How I work
I assist people to heal from Childhood Emotional Neglect by working within a Relational Internal Family Systems (IFS) frame.
This means I am very aware of attachment needs and the opportunity for therapy to provide a corrective experience of those missing needs.
IFS is all about being in relationship, and people who have suffered emotional neglect, are very sensitive to the relational environment. They often need the two layers of relational container that working in this way provides. Firstly the relationship with the Therapist, and secondly the relationship that the Therapist helps facilitate between the person and their various parts.
This means I am very aware of attachment needs and the opportunity for therapy to provide a corrective experience of those missing needs.
IFS is all about being in relationship, and people who have suffered emotional neglect, are very sensitive to the relational environment. They often need the two layers of relational container that working in this way provides. Firstly the relationship with the Therapist, and secondly the relationship that the Therapist helps facilitate between the person and their various parts.
Attachment
I am deeply influenced by attachment theory and consider it to be the foundational bedrock of my work.
When a secure trusting relationship is present in therapy, a client can begin the process of learning to truly relax into themselves and engage in the necessary work of healing. Without this foundation we will unconsciously direct much of our energy into securing the safety of the relational environment, much as we did as children when survival often meant sacrificing authenticity for belonging. This secure relationship develops over time through responsive emotional attunement and compassionately repairing any misattunement. Clients learn that my acceptance, care and regard for them is unconditional. All feelings and parts are welcome and make sense in the context of the person's life. The therapeutic relationship is sacred and not threatened by the feelings and needs of the client and can be held safety within the therapeutic boundaries.
When we experience any kind of adversive childhood experience, or even did not get adequate emotional attunement or support to cope with the "normal" challenges of childhood, our parts can experience a lot of mistrust in relationships, and therapeutic relationships are no different. In Relational IFS, we invite any mistrusting parts into the space.
If as a child we weren't helped to navigate our experience, our own feelings can become a source of threat for us.
Dr Gabor Mate points us to an important question: "When I felt sad, unhappy, angry, confused, bewildered, lonely, bullied, who did I speak to? Who did I tell? Who could I confide in?" In other words, who was available to help me process my feelings and experience?
If the answer was noone or the availability of someone was inconsistent, then chances are we will have some degree of challenge in being present to, and supporting ourselves in our various emotional states and accompanying nervous system activation.
Thus attachment and being able to be with our own experience and feel comfortable in our own skin are closely connected. Co-regulation with another is the prerequisite for growing the capacity to self soothe or regulate.
Within a Relational IFS container, I am available as the co-regulating other that was missing, when needed. The clients own wise adult Self also provides this to parts and the parts get to experience what it's like to recieve care from inside the internal system and from the outside coming in. Each parts needs are different, and they all get to choose what they recieve and when.
I meet my clients with curiousity and compassion and gently guide them to notice their patterns of attachment, and how those enter the therapy space, explore their origins and impacts and see them for the intelligent adaptations they have been. I assist clients to uncover and move towards their innate programming of secure attachment that they were forced to disconnect from, but was never destroyed.
I am an empathic companion on the journey as clients meet their pain and grief and the longing for the developmental needs that could not be met for whatever reason. I celebrate with them the reclamation of the feelings, ways of being and parts of themselves that they had to sacrifice to navigate the safest passage they could manage through life.
When a secure trusting relationship is present in therapy, a client can begin the process of learning to truly relax into themselves and engage in the necessary work of healing. Without this foundation we will unconsciously direct much of our energy into securing the safety of the relational environment, much as we did as children when survival often meant sacrificing authenticity for belonging. This secure relationship develops over time through responsive emotional attunement and compassionately repairing any misattunement. Clients learn that my acceptance, care and regard for them is unconditional. All feelings and parts are welcome and make sense in the context of the person's life. The therapeutic relationship is sacred and not threatened by the feelings and needs of the client and can be held safety within the therapeutic boundaries.
When we experience any kind of adversive childhood experience, or even did not get adequate emotional attunement or support to cope with the "normal" challenges of childhood, our parts can experience a lot of mistrust in relationships, and therapeutic relationships are no different. In Relational IFS, we invite any mistrusting parts into the space.
If as a child we weren't helped to navigate our experience, our own feelings can become a source of threat for us.
Dr Gabor Mate points us to an important question: "When I felt sad, unhappy, angry, confused, bewildered, lonely, bullied, who did I speak to? Who did I tell? Who could I confide in?" In other words, who was available to help me process my feelings and experience?
If the answer was noone or the availability of someone was inconsistent, then chances are we will have some degree of challenge in being present to, and supporting ourselves in our various emotional states and accompanying nervous system activation.
Thus attachment and being able to be with our own experience and feel comfortable in our own skin are closely connected. Co-regulation with another is the prerequisite for growing the capacity to self soothe or regulate.
Within a Relational IFS container, I am available as the co-regulating other that was missing, when needed. The clients own wise adult Self also provides this to parts and the parts get to experience what it's like to recieve care from inside the internal system and from the outside coming in. Each parts needs are different, and they all get to choose what they recieve and when.
I meet my clients with curiousity and compassion and gently guide them to notice their patterns of attachment, and how those enter the therapy space, explore their origins and impacts and see them for the intelligent adaptations they have been. I assist clients to uncover and move towards their innate programming of secure attachment that they were forced to disconnect from, but was never destroyed.
I am an empathic companion on the journey as clients meet their pain and grief and the longing for the developmental needs that could not be met for whatever reason. I celebrate with them the reclamation of the feelings, ways of being and parts of themselves that they had to sacrifice to navigate the safest passage they could manage through life.
"We are born in relationship, we are wounded in relationship, and we can be healed in relationship."
Harville Hendrix
Internal Family Systems (IFS)
IFS views the mind as a system of parts and multiplicity of mind is considered normal. If you have ever found yourself saying: "A part of me wants to do this (for example go to therapy) and a part of me (or maybe the rest of me) doesn't", then you are already somewhat familiar with the model.
Just as a family is made up of different people, so too our mind is made up of various subpersonalities, or parts. Although parts are valuable, with each contributing something necessary to the system to achieve balance or homeostasis, parts can become burdened. These burdens occur when a person experiences overwhelming experiences (trauma) that they could not integrate which results in harmful limiting beliefs.
Parts can carry burdens, but they are not their burdens.
Parts are helped to release their burdens through being fully seen, heard, understood, witnessed and supported within the context of a secure attachment relationship. Once this happens, they are able to return to their original naturally valuable state and the energy that was channelled into survival or protection can be freed to serve life and connection.
Internal Family Systems has been described as Attachment turned inwards. This is because healing occurs via the reestablishment of a trusting relationship between the clients parts and their core Self. Self is the energy or being that can not be damaged by negative life experience, although it can be covered over and made largely inaccessible. Once this energy is reaccessed, parts no longer have to be in their survival state and they can access the support of the life force that is Self. This Self energy is the wise part of us, the unconditionally loving being that can serve as the hub of the wheel and link parts into a harmonious interconnected system. Within the model the Self energy I describe can be thought of as the spiritual aspect to us that can offer unconditional support, while the parts are our humanity and are necessary for engaging with the world.
I consider this work to be a form of spiritual reparenting, as secure internal attachment relationships are built and nurtured. To do this I help people become curious about, and open towards their parts. Getting to know individual parts, the relationships they have with each other, the roles they occupy and to discover what they are trying to achieve. It is believed within IFS that there are no bad parts, just misunderstood ones. The impacts of what parts do can be harmful but their original intention is always good. In IFS we free parts to have the roles they actually want and are suited to, rather than the roles they were forced into due to life circumstances.
Just as a family is made up of different people, so too our mind is made up of various subpersonalities, or parts. Although parts are valuable, with each contributing something necessary to the system to achieve balance or homeostasis, parts can become burdened. These burdens occur when a person experiences overwhelming experiences (trauma) that they could not integrate which results in harmful limiting beliefs.
Parts can carry burdens, but they are not their burdens.
Parts are helped to release their burdens through being fully seen, heard, understood, witnessed and supported within the context of a secure attachment relationship. Once this happens, they are able to return to their original naturally valuable state and the energy that was channelled into survival or protection can be freed to serve life and connection.
Internal Family Systems has been described as Attachment turned inwards. This is because healing occurs via the reestablishment of a trusting relationship between the clients parts and their core Self. Self is the energy or being that can not be damaged by negative life experience, although it can be covered over and made largely inaccessible. Once this energy is reaccessed, parts no longer have to be in their survival state and they can access the support of the life force that is Self. This Self energy is the wise part of us, the unconditionally loving being that can serve as the hub of the wheel and link parts into a harmonious interconnected system. Within the model the Self energy I describe can be thought of as the spiritual aspect to us that can offer unconditional support, while the parts are our humanity and are necessary for engaging with the world.
I consider this work to be a form of spiritual reparenting, as secure internal attachment relationships are built and nurtured. To do this I help people become curious about, and open towards their parts. Getting to know individual parts, the relationships they have with each other, the roles they occupy and to discover what they are trying to achieve. It is believed within IFS that there are no bad parts, just misunderstood ones. The impacts of what parts do can be harmful but their original intention is always good. In IFS we free parts to have the roles they actually want and are suited to, rather than the roles they were forced into due to life circumstances.