I'm Shelley Walker
I work with people who look like they're coping...
but don't always feel that way
My own life has taught me that people, families and relationships are complicated; that strength and struggle often sit alongside one another, and that what we see from the outside rarely tells us the whole story.
My story
Life has taken me through some very different worlds. I grew up in the North of England and now live in the South. I spent years in the corporate world before building a career in health and fitness and eventually training as a psychotherapist.
Along the way, I’ve learnt that life rarely unfolds as neatly as we imagine it will. Relationships change, families are complicated, responsibilities grow and sometimes circumstances ask more of us than we expected. We adapt, keep going and often become very good at appearing fine while carrying far more than other people realise.
Those experiences have shaped the way I see people. I’m interested in the gap between how a life looks from the outside and how it actually feels to live it. I'm interested in the different versions of ourselves we can become as we move through different relationships, roles and stages of life
Relational
The relationship itself is an important part of the work
Integrative
Integrating different theraputic approaches to understand the whole person
Holistic
Holding mind, body and lived experience together
What led me here
Before training as a psychotherapist, I spent ten years working in the corporate world and almost twenty years teaching Pilates and fitness. Those very different worlds taught me a great deal about people, about pressure, performance, resilience, identity and the ways we adapt to what life asks of us.
Over time, my interest shifted from what helps us function to what helps us understand ourselves and make meaningful change. I became increasingly curious about what shapes the way we experience ourselves, our relationships and the lives we build.
My background in health and fitness still influences the way I think. I don’t see emotional and physical experience as entirely separate, and I’m interested in what we notice when we pay attention not only to what we think, but also to what we feel and experience in our bodies.
Training & experience
• MA Integrative Counselling and Psychotherapy
• BSc Sport Science
• DipHE Sport, Exercise & Fitness Evaluation
• MBACP
• Clinical Experience within NHS Primary Care
• Volunteer bereavement counsellor with Cruse
• MA Research: The experience of fathers raising autistic adolescents; an Interpretive Phenomenological Study
• Ongoing professional development in attachment, trauma, neurodiversity and relational practice.
You don't need to have it all figured out to start
An initial conversation is a chance to see whether we would be a good fit
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