Christopher Woodgate

I am a Psychologist in their final year of training, offering private therapy work. I have 15 yrs experience working across a range of clinical contexts, including: the probation service; personality disorders; inpatient psychiatric settings; forensic services; adolescent mental health; community secondary care (IAPT) & psychological therapies (step 4 psychology) settings.

I am happy to work with complexity, offering long term work as well as shorter term/focussed work to fit peoples' needs & budgets.

I have worked with people attracting various diagnoses, including: depression; anxiety (/panic/phobia); complex PTSD & trauma; sexual abuse &/or physical abuse histories; 'personality disorder'; OCD; sexual fetish & body dysmorphia. I understand these as 'labels' that may offer some indication of difficult surface symptoms but which can often obscure the more understandable, deeper reasons someone has come to feel & struggle, the way they do. Alternately, you may have experiences that are difficult to reconcile with your beliefs & identity; feel cut off or loose chunks of time; have creative/'unusual' ways of making sense of reality that others don't easily understand. Or, you may have more general goals of: relating to people in new ways; improved self-understanding, self-worth & self-acceptance.

I identify as a practitioner who draws heavily on applied psychodynamic theory in addition to other models and approaches, such as cognitive behavioural therapy, systemic work, social constructivist and social inequalities thinking.