Psychological Therapy for Parents & Families
Whether you are looking for ways to support your child to manage their feelings and behaviour, or support for your understandable experiences through the parenting journey, or ways to navigate life transitions and challenges as a couple and family, we offer a holistic compassionate package of care- from a one-off space to untangle and explore concerns together, to brief and longer term support. We offer a safe, welcoming, collaborative space, and a whole human approach to help you move towards your preferred future.
For Children & Families
For Parents & Parents to be
Children & Families
We work directly with parents/carers, drawing on our specialist expertise working in paediatric and community mental health settings. We use a whole child, developmental approach (seeing children and families in the context of their lives and factors that impact them), to promote a deeper understanding of your child’s unique experiences. Whether it’s a one-off untangling space to explore concerns, or briefer or longer term support, we work with you to build a tailored plan and psychological ideas to help you move towards your preferred future. We understand that seeking help when your child is experiencing difficulties and distress is a courageous step to support your child’s needs. We take your concerns seriously. We offer a human and heart centred approach to help your child and family to thrive.
We work with parents when their child is experiencing:
Anxiety, anger, low mood & behaviour concerns
Adjustment to a diagnoses and developmental differences
Living with a long-term physical health condition (parent or child)
Concerns with sleeping, feeding, toileting
Grief, loss, bereavement, seperation
Adjusting to transitions and change
School-based concerns
Trauma
Confidence, relationships, identity and friendships concerns
& much more
Parents & Parents to be
The parenting journey can be a huge adjustment and bring up a range of understandable and difficult emotions. Safely exploring these in therapy can invite understanding, compassion, confidence and coping resources to take forward into your life. We draw on specialist experience in supporting parents, parents-to-be and families’ mental health for over a decade. Whether it’s a space to explore concerns or longer term support, we offer a welcoming space to navigate the ups and downs at any stage of the parenting journey (including parents to be or contemplating parenthood).
I support parents and parents to-be experiencing a range of difficulties:
Emotional challenges during / after pregnancy and birth
Coping with loss and bereavement, including miscarriages and fertility issues.
Adjustment to becoming a parent, including bonding to baby, antenatal and postnatal depression and anxiety.
Exploring emotions in parenthood, e.g. anger, anxiety, triggers or difficult memories from the past or childhood coming up.
Stress, burnout, relationship difficulties including trust and boundary setting.
Feeling low in confidence, self-worth, self-critical
Parenting with physical health issues
Diverse parenting experiences, including gender, sexuality, race, age
Space to explore how you would like to be as a parent/parents, to give voice to stories of strength, challenges or fears, and what truly matters to you.
& much more.
Looking for support?
If you are a parent or carer, you can book a FREE 15-minute consultation with Dr Chantell Douglas. This is a quick chat to explore whether therapy might be useful. If it sounds like it could be helpful to you, we’ll arrange an assessment session to hear more about your experiences and explore support options. Our sessions are mostly online, with some limited in person sessions available in London.
Please note this support is not suitable if you have an urgent or crisis concern about you, or a child or young person - in this case please contact the GP, NHS urgent care / crisis lines, known health or care professional.
How we can support you
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Every individual, child, family and parent system is unique, and the type of support you need may differ too. Sometimes parents / families benefit from a time-limited number of sessions (1-3) to explore and help better understand the concerns they have about their child, for others this can be briefer and longer term support (6+ sessions). The space supports you to connect to existing strengths and skills, your parenting values and what matters to you and your child, build skills and strategies to support at times of difficulty, and to signpost to any further coping resources you may want / need, to continue working towards your preferred futures.
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We are interested in understanding individuals and families within their unique context, supporting them to give voice to experiences and build their preferred futures. This might include (although not limited to) exploring family culture, race, gender, sexuality, and unique intersections of identities. We might explore the wider social political contexts that impact on psychological wellbeing and mental health, including systems of power and oppression, dominant societal narratives (for example around parenting or motherhood) from a reflective, relational and compassionate psychology lens.
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A Clinical Psychologist is someone who has received extensive training in a range of evidence-based assessment and therapy approaches, consultation and research. Clinical Psychologists are trained to work across the life span, with learning, developmental and neurodevelopmental differences, and neuropsychological assessment. They aim to reduce psychological distress and promote psychological wellbeing. They can work individually, with groups, and think about how wider system and context factors impact on our lives as humans. They can provide supervision, consultation, leadership in organisations and training.
Clinical Psychologist is a protected title and registered profession. Clinical Psychologists in the UK are trained to a high standard through the NHS, similar to doctors and nurses, and work in a range of settings in the NHS, public and private sector.
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These time limited sessions (1-3) provide a supportive space to talk about a specific concern or issue. The sessions are brief and not therapy as such, the focus is on starting to make sense of experiences, rather than exploring difficulties in depth or ongoing therapy. Our approach is warm and friendly, inviting everybody to feel listened to and understood - whether it is as a parent or couple. Drawing on psychological ideas to develop a map (formulation) and shared understanding of struggles and strengths, and to meaningfully guide further support recommendations.
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If your child is experiencing increasing signs of emotional distress, or changes to their behaviour, or it’s bringing up strong emotions for you while navigating the understandable ups and downs of your parenting journey, whatever stage that may be, therapy could be a useful support to you and your child.
Therapy offers a safe, supportive space to explore and make sense of how we are feeling, particularly when we are stuck, worried, and overwhelmed. It can support us to reconnect to our existing wisdom, skills and values in order to navigate challenges and lead a more full, meaningful and whole hearted life.
We take an explorative, person-centred and holistic approach. We draw on evidence-based psychology models. We work closely with parents, learning about past and present experiences, their wider social and cultural context, and work collaboratively to identify goals for working together.
With your consent, Clinical Psychologists can work in partnership with other professionals, such as GPs, health visitors, and schools to help support yours/your child’s needs.
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