More about Niamh…

I am a queer person, living on the stolen lands of Naarm (aka Melbourne). I come from Irish and convict settler ancestry. I have lived and living experience with mental ill health, including depression, suicidality, and eating disorders. I have ADHD and autism and had the privilege of accessing diagnosis for both when I was in my late 20s. Despite this, I don’t think medical diagnosis is the be all and end all for neurodivergence and embrace people who are self-realised, peer diagnosed, or medically diagnosed in their neurodivergent journey. I consciously engage with the world as a fat person who is not trying to lose weight. I have worked hard to overcome my own experiences of internalised ableism, fatphobia, homophobia, and transphobia. I am continuing to engage in anti-racist learnings and continue to engage in both therapy and professional supervision to ensure that I am offering culturally safe therapy for people who have been racialized by white supremacy.

I live with my nesting partner and our pets living a life I could not have imagined when I was growing up as a young person in a country town and being raised Catholic. I have found joy in my adult life through connection with others who share my experiences, building laughter into my life, and practicing being my authentic self.

I love DnD and TTRPGs. I find freedom in the building and creating of stories with my friends and creating worlds that can, at times, feel safer than the one we live in now.

I am huge fan of a silly graphic t-shirt and have an ever growing collection.

Who do I support?

I love working with other people who have experiences of marginalisation by society, offering a space of open-hearted authenticity, acceptance and celebration of you. I want to offer a space for people where you don’t have to censor yourself or hide parts of who you are. I practice using an eclectic approach, aiming to offer support and use techniques that meet you where you are at right now rather than trying to fit you into a specific modality or approach.

The people I can support include (but is absolutely not limited to) queer and trans folk, people with diverse cultural experiences, polyamorous/ethically non-monogamous individuals and relationship groups, individuals and relationships that engage with kink, BDSM, and D/s dynamics, sex workers, fellow fat people, furries, plural people, and neurodiverse people.

Why see me?

I approach therapy as a collaborative process. Drawing on my own lived experience of engaging in the mental health system, as well as the experiences of others, consent, self-determination and non-coercive practices are core to my values as a therapist. The modern/Western mental health field for a long time has been a space dominated by frameworks of white supremacy, misogyny, and ableism. I aim to work through an anti-oppressive practice framework, allowing for the impacts of oppression on each person’s mental health and experience of the world. In my work, I aim to take the useful techniques and adjust them to create an inclusive, peer centred and honest space where you aren’t expected to be anything other than who you really are.