Noa Therapeutic - Psychotherapy, Counselling and Coaching

15/01/2026

It’s a REBRAND …Baby!

“When you realise your whole career is a trauma response” 😂🤣🙌🏻

✨ So anyway… using this to illustrate that…
I rebranded. ✨

I had a ‘trauma response’ to the last 18 months of NDIS shenanigans 🤪😩

New name, new look, same nervous system 😌

Jokes aside—
This refresh isn’t random. It’s a thoughtful (and yes, slightly trauma-informed) response to past, present, and future changes in the national disability funding landscape, which has made art therapy increasingly difficult to sustain as a sole practice—especially when my gorgeous, deeply loved community is largely funded through these supports.

Rather than disappear or dilute the work, I expanded the container.

I’m a Master’s-qualified Art Therapist with a strong foundation in psychotherapy and talk-based therapy. That training and experience allowed me to formally register as a Counsellor at the end of last year—though realistically, the work I offer sits at a psychotherapy level.

✨ What does that mean?
• Psychotherapy focuses on depth work—patterns, attachment, trauma, nervous system regulation, and long-term change
• Psychologists train through a different academic and diagnostic pathway
• Counsellors often work short- to medium-term, but some (👋) have advanced therapeutic training that allows for deeper, ongoing work

So while art therapy remains close to my heart and part of my identity, this evolution allows me to keep working ethically, sustainably, and with continuity—no matter how systems shift around us.

So… here I am.
Jack of many trades.
Holder of all your favourite “labels.”

Come in, pick your help plan—I’m here for it.

Same values. Same care. Same eccentricity.
Same deep, deep empathy and fire to fight for you.

Just a slightly bigger container

13/01/2026

Low executive function, low cognitive cooking… here we come

13/01/2026

So many of you tagged me in a post this morning, asking if I’d seen the new Barbie doll (which is not a sentence I’d ever expect to write.) l But as soon as I saw it, I knew why. And I couldn’t have been more delighted.

The text read, “Barbie and ASAN (The Autistic Self Advocacy Network) are proud to partner on the first-ever autistic Barbie, designed with connection and understanding at the core.​“

When I showed the doll to my daughter, Brooke, who is autistic, she took in the long, dark hair, hanging loose, like her own. I pointed out the beautiful, golden brown eyes just like hers, their gaze set ever so slightly to the side. I showed her the a-line purple dress that looks as though it came straight from her closet. And the flats, because just like her, autistic Barbie isn’t comfortable in heels.

And of course the pink, noise canceling headphones exactly like the ones she wears when the world overwhelms.

I asked if she might like to get one of the dolls. She’s 22 and not a big Barbie gal, so I wasn’t sure what to expect. But her answer said it all…

“I will call her Brooke.”

Thank you, from the bottom of my heart, to the folks at Mattel and ASAN for enabling my daughter to see herself in a doll, and for helping children and adults everywhere to celebrate the glorious diversity of the human condition.

{image is a side by side of two photos: one of Barbie and one of Brooke, looking strikingly similar.}

11/01/2026

06/01/2026

🌈😂🤣

03/01/2026

22/12/2025

22/12/2025

Wishing all my clients a regulated Christmas period

20/12/2025

As the holiday season approaches, many families are spending more time together — and for neurodivergent people, particularly those with a PDA profile, this can bring both connection and increased strain.

This song and video called “It’s PDA” is supposed to offer an alternative way of thinking about PDA — not as defiance or refusal, but as a nervous system responding to anxiety, loss of autonomy, and perceived threat.

This relatively amateur video does not and cannot speak for everyone.
It doesn’t represent how all people experience PDA, autism, or neurodivergence. Those experiences are deeply individual, and no single piece of work could capture them fully.

The hope is simply that it might act as a springboard for reflection — a gentle way to open conversations within families, and to invite more out-of-the-box thinking for parents, carers, and extended family members who may be trying to understand behaviours that are often misunderstood or judged.
For some families, it may help create shared language.

For others, it may simply plant a seed.
If this feels like it could be useful in your household this season — particularly during moments where expectations, demands, and emotions run high — it may be something to watch together or return to quietly.

No pressure. No fixing. Just another way of seeing

https://youtu.be/Qq4tcljwpbE?si=quCgGz-4MNa0GI_

“It’s PDA” is a song and animated video offering one perspective from inside a PDA (Pervasive Drive for Autonomy, sometimes referred to as Pathological Deman...

18/12/2025