DONNA
PSYCHOTHERAPIST & COUNSELLOR
COUPLES & RELATIONSHIPS COUNSELLOR
CBT SKILLS
ADDICTION TRAINED
INNER CHILD THERAPIST
RECENT ADHD DIAGNOSIS SUPPORT
PARENTING ADHD SUPPORT
YOUTH SPECIALIST
HYPNOTHERAPIST
UNDIAGNOSED INATTENTIVE ADHD, SON DIAGNOSED ADHD, PARTNER ASD
LOCATION ~ NN4
Donna is undiagnosed Inattentive ADHD and she has a son with the condition so understands it very well. She is very happy to work with either ADHD clients or partners or parents of ADHD family members.
Donna first learnt so much about ADHD when she was trying to get her son diagnosed.
She was staggered at the inefficiency and blocks she encountered on the way to getting him diagnosed. She was appalled at the lack of awareness of what turned out to be his Inattentive ADHD type.
Her son struggled hugely through school which caused an eventual mental health crisis in his late teens involving worrying levels of self harm. In desperation, Donna cashed in a pension to pay for her son to be diagnosed privately, which he was at the age of 19.
Since becoming immersed in the ADHD world, Donna has seen so many children being failed because of this ongoing chronic lack of awareness. She has seen ‘actively discouraging’ letters from mental health teams stating the ridiculous waiting times and unnecessary hurdles to get an ADHD diagnosis. And outright dismissal of parents’ own research to support diagnosis – with too much emphasis on ‘school reports’ when the school has in actual fact failed to recognise ADHD at all.
Donna is now absolutely passionate about helping ADHD clients have an easier journey to diagnosis and to support them therapeutically before, during and after that diagnosis
She has helped many clients who were unaware of their ADHD condition, by gently helping them recognise traits and bringing possible ADHD to clients awareness for consideration – which has been life changing for them.
Donna thoroughly enjoys working with recently diagnosed adults to untangle all the unhelpful coping strategies they’ve developed from being unaware. Donna then works with the client to clarify what is a result of those and what is a genuine ADHD trait that needs support.
Donna helps each individual client understand their own uniqueness within the diagnosis. She encourages acceptance, to becoming more congruent and then moving towards celebrating who they are – rather than trying to ‘fix’ something that was never broken. Just different.
Sometimes that can mean exploring and navigating a completely different landscape to that they have lived so far.
Donna first knew anything about counselling when a complicated bereavement left her lost and searching for meaning. She had her first taste of counselling and realised how incredibly helpful it was.
This set Donna on a career change where she could actually help people. She began by training in Reiki, Reflexology and Hypnotherapy whilst maintaining her career in IT, until financially she could leave it behind. She was disillusioned with the commercial world and knew her vocation was to help people like her son and their family members too.
She started volunteering for a local youth charity who were based at a CPCAB Counselling Training site and she could suddenly see a route to becoming a counsellor which fulfilled her need to help people.
It was beginning her counselling training that helped Donna to identify the root of her son’s mental health crisis. After a dark 3-year journey from crisis to diagnosis with her son, he emerged knowing who he was for the first time in his life, able to feel authentic by working through and ditching his false sense of self, realising he could never meet the ‘ I should’ conditioning from the neurotypical world and none of that was his fault! It was from this experience Donna decided to train further in ADHD awareness in order to help her son and others like him.
Donna now sees very clearly how these underdiagnosed disorders can result in poor mental health which can lead to severe crisis. To Donna this is of no surprise, when we are operating from the wrong ‘blueprint’ expectations of us which are incorrect, leaving the undiagnosed with low self-esteem, feelings of inadequacy, of incompetence and feelings of underachievement.
Having worked with a youth charity as a counsellor, Donna has had experienced in recognising traits and helped clients begin the diagnostic process with referrals. Many clients have found this to be positively lifechanging for them, starting a journey of self-exploration, understanding and acknowledgement of the difficulties that occur in trying to ‘fit in’ a predominantly neurotypical world.
Donna now uses her passion to help ADHD clients with her understanding of the system and how frustrating it can be, to help Headstuff adolescents and adults understand themselves, get the right diagnosis and work towards having a complete and nonjudgemental acceptance of their ADHD selves.
Qualifications
- Couples Counselling – Distinction 2023
- Counselling & Psychotherapy Level 5 2021
- Advanced Diploma in Therapeutic Integrative Counselling Level 4 2021
- Reflexology, Anatomy, Physiology & Pathology Level 5 2014
- Counselling & Psychotherapy Level 4
- Counselling Theory Level 3 2019
- Counselling & Psychotherapy Level 3 2019
- Counselling Skills Level 2 2018
- Hypnotherapy & Counselling Skills Level 3 2016
CPD
- Understanding ADHD: Current Research and Practice. The Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology & Neuroscience – Kings College London
- ADHD Research & Working with ADHD
- Addiction Therapy Diploma 2022 Distinction
- CBT 2022 Distinction
- Inner Child Healing 2022 Distinction
DONNA
HOLISTIC PSYCHOTHERAPIST & COUNSELLOR
COUPLES & RELATIONSHIPS COUNSELLOR
CBT SKILLS
ADDICTION TRAINED
INNER CHILD THERAPIST
RECENT ADHD DIAGNOSIS SUPPORT
PARENTING ADHD SUPPORT
YOUTH SPECIALIST
HYPNOTHERAPIST
INATTENTIVE ADHD, SON DIAGNOSED ADHD, PARTNER ASD
LOCATION ~ NN4
Donna is undiagnosed Inattentive ADHD and she has a son with the condition so understands it very well. She is very happy to work with either ADHD clients or partners or parents of ADHD family members.
Donna first learnt so much about ADHD when she was trying to get her son diagnosed.
She was staggered at the inefficiency and blocks she encountered on the way to getting him diagnosed. She was appalled at the lack of awareness of what turned out to be his Inattentive ADHD type.
Her son struggled hugely through school which caused an eventual mental health crisis in his late teens involving worrying levels of self harm. In desperation, Donna cashed in a pension to pay for her son to be diagnosed privately, which he was at the age of 19.
Since becoming immersed in the ADHD world, Donna has seen so many children being failed because of this ongoing chronic lack of awareness. She has seen ‘actively discouraging’ letters from mental health teams stating the ridiculous waiting times and unnecessary hurdles to get an ADHD diagnosis. And outright dismissal of parents’ own research to support diagnosis – with too much emphasis on ‘school reports’ when the school has in actual fact failed to recognise ADHD at all.
Donna is now absolutely passionate about helping ADHD clients have an easier journey to diagnosis and to support them therapeutically before, during and after that diagnosis
She has helped many clients who were unaware of their ADHD condition, by gently helping them recognise traits and bringing possible ADHD to clients awareness for consideration – which has been life changing for them.
Donna thoroughly enjoys working with recently diagnosed adults to untangle all the unhelpful coping strategies they’ve developed from being unaware. Donna then works with the client to clarify what is a result of those and what is a genuine ADHD trait that needs support.
Donna helps each individual client understand their own uniqueness within the diagnosis. She encourages acceptance, to becoming more congruent and then moving towards celebrating who they are – rather than trying to ‘fix’ something that was never broken. Just different.
Sometimes that can mean exploring and navigating a completely different landscape to that they have lived so far.
Donna first knew anything about counselling when a complicated bereavement left her lost and searching for meaning. She had her first taste of counselling and realised how incredibly helpful it was.
This set Donna on a career change where she could actually help people. She began by training in Reiki, Reflexology and Hypnotherapy whilst maintaining her career in IT, until financially she could leave it behind. She was disillusioned with the commercial world and knew her vocation was to help people like her son and their family members too.
She started volunteering for a local youth charity who were based at a CPCAB Counselling Training site and she could suddenly see a route to becoming a counsellor which fulfilled her need to help people.
It was beginning her counselling training that helped Donna to identify the root of her son’s mental health crisis. After a dark 3-year journey from crisis to diagnosis with her son, he emerged knowing who he was for the first time in his life, able to feel authentic by working through and ditching his false sense of self, realising he could never meet the ‘ I should’ conditioning from the neurotypical world and none of that was his fault! It was from this experience Donna decided to train further in ADHD awareness in order to help her son and others like him.
Donna now sees very clearly how these underdiagnosed disorders can result in poor mental health which can lead to severe crisis. To Donna this is of no surprise, when we are operating from the wrong ‘blueprint’ expectations of us which are incorrect, leaving the undiagnosed with low self-esteem, feelings of inadequacy, of incompetence and feelings of underachievement.
Having worked with a youth charity as a counsellor, Donna has had experienced in recognising traits and helped clients begin the diagnostic process with referrals. Many clients have found this to be positively lifechanging for them, starting a journey of self-exploration, understanding and acknowledgement of the difficulties that occur in trying to ‘fit in’ a predominantly neurotypical world.
Donna now uses her passion to help ADHD clients with her understanding of the system and how frustrating it can be, to help Headstuff adolescents and adults understand themselves, get the right diagnosis and work towards having a complete and nonjudgemental acceptance of their ADHD selves.
Qualifications
- Couples Counselling – Distinction 2023
- Counselling & Psychotherapy Level 5 2021
- Advanced Diploma in Therapeutic Integrative Counselling Level 4 2021
- Reflexology, Anatomy, Physiology & Pathology Level 5 2014
- Counselling & Psychotherapy Level 4
- Counselling Theory Level 3 2019
- Counselling & Psychotherapy Level 3 2019
- Counselling Skills Level 2 2018
- Hypnotherapy & Counselling Skills Level 3 2016
CPD
- Understanding ADHD: Current Research and Practice. The Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology & Neuroscience – Kings College London
- ADHD Research & Working with ADHD
- Addiction Therapy Diploma 2022 Distinction
- CBT 2022 Distinction
- Inner Child Healing 2022 Distinction