Welcome to Narratives of Us - online video talking therapy for people who may find themselves sort of stuck, lost, turned around, in a storm, unrooted… equally, this can be a place to build upon and illuminate the things already going well in your life, after all you made it this far! You’re doing a great job.

My name is Dane,

I am a hardworking Northerner, proud cat Dad and coffee lover and outdoorsy type from working-class roots currently working as a Clinical Psychologist and based in London. I am a therapist and supervisor. Here are my 8 central values as a therapist:

The Problem Is The Problem
I firmly believe that the person is the person and the problem is the problem. By making this distinction, we gain more control over the issue at hand, put things into perspective, find deeper meaning, and feel less stuck.

A Preventative Focus
Given the lack of governmental funding, budget cuts and austerity measures in our healthcare system it can be difficult to find access to support that prevents things from escalating, getting harder, broader, more complex and more risky. I believe everyone deserves early, more preventative support for our futures.

Your Right To Define
I encourage you to define the problems, troubles, issues, or concerns in your own terms, using your own words, expressions, and language. This ensures that your experiences are accurately represented. Whether you approach things from a scientific, spiritual, or cultural standpoint, I avoid using jargon, buzzwords or short-hand labels taken directly from manuals.

Values Embedded In Your Stories
The stories my clients entrust with me often recount experiences of hardship, loss, trauma, or violence. However, these stories also reveal tales of resilience, reclamation, overcoming, survivorship, resistance and strength. I help people shed light on what they hold dear, as these values can serve as a compass to guide us in a way that feels true to their personal journey.

Cultivating Hope & Resilience
I have witnessed firsthand that hope is not something inherent within individuals; it is something we build together with others. Even when despair does not shrink, hope can still flourish. I create a safe space for people to connect with their own inner resources and their chosen families and communities. Together, we navigate life's challenging storms of life and forge a path forward.

Kindness
As someone who has sought therapy myself, I understand the importance of establishing a compassionate therapeutic relationship. Sadly, compassion is often lacking in overwhelmed support services. I recognise the significance of kindness when discussing one's deepest vulnerabilities with a stranger.

Informed Curiosity
I believe in maintaining a balanced approach of on the one hand, being well-informed about important topics while on the other hand remaining curious. This balance helps to dovetail your unique experiences, culture, and expertise and also allows me to share relevant insights and ideas on various issues. For example, issues such as depression, stress, anxiety or ill-health, or matters relating to diversity such as The Global Majority, LGB and Trans communities.

Radical Relational Accountability
In working with relationships, my aim is to help individuals appreciate and take responsibility for the impact of their actions on each other's self-narratives. This involves engaging in intentional relationship practices and ethics that nurture and positively shape the stories of those you care about, based on what holds importance in your unique relationship.

🎒What is in my Therapy Backpack?

As a Clinical Psychologist on a journey, I am lucky enough to have collected a range of skills from clients and training. If this collection was represented by objects in my climbing bundle of treasures, I bring with me:

• 🖊️ - A pen to represent you as the author in your preferred story, documenting the unique moments, a concept from Narrative Therapy.

• 🍵 - A Flask of Tea / Coffee, for reminding me to unite “communication” with its origin words of community, communion and commonality - a notion from Community and Liberation Psychology and Feminist writers.

• 🎷- A musical instrument from an orchestra to represent multiple perspectives, (around us, but also multiple parts of us): ideas from couple and family work and Systemic Family Therapy which are very valuable in thinking about relationships and interconnectedness.

• 🏹 - A bow and arrow to remind me of values - how to focus our aim on what people find important, what they care about, and ideas from, Acceptance and Commitment Therapy.

• 📷 - A Camera, for capturing those little moments that are actually big moments. Wisdom from Mindfulness, and Compassion Focused Therapy can come together for kindness in the here and now.

• 🗺️ - A map that might allow us to explore other territories when useful - walking into other approaches be that leaning into Solution Focused Therapy, Psychodynamic Theory, Mentalization Based Therapy and the popular Cognitive Behavioural Therapy modalities - but more importantly perhaps your own maps of knowledge such as Spiritual, Cultural or Community frameworks.

Special Interests

I have special interest in a Narrative Therapy Framework. This approach colours the way I do Assessments (hearing your stories and being curious), Formulation (making sense of the problems together) and Therapy (making steps towards how you’d prefer things to be). I also have a special interest in working with families, couples and groups using Collective Narrative Practice. My thesis used a Narrative Practice Framework to design a therapy group called ‘The Theatre of Life’ (Duncan, 2017) involving community and participants in “action research” at all stages from design, data collection and data analysis. This has since been used in the NHS with success. I have attended additional specialist training with Gendered Intelligence, for working in therapy with gender diversity. I facilitate regular special interest groups to keep up to date with current research and ways of working.

My Solidarity Team

As a clinical psychologist, I am informed and transformed by some amazing and inspiring people. We keep each other a breadth of research, discuss themes important to the work and share resources and ideas together.

Training & Qualifications

I have over 14 years of experience working in the NHS. I completed a 3 year Professional Doctorate training programme in Clinical Psychology at The University of East London. I am HCPC accredited. I have worked at Great Ormond Street Hospital for 6 years, and I now also teach a the University of Hertfordshire and run community therapy groups with Gendered Intelligence. I run care spaces for looking after other Clinical Psychologists, and supervise other Clinical Psychologists.

A Clinical Psychologist wears many hats. We are therapists - and we are also researchers, teachers, consultants, writers, neuro-cognitive scientists, advocates, activists, leaders, supervisors, supervisees, group facilitators and reflective practitioners.

In the UK, Clinical Psychologists complete rigorous training. My training included a degree in Psychology, followed by 4 years working full-time as an assistant psychologist, before a 3-year applied professional doctorate course. Unlike PHD's which are focused on research, a professional doctorate includes 6 six-month assessed NHS therapy placements covering all major areas of practice across the lifespan (child, adult, older-adult, learning disability and specialist); alongside an immersive training schedule (case reports, exams, essays, presentations, seminars, group work).

Publications

• Duncan Mills D; Castro Romero, M; Ashman, J. (2018) ‘The theatre of life: Collective Narrative Practice with Young Trans People’. In: Working systemically with trans, non-binary and gender expansive people. Context. Context, The magazine for family therapy and systemic practice.

• Duncan Mills D. (2017) The Theatre of Life: Collective Narrative Practice with Trans Young People in the Community. (Doctoral dissertation, University of East London).

• Castro Romero, M., Lopez, J., Byrne, A. & Duncan Mills D. (2016) Narrative in research: four stories of researching within a Narrative Framework. Fourth European+ Conference of Narrative Therapy and Community Work, Barcelona, Spain.

• Duncan Mills D. & Howes H. (2015) Calm In The Chaos: Mindfulness & Compassion For CAMHS Staff. Clinical Psychology Forum. This article reflects on a Mindfulness and compassion class for staff which ran for one year at the CAMHS in Newham, East London.

• Rao, A. & Mills, D. (2012). When Mentalisation Breaks Down: Suicide, Self-harm and Violence. East London NHS Foundation Trust Talk Newsletter.

• Taylor, P. & Duncan Mills D. (2010, July). Targeted Mental Health In Schools Project. From Rhetoric to Reality. Poster session presented at the Annual TaMHS Conference, Wigan, UK.

• Linthoi, A. & Duncan Mills D. (2010, April). Salford Targeted Mental Health In Schools Project: Everybody’s Business. Presentation at the National TaMHS Conference, Manchester, UK.

• Muscutt, J. & Duncan Mills D. (2010, May). Data Gathering for the Targeted Mental Health In Schools Project. Presentation at the National TaMHS Conference, Wigan, UK.

Zarina Situmorang