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Contributor
Amanda Seyderhelm
Certified play therapist, author and Great Ormond Street Hospital Ambassador working with young children
How we make sense of our story, is how we make sense of ourselves, and live resilient lives.
At the heart of my work is empowering women, children and families to make sense of their losses, and build emotional resilience, so that they can thrive and smile again.
Trauma, loss and bereavement can interrupt our capacity to express ourselves in a healthy way. Young children in particular struggle to express their difficult feelings and emotions verbally, so play therapy gives them the tools to build emotional resilience. Adults get stuck between over analysing and empathising, and the creative arts help them to achieve balance between their left and right brains, and improve their creative and expressive functioning.
My teaching and research interests are in how the role of therapeutic storytelling can affect change in loss and bereavement. My volunteer work at Great Ormond Street Hospital for Children is about helping children who are facing end of life illnesses. As an ovarian cancer survivor, I have faced my own mortality, and not only endured and benefitted from Western medicine cancer treatments, but also used the creative arts to fully recover my health, and transform my life.
As a member of Play Therapy UK I conform to its ethical framework, Conduct of Practice, appropriate clinical governance procedures and CPD requirements. I am registered on the PSA Approved Play Therapy Register. My work is clinically supervised, and I have professional liability insurance and a fully enhanced CRB.
My private practice is at The Broad Street Practice, Stamford, Lincolnshire.
