Issues I Work With
Click on some of the most common issues below to read more.
Get in touch if your issue is not listed here to see if I can help.
Emotional Issues
Disorders
Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD)
Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD)
Alcohol
Cigarettes
Drugs
Gaming
Fear Of Flying (Aerophobia)
Fear Of Confined Or Crowded Spaces (Claustrophobia)
Fear Of Open Spaces (Agoraphobia)
Relationship Issues
Conflict
Personal Relationships
Parent Child Relationships
Work Relationships
Goals And Self-Development
Low Self-Esteem
Confidence
Public Speaking
Removing Obstacles
Achieving Goals
Building Resilience
Weight Loss
Breaking Habits
Stress
Stress is the body's reaction to feeling threatened or under pressure.
There are two types of stress, good stress and bad stress.
Good stress is motivating and helps us achieve things in our daily life. Bad stress affects people's life and causes many different symptoms.
It can affect how people feel physically or mentally and the way they behave.
Anxiety
Anxiety is a feeling of worry, nervousness, or unease about something that is happening now or in the future.
Anxiety can be a normal feeling that most people experience at some point, feeling anxious about going for a job interview, exam or date for example. But it can be a problem if it stops you doing the things you want, or it is affecting your quality of life.
There are many types of anxiety, from fears like public speaking or dating, to general or social anxiety. Anxiety can also be related to other issues, from Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD) and Post-traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), to phobias or addiction.
While everyone is different, some common signs of anxiety are trembling, palpitations, shortness of breath, feeling sick or stomach ache and not sleeping well.
Depression
Depression is a feeling of intense sadness for long periods of time.
While everyone feels sad sometimes, depression is more than that. With depression, sadness lasts for weeks or months and it can affect everybody differently.
You may feel very tearful or tired, get bad sleep or lose interest in things you usually enjoy for long periods. This can lead to feelings of hopelessness or suicidal thoughts.
Depression can be triggered by events like losing a loved one, the end of a relationship or life events not working out the way you had hoped.
Hurt
Hurt is a feeling of emotional pain, usually caused by other peoples' words or behaviours and is seen as an attack to peoples' self-esteem.
Hurt is a feeling that all people experience in their lives. People may feel hurt when they have their work criticised, their effort not appreciated or when being treated unfairly.
People who often feel hurt think of themselves as alone, uncared for or misunderstood by others. When this happens, they do not disclose what the hurt is about instead they shut down the communication with others, thus ruining their relationships and becoming prone to depression.
Guilt
Guilt is a feeling of having committed some wrong doing or failed in an obligation or expectation.
People who experience guilt blame themselves for things that have done or not done.
When this happens they feel that they deserve some soft of punishment and therefore make decisions that increase their suffering.
Physical symptoms range from isolating themselves to self-harming.
Shame
Shame is a feeling of embarrassment about an uncomfortable situation that has been revealed to other people publicly.
Shame is a feeling that all people experience at some point in their lives. People my feel ashamed when they failed in a public presentation or humiliated by other people's words in public.
When people feel ashamed, they think that other people look down on them and for this reason tend to isolate themselves, attacking others to save face or ignore attempts of restoring the social situation.
Anger
Anger is a strong feeling that makes people want to hurt someone or be unpleasant towards them because of something unfair or unkind that has happened.
Anger is a feeling that all human beings have. There are two types of anger, good anger and bad anger.
Good anger is helpful because it helps people to stand up for themselves and their rights.
Bad anger is unhelpful because it can lead to verbal and physical aggression, which ruins people's personal or work relationships and affects their lives.
Jealousy
Jealousy is a complex emotion about a threat to one's relationship, that my be real or imagined.
Jealousy can occur in almost every type of human relationships, from romantic relationships between couples to siblings who compete for parental attention.
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Jealousy can include feelings of intense rage, fear and humiliation and always involves a third party seen as a rival for affection or attention.
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Behaviours include monitoring obsessively another's communication, relationships, whereabouts or even behave violently towards them.
Envy
Envy is a feeling that you wish you had a possession that someone has.
Envious people try to denigrate the value of the desired possession with the intention of spoiling it or destroy it.
Behaviours associated with envy are: denigrating verbally the person who has the possession, taking away the desired possession either to have it or just to deprive others from it.
Grief And Loss
Grief is a feeling of great sadness, especially at the death of someone significant.
Grieving is a natural and necessary response to bereavement. Every time people experience bereavement (or a loss of any kind) they go through a process of adjustment to loss, which varies in length.
Bereaved people usually find it difficult to sleep, to concentrate, to eat and feel tired. Sometimes people become stuck in their pain and loss which can lead to depression.
Insomnia
Insomnia is the condition of being unable to sleep over a period of time.
Whist everyone experiences a sleepless night now and again, with insomnia people find it difficult to fall asleep, stay asleep or wake up too early in the morning for continuous, long periods of time.
Insomnia can happen to everyone and is associated with anxiety, depression, chronic pain conditions, menopause, pregnancy, other sleep disorders, etc.
People with insomnia feel tired, cannot concentrate, feel irritable during the day and struggle with their daily tasks.
Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD)
OCD is a mental health condition where people experience distressing and intrusive thoughts, and repetitive compulsive behaviours.
For example, someone with an obsessive fear that their house may catch fire, will check that their cooker is turned off several times before leaving the house.
Common obsessions are: fear of harming yourself or others intentionally or by mistake, fear of contamination by disease, a need for order, etc.
Compulsive behaviours include: checking, ordering and arranging, asking for reassurance, cleansing and hand washing, counting, etc.
Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD)
PTSD is an anxiety disorder caused by frightening, extremely stressful and distressing experiences such as road accidents, sexual assaults, childbirth difficulties, childhood abuse or severe neglect, etc.
Common PTSD symptoms are sleep problems (insomnia), concentration difficulties, flashbacks (reliving the traumatic events while awake or though nightmares), feelings of guilt, irritability and isolation.
PTSD can be treated successfully with CBT therapy and Eye movement desensitisation and reprocessing (EMDR).
Research shows that one in three people experiencing traumatic events develop PTSD.
Panic Attacks
A panic attack is a feeling of intense anxiety.
When people have panic attacks they may experience physical symptoms such as shortness of breath, a racing heartbeat and chest pain, trembling, feeling faint, hot flushes and nausea.
The symptoms of panic attacks are not dangerous but they can be very frightening and overwhelming. People may feel that they are having a heart attack or that they are going to collapse or die.
CBT therapy helps people to mange their symptoms and alleviate distress.
Addictions
Addictions are disorders characterised by repeated substance misuse, or repetitive engagement in unhelpful behaviours despite harm to self and others.
People may be addicted to alcohol, cigarettes, food, chocolate, video games, sex, gambling and so on.
Issues associated with addiction are sleep difficulties, anxiety, depression, relationship issues, work related issues, health problems etc.
Phobias
A phobia is an excessive and irrational fear reaction. People may experience a deep sense of dread or panic when faced with the source of their fear. The fear can be of a certain place, situation, or object.
A phobia is usually connected to something specific; fear of heights, dogs, snakes, enclosed spaces, flying, dental procedures, needles, blood or injury, nightmares or darkness and social interactions.
People with phobias often realise that their fear is irrational, but they are unable to manage it. Such fears can interfere with work, school, and personal relationships and CBT therapy helps to manage these.