Jude Galloway - Psychodynamic Psychotherapeutic Counsellor

Across 9 years of psychodynamic therapy practice, I have evolved an approach informed by my concurrent practices as artist and gardener: nurturing, growth and transformation infuse our work together, both informing and cultivating the discovery of where and how we can live in ourselves and the world.

The work of therapy resides in a space that we inhabit together, a space where meaning can be made or found. It is a place in the clearing. Here, lives and held views can be encouraged to be found, to be heard, and to potentially transform.

My focus

Depression & stress

I have worked across a wide spectrum of specific life circumstances; have uncovered and encountered triggers that cause stress; have unearthed the non-specific feelings or factors that can evoke depression and loss of meaning; and have helped people live with and through the often-debilitating effects.

Bereavement

The period following a deep loss – of loved ones, of a relationship or of a role in the workplace for example – can be a profoundly difficult time. Therapy enables a safe step into the processes of grief and finds essential space, space to make sense of loss, to find ways of making both big and small adjustments, space to build the foundations of a life going forward.

Gender, sexuality & relationship diversity (GSRD)

My work has developed a specific field of experience with supporting people through the process of questioning and discovering their gender identity, their sexuality and their relationship diversity (GSRD). My approach is LGBTQ + affirmative. I identify as they/them. I have long term experience of working with clients with ADHD and neurodiversity.

Terminal & chronic conditions

I bring specific training and experience of terminal and chronic illness for the person, family and carers, helping all to navigate the emotional complexity of this time and to invoke a language that speaks of it, finding ways into comfort and acceptance and engendering coping mechanisms where possible. I have extensive experience of thinking about, and working with, clients with Cancer, TBI (Traumatic Brain Injury) and those with a diagnosis of Alzheimer’s or Dementia.

Eco-anxiety

Worrying about, and fear of climate and ecological breakdown can have a negative impact on a person’s capacity to cope in both acute and chronic ways. With both therapeutic and ecological experience, I offer a unique place to help people address eco-anxiety’s specific stress, depression and bereavement.

Neurodiversity

I have a long-term and widening experience of working with neurodiversity, with particular emphasis on ADHD.

My approach

My practice brings together the therapeutic experience and training I have undertaken with that of my professions as an artist and gardener – all are fieldwork of a type, all require space, all require responsiveness, attentiveness, commitment and cultivation.

The person, as much as any garden, is an ecology and a landscape, and as much as any artwork, the person is created in relation to others. Practising as an artist and gardener has taught me a great deal about presence and patience. It has also taught me about the nature of transformation, of the gains and the losses that can come with it, and the deep connection between the two.

The invitation of the therapeutic relationship is that of entering into a different kind of conversation, a conversation with a quality that maps the topography of a life, a conversation that holds respect, open curiosity and non-judgment. The therapeutic relationship offers a place to notice and to help connect with the more unconscious ways in which we manage our emotional distress and anxieties. In time it may be possible to make real contact with these more distressed and hidden parts of ourselves, bring greater understanding and attunement, enable transformation to naturally unfold and a deeper resilience to occur and a more abiding sense of self to emerge.