About me
Hi I am Catherine For many years I worked as a health visitor in the NHS, supporting women and families through pregnancy, birth, and early parenthood. It gave me a front-row seat to the realities of motherhood. The complicated, messy, emotional reality that many women experience. I met women who were exhausted, isolated, grieving, questioning themselves and trying desperately to live up to impossible expectations. I know Motherhood can be one of the most rewarding life experiences. I also know it can be one of the most challenging. Especially when you feel as though you are supposed to cope, or when “the Village that should be supporting you simply isn’t there. How Counselling may help? Many of the women I work with arrive feeling as though they are failing in some way . Perhaps they’ve struggling to adjust to motherhood. Perhaps they are carrying grief after loss. Perhaps fertility treatment has left them exhausted and questioning themselves or perhaps they have forgotten how to pay attention to their own needs. What your story counselling can offer an opportunity to stop carrying it all on your own. Together we can make sense of what is happening beneath the surface. The expectations you’ve placed on yourself and the experiences that may be shaping how you feel today. As our work progresses, many women find that they become less critical of themselves and more accepting of the reality of motherhood. They begin to trust themselves and feel more confident. Over time feeling more calmer, more connected and less weighted down by guilt, comparison and self-doubt. Despite what the media, parenting book and well-meaning advice might suggest you don’t need to be a perfect mother just “good enough”
Speaks
English
Type of sessions available
In person
Online
Areas of expertise
Anxiety
Family issues
Bereavement
Infertility
Postnatal depression
Marriage
Parenting
Miscarriage
Menopause
Pregnancy
Childhood difficulties
Fees
Average session fee:
£70.00
Fee structure
No fee structure provided
My working schedule
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Therapy offered
Integrative
Client groups
Adults
Training and qualifications
For 25 years, I worked in the NHS as a health visitor, so I've spent a lot of time alongside women in those early days, weeks and months of motherhood. And if there's one thing I learned, it's that becoming a mother rarely looks quite like the version we imagined beforehand. I've sat with women who adored their babies but desperately missed their old lives. Women who worried they were getting everything wrong. Women who struggled to feel the connection they expected. Women who looked as though they were coping beautifully to everyone else, but behind closed doors felt exhausted, lonely or completely unlike themselves. I understand how complicated this time of life can be – how different feelings can exist alongside each other, and how difficult it can be to admit what you're experiencing when you think you're supposed to be enjoying every minute. Today, I bring that experience and understanding into my work as a qualified counsellor and registered member of the British Association for Counselling and Psychotherapy (BACP). I'm an integrative counsellor, which means I don't believe that one way of working suits everybody. Our work will be shaped around you, what you're experiencing and what you need from counselling. My counselling experience also includes working with MIND's bereavement service and MumsAid, supporting people experiencing bereavement, perinatal mental health difficulties and family and relationship problems.
Verified professional membership
