Susan Tomlinson

I have availability at the moment and I tend to follow the school holiday terms. 

Taking that first step to therapy can feel daunting, but talking to someone who isn't involved with your everyday life can help you untangle your thoughts and feelings and find much needed space to reflect and make changes in your life. Therapy is essentially about getting to know, like and trust ourselves, so we can weather life’s inevitable ups and downs. It is not about fixing who we are, but more reframing and reclaiming who we want to be.

You may have a specific issue to unpack, and you feel as if you need a small number of sessions and practical tools to help with the situation, or maybe you feel as if you'd like support in exploring more intense life changes, and so moving through any difficult feelings to create a new way of being might mean working together over a longer period of time. It's entirely up to you and what feels right.

My approach is both collaborative and down to earth and I'm mindful of holding the therapy in a way that is  bespoke and works well for you. I draw from various therapies, including humanistic, Gestalt and transpersonal approaches, but I also like using the creative imagination, listening to the body and using mindfulness techniques in a practical and every day way.

This integrative approach emphasises the uniqueness of everyone -  it's all about finding a way of working that works best for you.

I work with a variety of issues but my areas of speciality include anxiety, generalised anxiety disorder, OCD, panic disorder, eco anxiety, stress and relationship difficulties, both in personal life and at work.

My Background

I was a BBC TV producer and print journalist before training as a psychotherapist, so I bring an awareness of the challenges associated with working in both a creative and corporate environment. Because of this, one of my areas of interest is workplace stress and burn out and I have recently designed a stress management course, particularly for those working in the creative industries.

I also create and run workshops on a variety of topics from exploring our relationship with money to the experience of becoming a mother. At present, I am particularly interested in working with eco anxiety and understanding the emotional and psychological impact of living with our present environmental emergency. I am a New Zealander who has been living in London for 25 years, so I appreciate the issues associated with emigrating and living far away from home.

We’ll meet for an initial session – it’s really important that you feel we can work well together. and from there, we'll work for a minimum of six sessions. After that, we might work more open endedly, trusting that you'll know when you feel we've worked through what it is you wanted to explore and you're ready to leave.