The Healing Space

The Healing Space I'm Gemma, a BACP Accredited Counsellor & Psychotherapist. Founder of The Healing Space Therapy, Lymm, Cheshire. Therapy for children (7+), teens & adults, plus family support & parent coaching. Attachment-informed, trauma-aware. In person & online.

Book now: https://portal.therasee.com/the-healing-space/booking

21/08/2026

The Great ADHD Myth aired last night. If it got you thinking about your own daughter, here’s the bit that doesn’t always get said.

The signs in girls aren’t subtle. A child who can’t get started, loses everything, drifts off halfway through a sentence and is completely spent by half three is not concealing anything. She just isn’t causing anyone a problem.

That’s the real threshold. Not the diagnostic criteria, whatever we tell ourselves. Children get referred when they’re inconvenient, and a girl who’s quietly drowning while turning in acceptable work doesn’t qualify.

The part that lasts isn’t the delay. It’s what she decides about herself in the meantime. By eleven she isn’t puzzled about why school is harder for her than for everyone else. She’s concluded she’s stupid, or lazy, or not trying, and that belief tends to outlive any assessment she eventually gets.

So the useful question isn’t whether she’s coping. Plenty of them cope. It’s what it’s costing her to.

Free ADHD planner if you want one that’s built around energy rather than time. Comment PLANNER.

A flooded child cannot process language at the speed we deliver it. So the calm, reasonable explanation you’re offering ...
19/08/2026

A flooded child cannot process language at the speed we deliver it. So the calm, reasonable explanation you’re offering is arriving as more noise into a system that already has too much coming in.

That’s the bit most advice skips, and it’s why so much of what we instinctively do makes things worse rather than better.

This guide goes through what’s happening underneath, what actually helps while it’s happening, and what to do afterwards, which is where most of the learning takes place. Not in the moment. Children don’t learn regulation while dysregulated.

It’s a printable, so you can keep it somewhere you’ll see it on the bad days rather than somewhere you’d have to go looking for it.

Comment OVERWHELMED for the link.

A child put their hand up in the middle of a session last week and asked if we could just… stop.Not stop the session. St...
18/08/2026

A child put their hand up in the middle of a session last week and asked if we could just… stop.

Not stop the session. Stop everything for a minute. No task, no talking, no next thing.

They weren’t being difficult. Their battery was empty and nobody had taught them what that actually feels like from the inside, or that they’re allowed to say so.

That’s the whole idea behind Workshop 5: Managing Overwhelm & Big Emotions.

We use an emotional battery as the through-line of the session, not as a one-off metaphor but as something the children actually build with. They map what drains them and what recharges them, play a game that makes “I’m running low” something they can name instead of act out, and leave with a Recharge Fortune Teller they made themselves, something small and physical to reach for the next time the battery drops.

📅 Monday 24 August
👥 Ages 8-11, small group setting
⏳ 2 hours

If this sounds like something your child could use, you can book their space here 👉🏻 https://thehealingspacetherapy.co.uk/live-courses-%26-workshops

Most of us carry a few things we’d describe as simply who I am. Organised. Independent. Easy-going. Low maintenance.Some...
18/08/2026

Most of us carry a few things we’d describe as simply who I am. Organised. Independent. Easy-going. Low maintenance.

Some of that really is temperament. Plenty of it is a conclusion reached early about what was safe or available, repeated for so long that it stopped feeling like a choice.

The way to tell is what happens when you try the opposite. If being disorganised for one afternoon is mildly irritating, it’s a preference. If it produces genuine dread, that’s something else, and it’s worth being curious about rather than proud of.

None of this needs undoing. Adaptations aren’t faults, they’re evidence you worked something out under difficult conditions and it held.

But it’s worth occasionally asking whether the thing that kept you safe at nine is still earning its place now.

17/08/2026

Separated parents arrive exhausted from trying to make the other house run the same way, and usually convinced that’s the problem. Same bedtime, same rules, same screens.

It’s almost never the thing that’s hurting the child.

Children manage difference far better than we expect. They already do it constantly. School has one set of rules, home has another, a grandparent’s another again, and they adapt without much trouble.

What they cannot manage is carrying the relationship between two adults. Passing messages. Being asked how it was there. Watching a parent’s face change at the mention of a name.

If you change one thing this week, make it the questions after a handover. Did you have a good time is fine. Anything that asks them to report back isn’t.

If things have got stuck between two households, that’s rarely something either parent can unpick on their own. I do family work and parent consultation alongside seeing children, in Lymm and online.

Details in my bio.

Almost no child is referred to me specifically because they’re struggling with friendship. It’s what a lot of them want ...
15/08/2026

Almost no child is referred to me specifically because they’re struggling with friendship. It’s what a lot of them want to talk about once they’re in the room.

And there’s a reason it can feel so enormous at this age.

Around 8–11, friendships become more complex. Children are becoming increasingly aware of trust, reciprocity, loyalty and belonging. Peer relationships start to carry much more emotional weight, while children are still developing the confidence and perspective to navigate all of it.

So when a friendship group changes, adults can see a situation that will probably pass.

The child may experience something much bigger:

What does this say about me?

Why don’t they want me?

What did I do wrong?

Do I have to change something about myself to fit in?

Which is why “you’ll make other friends” can be both completely true and completely unhelpful.

Sometimes what a child needs first isn’t a solution. It’s someone willing to get curious about what happened, what they made it mean and what friendship looks like from their point of view.

That’s what we’ll be exploring tomorrow at Friendship Struggles & Social Confidence, part of my Confident Kids workshops for 8–11 year olds.

A small group, lots of conversation and practical activities, with space for children to think about friendship and confidence without being told simply to “ignore it” or “make new friends”.

📍 Lymm
📅 Monday 17th August
👧 Ages 8–11

Link in bio. SUMMER3 when booking three or more workshops.

I nearly didn’t post this one, because there’s an obvious risk in a therapist listing the things she finds hard.But I th...
14/08/2026

I nearly didn’t post this one, because there’s an obvious risk in a therapist listing the things she finds hard.

But I think that’s the wrong risk to be worrying about. A version of this job where the person has it all worked out isn’t one I’d trust, and I don’t imagine you would either.

Most of what I know, I learnt the long way round.

Some of it later than I’d have liked, which isn’t a qualification anyone would choose and is also exactly why I do this rather than something easier.

It’s the part I’m most useful with, because I’m not guessing.

So if you’re after someone who’s got it all sorted, it isn’t me. If you want someone who knows what’s going on underneath, that I can do.

Therapy for children, teens, adults and families in Lymm, Cheshire and online. Workshops, courses and resources in my bio.

13/08/2026

The parents who bring teenagers to me almost always say a version of the same thing in the first session: they used to tell me everything.

And the young person, when I see them on their own, almost always says a version of the same thing back: I do want to talk to her, just not the second I walk in the door.

Both are true, and neither has worked out that they’re describing the same problem.

You’re asking someone to compress seven hours into a sentence at the precise moment they have the least capacity for it. Secondary school demands an enormous amount socially. By four o’clock the part of the brain that turns experience into a story has very little left. Fine isn’t a deflection, it’s the only thing in reach.

Small questions work better because they need less. What was the worst bit. Who did you sit with. What was for lunch.

The rest arrives at half ten at night while you’re loading the dishwasher and not looking at them.

If yours starts secondary next month, this gets noticeably harder before it gets easier. My transition workbook covers what to ask instead and what to do when they go quiet.

Link in bio.

Friendship Struggles & Social Confidence workshop is filling fast.Did you know? Around ages 8 to 10, children go through...
11/08/2026

Friendship Struggles & Social Confidence workshop is filling fast.

Did you know? Around ages 8 to 10, children go through a real shift in how they think about friendship. It stops being just about who they sit near and becomes about trust, loyalty, and finding people who share their values, which is exactly why fallouts start to feel so much bigger and more personal at this age. It’s also when peer pressure starts creeping in and self-consciousness about fitting in ramps up.

If your child comes home replaying something a friend said, or has started worrying about who they can really trust, this one’s for them.

Workshop 4: Friendship Struggles & Social Confidence

📆 Monday 17th August, 2 hours, small group (max 6 children), ages 8-11

This session gives your child the tools to read friendship “clues” and warning signs, understand what makes a good friend, and practise the kind of problem solving that stops small fallouts turning into big ones. It’s all done through play and creativity, not lectures, so it lands in a way that actually sticks, right at the developmental stage when it matters most.

By the end, your child walks away with:

• A clearer sense of what a healthy friendship looks and feels like

• Practical tools for handling friendship wobbles when they happen

• A confidence boost that carries into the school gates and beyond

• A handmade keepsake for their Therapeutic Toolkit, plus a take-home reminder card

Why it’s worth it: this isn’t a one-off craft session, it’s therapeutic work designed and delivered by a Child & Adolescent Psychotherapist. You’re getting the kind of support that would usually take weeks to build in 1:1 sessions, condensed into a focused, small-group afternoon, at a fraction of the cost of individual therapy.

Only 3 workshops left in the series:

• Workshop 4: Friendship Struggles & Social Confidence, Mon 17 Aug

• Workshop 5: Managing Overwhelm & Big Emotions, Mon 24 Aug

• Workshop 6: Navigating Change, Tue 1 Sept

Book 3 or more and save with code SUMMER3.

Spaces are kept genuinely small to make sure every child gets real attention, so they don’t hang around long. Don’t wait until it’s gone.

👉 Book here: https://thehealingspacetherapy.co.uk/live-courses-%26-workshops

👭 Workshop 4: Friendship Struggles & Social ConfidenceOnly 3 workshops left in the Confident Kids summer series, and thi...
11/08/2026

👭 Workshop 4: Friendship Struggles & Social Confidence

Only 3 workshops left in the Confident Kids summer series, and this one is close to my heart. So many of the children I see aren’t struggling because they don’t understand feelings, they’re struggling because they don’t know how to navigate the messy, unspoken rules of friendship. Who to trust, when to speak up, what to do when a friendship stops feeling good.
This workshop gives them the tools to work that out for themselves.

📅 Monday 17th August
🧒 Ages 8-11, small groups (max 6 children)
⏰ 2 hours

What your child will do:

Through play, discussion and creative activities, your child will explore what makes a friendship feel good, how to spot when something isn’t sitting right, and where their control really lies when friendships get complicated. The session ends with a hands-on craft they get to take home and keep.

What they’ll gain:

A better understanding of what a healthy friendship actually feels like, language to name when something feels off, and practical tools to fall back on next time a friendship gets hard. It becomes part of their personalised Therapeutic Toolkit, built across the whole series.

Why book this one:

Friendship struggles rarely fix themselves, and left alone they can quietly chip away at a child’s confidence long after the school gates close. This workshop gives your child a safe, guided space to figure it out with support, not on their own.

Only 3 workshops remain in the series:

✨ Workshop 4: Friendship Struggles & Social Confidence, Mon 17 Aug
✨ Workshop 5: Managing Overwhelm & Big Emotions, Mon 24 Aug
✨ Workshop 6: Navigating Change, Tue 1 Sept

Book 3 or more workshops and use code SUMMER3 for a discount.

Book here: https://thehealingspacetherapy.co.uk/live-courses-%26-workshops/ola/services/summer-holiday-workshops-for-children-tweens-friendship-struggles-social-confidence

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11 Eagle Brow, Lymm
Lymm
WA130LP

Telephone

+447359459004

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