One of the old chestnuts of addiction recovery is this question - Do drinkers need to deal with their past before they can stop drinking?  In this video Lou and John discuss the issue and their different approaches to helping clients. Also Lou talks about deprivation and abuse and differentiates between them and how she …

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You are living in the same house, you are seeing the same issues and consequences, and YET!!  When you talk about the drinking, the problems, the solutions it feels like you. not only don't live in the same house, in fact you live on different planets.  How can this possibly happen?? In this video about …

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In this video Lou discusses how we adjust to change. At first it can be very strange and incomprehensible but slowly we start to accept and recognise what is happening. Lou compares it to learning a new language, that at first we struggle, ten we translate from our native language and eventually we think in …

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Sometimes, when we are in the midst of change, it can feel like little is happening or, worse, that we are going backwards. Lou describes the journey of change as more like a journey through a city than one through the countryside. In the latter we can usually see quite far ahead and have a …

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This is a short series looking at what we can learn from Lou's counselling sessions. Much of her counselling practice is helping couples to have a better relationship. So there are many lessons and tips that can be taken from her counselling room and applied directly to other relationship situations, such as Bottled Up. Read More >

In this video Lou talks about her marriage to a drinker. Would she have changed how she had approached him, how she had discussed things with the children - almost certainly! Hear what she would have changed and why in this candid video. To watch the other videos in this series follow the links below. …

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Continuing with the series of - Things I know now that wish I had known ...., Lou talks about the beginning of her relationship.  What would she have done differently, would she still have got married or what would she have changed.  Find out by watching this video. To watch the other videos in this …

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In this, the second of the 'if I had known then' videos, John talks about recovery and the unexpected positives. Like many drinkers, I expected that my life, at least my social life, was over when I stopped drinking. What I found was that, instead of my life being over, it really just began. So …

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This is the first in another short series of videos.  In this series we are answering the question - If I had known then what I do now then ,,,,,? In this first video John is answering the question about the beginning of his drinking.  It is about Problem drinking signs I wish I had …

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One of the things I find myself doing in 1 to 1 sessions is providing coaching family members on how to talk to their drinker.  Many people who come to me feel that they have tried everything and nothing has been successful.  So they come looking for that perfect thing to say that will make …

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