Adult Therapy
Have you ever wondered why you do the things you do?
Why you use a certain washing product for your clothes?
Why some things feel completely acceptable and others don’t?
Why you react strongly to something that, afterwards, seems so small?
So much of how we live comes from what we learned growing up.
Every family has different values, expectations and ways of doing things. Our parents may simply have continued what they learned from their own parents.
It becomes our normal.
We don’t question it. Why would we?
Sometimes what we learned is helpful.
Sometimes it isn’t.
And sometimes we desperately want to do something differently.
We know what we need to change. But when the moment comes, we just can’t.
We learn how to be in the world
As children, we adapt.
Maybe you learned to keep the peace.
To be good.
To do what you were told.
To watch other people’s moods.
To put their feelings before your own.
Maybe you needed permission for everything, however small.
Perhaps saying no felt impossible.
Maybe being helpful, successful or well behaved got you approval.
You might not consider your childhood difficult at all.
Perhaps your parents loved you, you were well cared for and you have plenty of happy memories.
But that doesn’t mean you didn’t learn things about who you needed to be.
And sometimes we carry those lessons into adulthood without even realising it.
Feel familiar?
Do you get angry really quickly over something that seems quite small?
Do you automatically say yes when you want to say no?
Do you worry about disappointing people or feel guilty putting yourself first?
Do you feel as though you need permission, even though nobody is actually stopping you?
Do you know what you should do, but somehow can’t make yourself do it?
Do you spend so much time thinking about what everybody else needs that you struggle to know what you need?
What do you want?
What do you enjoy?
Do you know who you are?
And what about your physical health?
Do you have unexplained aches and pains? Do you feel tired, even after a nights sleep?
Have you found yourself living with rheumatoid arthritis, lupus, multiple sclerosis, psoriasis, inflammatory bowel disease, an autoimmune thyroid condition, fibromyalgia or another chronic health condition?
Research has found links between adverse experiences in childhood and an increased risk of some chronic and autoimmune conditions later in life. Scientists are exploring how prolonged stress may affect our stress-response, inflammatory and immune systems.
This does not mean that childhood experiences caused your illness. These conditions are complex and have many contributing factors.
But adversity isn’t always something we recognise as trauma.
It can be years of keeping the peace.
Walking on eggshells.
Trying to be good enough.
Feeling responsible for other people’s emotions.
Learning to cope alone.
You might simply have thought that was normal.
Understanding why, can help us change.
I can help you to become curious about these patterns rather than simply telling ourselves we should be different.
Together, we'll explore what's been happening, make sense of your experiences and work towards the changes you would like to make.
Why do I react like that?
Why is saying no so difficult?
Why do I need everybody to be happy with me?
Why can I know exactly what I want to change, but still feel unable to change it?
Sometimes understanding why we learned to be the way we are can be the beginning of learning that we don’t always have to be.