Ben Crawshaw

You may appear to those around you to be functioning but privately harbour feelings that leave you overwhelmed, anxious and confused. Despite having tried your best to change and make life better, you may feel stuck and unsure of the best way forward. You may have a sense that your past is affecting you, your childhood, upbringing and experience of family holding you back or influencing your present choices and behaviour. Perhaps you have specific ways in which you'd like to improve your current relationships. You might experience a lack of confidence, feel insecure at times and have doubts about your identity and your sense of yourself.

Whilst theories and clinical experience are essential, in my view, the effectiveness of therapy rests on the quality of the human relationship between client and therapist. There are some elements of this therapeutic relationship that are essential, such as trust and the valuing of understanding. I adopt existential and psychoanalytic approaches, which means we'll focus on your subjective experience of the world, along with having an awareness of unconscious dynamics, relational and emotional patterns. My approach is often useful for clients that struggle with long-standing difficulties in the way they think and feel about themselves, the world and their relationships with others.