Freda engaged with me after a life changing experience which profoundly challenged the way she was living her life. I created a secure environment in which she felt safe enough to explore her history in a way that helped find context and meaning to her experiences along with new understanding and direction for her future and that of her children.

We explored her emotional confusion, where authentic feelings of sadness and grief had been taken hostage by anger which she had directed towards herself for many years, this manifesting as destructive attitudes and behaviours. This exploration was powerfully facilitated in local woodland where the trees and landscape became a living metaphor, mirroring her life’s experiences. New growth, in the form of saplings growing from a fallen tree trunk also served as a motivation to a better future, as we considered Nature’s resilience in its battle to survive and adapt to its environment.