Professional background

I’m a Clinical Psychologist (DClinPsy BSc Hons) by background but not actively working anymore. I did my first degree in Psychology (learning about all things to do with human behaviour and the mind) at Northumbria University in 1999 and then completed doctoral training in Clinical Psychology at Newcastle University 2002-2005. Clinical Psychology involves learning how to apply psychological understanding to help people alleviate their distress and promote personal growth. After qualifying in 2005, I worked in a range of settings including acute inpatient mental health wards and in community mental health teams in the NHS. After 15 years I set up my own private practice too, providing therapy for adults with a range of difficulties and my expertise was EMDR, Compassion Focussed Therapy and working with complex trauma. In Spring 2022, I wound down my whole therapy caseload one by one, and then I stopped work altogether, for a break. I had the luxury of one full year to rest and work out my priorities, what brings me joy and fulfilment and how to navigate perimenopause. Writing these blogs is both personally therapeutic and rewarding to think that it might go a tiny way to helping someone else on their Perimenopause journey. I’m in a new phase and I’m excited about the future. I’ll always be a psychologist. It’s part of my identity and in my nature to be curious, to strive to help others through deeper understanding and insight and to contribute to this planet’s most precious renewable energy source – compassion.