If you have been wounded relationally, you may be wary with good reason about choosing a therapist or going to therapy at all. This is why pacing, a safe relationship and consistency are important in trauma-sensitive therapy.

The difficulty of being unable to speak your mind can come from many places. If it has been with you for decades and since you were a young child, it may take time to get to a place, even in therapy, where you feel you can speak up and be the authentic you.

Should I choose a therapist who specialises in a specific mental health problem or diagnosis, such as anxiety or depression?

Grief counselling is not just about grief, and the process of mourning often encompasses more than the ache of loss — to make sense of what has happened, approaching relationships, be it with people, with a job loss, a loss of a physical capacity, or a home, we can say “hello again”, but on different terms.

Everyone’s story leading up to suicide bereavement is unique, albeit in many cases also similar to some other people’s stories. Whether you were a colleague, a doctor, a teacher, a friend or a close family member, the despair of losing someone to suicide can feel shattering in many different ways.

It is the time of year for get-togethers of all sorts. But it is also a time of painful loneliness for some and yearnings of belonging.

Narrative therapy is a respectful, non-blaming approach to counselling, which centres people as the experts in their own lives.

Sadness is with us. A young boy in Bendigo, Central Victoria, died yesterday, hit by a truck while walking to school.

We need fathers as helpers, nurturing our young men into adulthood. What do you wish for your young man? What do you want him to learn from you?

What first inspired me to write this journal entry was a fellow counsellor’s offer of a Brave Belonging Circle for skilled migrants in Australia.

Bloom is an animated story about how the power of human connection can light us up when we feel stuck in the dark. I put it here to remember what we as humans may yearn for when ‘way out’ thoughts come around

In his musings about free will and time, writer Oliver Burkeman advises that we should give up trying to reach a phase of life that’s problem-free.

The papering over of hardship, perceiving people as doing just fine and ignoring pain, can feel invalidating and minimising.