My reflections
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Longer reads
Relationships
I have been thinking a lot lately about what happens to couples when life gets stressful. Sometimes I sit with couples who genuinely care about each other. They are kind, thoughtful people who want their relationship to work. Yet somehow, when stress takes hold, they can find themselves on completely different sides of the room.
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I've been thinking a lot lately about disappointment. Not the big ones, but the quieter ones - the conversations that don't lead to change, the promises that quietly disappear. What stays with me isn't the disappointment itself. It's what I do next.
Read the pieceSelf care
One of the questions I ask every client is, “How are you looking after yourself at the moment?” It's funny how often that question is met with silence - not because people don't know what self care is, but because we're so busy looking after everyone else that we rarely stop and ask ourselves the same question.
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One of the greatest gifts we can give the people we love is permission to have their own little island. Not a place they disappear to because they're angry or pulling away, but somewhere they can simply be themselves - time to think, to breathe, to recharge.
Read the pieceAttachment
A reflection on early attachment, the quiet moment when a connection begins to matter, and the uncertainty that lives in the space between forming and being held.
Read the pieceAnxiety
A 3am reflection on worry, uncertainty, and the difference between not knowing and danger. What strikes me is that the hardest part wasn't that I knew something bad had happened - it was that I didn't know anything at all.
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One of the things I've noticed in relationships - both personally and professionally - is how easily familiarity can drift into complacency. It rarely happens overnight. Then life happens. Work becomes busy. Children arrive. Responsibilities grow. The relationship settles into the comfort of everyday life.
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People tell me they're staying for the children. Or because marriage is a lifelong commitment. Or because they made vows. And sometimes all of those things are genuinely important and deeply held values. But I've also found myself quietly wondering whether that's always the whole story.
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Gee... infidelity is hard. It's heartbreaking, confusing and, for many people, it becomes the moment that changes everything. But once the dust settles, there can be real value in being curious about the relationship itself - not to take responsibility for someone else's affair, but to take ownership of your own experience in it.
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It's one of the questions I hear most often in my therapy room. Not, “How do I leave?” But, “How do I know?”
Read the pieceAttachment
If we're going to use attachment labels, I would probably describe myself as having some anxious attachment tendencies. It was only when I found myself opening up to love again that I noticed how vulnerable it can feel to care deeply about another person. But over time, I've come to realise that no relationship can permanently provide what we haven't yet learned to offer ourselves.
Read the pieceFriendship
One of the hardest lessons I've had to learn is that sometimes people leave our lives without giving us the explanation we hoped for. Friendships that faded, friendships that ended abruptly, and the difficult truth that nobody is obligated to remain in our lives simply because we wish they would.
Read the pieceAttachment
Over the past few years, I've noticed attachment styles appearing everywhere. People come into counselling saying things like "I'm anxiously attached" or "My ex was avoidant." But at what point does a helpful insight become a label that limits us?
Read the piecePatterns
Most of us don't consciously choose the patterns we repeat in relationships. Often, they developed for a reason - at some point, they helped us feel safe, connected, or protected. But what happens when the pattern starts holding us back?
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