S. Martin Hodges
At a time when IT enables infinite communication, it seems ironic that the capacity to feel truly heard and understood diminishes. And as the world increases in speed the demands of life can leave us feeling anxious and overwhelmed.
My aim as a psychotherapist is a simple one – to encourage more people to feel comfortable talking about their mental and emotional health, to improve lives by truly listening, reflecting, and helping you find your own answers to challenging or complex feelings.
By working together in a straightforward and uncomplicated way, answers can be found, perspective gained, enabling you through difficult times and emotions, to achieve clarity, calm, and resilience.
Receiving help and support during the menopause is vital for maintaining our sense of perspective, which sometimes needs an independent and trusted individual rather than a member of our family or a close friend.
Counselling offers a safe and comforting environment in which to explore difficult and complex feelings to leave you with a sense of understanding and acceptance.
Counselling helps explore the recurring issues, identify where our expectations are leaving us unfulfilled, and helping to remember why the relationship is important to you.
Accepting we feel depressed is never a matter of how strong or weak a person is. Talking things through with a counsellor can help you to unravel complex issues and difficult feelings to leave you with a renewed sense of clarity and well-being.
Persistent feelings of anxiety are more than a fleeting worry or concern about a specific event or activity. You can recover. Talking through the cause of your anxiety is the first step to finding calm, stillness, and a sense of empowerment.
Talking through the cause of your stress is the first step to finding calm, tranquillity, and a sense of liberation from the pressures of stress. Working with a skilled and compassionate counsellor will help you to recognise the triggers giving you methods and strategies that support and enable you to take control.
Having qualified in 2000 I have worked in schools, GP surgeries, and latterly in private practice, predominately with young adults, graduates, and senior professionals using a person-centred approach alongside Gestalt, elements of CBT (cognitive behavioural therapy), and extensive coaching skills.
In essence, I work with whatever approach I feel will bring the best results and be the most relevant for the individual, helping you to discover your own meanings and insights, instead of telling you mine.
Alongside counselling I have worked as a consultant to global corporates on areas such as leadership skills, brand culture, team dynamics, and personal empowerment, through utilising workshop facilitation, keynote speaker, one-to-one work, and group development on-site.
My area of focus is with menopause and the emotional impact on our relationships – with our partner, our family, our work colleagues, and most importantly, with ourselves. This includes providing a calm and non-judgemental place for men who are struggling to understand the changes in their menopausal partner.
In addition, the impact of grief. Bereavement could involve the death of a loved one, although less obvious aspects of grief can involve any form of loss that impacts our emotional and mental health – lifestyle, function, purpose, relationships, in fact, any aspect of our life where loss leaves us feeling hurt, distressed, defeated, and confused.
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"One of our greatest freedoms
is how we react to things."