Sue Pearson
Counsellor at Caxton Surgery, Oswestry

I have spent all my professional career in the Health Service, firstly as an Occupational Therapist specialising initially in Rheumatology at the Robert Jones & Agnes Hunt Orthopaedic & District Hospital, Oswestry, and then going on to management.

I was selected by the then National Marriage Guidance Council (now Relate) to teach counselling to Health Service staff in the West Midlands as they were unable to keep up with the demand for counselling courses. I did this for several years, branching out also into Assertiveness and Stress Management on management courses.

I have a particular interest in Bereavement and Loss in its widest form and have also done staff lecturing and training in and around this subject. My counselling training was with Relate and after 6 years with them I became a counsellor in Primary Care and am a rregistered counsellor with the British Association for Counselling in this area.

As well as my GP work I also work independently for Axis - a Shropshire based organisation dealing with Sexual Abuse - I see both the adult survivors and also the relatives of those who were abused as children.

My orientation is now fairly eclectic according to the needs of the client, and I use a mixture of psychodynamic, cognitive behavioural therapy and brief therapy. I feel that my background as an Occupational Therapist is extremely useful in a primary care setting as I have a good understanding of medical conditions and how the system works.