Laura Garnett

Counselling Psychologist

Before joining the Five Rivers team I worked in a range of settings including an NHS Psychosis team, primary and secondary schools and the third sector. I also set up a service for 16–24-year-olds who struggles to access ‘mainstream’ therapy services due to not having access to a GP. I have a broad range of experience in terms of client groups and presentations; however, I have always had a particular interest in working with trauma and in particular dissociation. Prior to starting my current role, I worked primarily with adults and saw the lifelong impact adverse childhood experiences could have. I wanted to be able to intervene earlier to support children and young people to work through and recover from trauma before it could impact their adult life.  

I joined Five Rivers in 2017 and during my time here have had the opportunity to work within Fostering and Integrated Residential/Education services before progressing into a role within our leadership team. By developing within Five Rivers, I have been able to grow my knowledge around developmental trauma and supporting children’s recovery both through offering direct therapy and working indirectly with the significant adults in a child’s life to support them to better understand their needs and develop their own self-reflective skills. I now apply these skills to service development and supporting our teams to become more trauma informed and trauma responsive to impact change in a more systemic way.