Place to Talk Therapies

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BACP Accredited Therapist | EMDR Practitioner | Supervisor
Counselling for shame, self-worth, trauma & relationships
1:1 & couples | Bournemouth, Ferndown, Burbage & online
Free download: https://place2talk.kit.com/the-bus

17/09/2026

Sometimes it isn’t what happened that stays with you.

It’s the fact that someone had a choice.

• A choice to be honest or to hide.
• A choice to protect the connection or risk it.
• A choice to honour their commitment or cross a boundary.
• A choice to tell the truth or create a version that suited them.
• A choice to take responsibility or shift the blame.
• A choice to face the consequences or avoid them.
• A choice to repair what they had damaged or leave you carrying the impact.
• A choice about who they were going to choose.

Betrayal is not only about what someone did.

It can be about every choice that made it possible.

Every moment they could have chosen differently.

Every opportunity to be honest, to stop, to protect what mattered, to consider the impact.

The pain of betrayal can reach far beyond the loss of the relationship.

It can make you question whether you were enough.

Whether you mattered.
Whether you were truly seen.
Whether the connection was ever what you believed it was.

You may find yourself comparing, analysing and replaying things you once took at face value, searching for the moment you became less important.

Somewhere in all of that searching, their choice can quietly become a judgement about you.

Oftentimes, in trying to understand their choices or hold onto the connection, we begin betraying ourselves.

Ignoring what we know.
Abandoning our boundaries.
Doubting our instincts.
Making ourselves smaller to remain connected.

The truth is:
Their choices were theirs.
Their lack of honesty was theirs.
Their decisions were theirs.
Their lack of accountability is theirs.

None of it is a measure of your worth.

Perhaps the deeper work is separating their choices from your sense of self.

You cannot choose for someone else.

However, you can choose what you do with what their choices have revealed.

Sometimes choosing yourself begins with something very simple: Believing yourself again.

Connection matters.

The connection with another person matters.

The connection you have with yourself matters too.

Especially when betrayal has made you question both.

Shame rarely looks like shame.It shows up as over-explaining a decision nobody questioned. As saying sorry for something...
08/09/2026

Shame rarely looks like shame.

It shows up as over-explaining a decision nobody questioned. As saying sorry for something that was never yours to apologise for. As staying carefully acceptable, so nobody gets close enough to see something you didn't want seen.

This latest article looks at how shame hides in plain sight, in perfectionism, in people-pleasing, in the small moments most of us never think to name, and what it actually takes to start recognising it in yourself.

You are not broken. You're carrying strategies that once helped you survive.

Read the full piece, link in bio/comments.

I've lost count of how many people tell me they nearly gave up looking for a counsellor before they found the right one....
08/09/2026

I've lost count of how many people tell me they nearly gave up looking for a counsellor before they found the right one.

There are so many qualifications, approaches and specialisms to wade through, and most websites start to blur into one after a while.

I've put together a free one-page guide with what's worth checking, what's worth asking, and what's worth noticing in yourself along the way. Free to download, link in article which you can find in my bio.

Choosing a counsellor rarely comes down to the person with the most letters after their name.It comes down to something ...
07/09/2026

Choosing a counsellor rarely comes down to the person with the most letters after their name.

It comes down to something harder to put into words: whether this is someone you could actually talk to.

Swipe through for what we think matters most, beyond the profile page.

The full article, How to Choose a Counsellor: What Actually Matters, is linked in the comments and at the top in the bio.

Health anxiety can make it difficult to know when to trust your body, when to seek reassurance and when to allow a worry...
05/09/2026

Health anxiety can make it difficult to know when to trust your body, when to seek reassurance and when to allow a worry to pass.

The Watchful Body is a reflective resource exploring the checking and reassurance cycle, what may be happening within the nervous system, and what it might look like to build a gentler relationship with uncertainty.

It does not ask someone to stop worrying or suggest that their fears are irrational. It begins with understanding what the watchfulness may be trying to provide.

Two versions are available:

• Individual Resource: a six-page Print PDF and a six-page Fillable PDF for personal reflection or bringing into therapy

• Therapist Resource Pack: both client versions and the 12-page Working with Health Anxiety: Therapist Companion

The Therapist Companion explores the reassurance cycle, nervous system responses, therapeutic language, common responses and clinical considerations when introducing the resource.

Choose the version that fits how you plan to use it:

Individual Resource:
https://payhip.com/b/oaZtm

Therapist Resource Pack:
https://payhip.com/b/SQYru

Personal growth isn’t always about doing more. Sometimes it’s about having the right support when life feels difficult, ...
04/09/2026

Personal growth isn’t always about doing more. Sometimes it’s about having the right support when life feels difficult, overwhelming or simply a little too much.

At Place to Talk Therapies, we support people through change, challenge and personal growth, offering counselling and therapeutic support for adults and couples.

Sessions are available online across the UK.

We work with a range of issues including anxiety, low mood, trauma, grief, relationship difficulties, life changes and those times when life feels difficult to navigate.

For those looking for a more affordable option, our Lower-Cost Counselling Service (LCCS) offers online counselling for £40 a session, with the choice of weekly or fortnightly appointments.

Whether you’re looking for support for yourself or someone you know, you can find out more about Place to Talk Therapies: link in comments.

Checking can make sense when something feels uncertain or threatening.It may involve examining your body, searching symp...
03/09/2026

Checking can make sense when something feels uncertain or threatening.

It may involve examining your body, searching symptoms online, asking someone what they think, revisiting medical information or arranging further reassurance.

The relief can be real. It may also be brief.

When uncertainty returns, the mind can interpret that return as evidence that another check is required. Over time, the search for certainty can become part of what keeps attention anchored to the fear.

Recognising this cycle does not mean dismissing physical symptoms or deciding that a concern is psychological. Appropriate medical advice remains important when you are concerned about your health.

It offers another layer of understanding: what happens before checking, what relief provides and what draws attention back once that relief begins to fade.

This is one of the patterns explored in The Watchful Body, a reflective resource on health anxiety.

Sometimes reassurance lands and your body softens a little.A doctor has listened. Someone you trust has helped you think...
01/09/2026

Sometimes reassurance lands and your body softens a little.

A doctor has listened. Someone you trust has helped you think it through. You have checked the symptom or found the information you were looking for.

For a while, things feel quieter.

Then another sensation catches your attention. A thought returns. Something you read or hear brings the fear back into focus.

This can feel exhausting, particularly when you have already been reassured and cannot understand why the worry has returned.

Health anxiety is not always a failure to listen to reassurance. Sometimes it reflects a protective system that has learnt to treat uncertainty as something requiring close attention.

Checking, searching or asking can offer a brief sense of certainty. When that relief fades, the cycle begins again.

Understanding this pattern is not about ignoring physical changes or avoiding appropriate medical advice. It is about noticing how worry, checking, relief and returning doubt may have become linked.

The starting point is not judgement. It is curiosity about what the watchfulness has been trying to provide.

26/08/2026

The truth about inner healing!
It is a journey, it is a process and it is gradual. That doesn’t make it wrong or mean we’re failing.

We can become so focused on getting rid of uncomfortable emotions that we miss what they are trying to tell us.

Healing isn’t about never feeling difficult emotions. It’s about being able to meet them, understand them and work with what sits underneath them.

My free resource ‘The Bus’ is a starting place to explore the emotions that are the ‘passengers’ on board throughout life! We all have them 🙂

Get it here: place2talk.kit.com/the-bus

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Bournemouth

Opening Hours

Monday 10am - 8pm

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