Michael Guilding
Member Status: Senior Accredited
Member No: NCS22-01380
Location: YORK
I am a counsellor, psychotherapist and clinical supervisor with 27 years’ post-qualification experience. Following my core training I worked for WPF Counselling North in Leeds, The Tuke Centre in York, and The Oakdale Centre in Harrogate.
I established my own private practice in 1997 and also worked within the local NHS Psychological Therapies Department as Practice Counsellor for the Tadcaster Medical Practice and the Jorvik Medical Practice in York. In 2004 I took up the post of Head of Counselling within NHS Psychological Therapies with responsibility for the recruitment and management of counsellors working within GP practices in the York and Selby areas. In 2007 I also took on the management of the local Primary Care Mental Health Team.
I retired from the NHS in 2011 and have since been working purely in private practice.
I work with a wide range of issues, with a particular interest in attachment and relationship problems, anxiety, depression and trauma, and the recovery of motivation and vitality. I also provide clinical supervision to other counsellors and psychotherapists and run workshops for therapists on understanding and regulating our own biological fear system entitled “Fear and the Therapist”. Additionally I offer personal development groups for therapists using Una McCluskey’s model of working entitled “Exploring the dynamics of attachment in adult life”.
I will be retiring from general clinical work at the end of March 2023, but will continue to run workshops and exploratory groups for therapists.
I have been studying the fear system for many years as I believe that dysfunction of this system underpins the vast majority of mental illnesses and emotional disturbances, and a significant proportion of physical illnesses. I have also come to the conclusion that the biological mechanism underlying depression is metabolic shutdown triggered by the dorsal vagal branch of the parasympathetic nervous system. Details of my writings on this including my two articles on Complex Trauma published in “Perspectives on Trauma”, the journal of the Complex Trauma Institute, can be found on my website:
www.michaelguilding.com