Jo Schaeffer
Psychotherapy is an effective treatment for mental health issues like anxiety, depression, stress, body-image, self-esteem, sexuality, relationship difficulties and healing trauma. It is a healing opportunity to deepen your connection with yourself and others and to increase spontaneity, autonomy and intimacy. We work with repetitive patterns and life scripts which you might be unconsciously living out.
Jo has been working as a psychotherapist for over 20 years. Her back ground is in Relational Transactional Analysis and Somatic Psychotherapy. She works with individuals, couples and groups.
Psychotherapy Specialities
Psychotherapy works effectively with the following areas and more....
Anxiety and Depression
Anxiety and depression are a cultural epidemic of our time. Most people have experienced either or both to some extent at some time in their life.
Psychotherapy addresses both the day-to-day management of symptoms as well as the underlying causes of these conditions to facilitate lasting change.
Psychotherapy works as a complementary treatment with medication, they work in different ways. It can also provide structural change required to be able to stop taking medication.
Trauma, either recent or past, can have a huge impact on how we feel, think and function on a daily basis. It effects our relationships and can also prevent someone from being able to develop in their life and move forward.
Recovery from trauma can take time to establish safety first, process the trauma and integrate these experiences with a new sense of identity.
NeurOptimal neurofeedback can be especially helpful to compliment talking therapy and the recovery from trauma.
Having children is one of the most confronting and rewarding experiences of being a human. It can force us to see ourselves in ways we may not have expected.
Psychotherapy can help you to stop handing down patterns which you can see in your family lineage.
Embracing parenthood can also require massive adjustments in who we are and how we live our lives. Issues around identity and purpose arise. Psychotherapy provides a space to explore these developments and re-design your self, your relationships and your work/life balance.
Body image
Relationships
Relationships can have a serious effect on our mental health.
Do you notice repetitive patterns in your relationships which you just can't seem to change?
Are you able to trust and feel satisfied in relationships?
Psychotherapy can help you to understand these relationship dynamics, work with unconscious patterns and establish healthy boundaries and ways of relating authentically with people in your life.
Explore your experiences of and your relationship with your body, how you see yourself, your relationship with food, the roles you take on and how you nourish and care for yourself.
Wanting a relationship
Are you single and looking for a meaningful relationship? Together we can explore what is blocking you from having an intimate, satisfying relationship and unravel repetitive patterns which are holding you back.
Get yourself ready for the relationship you want.
Couple Therapy
Are you currently in a relationship, but wondering if there is more to life than this? Could your sex life be more satisfying? Do you feel stuck in certain areas of your relationship or have trouble communicating with each other?
Psychotherapy can help you to identify relationship dynamics which prevent you from being able to share a satisfying connection with your partner.
Psychotherapy can also help a couple work through conflict or differences. It may be the turning point for both parties to decide whether they want to say yes or no to staying in the relationship.
"Love is nature's psychotherapy"
Eric Berne
Grief and bereavement
Any change or loss in life can require a process of grief and bereavement: losing a job, the end of a relationship, surgery, moving house, death of a pet, even the tiniest thing.
The process of grief involves a full spectrum of emotions and requires an adjustment of our relationship to our self and our identity to integrate the change. If the natural flow of emotions are not allowed to happen, this can easily be confused with depression or anxiety, but it is not.
If you do not have relationships and support structures in your life to hold the space for you to process this full spectrum of emotions and experiences then psychotherapy can offer you that.
Self-esteem
Our sense of self-esteem is based on thoughts and feelings we have about ourself. These could include not liking certain things about ourself to hating ourself in general, feeling extremely uncomfortable and not knowing what to do with ourself when alone and around others, constantly comparing ourself to others, being concerned about what people think about us.
Our relationship to self is developed in our early relationships with others. Being able to have a safe space to explore your experiences of yourself and relationships can help to process these experiences, make meaning for yourself and allow you to find and choose new ways of being.
Addiction
Whatever you may be addicted to:
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cigarettes
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alcohol
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drugs (illicit or prescription)
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a certain relationship
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a job
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overspending
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gambling
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unhealthy behaviours
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going to the gym
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biting your fingernails.....
it is probably easily replaced with another, and so the vicious cycle goes on.
Addictions hold us up in our lives and prevent us from being able to fully grow and live more satisfying lives. Letting go of the addiction dynamic can be one of the most challenging things you ever do and not something you can do on your own.
NeurOptimal neurofeedback can be especially helpful to compliment talking therapy in the treatment of addiction.