Dramatherapy

Psychotherapy & Dramatherapy for improved mental health & wellbeing in Aberdeen, Aberdeenshire & beyond.

What is Dramatherapy?

Dramatherapy is a form of psychotherapy that uses drama and theatre processes to achieve therapeutic goals. In Dramatherapy, participants are supported to use creative expression to explore their stories, set goals, solve problems, express feelings and achieve improved mental health and make positive changes in their lives.

Dramatherapy’s creative flexibility makes it an appropriate intervention for people of all ages from children and adolescents through to older adults. Dramatherapy can be brief or long-term depending on the need of the client. The therapeutic relationship is at the heart of dramatherapy which supports and nurtures personal growth.

Dramatherapy can help build confidence and self-esteem, address communication problems, promote a sense of self-worth, and encourage involvement, expression, and connection with others. This is achieved through 1:1 or group Dramatherapy.

Working in the Here and Now

Dramatherapy invites personal growth, self-awareness and spontaneity, through a creative process.

Although I may plan each session based on a theme, I am trained to deal effectively with emotions or conflict that might arise during the session. These situations provide meaningful opportunities for growth & skills development.

Through role-play, role reversal, improvisation and other drama-based processes that provide rehearsals-for-living, you will have many opportunities to learn and practice social-emotional integration and reflect on past behaviours or experiences.

Projection

Projective techniques are a key feature of dramatherapy. It is a distanced approach that allows people to project onto an inanimate object, or fictionalized character, feelings, thoughts, fears and wishes. It is often easier to create a fictional character to explore unexpressed feelings than it is to express this on your own.

I may also integrate other creative arts modalities as a tool for projection. For example, I may ask you to write a story or a letter, invent a fictional character and give the character a voice or pretend to become that character. The safety of working through projective techniques are aimed to free you from the negative images you hold of yourself, and opens you up to new ways of being perceived.

Embodiment and Role

Through the embodiment of character and role-play, clients gain a new experience of themselves in the here and now. Unlike talk-therapy, drama therapy engages the client through all their senses, as well as through the body – kinesthetically. This visceral experience is internalised.

Dramatherapy is especially helpful for articulating thoughts and feelings, as clients can act out emotions that have been unexpressed. For people, who may have difficulty with self-reflection and making the connection of what is discovered in therapy to their own lives, the experience in dramatherapy enables them to practice interacting and reacting in different ways.

In dramatherapy, acquiring knowledge is a lived experience.

Who can Dramatherapy help?

Drama Therapy can help those who are:

Experiencing mental health challenges
Struggling to self-regulate
Facing a bereavement or loss
Feeling anxious
Living with depression
Encountering difficulties at school
Struggling with communicating

Feeling isolated
Having problems with peers
Experiencing family difficulties
Trying to overcome trauma
Having behavioural problems
Enduring low self-esteem
Engaging in self-destructive behaviour

Dramatherapy is for everyone.

You do not need to have any skills or experience of drama, theatre or the arts to take part in dramatherapy.

The aim isn’t to perform, but rather to work with the therapeutic aspects of this work at your own pace.

For more information please visit The British Association of Dramatherapists.

Should I do individual or group Dramatherapy?

Fundamental yet subtle differences

The differences between group therapy and individual therapy are clear. In individual therapy, there is one client and therapist. In group therapy there are multiple clients. Group Dramatherapy is roughly defined in my practice as around 6 clients.

This obvious difference leads to a variance in how sessions unfold, in the content of the conversations, and in how bonds and alliances between clients and therapists are formed.

For instance, the one-on-one context of individual therapy may lead to more sensitive topics and personal feelings being addressed than in a group setting. However, that doesn’t mean intimate topics are not discussed in group therapy. Clients in a substance abuse group may all speak to their addiction struggles, but each in their own way. This affects the session, how it progresses and what insights are reached.

Also, group dramatherapy sessions are more likely to have specific purposes. While an individual session can be wide-ranging, group therapy is often focused on one topic that unites clients: for example, depression, eating disorders, terminal diagnoses, academic challenges, substance abuse or chronic pain.

I also offer online sessions

I can offer online dramatherapy sessions via Google Meet and Zoom.

When you use our contact form, please state if you’d prefer your session to be online or face-to-face.

The benefits of working online with me:

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Please do get in touch. Once you have set up an appointment, I will send you an email confirming the details of the initial session along with directions.

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Sessions can be booked in the areas of Aberdeen, Aberdeenshire and throughout Northeast Scotland.

Alternatively, online appointments can be booked.