Holding Many Stories

Hello reader.  I’m not sure what has bought you to this page but I am so grateful to your attention.  It has taken quite a lot of summoning of energy and motivation to set this up, but I feel this is a really important step of my own journey to self-actualisation and acceptance.  This is my purpose for this website, or at least part of it.  I also want to use this platform to learn and share that learning along the way.

So who am I?  My name is Nicole.  I am, at the time of writing this, 38 years old.  I am married to an amazing man and I am a mother of 4 kids, 2 dogs and 2 cats.  After many years of indecision and considering my future, I am three years into the training to become a counsellor, and I am due to qualify this summer.

I have lucked out in my adult life.  But I have been through some horrendous trauma, and very much lost my way at a few times in my life.  I want to share these with people, partly for myself, and partly to connect with people who have experienced similar things in life…even if that connection is more of a spiritual one. 

Some of the key themes of this writing experiences, as they are key themes in my life are adoption (I am an adoptee), neurodiversity (because I am!), motherhood (likewise), teenage motherhood (because I was!), grief (I’ve had my fair share), and counselling…because that is my future.

I am a keen creative writer, so I hope to share stories, poems, anything creative and written!  Feel free to hold me accountable to that!

I am hoping to share my learning with you all too.  I love learning, and sometimes I get really excited by a particular topic or issue and I think it would benefit me to share that, and hopefully it would benefit others too.

But I am also very keen to learn from others about their own experiences.  I am hoping I can create a sort of therapeutic community that may have particular key themes, but that these themes can grow with the community.  I would love to talk to people about their experiences in life, traumas, healing journeys and what makes you all who you are.  Over time, I would love to interview people, and maybe share some of your own writing, creative expressionism, videos, interviews or anything else that people would love to share.

My name is Nicole.  Nice to meet you.  Please, take a seat, get comfy, and let’s talk.

On the surface I am a happy, family-orientated and uncomplicated person. 

But you should never judge a book by it’s cover right?  I  am far from uncomplicated.  I love my life but I have so much bubbling under the surface that has impacted who I am, how I think, what I feel, and my experiences of life.  I am a tangled mess of self-doubt, self-criticism, shame, overthinking, sensitivity, fear and morosity.  Life has thrown shit my way and I have failed to dodge the splats.  In fact I have been covered in so much excrement at times in my life that it has dragged me down to the sewers which is where it belongs right?!  And I with it.  I have had childhood experiences that bring tears to the eyes of even the most hardened professional.  I have had school and friendship issues that have left me numb.  I have experienced loss, suffering and hardship that have left me unable to distinguish between what brings be joy and what stamps every part of Nicole out of the already crumbling shell.

But, dearest reader, that I want to highlight, is I have survived.  I have built a life that I am proud of, filled with love and strength to deal with whatever challenges are thrown at me.  This is largely down to the support of my incredible family and friends, but also, in part, due to my therapeutic journey.  Starting out as a trainee has opened my eyes to the healing power of talking.  Not just vocalising your innermost thoughts, but sharing them in a space that has the ability to keep you safe and hold you in that space.  To have someone sit opposite me and give me that space to talk, not judging any part of what I say, believing me and accepting me, and offering empathic and therapeutic responses, has such powerful healing energy.