Sue Gascoyne

I am a warm and insightful Play Therapist and Creative Arts Counsellor, experienced in supporting children and young people with emotional and behavioural difficulties to explore and express their emotions, build resilience and find a voice. With sessions often featuring messy play, sensory play or working outdoors in nature, I use creative approaches for successfully working through trauma, loss, anxiety and change.

Play therapy is a creative play-based approach for helping children and adolescents who have experienced trauma, attachment, behavioural and emotional difficulties, to find new ways of expressing their emotions, build confidence and self-esteem, support self-regulation and make better behavioural choices. Using play and creative approaches (rather than talking), my role as a therapist is to create a safe, warm and empathetic environment in which the client can explore and ‘play out’ feelings and problems, working through issues at their own speed without judgement. I am privileged to have worked alongside and helped so many children and their parents/carers who have made lasting positive changes to their lives. In addition, I have over 16 years’ experience working in the education sector, I am a published author with a specialism in sensory engagement.

My Therapy Practice - Creating a safe and empathetic therapeutic relationship and environment for clients (and their caregivers) are essential. My approach is warm, playful, yet structured, giving children space and opportunities to explore whilst feeling safe,  contained and supported. Although I work mostly one-to-one, I also offer support for families and parenting through parent/carer child dyad work, where the focus is on building connections and attachment and modelling effective strategies and approaches. In addition to working in private practice, I am commissioned via Local Authorities, Adoption and Fostering Agencies, Social Services, mainstream and specialist schools.

My Therapy Practice - Creating a warm and empathetic therapeutic relationship and safe environment for clients (and their caregivers) are essential to the success of play therapy. My approach is playful, yet structured, giving children space, permission and opportunities to explore whilst feeling contained and supported. Although I work mostly with individual children and young people, I also offer parenting support through parent/carer child 'dyad' work, where the focus is on building connections and attachment and modelling effective strategies and approaches. In addition to private practice, I am commissioned via Local Authorities, Adoption and Fostering Agencies, Social Services, mainstream and specialist schools. 

I have supported children and young people with a wide range of issues including bereavement, anxiety, stress, trauma, work, depression and anger-management. As well as providing creative resources including sand, clay, messy play, art and crafts, puppets, music and role-play for clients to use, I favour a range of approaches including Theraplay, DDP, TraumaPlay, Neuro Dramatic Play, Autplay, Therapeutic Life Story work and Sensory Attachment Intervention, which are tailored to client’s individual needs. I provide both short and longer-term work. Sometimes weekly one-to-one sessions with a child or siblings is most beneficial, while for others, joint adult/child sessions, or a combination of the two, are appropriate. With a Level 1 in DDP and Theraplay I can apply this in sessions and offer an adult/child MIM assessment to support parenting. I believe counselling should be accessible for everyone and offer flexible appointment times and concessions to parents/carers where I can. I am insured and registered with BACP and PTUK abiding by their professional code of conduct. I am also GDPR compliant ensuring client data is protected.

Initial Consultation - Where possible I meet parents/carers/referrers to explore the challenges, client history and hopes for sessions. Relationships are key so I offer a free initial consultation to see if I am the right therapist for your child, family or organisation.

Testimonials – 

"I have always found Sue to be patient, a good listener and very knowledgeable about trauma, attachment difficulties, adoption related issues and more! I have enjoyed working with Sue and am impressed with the support she has offered the child and their family. The therapeutic work has ended very positively. I am looking forward to working with Sue again in the future." - MW (Post Adoption Social Worker)

"Sue worked with a child in our school for a period of 30 weeks. Sue was wonderful at talking to the parents, she ensured they understood what she was doing and helped to reassure them about the process. Sue provided the class teacher with strategies in how to support the child during times of transition. This was vital and ensured that the child’s behaviour didn’t impact on the class. Sue’s work has been invaluable in preventing a child being at risk of exclusion." - CN (Primary School Head)

"Many thanks for your support and hard work, it is clear that the children have benefited from play therapy and this has supported them with their emotional wellbeing." - RC (Family Solutions Team)

"Sue has been working with our daughter for over a year, and during this time we’ve seen great improvements in her confidence, self-esteem and interaction with others. Sue is a very warm individual and quickly makes our daughter feel comfortable and at ease during sessions. Sue shows such great empathy, kindness and positivity during the sessions that I have attended and she shows a talent for engaging our daughter at the right level, reassuring her along the way. Sue has also given us useful and constructive advice to help us." - KG (Parent)