserve.

How I work

My work is based on my humanistic therapeutic training as a foundation, strongly rooted in the traditions of talking therapy. Woven into this, through the years I have prioritised anti-oppressive training, trauma training, and eating disorder training. My work is informed by social justice movements, liberatory therapy, Body Trust.

Deeply relational, we move at the speed of trust (with thanks to adrienne maree brown for that phrase), building trust and safety, mutual courage, and intimacy, to facilitate our work. We are able to draw on psycho-education, resource sharing and my own lived experience as a fat, neurodivergent, queer woman.

THE DETAILS

All my sessions are online via Zoom, with clients around the world. This is a fully accessible service, with typed option available using the platform, or traditional talking therapy. We can work with cameras on or off.

Sessions cost £115. 

I understand that weekly therapy is a big financial commitment, and I believe quality emotional support should be available to everyone. I offer a discounted rate of £75 for those not able to pay the full session cost. Typically, this rate is used by those who don’t have the same access to resources due to structural inequality, whether that’s income level or those with marginalized identities. This rate is also available to students currently enrolled on a counselling course, needing personal counselling as a requirement of their qualification. 

I offer both shorter term and long term work, and it varies for each person; the 'right' amount of counselling is the right amount for you. We will regularly review our work together, to ensure your needs are being met. As we reach the end of our work together, we will ensure we take our time to prepare for our ending, honouring the work we have done and the connection we have made.