Oonagh - Professional Experience
I have been working with families for over 20 years in both educational and community development settings . I began as a secondary school teacher specialising in working with students with special educational needs - primarily neurodiverse children, before retraining as a Family Therapist.
Throughout my career I have specialised in working with adolescents and families who have had complex behavioural, emotional and educational needs. I developed and delivered programs that would support the family system, strengthen family connections and collaborated with families to create new strategies that would create a more stable and supportive family dynamic.
I have been a trained practitioner of Restorative Practice and Mediation since 2002 and have worked in Ireland, Australia and the US with adults, children and adolescents in their family units ,helping them to address and manage conflict (the big and the small) and work more cohesively as a family unit. I have implemented Restorative Justice programmes in schools internationally, incorporating anti-bullying strategies that focused on teaching older children and teenagers skills and tools that foster empathy, resilience and emotional intelligence.
I am an advanced level trained practitioner of NVR - a programme that helps families in distress, particularly parents whose children who are behaving violently or aggressively towards them or their siblings . I have also trained with Parents Plus as a programme co-facilitator working with parents who are going through it with their teenagers.
Over the last 10 years I have worked with individuals, couples and families who, through expatriation or migration have needed support acclimating and adjusting to life in a new place. As someone who has been a guest in many countries, this work has a special place in my heart.
While I now focus on family practice, I still occasionally facilitate therapeutic parenting groups and restorative practice trainings in schools and organizations as it is work that I really love doing.
I love this work and I really like people. People are pretty amazing. Their strength and resilience. Even when they feel at their lowest, there is something there, within themselves working to work it out. I take a collaborative approach with clients and I’m always coming from the understanding that clients are the experts in their own lives. It would not make much sense for us to meet and for me to assume I had all the ‘answers’, telling you what to do and when. That’s a little too finger waggy for me. We work together to develop and understand the issues or problems with a wider lens. Understanding what are the things ( beliefs, rules, roles), that are limiting or constraining us. We work out; “Where are we stuck? Is anyone else stuck? What is keeping us stuck? and what direction do we want to move in?”
I have five children (this a non judgemental space:), four of whom are currently teenagers, again… no judgement:), and I have spent large parts of my career working with teenagers and their parents. Inexplicably enough, adolescence and the teenage years are perhaps my favourite part of human growth and development. I thought this might change when my own guys hit these years - that when the rubber hit the road and these teenagers lived with me I might like this part less, ( a lot less), but something else happened. I didn’t like adolescence any less, but my appreciation of parents & guardians (and anyone else who is in the trenches of this stage) went all the way up.
Years ago, when my kids were littles, a friend of my mine who had kids the same age, sent me a meme which said;
“ It seems unfair that the people who want to go to bed, have to put the people who don’t want to go to bed, to bed”.
I think about this idea more now with teenagers than I did with younger children. There’s something about having to do the ‘thinking’ for a teenager - the risk assessment, the organization, the time management, keeping them safe while letting them be more independent and doing this all while the same teenager thinks you know absolutely nothing. There’s nothing quite like your teenager ‘introducing’ you to Nirvana to really drive home how little they think you know. It can make us feel crazy and so, so tired. We see ourselves becoming the parents we didn’t want to be and there can be a heartbreak in that. This can really impact our relationships; with our teenager, our partners, our parents, how we show up for our other kids, how we show up at work - the whole deal. When we have babies there are groups we go to, books we read, support and resources that we access and it feels normal and acceptable - baby not sleeping, potty training, toddler biting, four year old doesn’t want to share. The sense is that we’ve all been there. This can feel different with teenagers. Parents tend to share less of their difficulties, fearing their kiddo will be labelled or maybe shamed and their family and parenting will be judged. It can be really isolating and lonely and it also helps to keep the problem or the situation to stay stuck in the same pattern.
I work with parents, single parents, co-parents, foster parents, adoptive parents, step-parents, grandparents - all the parents and the guardians or caretakers of children who want their relationships and their lives together, to be better together. I work with adolescents and teenagers individually and as part of families. Family therapy is a beautifully flexible psychotherapeutic discipline and we keep in mind, that even if we attend individually, our family - the one we came from and the one we have made are always in the room with us.
Therapy is work and it can be really hard work for clients. Recognizing and understanding how we create, co-create & participate in the patterns, beliefs and dynamics of our relationships is strong medicine. One of the most important facets of therapy is the relationship that is established between the therapist and the client. Our first session is always an exploration of the issue and also an introduction, getting to know how or if we can work together. I would never like a client to feel compelled to continue attending because we had one session . A client from some years ago spoke to me about the worry of hurting the therapists feelings. Absolutely not. You must choose the best therapist for yourself, one with whom you feel respected, safe and feel like you can develop a therapeutic relationship where trust can be established. Not everyone works well together. This is not something to take personally or worry about, but its actually a great start in beginning to take your own wants and needs into consideration. I write this as I believe it’s important that you have a sense of me so you can make the best decisions on behalf of yourself. I position myself as working to be useful for the client, working towards the goals they have set; moderating, supporting and challenging.
If you would like to schedule a brief phone call with me before making an appointment, send me an email and we can arrange a time. My phone is off during sessions so I will not be able to answer if it is an impromptu call. The best way to contact me is through email or the contact form. I respond to emails within a day or two.
I imagine if you have found this page you are, to some extent or another, experiencing some difficulty and distress. In what ever turmoil you are feeling, you are looking for help and support and that takes strength and courage. So well done you and keep going.
“Ring the bells that still can ring
Forget your perfect offering
There is a crack, a crack in everything
That's how the light gets in”Leonard Cohen