I grew up in the 50's and 60's in a Surrey village but left home to attend University in Swansea. In those days the Welsh universities didn't make you commit to your Honours subject until the end of the first year. I didn't know what I wanted to do. At one time I had wanted to join the Diplomatic Service but when I discovered that women were expected to leave if they married I decided it wasn't for me. Polite society would shun you if you lived with a man to whom you weren't married!
My 'A' Levels were in French, German and Latin. I'd wanted to do Maths but you couldn't mix arts and science subjects. So in my first year I studied French, Politics and took Psychology simply because I was curious about it. And I never looked back. After my degree I went on to do in-service training in Clinical Psychology. I currently work for the NHS.
I raised five children, learnt to sail yachts in races and on long trips across the world, kept and still have horses, ring church bells, and could once do the Highland Fling and the Scottish sword dance. I am now learning renovation techniques for old buildings to transform my next home, just across the border in England.
Fortunately from childhood I had my own anxiety and obsessive tendencies. These later enabled me to use my own experiences to work out what did and didn't work therapeutically. When Jon Kabat Zinn introduced the concept of Mindfulness I took it up and then later when Acceptance and Commitment Therapy developed I felt I had come home.
At one time I attempted to write fiction - romances. I did get one title published by Rainbow Romances but I soon realised that I was unable to make my characters suffer sufficiently so reluctantly I gave up. I do still have a steamy novel about a riding school lurking somewhere on my hard drive and maybe one day I might feel a desire to revisit it and see if i can adapt it at all...
I would also like to maybe write psychological thrillers, but never seem to find a plot that satisfies me. So for now I stick to what I can do - writing psychology self help texts when I feel inspired.
I am currently trying to help a wider audience through my own website - what-to-do-about-anxiety
