The #TherapistsConnect Podcast
The #TherapistsConnect Podcast
Elizabeth Turp
In this episode of The #TherapistsConnect Podcast, Dr Peter Blundell (Twitter - @drpeterblundell) interviews psychotherapist Elizabeth Turp. Elizabeth is a psychotherapist in private practice, a trainer and writer.
As well as her book 'CFS/ME Support for Family & Friends' she is part of recently published resource for people living with chronic illness 'When Bodies Break - how we survive & thrive with illness & disability'.
She publishes articles to her website www.elizabethturp.co.uk on wellbeing and therapy subjects such as how therapy and mindfulness can help with physical illness; overcoming blocks to starting counselling; working for yourself when you live with a long-term condition; counsellor self-care; sleep and current topic post-COVID recovery. See 'articles' and 'archived articles' pages for these and more.
She has recently given talks on self-care in self-employment and understanding invisible illness, and is currently planning training in self-care specifically for counsellors.
You can follow her on Twitter @lizahpool for related subjects.
#TherapistsConnect is a platform for connecting therapists.
Website: www.Therapists-Connect.com
Twitter: @Therapists_C
Instagram: @TherapistsConnect
Facebook: @TherConnect
Origins of #TherapistsConnect
Welcome to the therapist connect podcast. Dr. Peter Blundell, interviews therapists about their work and experiences within the therapy community.
Peter Blundell :Hello, and welcome to therapist connect podcast. My name is Dr. Peter Blundell. And today I'm interviewing Elizabeth Terp, who is a therapist and counsellor who lives and works in Liverpool. And she's also written a book, which supports family and friends of individuals who have chronic fatigue syndrome. And it's lovely to have her here on the podcast today. Oh, it's lovely to see you face to face. Yeah, thank you so much for doing this. I really appreciate it. Really, okay, we'll crack on then. So and I've read a little bit about you on your website and everything but I suppose could you tell the the people who'll be listening? how you came to be a therapist, really, and what kind of drew you to the profession okay.
Elizabeth Terp :I was one of those where I always sort of felt like I i knew what area I wanted to go into, but I didn't know what the job that fitted that was, if that makes sense. Yeah, so I like lots of people in my family and things like teachers and nurses and all of that. So I knew something in that area. But it wasn't till I went to university. I did. I did a combined degree in English and psychology. And then in my final year, you have to pick the options. And I picked counselling psychology, and I was like, that's it. That's, that's what I want to do. And it was just absolutely brilliant. Obviously, I was quite young at that point, because I went straight from school to university. So it was a little bit too soon to kind of training go forward. So after that, I did volunteer where I thought I knew I needed to test myself. So I went and worked for victim support. So I volunteered with them because I wasn't sure at that point, whether I had some of the toughness required to do the work that we do. And I know you'll understand what I mean by that. And so just Could I could I cope with it? Basically, could I take some of this distressing stuff? So I did that. And I found out that I have more skills in that area than I thought. And I did work my way up through that, and then did other bits of voluntary work. And then I was quite young when I started training to be a counsellor. So basically, as soon as they let me do it, I did it. Like, only 24. When I started, I know there's a lot more younger people coming through now, but this is 20. This is 22 years ago. So it was less usual for the younger people.
Peter Blundell :And I think at one point that some of the courses didn't they restrict as well, I think, at age level, that's not really the case now, but
Elizabeth Terp :you have to work quite hard to get on it if you were my age.
Peter Blundell :So you've been doing it for 22 years
Elizabeth Terp :I know. I can't even believe itit's weird, but it's true.
Peter Blundell :Fantastic. So can you tell me a little bit obviously, that's when you qualified. Can you tell me a but about your career over that over time.
Elizabeth Terp :yeah. So I was when I was training, I was still working for victim support, I was managing one of the schemes. So I got a bit of funding and then we did like a side project with a bit of counselling there. And then then my next job was supposed to be a counselling job was working in a drop in centre with homeless people. But it didn't quite work out like that. Because anyone who knows Maslow's hierarchy of needs, knows that there's a lot more needs that people need when they're in that situation. Before therapists it was a really great job. But there wasn't a huge amount of therapy going on in the role. So then I was, I'll say I was I was lucky at the time, because I managed to get a job in the NHS. So this was six years or so before IAPT. So I actually got a job in a counselling service in the NHS in Knowsley and it was absolutely brilliant. It was it was the dream for obviously. So we'll get on to this but for any newly called If I counsellor is to get a full time paid job in counselling, isn't it? Yeah. And I got one in the NHS and at that stage because I was hadn't really had a proper therapy job before that, as I say, because the jobs I had hadn't really allowed for enough face to face work. And so to be in a team of experienced counsellors who were nurturing and brilliant, and you know let you work autonomously, but then there was always, always someone there to sort of support you and guide you. Absolutely perfect. What could anyone need more than that, at that stage in your career? Yeah, that was great. And it continued to be great. And then IAPT came in. And so it did change after that. And I'm not I'm not going to go off on one too much about that. But just to say, so I worked in the NHS for another six years after IAPT. And I ended up leaving for various reasons, you know, not just because of the way that went, but a large part of it was I didn't feel I could work there anymore, which was very sad about actually because I'm really do believe in the NHS and I, my pain would have been to stay in the NHS for my whole career. But it just wasn't viable for me to do that. And so I left I left
Peter Blundell :It was quite a big thing for you to leave that if you were kind of very committed to it. And
Elizabeth Terp :yeah, horrible. And I should have left a lot earlier than I did. I know, we'll get on to probably talking about other stuff. But I also had some quite serious health problems around that time. So it was a case of, because other people said, Oh it is brave of you to leave, but actually, it was necessary. I had to, in order to continue to do the work that I love to do and look after myself. I had to leave. And so I did and that was seven years ago now and I left and I've been in private practice ever since. And it's just fantastic. I mean, I didn't know what they will be like and I was scared about what you know, what would I feel like completely at sea or you know, would I miss the support will basically it's all the good stuff and none of the bad stuff. It's just
Peter Blundell :It's quite liberating.
Elizabeth Terp :Its wonderful , I'm so, so grateful for it. It's just really great. So I've been doing that ever since. Various and I've managed I'm quite proud of the fact that because I believe in people being able to access help and not pay for it. A third of my work is working with people who aren't actually paying for their own therapy. I've got various different routes that I've managed to establish either with companies or EAPS, or private or whatever. So at least a third of my clients don't pay for the therapy, which I'm pleased about because as I said, I believe in the NHS, and I didn't want to completely leave that model behind. Yeah, so yeah, so it's okay. It's okay with me now. Yeah.
Peter Blundell :So how long have you been in private practice for
Elizabeth Terp :Seven years?
Peter Blundell :Seven years, seven years? Yeah. That's quite a while isn't it?
Elizabeth Terp :Yeah, I think I think I didn't know was all the things that you need to kind of to get that off the ground quite quick. I'd already done becasue in the NHS, they make you do all manner of additional training, obviously, I've done my accreditation, I've done a master's in counselling before I was in the NHS even so I kind of had a lot of things which I didn't need to do as much as I thought I would need to do to set myself up, put it that way. So yeah, some of some of the work just came to me, and then I built on the other stuff on it. Yeah, it's been fantastic.
Peter Blundell :And it sounds like to do that transition you had like, so you had quite a lot of things in place that you weren't even aware of. Yeah, they actually came to be useful moving into private practice really
Elizabeth Terp :That was really satisfying, because obviously, a lot of those things I put a lot of hard work and effort into, you know, and in the NHS, they weren't appreciated. Really at all. And in the outside world, I mean, that was so wonderful to hear, like how much value was put on to all the things that I had done in the past and, you know, yeah, and it worked really well. It still does. So,
Peter Blundell :yeah, I find it quite fascinating as therapists or just in general really sometimes how when we're in organisations How we can be restricted or blinkered? Because we're just in that system, aren't we, and we don't really necessarily know what's going on out there, we kind of have an idea, but we don't fully know or realise that it exists until we take that step. And then,
Elizabeth Terp :There is stories that you're told about the culture that you're in, that's like, that's the be all and end all and, you know, whereas Actually, I mean, it's so much different. I mean, it seems still evolving. Now, the sort of work I'm getting now which things I didn't even know, were possible. So I'm actually still developing my practice now. Which is also important, isn't it? Because you don't want to stagnate in any point during this work. It's really important to keep learning and challenging and all that and that kind of happens quite naturally, obviously. But you know, it also does happen naturally in the sort of work tends to come. Yeah.
Peter Blundell :Do you think that work because ive had a look at your website and see some stuff on social media. Do you feel like you kind of put your sell out there quite a bit because I feel like you kind of from just from reading your website, you just didn't seem to kind of, I just got the impression that you're kind of really putting yourself out there a little bit
Elizabeth Terp :Thats really interesting because I don't feel like I put myself out there. It's really interesting and like part, I'm glad you've asked me to say this because I like the opportunity to reflect as well. It's really useful. And one of the reasons I suggested doing it is because I want to get better at putting myself out there. Because there's like the one of the things I'm developing alongside my therapy work is I'm developing doing training and CPD courses. I used to do some training in NHS and things like that. And in the last year or so, I've started to do some training again. So that's the part of my business that I need to learn how to publicise. But I think probably what you're observing is that a lot, I've done a lot of writing stuff, and I do, I guess I do put that out there. But I don't put it out there. In a way, as a way to attract clients, it's not, it's not intentional. It's not like, Oh, I do this and I and then you can come and see me. And it doesn't really work like that either. Because I think, I think I think about this a lot, because my main specialists areas working with people with chronic physical health problems. And, and that's a very complex area. And you know, it's quite difficult work depending on where the person's at and how complex the health problems are. And so I do do some of that work, but it's certainly not what I spend my whole working time doing and I wouldnt want it to be either. So the writings almost like it's not separate. It's related, but it's, it came first, in a way so I started writing when I was still quite new in the NHS, because Ive always, I never saw myself as a writer, as such and it wasn't deliberately writing that's a coincidence occurred. And since then, I've just bits of articles here.
Peter Blundell :Thats what I think of you're putting yourself out there that is a way of putting yourself out there
Elizabeth Terp :I guess I'm trying, I'm trying to share my knowledge. And I'm trying to, you know, because I think I think the field that I specialise in is there's such a dearth of actual people who know what they're talking about. And people who have, you know, complex health problems, quite often don't encounter any health professionals who understand what they're going through at all, even the ones who are supposed to because they're specialists, often they don't understand. And so that's like, absolutely heartbreaking. I've experienced it myself. So I have like a really deep empathy for that. And I think it's so important for somebody like me, who has kind of a personal knowledge, but also professional knowledge that I do something with that information because it's almost like I feel like I have to do it. I'd be wrong not to because I don't sound like really self righteous or something, but somebody's got to do something about it
Peter Blundell :I thought that was one of the things that was interesting about therapists. There's actually lots of people doing this fantastic work that no one was actually hearing or people were hearing out. But it was groups of people hearing about differently. Yeah. And actually trying to kind of elevate that and kind of go look at this person look this you might find this interesting. Look at this over here, I think is a is a fantastic opportunity on social media.
Elizabeth Terp :I mean, that's what I like so much about what you've got now. Because, you know, it's been absolutely brilliant, what you've done, because that's what I personally want. I want to be able to see what other people what good other people are doing, rather than have discussions about negative stuff, because there's plenty of difficulties in our profession. Yeah. But there's also but it's so much better to find out what everyone's getting up to, isn't it and like, learn about who's in the area? I mean, you know, we're in the same city, aren't we? Yeah, maybe one day we'll be allowed to meet in person
Peter Blundell :when we're allowed
Elizabeth Terp :Yeah so nice to get to know people a little bit and sort of know who's around and what they're up to. And yeah, I've really enjoyed it.
Peter Blundell :Absolutely. And I think you're right, I think some Something's going on on your doorstep a little groups of therapists who were who were there discussing and would love to meet with a therapist, but it just doesn't happen for one reason or another. So
Elizabeth Terp :So you've created a platform for people knowing more. And I think that's really great. And it's
Peter Blundell :It has been lovely for me just kind of been able to actually speak to people because I feel like it was such a whirlwind at the beginning. It was it was, it was almost facilitation rather than involvement
Elizabeth Terp :It went off really quick. Didnt it?
Peter Blundell :It did.
Elizabeth Terp :We were waiting for it. We needed it.
Peter Blundell :It was lovely. It was really nice. So do you want to tell me a little bit about how would you describe your therapeutic approach? Or modality or whatever you want to call it?
Elizabeth Terp :Well, I would describe it as integrative I know some of this language is debated, isn't it whether you know, whether it's eclectic or whether I call it integrative because I consider that I integrate various different approaches. And but the way that I mean my my approach is really heavily influenced by having worked in the NHS. And over time as the culture changed in NHS mental health, there was much more pressure to train and CBT and to train and IPT. And basically we were at points told you have to do this training, even if because always person centred trained and I love that approach. And I was basically made to do some of these other trainings.
Peter Blundell :Were you resistant?
Elizabeth Terp :Oh yes, yeah, and I won't get into any of that because that could go on all day. But let's just say I did just CBT training, I made sure they sent me on the highest quality possible Certificate course in the Northwest. So I did at Salford. It was absolutely It was really good. And I did get some really good things from that. And but I like to reflect now I'm out private practice and meeting individual people's needs, how little I use CBT is quite interesting. I do use it very occasionally. But I coming back to the question I consider that I'm sure every good therapist does this, but my job is to meet the client where they are. And so I individualise all the things I've got to offer to them. And that's, you know, and that's highly complex stuff. And it doesn't just involve skills and strategies and theory does it involves language and you know, speech and it is fascinating because obviously, you can tell I'm not from Liverpool, but like I like I really aware of how my my accent changed. I've lived here for a really long time, my accent changes like naturally according to who I'm working with. And you know, and not in a deliberate way obviously, I wouldnt do that. much as I love the scouse accent, I have never picked one up, but like you just you just you when you go into where the person is, don't you? And I think so I had all these extra trainings that I did. And then I chose to do some mindfulness training, because that felt like something that would be good for me as well as good for my clients. So I did that that's heavily influenced my practice and I have a mindfulness practice myself now. And that really helps me really helps me now during this period of history, but my I have a lot of clients who I mean like, I don't ever say to my clients, this is how I work. And we're going to do this, this and that. I wait for them to tell me what they want. And a lot of my clients will say things to me, like, Oh, you know, wants to learn how to be more present or I wants to, you know, a lot of them don't know, they're talking about mindfulness. They haven't heard of it. But they are, they're asking me for that. And so we'll do a bit of work on that. And so a lot of my clients do mindfulness alongside the therapy. And that's quite a profound thing. And then the other side of my practice that's kind of come started from personal experience and from working in primary care where a lot of the clients coming through had physical health problems, and I had quite serious physical health problems also. So over time, I've evolved a way of working with that. And as you probably saw a website added by the person where I was a patron of a charity so I've written a lot of resources for them about different things. And I kind of consider myself I call myself an expert patient. And that's a bit of a thing if everyone understands what that means now, but basically just means a person who lives with health problems who self manages their health problems without drugs, you know, so as much as possible, and so I kind of live I live what I sometimes not always not, not, obviously, not all my clients have health problems. And some of them haven't got a clue that I've got health problems because they never googled me and they never like read all my stuff. And but I kind of, I can work quite well with people who are dealing with some pretty challenging things. But I also work with general you know, what, across the board have all kinds of different issues because I prefer to do that area. So yeah, so it's kind of just developed over time as it does for everybody, I suppose into this kind of mixture of whatever somebody needs. It seems to work quite well, but I like to observe how little of the more manualized therapies, I actually need because my clients don't need me to use them. And that's what I find interesting. So basically what I'm saying is I was in person centred therapy, most of the time, that's what I'm doing. Yeah. Yeah. And I know, you know, you're not surprised by that is
Peter Blundell :No.
Elizabeth Terp :No therapist is here. If you look out there in the world, you'd think that cant be possible. It doesn't work and blah, blah, blah, but it really does work. And now now I'm out of a structured organisation, I only have X amount of sessions. I still can't believe I can work with my clients for as long as they need me to, it's okay. Not all of them for some limitations, but
Peter Blundell :it's wonderful, isn't it? I find that particularly in private practices is just absolutely that it's just open to as much as they need, you know, and that, you know, sometimes that will be a couple of sessions, you know, and sometimes it might be working over years potentially, you know, with with people And I think that's, that's wonderful, you know that people can get that opportunity. And I was just thinking that when you talked about describing your practice and your approach, and it's so interesting, I've not done that many interviews so far, but I've spoken to a few different people, but they've all labelled their approach so differently, you know, existential, pluralistic, person centred integrative, whatever it is that the whole labelled it, but they've nearly all of them have said. Meeting the person, you know, in the moment where they're coming from in the here, and now it's just, which I found absolutely fascinating.
Elizabeth Terp :Isn't it because even though you might be bringing in tools, you're offering them to an individual person and you know, it's completely up to them whether they take them on or not.
Peter Blundell :Absolutely, yeah,
Elizabeth Terp :I consider that to still be person sensitive to it. But then a lot of the work I do is pretty purely person centred.
Peter Blundell :Yeah,
Elizabeth Terp :Because there's no need let's be honest, there's actually no need for it. None of the faffing, they need the space, they need to be heard. I's so it's so simple. It's not simple because most humans can't do it. But it's the simplest thing, isn't it? The we're actually doing this here is a 100 level.
Peter Blundell :And it's interesting, isn't it that it is simple concepts. Yeah. It's such a simple concept. And I think sometimes when I'm with students and stuff that I think sometimes before the ground placement, they maybe get a little bit frustrated, because they kind of like what else what else is there. But, like what you were saying there, the wonderfulness of it is that actually you can go to this amazing depth with just this very, very simple concept and simple idea. It's not simple to do. But it's very, it's simple to understand. Yeah.
Elizabeth Terp :And often, I mean, the sad thing is that often, you'll meet people who've either had lots of therapy before or they've waited a very long time for their therapy, and they come and speak to you. And they're like, no one's ever listened to me like this before. No one's ever heard. You know, yeah, it's really awful, isn't it? You know?
Peter Blundell :Absolutely. After they've been directed to a website that tries to teach them how to think in a different way, and then all of a sudden, someone's actually trying to pay attention to what they're trying to say.
Elizabeth Terp :And that in itself, like straightaway, there's a transformation that can occur there. I mean, sometimes it's actually quite frightening for them. And for the therapist, isn't it that within one or two sessions, they can start to feel very different? Just because they've been at last they've been heard. Yeah. It is so healing and powerful. And, of course, I'll get we'll probably get on talking about this, but like working in a remote way like this.
Peter Blundell :Yeah,
Elizabeth Terp :It is different. I mean, you can't it does work. So that's really good. It does work. But it's different than actually being in the room with a person as well.
Peter Blundell :Yeah, absolutely. I think that interesting dynamic as well as maybe if you You've been working face to face with somebody, but now all of a sudden, now you're online. And all of a sudden, you know, if this the the context is different, and they're seeing some of your house and you're seeing some of their house and it changes the dynamics a little bit, doesn't it?
Elizabeth Terp :Some clients have commented on that, because I've sent making sure they're okay. And asking them, how's it going? And I think because if you have already worked with them, they know you. They know your voice. And like, I'm doing a lot of my work on the phone, actually, because I gave my clients the option of either or because I've done both before. So I was quite lucky. I had a bit of practice. So yeah, most of mine are working on the phone, which is different again, but they you just fall into the rhythm because you know how each other talks, you know, how much I know I'm talking about now, but when I'm working with a client, obviously, I'm not talking and they're used to that they used to, you know, how much space is normally in our interactions and stuff like that. So yeah, it's Yeah.
Peter Blundell :And so I'm changing the conversation slightly if and because you've been, it's nice to see actually , that you've been in practice so long but you are still so passionate about therapy, you know, which is I think it's fantastic. And what advice would you give to somebody if they were coming into the profession now or thinking about?
Elizabeth Terp :This is one of the hard questions that you let me know about before. And yeah, I do have an answer for this. Because sometimes people do ask me, like, I've had clients who've said to me, oh, you know, I'm gonna train as a counsellor now. You know, and then I'm like, Oh, no, so my answer it, I'll just tell you what I say to them, because it's a contradictory answer. It's like, hey, it's the best job in the world. And if you if you really truly love it, it's amazing. It's like the best, most satisfying job. And B, you must know there's no work. You must realise there's no paid jobs and You know, in order to build a private practice, it can take a very long time. And so I do you know, I feel hate it when someone asked me this question because it makes me squirm. But I feel like you have to be honest with people, the amount of people I've met who, who are seen on forums and things who are doing their training, and no one's ever told them that there's no magic jobs out there.
Peter Blundell :Yeah,
Elizabeth Terp :It's just terrible. And and then the heartbreak for people when they finish the training, they're being forced into private practice. Probably should really probably do that straight from training. I think a lot of people feel like they have to do that. And it's just really hard. It takes a very long time. I think like I said, the beginning, the reason I kind of fell on my feet with it was because I'd already done all the things that person needs to do.
Peter Blundell :Yeah,
Elizabeth Terp :Whereas if you just come out of your training, you might be very good at your job, but you don't necessarily have all the support and the backup and the knowledge and you know, all this risk management skills, all the things that you need. Yeah, on your own in isolation, because it's pretty tricky, isn't it?
Peter Blundell :Oh, yes, yeah. Yeah.
Elizabeth Terp :That's what I say to people. So it's horrible, but it's true.
Peter Blundell :And I think you're right. I think it's important to be honest about that, really. And I know there's a lot of campaigning going on at the moment around employment opportunities for therapists. And but, you know, it's not at a stage yet where, you know, unlike other professions say that, you know, not that you're guaranteed a job, but there is a lot of jobs out there waiting for you. Yeah, it's not like that.
Elizabeth Terp :When I was in the NHS, and the way that things went, that the original team was just counsellors, and by the time I left without getting into any of the reasons, we're not here for that. But by the time I left, there was hardly any of us left, which basically pushed out and so there's there is some counsellors in the NHS now, but they're very few and far between. and you have to have that's another myth, isn't it? People think, Oh, I can go as a PWP and then try and get through doesn't work like that, because in the NHS, you have to have the IAPT recognised qualifications, which are extra qualifications, and then not necessarily what you've just been training to do, especially if your person centred. So, in a way, I've seen a lot of debate around that as well, because I think newly qualified people, obviously they need to make a living especially for, you know, starting out in their career. Sometimes they'll do like almost a deal with the devil, they're like, I'll do this training is the only way I can get a job. But this this work is not like that you do what feels right. To you. I think dont you? Well a lot most of us do anyway.
Peter Blundell :Well, it's challenging, I think, to be forced into a approach that you don't believe in, you know, for employment. You know, and I think that that is difficult and I think particularly if you are being trained initially in person centred and then you are, you know, pushed into doing a different approach which you don't want to do in it in an organisation. I think I think it's challenging for people because the, you know, the way you approach person centred training and the way you you live it, don't you don't? You don't?You don't just do it, you live it. Yeah. So it's a bit of a mismatch then to then try and say, actually, to forget that and
Elizabeth Terp :Yea yea yeah throw all that self awareness out the window. It's really tricky, but it is the best job in the world is so grateful for so many things. I won't bore you with that I am still managing to do it, you know,
Peter Blundell :Your passionate about it as well, which is great.
Elizabeth Terp :Yeah.
Peter Blundell :Fantastic. And so is there any other rewards or challenges you think that you've maybe had or you think that there is in therapy?
Elizabeth Terp :Well, I think the main reward is what I kind of alluded to before, which is that it's one of the only jobs in the world where every single encounter you have you get something out of it. And you know, like a lot of jobs, there's very little, you can see very little outcome from a lot of jobs, you get very little feedback, but in the work that we do, there's like micro moments of that every single session with a person and, and it's just so uplifting. It's like, you know, like, if your having a bit of a bad day, and then you go into work, see your clients. I mean, I just, it's just amazing. It's just, it's like, so completely affirming all the time. And I'm not so you know, that might sound really silly and flippant, but I know, you know what I mean?
Peter Blundell :Yeah.
Elizabeth Terp :You could be working with someone who's quite severely depressed. But within that session, there'll be something that they have got from that there'll be some humour, there'll be, there'll be something that makes all of that worthwhile. And, you know, and that's great. I mean, so rare, isn't it? So that's the main reward, I think. And obviously, the the greater thing is just seeing people go from where they started to where they are and then going back out into the world and like, having got to where they want to get to wherever that is you know,
Peter Blundell :It is a privilege to be part of that, isn't it?
Elizabeth Terp :And the secrecy of it all as well, I, that's one that's related because that's what I also struggle with it sometimes you're working with like these, everyone is amazing, every human is amazing. And everybody's working in on some amazing stuff. Sometimes there'll be things that I want so badly to tell someone else about, you know, whether it's a small scale thing that's an individual achievement, or whether I'm actually working with someone really impressive. And, you know, even slightly famous, you know, can't tell anyone. I find that really challenging. And I you know, I I am one of these therapists who, who takes confidentiality completely seriously.
Peter Blundell :Yeah, me too.
Elizabeth Terp :I know some people have more fluid banter. I don't discuss my thoughts with anybody, you know, and my supervisor may be but you know, even dont tell my supervisor the names of my clients, so, but you know, you sometimes you go, oh my god, I gotta tell you what this person did and you just can't, you just don't gotta keep it all in. So that's quite challenging. Don't get me wrong, I do it. But I sometimes find it hard. And the other thing I find the most challenging about the work is not just because I'm outside the NHS because it also exists if you're in the NHS, but what I find really difficult is when I'm working with people who can't access the other services that they need, so whether they've got like quite severe and enduring mental health problem, and they're trying to get into a specialist service, or when I'm working with someone with an undiagnosed physical health problem, I mean, so part of my job again, it's evolved because I was in the NHS and actually my first job in the NHS, I forgot to mention was getting people off tranquillisers and sleeping tablets, that was actually a specific role that I was employed with someone else to do. Because that was the target at the time. I don't get that anymore. So and but from that, I did a lot of GP liaison work. And so now I do, you know, do referral letters and things for people because that's what I used to do a lot of in the NHS. So if somebody is trying to get a service, and they're having terrible trouble doing it, then I look, not all therapists do this, but I would maybe write them a letter of referral, you know, I have some ability to do that. So sometimes I can help with that. Sometimes I can help them get past the obstacle that they might have. But other times, all I can do is support them, and try and help them to help themselves whilst they're waiting for some quite important treatment. No, I find that really difficult because obviously, the NHS is massively under resourced. Maybe everybody knows that now. But a few weeks ago, people didn't know that, you know, it's been upsetting me for decades, but the average person in the public did not know how under resourced the NHs is, it just is. And you know, it isn't it has been for a very long time. And so that happens a lot. You know, it's not because the people in services don't want to help. It's because they haven't got the resources to help people often so I find it really horrible, very upsetting
Peter Blundell :and frustrating as well, isn't it you know, that actually there is only so much an individual person When I mean a person, I mean the client can do in their own circumstances. And actually, sometimes context or organisations or funding or whatever it is, actually is the thing that's holding people back and not actually the fact that the person themselves.
Elizabeth Terp :And I think that's sometimes why is appropriate with the experience I have for me to support that occasionally, because it's the person especially for persons also depressed because of the circumstances. It's, as you say, really hard for them to fight that system, you know, so occasionally I will support them with that, because I can't I feel like I have to, I can't not do that. You know, and I think that maybe quite a few people listening Oh, I would never do that. But again, that comes from my experience, you know, working in that setting and being used to doing that.
Peter Blundell :And I think potentially using your experience from the NHS, you know, actually that letter of support can actually make a massive difference eventually to that but that person and their life.
Elizabeth Terp :Yes, sometimes it benefits that they've been rejected from, you know, it can be extremely powerful, you know? So yeah. And so that's when I guess I takes all the power back, don't I by doing that. So this is really distressing, what can I actually do here? And and when I do that, by the way, I do that in a collaborative way, I don't write the letter, I do it with the person. So I asked them what they want me to put in it. And then you know, and then I let them read it before it's sent. It's not It's not me taking the expert role. It's me, basically, actually, like I used to do with GPS in the NHS, it's me manipulating my position. And, you know, I'll do things that I never do in everyday life. Like I'll write all my qualifications along the bottom of the letter and whip them with with it, you know, I don't never do that. There's no need to do that with flies. But if you're if you're sending a letter to a consultant, you've got to do it. So that's when you know, I know I know it's play that game. So that's what I do and I quite enjoy that.
Peter Blundell :So we've touched on this briefly, we've talked a little bit about the therapists connect hashtag. And I was just wondering how you'd experienced it because it did feel like it was it was quite a bit of a quite successful and just your understanding and experience of social media in general really as a therapist, I'd quite interested to hear about that.
Elizabeth Terp :Yeah. Okay. So yeah, I do, I tend to use different social media in very distinct ways. And that's just my own kind of well being really so Twitter is actually the main one I use the only one I use professionally actually. So obviously, as you've seen, I've got a mental health well being feed on Twitter myself. And so I on Twitter and mostly follow advocates of people who have got chronic illness and other mental health professionals and just people of interest really in the field. So that's so on Facebook. I don't have any professional presence on Facebook because I think personally feel like Facebook's more social. So I keep myself very private on there. And then I've got an Instagram that again is just for myself. So go, yeah, Twitter's the place I spend most of my social media work time, I guess. And yeah, I get a lot a huge amount from that I've made some really important connections on previous to what you've done, which are really bizarre, like, obviously, international people that you never likely to meet in real life like, and one of the pieces of writing I've done in somebody's book was because I made a connection on Twitter. And that's really good. And these things tend because you said before that you notice that I do put a lot out there, but I don't usually do it in a calculated way. So I'm very bad asking for things. I'm trying to get better actually, because I think I think I probably asked you this, but I find it quite difficult to do that. So what tends to happen is that people have seen things I've done and then they've come to me and go No, you know, seen this or like this. Do you want to do that and oh, okay, that's nice. So that's happened quite a lot. So I've made a lot of connections like that. Yeah. But it wasn't until you did yours. There wasn't a cohesive community. I would say there's a group of people who were also involved in your who do a lot of you know, who were already having good conversations. I recognise some of the names, but I think what you've done is kind of bring it together, which is really good. And it's, I don't know, when you did that, because it was it
Peter Blundell :It was beginning of January. Yeah. Yeah.
Elizabeth Terp :When you did it, it was just it was just really great. It was like, almost like, somehow,
Peter Blundell :I mean, it's still I still find it a bit bizarre that it even happened. And I said this to somebody else the other day, the it was a tweet, which didn't have a great deal of thought to it to be completely honest. It was it was it was just a little idea and I was really expecting, you know, five or six people you know, to kind of respond and and and you know, in a bit more a bit more networking and whatever. And then not only did was the original tweet successful, but I think the hashtag. Yeah, well actually just use this hashtag. And actually, you can talk about anything to do with therapy that other therapists might be interested in.
Elizabeth Terp :And it's worked really well. Yeah. And I think it is quite different. Because I think the other thing I didn't say, follow my Facebook profile is private. I mean, a lot of therapy Facebook groups. And what I'm finding is what you're doing is very different to them. There's some really good stuff going on there. There's this I'm sure you're aware of some of the groups there's really good positive stuff, but it's somehow I don't know, it's different. It's got a different tone to it somehow. It's a lot more problem based. And whereas what you're doing is a lot more knowledge based and kind of community sharing. Yeah. Yeah, it's much more what I need, I think. Yeah. Then I need the other things that are not interesting. Yeah.
Peter Blundell :Which is great. And I think you know, all of those. All of those things are necessary, aren't they? We need You've no spaces to critique things and look at things and examine things. But you know, we also need to kind of collaborate and be a community as well when we need to be. And so I think both of the things are valid, but and we might see different things out at different times, I suppose.
Elizabeth Terp :Yeah.
Peter Blundell :Well, just kind of following on from that point then. And one of the things that came out and a lot of therapists have messaged me about this is that idea of being connected to each other really, and that sense of community and I just wondered what were your kind of thoughts or experience around being feeling connected to the wider therapists community working in private practice now compared to say, when you were in the NHS?
Elizabeth Terp :It's been quite interesting to observe how little I miss the team that I was in about, I realised that's because the team didn't exist anymore. It literally exists, but the way that it's been managed, there was no team and we couldn't access each others support anymore. So I didn't miss that at all, which was really shocking to me. It's like, Oh my god, but used to be a team of 40 people. And now that you never look back, I'm still friends with some of those people, by the way, obviously. And yeah, especially the ones who have escaped from there. So I do have I thought a lot about this because that was a really important question that you asked me. So I thought about all the different places that I have, like little networks of people, and I've got some really good friends who are at similar stages in their career because I feel that's quite important as well because there's a vast difference isn't there between newly qualified and someone at the level I'm at, and different needs and different support needs and everything like that? So I've got a friend that we kind of meet once a month on line and just chat about whatever it is you need. And then I've got a couple of friends who we let me say them and just pass me up and go out socially and out there. practices and our work life balance are so similar. It's really amazing. Like we were all quite successful in terms of our work, but we all work three days a week, none of us work on Fridays, we've all got a really great work life balance. And it was so nice to find them. I found them on Twitter and Twitter and LinkedIn, one of them is in both, but that's how I met them, you know, and now we're really good friends and we support each other and, you know, often it's got nothing to therapy, we're just we're just in a very similar mindset. Yeah. And yeah, there's some local therapists that I like know and meet up where I've got some friends and some of the bills or work in the eco offices. And so there's lots of counsellors in there. So make friends with some of them. So some socialize with some of them another thing that I am involved in which I get a lot out of, which again, is international, but there's a couple of really great podcasts that I listened to really regularly don't if you've come across my favourite therapy podcast, have you heard of it is Tell Me More About That. Tell me more about that. All right, so we'll say more about that. Sorry. Okay. But a man in Portland, Oregon called Jeff Gunther, and he is hilarious he is so good, because he's actually risking his licence because, you know, in the States, it's very different. Yeah. He's so honest. And he does a lot of really great, open, talk about what it's like to be a therapist. And he's absolutely brilliant. So listen to his podcast every week.
Peter Blundell :I will have to listen to that. Now,
Elizabeth Terp :It's really good. It's really, especially at the moment because he's doing some about what's it like in this pandemic, you know, yeah, but he's has, like guests on who are other therapists. I get a lot from that. So that's like a bit of an international kind of community. And then yeah, I don't feel as isolated as I thought I would. I think sometimes, you know, I have to work quite hard at that to make sure I've got enough. Yeah. I'm just about to start peer supervision with a with an ex colleague. Friend of mine, partly to get into a different time. Yeah, well,
Peter Blundell :I was gonna say that does sound like there's quite a lot of different elements to that really. And I think that's a really good point and you know, speaking to students sometimes when they're about to qualify and and they're kind of like worried about because they've quite supported once through training, and then coming out of it. And I often try and kind of explain to them that actually, you can get that support from it doesn't have to cost money necessarily, obviously, have you supervision but you say can have peer support, you can access you know, other groups and things like that. But it doesn't necessarily you can try and feel more connected without actually feeling like you have to have the course students around you.
Elizabeth Terp :It is meeting like minded therapists as well. A couple of people think I was a couple of years into private practice. And there was a couple of quite innovative newly qualified people who actually approached me and said, you want to meet up for a coffee I'm setting up on I just fancy a chat, and I actually really liked that because they didn't they didn't want anything from me. Get to know And it was really great. And so that's the way obviously to make connections for referring back and forth. And you know that. And if you if you take opportunities like that and make them happen, then you quite quickly end up with a bit of a network of people. But I mean, saying that I mean, I don't have a huge network of people I refer to I could do it's like getting to know more people. Totally for sure. But Liverpool is a small place.
Peter Blundell :it certainly certainly is and then the therapy community in Liverpool is even smaller.
Elizabeth Terp :You already know them thoroughly. Yeah. Yeah. What you're doing is definitely a good
Peter Blundell :Thank you. And I hope so. And I think hopefully, I think with the podcast idea, it was kind of actually kind of talking to therapists who were in practice and kind of putting out those those stories out there really to kind of get a clearer sense of what what we're doing and kind of the things that we can share with other people. Really Is there anything that you think that we could be doing as a profession to kind of help us connect more as therapists or pay us all properly might be one?
Elizabeth Terp :You know what? I think? Maybe I'm not sure if you could ask me about what I think the greatest challenges to the profession because that's the answer, for me, personally, is, is working together in whatever ways you can to try and be valued more and yeah, and the word profession. I think, obviously, this is a profession, you know, it's certainly a profession that I chose to go into and trained to do. Well, I don't think it's seen as a profession, but a lot of people in it necessarily behave like it is a profession. And I don't mean that in any derogatory way. But I mean, the volunteering culture that there is and the way that people are prepared to work for next to no money, but a lot of the time and, you know, sometimes that's because they have to make money. I understand But there's a lot of I feel like this is a really major issue. And it's kind of popped up a bit more since the lockdown where there's absolutely organisations that are setting themselves up to help people's mental health. And they're expecting counsellors to work for nothing. Yeah, that is outrageous and absolutely disgusting. And I really think it's gonna damage this element of our profession even more because then that sets up an expectation that we did, why would we do this for nothing? This is such a precious thing that we do.
Peter Blundell :And I think this is a really important discussion point. And I think there is people who kind of arguable I want to volunteer and I think there is a difference between and somebody who is, you know, got enough money has got maybe got a job and wants to do a few hours volunteering, you know, in approaching an organisation compared to a culture of an expectation that, you know, everybody will volunteer
Elizabeth Terp :We definetly have that culture. EAP's, which is where a lot of people start their private practice, because it's a way of having some of the rates some of those pay are absolutely appalling. I mean, yeah, 25 an hour, when I don't know, the average percentage of expenses in your first couple years of private practice, probably going to be 40 to 50%. I don't know. It certainly was when I was setting up my private practice. And he getting so you end up with less than 10 pounds an hour, you know, we spent how many thousands of pounds on training, it's just not right. Is it so that for me that that's where we need to kind of find a way to come together. And that, to me is the greatest challenge because if we look at how we're valued compared to some other professions in mental health, and you know, believe me, I worked in the NHS, I've met a lot of other mental health professionals in other roles, and I've not met any who I thought were better therapists than me and my colleagues, yet they some of them are on salaries that are four times the amount. That's not right. You know, so there's a valuing problem there isn't there?
Peter Blundell :Yeah.
Elizabeth Terp :And I think we need to sort that out. Because if you don't, it just continues to get worse. It's dragging, pay down. No one's ever going to be able to make a living. And of course, this whole class thing is coming back into it, isn't it?
Peter Blundell :Yeah
Elizabeth Terp :It's becoming again. I mean, this is just horrendous, like, from when I started. And it's kind of it almost looked like it was getting a bit better, didn't it? It was becoming more accessible as a profession for different people with different backgrounds. And it almost feels like it's going back again, it's becoming that hideous, white, middle class, middle aged woman thing, again, which is just wrong. I mean, it's just wrong on so many levels. Yeah. Obviously, I am some of those things myself, but it doesn't mean I don't have a duty to point out that that's not how it should be.
Peter Blundell :And this idea of diversity, isn't it and actually having a wealth of different people and surely the more diverse we are as a profession, you know, the more valuable we can be.
Elizabeth Terp :We have to represent the population of people that might want to come and see us. You know, I mean, that's changed a bit, but I really don't think it's enough, I think a lot of work. And so that is related to the valuing. Because if it's hard to make any money, people can't go into the profession in the first place unless they're privileged. And so we need to redress that in order to get that mix. You know, so I feel really passionate about all of that kind of stuff.
Peter Blundell :And so my next question is going to be you've had a book published. Yes, I can think kind of fits in with your specialism that you've kind of talked about before, and it's about chronic fatigue and ME is, could you tell me a little bit about how you came to write that?
Elizabeth Terp :One again, that was another strange coincidence, and that actually came before the specialism in a way. What happened was, I tried I've thought about this this morning. So make sure I've got it in the right order, because it was quite a long time ago. I wrote that about 12 years ago now. So what happened was, I knew someone in the NHS who knew I had been writing some stuff, just for myself, I must have just been talking about something. They both knew this lady who was an editor of a series of books, and they were looking for someone to write a book about ME. I knew far too much about that illness at that point. And it was really amazing. I mean, I was like, blown over. I've been asked to do it. But it was really challenging because the book is, is not for people who have chronic fatigue ME it's for the friends and family of the people. That's why series is called friends and family. And there's other illnesses in the series, written by other people. Anyway, so I wrote it and it was really useful for me to write it as well. As you know, I enjoyed writing it obviously. People have found it helpful, but what was the best thing for me was it helped me to understand more about why some of the people in my life had struggled so much with me being ill. And that that was really, really good. It was painful, but it was helpful. So yeah, so because at first I was like, I'm not writing a book for those people, you know, why should I write a book for people who haven't managed to help me? But it helped me to process that, you know, yeah. So yeah, so I did that. And that was published and it was bizarre and wasn't straightforward, of course, because publishing never is straightforward is it and, you know, it's, it was a bit disappointing. Like it hasn't really been publicised that well and I for a long time, I was well enough to publicise it myself really ironic, but I wasn't. And so it hasn't really had the reach that it might have done. But since then, I've done various other little things in another couple of books, and I write a lot of my own articles now because I tend to find that, you know, I can have complete control. I have complete control over the book. Don't get me wrong, did that but i wanted i was thinking about writing another book, but then I know some people that were like proper novelists and things and I've asked their advice is like, Well, you know, would you use self publish or get published by a publishing company or whatever. And it's just a minefield, it's so complicated. And so I personally feel like the you don't make money out of having a book. By the way, anyone who's listening thinks I made loads of money from writing it. I didn't make any money from it. And that is why I wrote it either. So you don't make money from it. So you've got to do it for the joy. Yeah, but also for, like I said, about talks that I'm doing about sharing knowledge. And I share my knowledge by writing an article and publish it on my website. Yeah, so that's kind of the way I've gone now. But But now I'm moving into doing talks because I love that also. And obviously, you can reach big groups of people all at once. So now we're in lockdown on gonna try maybe and do some of that online as well. And yeah, so I've kind of evolved from that. And yeah, and I know over the time, like I had, I was quite ill, that I don't have ME anymore. That's a whole other story. Don't even ask me that, that opened up a whole massive can of worms, but I do have I do still have other health problems. And, and so, you know, I still use a lot of the strategies and things that I need to to kind of manage my own health. But a lot of the tools that I have to use self care stuff, pacing, you know, all kinds of things. Not only are they perfect for surviving a lockdown, like mentally and physically, but also they're great for working in private practice, because I have to have really good boundaries and limits and you know, really good support systems and all kinds of things to manage. You know, so it turns out that going through a lot of very difficult health stuff, and come out the other end with some really good skills.
Peter Blundell :Learning from it as you Yeah, yeah. Despite the challenges, yeah.
Elizabeth Terp :So I just continuing to write and I've had an idea actually, I've been speaking to my supervisor just yesterday about this. About The fact that we're in a global pandemic, and one of the big triggers for fatigue related illness is viruses. I don't know how much you know about that. But for a lot of people, they've never fully recovered from a viral infection of the level of COVID-19. And so I'm starting to think, you know, what can I do with my knowledge around fatigue? Yeah. Because all the all the illnesses that I have experienced myself, but also kind of fit together in people, there's normally multiple diagnosis. They all have similarities in their fatigue and in the management. And so I have a lot of expertise in that. So I'm starting to think, Oh, hang on, maybe I've got something to offer. Yeah, not right now, maybe. But you know,
Peter Blundell :well, that's the thing, isn't it? It's going to be the long term impact on people and groups of people that this may potentially have. And, you know, any advice that they can get in terms of having to manage the repercussions or the consequences of what's happened i think is going to be very valuable to people.
Elizabeth Terp :So it's not very nice to have expertise in such a horrible area but it's least it's got some things that maybe you can do something with it. Yeah, so yeah, I mean, I do want to write another book and I've got a lot of ideas, but I don't really think it's the best place to put my energies.
Peter Blundell :I think that's all my questions. Really. How did you feel being on the podcast? Is it okay? Good. It's been a really lovely chat get to know you a little bit better. And I do hope since we live quite close to do what we absolutely love a coffee or something. It'll be very strange.
Opening :Thank you for listening to the therapist connect podcast. Go to www.therapists-content.com for more discussions and debates. Transcribed by https://otter.ai
