What people bring
Sometimes it is one relationship: a partner, a parent, a boss, a friend, where something is stuck and you cannot see the way through. Sometimes it is a pattern that follows you from one relationship to the next. You end up with the same kind of person. You give too much and then resent it. You say yes when you mean no. You go quiet when you are hurt and then explode. You find it hard to let people close, or hard to let them go. You are surrounded by people and still lonely.
Living abroad adds its own relational strain. Friendships are built quickly and lost quickly as people move on. Family is far away, which can be a relief and a wound at the same time. Partners may come from different cultures and different languages, so that even arguing is a translation. And the ordinary difficulty of asking for help becomes harder when you are supposed to be the one who chose this adventure.
This page is about individual therapy. If you and your partner want to come together, I also work with couples.
Patterns are not flaws
The way you relate was learnt somewhere. Pleasing people, keeping the peace, managing everyone's feelings, withdrawing before you can be rejected, staying in control: these were intelligent adaptations at some point in your life. They kept you safe, or loved, or out of trouble. The problem is not that you have them. The problem is that they keep running when they are no longer needed, and they cost you.
In therapy we get curious about those patterns instead of fighting them. What is this part of you protecting? What is it afraid would happen if it stopped? Often, behind a pattern that looks like a weakness, there is a need that was never allowed to be a need: to be seen, to rest, to say no, to matter.
How I work with relationships
Therapy is itself a relationship, and I take that seriously. How you are with me, what you expect, what you hold back, where you brace: these are not distractions from the work. They are often the work. The therapeutic relationship is a place where you can practise being honest, disagreeing, asking for something, and finding that the connection survives.
I draw on the person-centred approach, Gestalt and parts work, and on a systemic sensibility: you exist inside families, couples, workplaces and cultures, and your difficulties make more sense when we see them in context. I notice what happens in your body when you talk about particular people. I point out contradictions without turning them into accusations. I do not tell you to leave or to stay, and I do not take sides against the people in your life.
We also look at boundaries, which for many people is less about learning to say no and more about believing that they are allowed to.
What can change
People often start to notice the pattern while it is happening, rather than three days later. They become able to pause before the automatic yes. They tolerate more closeness, or more distance, depending on what they needed. They have conversations they had been avoiding for years. Some relationships improve. Some end, more cleanly. And the relationship with yourself, which is where all the others begin, becomes less harsh.
