Perinatal Support
Why is it important?
Pregnancy, birth, and the first year of parenthood can bring huge emotional and psychological changes - for mums, dads, and couples alike. While this period can be joyful, it can also feel overwhelming, isolating, and exhausting. Around 1 in 5 women experience a perinatal mental health difficulty, and approximately 1 in 10 fathers experience depression or anxiety during the transition to parenthood. Relationship stress, sleep deprivation, birth trauma, identity changes, and the pressures of caring for a baby can affect the whole family. Perinatal therapy provides a safe, supportive space to navigate these challenges together or individually. Therapy can help parents manage anxiety, depression, intrusive thoughts, overwhelm, relationship difficulties, and the emotional adjustment to becoming a parent.
Seeking support early can improve wellbeing for parents, strengthen family relationships, and support healthy bonding and development for babies. You do not have to struggle alone - support during the perinatal period can make a lasting difference for the entire family.
Statistics sourced from the World Health Organization and peer-reviewed perinatal mental health research.
Who is it for?
Pregnancy, birth, and/or early motherhood can bring profound emotional and physical changes. While this time can be joyful, it can also feel overwhelming, exhausting and emotionally challenging. Many women experience anxiety, low mood, birth trauma, identity changes, feelings of guilt, loss of confidence, or difficulties adjusting to motherhood during the perinatal period. Hormonal changes, sleep deprivation, fertility journeys, breastfeeding challenges, relationship pressures, and the expectations placed on mothers can all impact emotional wellbeing. Therapy offers a safe, compassionate space where women can speak openly about their experiences without fear of judgment. Perinatal therapy can help support women through pregnancy anxiety, postpartum depression, intrusive thoughts, birth trauma, overwhelm, self-esteem difficulties, and the emotional transition into motherhood.
Mums
Becoming a father can bring huge emotional, practical, and personal changes. While many dads feel pressure to 'stay strong' and support everyone around them, the transition into parenthood can also feel overwhelming, stressful, isolating, or emotionally exhausting. Therapy offers dads a supportive, non-judgmental space to talk openly about anxiety, low mood, relationship pressures, identity changes, stress, or the challenges of adjusting to fatherhood. Perinatal therapy can help fathers feel more supported, connected, and confident as they navigate the demands of pregnancy, birth, and early parenting alongside their partner and family.
Dads
Pregnancy, birth, and becoming parents can place new pressures on even the strongest relationships. Changes in roles, sleep deprivation, emotional overwhelm, communication difficulties, and the demands of caring for a baby can leave couples feeling disconnected or struggling to support one another. Perinatal therapy offers a safe and supportive space for couples to navigate these changes together. Therapy can help strengthen communication, rebuild emotional connection, process difficult experiences such as fertility challenges or birth trauma, and support both partners through the transition into parenthood. With the right support, couples can feel more connected, understood, and better equipped to face the challenges of family life together.
Couple
Antenatal Support
Cognitive Behavioural Therapy can help with these common experiences, and more, during the pregnancy period:
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- Birth anxiety
- Birth trauma from a previous experience
- Pregnancy worries
- Depression
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Behavioural Couples Therapy can help with working through the above as a team, or can be used to:
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- Explore differing family experiences that influence how you both may wish to parent, and negotiate these differences in preparation for parenthood whilst staying strong as a couple
- Discuss and plan what would be helpful during uniquely demanding moments coming up, such as birth, and the first few weeks & months of parenthood
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Throughout the perinatal period
Support is available to accompany you across your entire journey into parenthood. While preparing during pregnancy offers a strong foundation for managing this transition as an individual or couple, the realities of birth and parenting are often unpredictable. You may find that you need extra guidance to navigate your new environment, or you might encounter unexpected hurdles that require a compassionate ear. At times, the simple exhaustion of caring for a newborn can make it difficult to remember the coping strategies you previously practiced.I am pleased to provide a flexible approach to longer-term support that adapts to your evolving family life.
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We can collaborate on a plan that fits your schedule, which often includes a postnatal follow-up session to assess your current needs and well-being. From there, we can determine the frequency of future sessions or scheduled check-ins. I am deeply committed to ensuring perinatal care remains responsive to your unique circumstances and the natural shifts of early parenthood.
Services I offer during the perinatal period
Post-natal Support
Cognitive Behavioural Therapy can help with these common post-natal experiences:
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- Birth trauma
- Anxiety about being a good enough mum or dad
-Post-natal Obsessive Compulsive Disorder
-Post natal Health anxiety
-Post-natal depression
- Changes to identity, and feeling a loss of self
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Behavioural Couples Therapy can help with:
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- Exploring & resolving differences in expectations around parenting responsibilities, styles and approaches
- Assisting each other to create space for yourselves as individuals, and as a couple, outside of being parents.