1999         Doctorate of Clinical Psychology          

                University of Leeds

1996         MSc. in Clinical Psychology                 

                University of Leeds

1991         BA. (Hons) in Natural

                Sciences (Psychology) 

                                                              Cambridge University

                                                              Grade 2 i

I set up an innovative service providing medical treatment in primary care for people who self-injure. District nurses were trained to understand why people self injure and the importance of an empathic, non-judgmental response.

The feedback from the people who used this service about their experience of empathic care was very rewarding. The self injury service subsequently won an award in primary care innovation from the Health Services Journal and was highly commended by The Secretary of State.

I also set up and facilitated a self-group for people who self-injure. This group became a consultative group as well as a support group, which aimed to educate other services about understanding self-injury and we worked with A&E, the police, the ambulance service and mental health services to offer training and improve services.

I love all aspects of my work and feel very lucky to have such a varied and rewarding working life. However, I also love my life outside work and try very hard to keep a high proportion of my life for leisure and activities which boost my own mental health and calmness.

I enjoy playing the oboe in an orchestra and play baritone horn in a brass band. I also play tennis, badminton and swim.

I enjoy time with my son, who endlessly fascinates and entertains (and frustrates) me. I was delighted to be able to have time off work after taking redundancy from the NHS, and used this to spend as much time with him as possible before he started school.

We used some of this time to go on ‘adventures’ and took a trip round the world, visiting Japan, China, Vietnam, Singapore, Australia and San Diego. Most of the images on this site are photos from our adventures. We hope to travel more in the future.