About me
Professional expertise. Personal understanding. No assumptions about your story.
Who I am
My name is Karolina and I’m a psychologist with a particular interest in domestic abuse, coercive control and the ways harmful relationships can change how people see themselves, other people and the world around them.
My understanding of domestic abuse is personal as well as professional. I know what it is like to question your own judgement, wonder whether something was really “bad enough”, and realise that the effects of a relationship can continue long after individual moments have passed.
That lived experience matters to the way I work, but it does not mean I will assume that your story looks like mine. It has made me more aware of how complicated these relationships can be, and how unhelpful it can feel when somebody else thinks they already know what you should do.
You do not need to arrive with a clear explanation, a diagnosis, or certainty about whether what you are experiencing is abuse. Sometimes the starting point is simply: something doesn’t feel right.
Let's get Through this together.
My professional background
My professional background is in forensic psychology, where I have worked with people with complex psychological, relational and trauma histories.
That work has taught me to look beyond the surface of behaviour and ask different questions: What has happened? What keeps this pattern going? What purpose might a response once have served? What is happening in the wider relationship or environment? And what might need to change for something different to become possible?
I bring that same curiosity into therapy. Rather than reducing experiences to symptoms or telling you what you “should” be feeling, I want us to understand the whole picture — including relationships, trauma, attachment, shame, neurodivergence, identity, coping strategies and the ways you have learnt to protect yourself.
Why domestic abuse?
Domestic abuse is often talked about as though recognising it should be straightforward. In reality, people can love someone and be frightened of them. They can know a relationship is hurting them and still want it to work. They can leave and miss the person. They can be successful, capable and independent in every other part of life while struggling to understand what is happening at home.
And sometimes there is no moment where somebody suddenly thinks, “this is domestic abuse.” It can begin with a much quieter thought: “I don’t feel like myself anymore.”
That complexity is one of the reasons I wanted to specialise in this area. I want therapy to offer somewhere you can think without being pushed towards a particular conclusion. Somewhere you can understand what has happened, what is happening now, and what you want next.
What I’m like to work with
I’m warm, straightforward, curious and fairly difficult to shock.
I don’t believe therapy needs to feel overly formal, and you do not need to speak in psychological language with me. There will be serious conversations, but there can also be humour, ordinary conversation and moments where things feel lighter.
I will challenge you when I think it might be useful, but I will not tell you how you should live your life.
I will not expect you to disclose everything before you are ready, and you will not have to convince me that something was sufficiently harmful to deserve support.
Most importantly, I want therapy to help you hear your own voice more clearly — rather than replacing somebody else’s answers with mine.
LGBTQ+ affirming practice
I want therapy to be somewhere you can talk about your relationships and experiences without having to explain or defend who you are.
I welcome LGBTQ+ clients and recognise that domestic abuse and harmful relationship dynamics do not always fit the stereotypes people are used to seeing. Identity, sexuality and gender can sometimes become part of how control, shame, isolation or fear are experienced within a relationship.
I won’t make assumptions about your relationships, your identity or what a healthy life should look like for you. We can focus on what is actually happening and what matters to you.
Professional training & approach
Compassion Focused Therapy (CFT)
Particularly useful where shame, self-criticism and self-blame are prominent.
Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT)
Supporting people to understand difficult internal experiences while reconnecting with their values and the life they want to build.
Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT)
Exploring links between thoughts, emotions, behaviour and patterns that may be keeping difficulties going.
Schema-informed approaches
Helping to understand longstanding patterns in relationships, beliefs about yourself and responses that may have developed through earlier experiences.
My work is also trauma-informed and neurodiversity-informed, with therapy adapted around communication style, individual needs and the pace that feels manageable.
A central part of my approach is psychological formulation: making sense of what has happened, what may be keeping difficulties going, what has helped you survive or cope, and what might help things begin to change.
I aim for therapy to be collaborative rather than prescriptive. We will decide together what we are working towards and regularly consider whether the work is actually helping.