Specialising in women’s counselling, I have an in depth understanding of the experiences and feelings of women who, through family break up, divorce and separation find themselves living apart from their children and grand children. Click here to find out more about my approach and my qualifications.
Women spend a lot of time caring for others and we can feel undeserving, guilty or too busy to take care of ourselves. Sometimes we feel like we should be able to cope or we shouldn’t have got ourselves into the situation we find ourselves in. Society has high expectations of women as mothers and carers and women without children often say they are made to feel like unnatural, abandoning or unfit mothers.
Family break ups are very stressful. It can feel like you need superwoman strength to deal with family law solicitors, going to court, mediation services, social workers, CAFCASS (Children and Family Court Advisory Support Service) and the CSA (Child Support Agency).
It can be hard to reach out for help and support if you feel guilty, worried about what others think or anxious about being judged. I understand this and am able to support you through counselling.
How counselling can help you:
counselling aims to help you cope with personal problems. I will do this by asking questions, listening to you, reflecting on what you have said and exploring the range of options that may be available to you.
counselling can help by making you feel safe enough to face what you fear and move through it. It shows you that you can survive painful feelings. It gives you the opportunity to review and reality check the way you think about things, particularly the negative messages you might tell yourself about living apart from your child or grandchild.
More specifically, counselling can help with...
• Divorce, separation and shared parenting problems
“Everything my ex husband and I agreed on amicably just disappeared. I never stop telling my children that we both loved them but I know he tells the children too much about our marriage.”
• Providing emotional support during the legal process of the family courts
“You have to be so strong, you can’t break down or get angry in court. The judge talks about Special Guardianship, supervised contact at a contact centre, a psychologist’s report and all I can think about is impact of all of this on my child.”
• Difficulty coping with the process of separation
“I can’t believe the things my ex is saying about me. And there are so many decisions to make. I get overwhelmed, I don’t know how to cope and I wake in the night with my heart racing”.
• Moving on after divorce
“It feels like I’m on a rollercoaster – I’m angry, frightened, sad, anxious and confused.”
• Loss and sense of bereavement at no longer being 24 hour, hands on mum
“It is so very difficult to move on, especially when there has been so much pain. I can’t stop crying.”
• Trauma of lost residency/custody or being denied contact/access
“I haven't seen my son who is 10 for a whole year. I still can’t believe this is happening to me. I live in the hope that my ex will soften and let me see him, I miss him so much.”
• Grandmother loss– I’m not allowed to see my grandchildren
“I used to pick my grandchildren up from school. They used to stay with us regularly at weekends. I just can’t believe that my daughter in law won’t let me see them anymore.”
• Self esteem problems
“I’ve lost confidence in my ability to make decisions. It is so very difficult to move on, especially when there has been so very much pain.”
• Being a target parent when Parental Alienation Syndrome (PAS) or Hostile Aggressive Parenting (HAP) is or has taken place
“My daughter is now 24 and I haven’t seen her for ten years. I long to contact her but I don’t know what to say and I’m so afraid of being rejected again.”
