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  • Psychotherapy in West London
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Psychotherapy in West London

Psychotherapy & Counselling with Marcus Gottlieb

Boarding School Survivors Therapy & Counselling in London

Therapy for Boarding School Bullying and Abuse Victims

Therapy for ex-boarders who were bullied or abused at boarding school helps you come to terms with very difficult experiences that may, up to now, have affected and informed your life in all sorts of damaging ways.

Boarding School Bullying: Nowhere to run or hide

Boarding school is a 24/7 immersive experience with nowhere to hide or to run, and bullying at boarding school was remorseless and inescapable. If you were being bullied or abused, there was no let-up in the evenings, there was no safe refuge, and there were no parents around to protect you or to calm and reassure you, let alone to bring a complaint.

The experience of many boarding school survivors was of bullying being ritualised, a daily or nightly routine of torment, physical beatings, teasing, stealing, verbal and emotional abuse, and being ‘sent to Coventry’. Painful initiation ceremonies were not uncommon, and many ex-boarders experienced the institutionalised servitude of the fagging system.

Being bullied was ‘normal’, complaining was ‘weak’

Bullying was usually normalised, a severe distortion of reality. The schools and often even parents saw it as ‘character building’, and the children took their cue from that, and made a mental adjustment to enable them to think that, for all the savagery of beatings and humiliations, they really were enjoying boarding school. This led to a cognitive dissonance that may still affect the clarity of your thinking about the world and your place in it.

The one thing that was disapproved of universally was sneaking or telling tales, whereas it should have been the bullying and abuse that was condemned.

Being the scapegoat of Boarding School Bullying

Pretty much everyone suffered from some bullying, but often there would be one particular, scapegoated victim, picked for some difference of appearance, accent, class or race, or just because they said some naive thing on their first day that led to years of mean teasing and cruelty.

People who have been the butt of such scapegoating may spend a lifetime avoiding groups, commitments and relationships, berating themselves for not having fought back against the bullying mob.

Being Bullied by figures in authority in Boarding School

Bullying may be at the hands of teachers, psychologically disturbed adults who gain some gratification from being callous towards children. Or it may come from other pupils, such as prefects placed in positions of power or authority completely unsuited to their age and level of maturity. Themselves angry, deprived and neglected, driven by a survival instinct and a desperate need to feel safe, these older pupils sometimes behaved like animals, and you may have been their victim.

At boarding school there are no families and there is no love, and where children are left to fend for themselves without the love and care of adults, bullying and abuse are liable to be rife.

The struggle to understand why those who loved you sent you to this place to be bullied

In therapy, one of the hardest things to come to terms with, and find a sense of peace, is that it was your parents, who loved you, that put you in harm’s way, in effect sacrificing you to bullies or paedophiles.

If this is something you struggle with, you would be absolutely right to find this bewildering and senseless. In therapy for boarding school bullying we explore these feelings and will work through them patiently and sensitively.

Boarding School Bullying and Sexual Abuse

Sexual abuse is also an experience reported by many boarding school survivors. In the bubble of boarding school, closed off from the world, where parents don’t have daily oversight and cannot see the small signs and changes that might alert them to the abuse that’s going on, abusers can feel enabled and emboldened to exploit children’s innocence. Actually, for the lonely child, inappropriate attention, affection and company are more welcome than none. All too often, the adult survivor suffers guilt and shame about having ‘let it happen’, feelings they then mask with addictions, depression and all sorts of self-damage.

Therapy for Boarding School Bullying and Abuse with Marcus

If you suffer from the emotional or psychological after effects of having been the victim of Boarding School Bullying, therapy with Marcus can explore your feelings and ways to come to terms with hurt and the scars that the experience has left on the adult you. Contact Marcus to have a conversation about therapy.

Contact Marcus

Some helpful articles and resources on the subject of Bullying and Harassment

George Monbiot: Read his blog article ‘Acceptable Cruelty’

Video: Classic cinematic portrayal of ritualised bullying

Video: Showing how a school teacher in France resolves bullying in the classroom (click the settings mode to request English subtitles)

Video: Ted Talk: Let’s talk about bullying | Nicholas Carlisle

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Boarding School Survivors Issues Therapy

Boarding School Issues I Often Work With In One-to-one Therapy

  • Boarding School Survivors and Relationships
  • Boarding School Survivors and Depression
  • Boarding School Survivors and Bullying
  • Boarding School Survivors Workshops in London

Boarding School Survivors Workshop Programme

The pioneering 4-day workshop is spread over TWO WEEKENDS A FEW WEEKS APART. Participants are asked to commit to attending ALL 4 DAYS. The workshop has been running for two decades and was created and is still supervised by Nick Duffell, author of ‘The Making Of Them’.

NB. These courses are very popular so early booking is always strongly advised.

Men’s Course – Spring 2024

Part One: Saturday 09 MAR – Sunday 10 MAR 2024
Part Two: Saturday 18 MAY – Sunday 19 MAY 2024
Venue: Hampstead, North London.
Times: 10am (arrive by 9.45) to 6pm each day.
Cost: £650 (£250 deposit to secure place).

Women’s Course – Spring 2024

Part One: Saturday 24 FEB – Sunday 25 FEB 2024
Part Two: Saturday 06 APR – Sunday 07 APR 2024
Venue: Highgate, North London.
Times: 10am (arrive by 9.45) to 6pm each day.
Cost: £650 (£250 deposit to secure place).

Men’s Course – Autumn 2024

Part One: Saturday 21 SEP – Sunday 22 SEP 2024
Part Two: Saturday 02 NOV – Sunday 03 NOV 2024
Venue: Hampstead, North London.
Times: 10am (arrive by 9.45) to 6pm each day.
Cost: £650 (£250 deposit to secure place).

Women’s Course – Autumn 2024

Part One: Saturday 05 OCT – Sunday 06 OCT 2024
Part Two: Saturday 16 NOV – Sunday 17 NOV 2024
Venue: Highgate, North London.
Times: 10am (arrive by 9.45) to 6pm each day.
Cost: £650 (£250 deposit to secure place).

Men’s Course in North America (2024) 

Part One:  Wednesday 05 JUNE – Monday 10 JUNE

Part Two:  Friday 04 OCT – Sunday 06 OCT

Venue:  Nova Scotia, Canada

Costs & all other information:  Please request by email.

More information, including how to book …

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Pesso Boyden Group with accredited practitioners Deborah Clarke and Marcus Gottlieb

Pesso Boyden Group with accredited PBSP practitioners Deborah Clarke and Marcus Gottlieb

Pesso Boyden Therapy (‘PBSP’) is a philosophical process for becoming whole.

It is a respectful, interactive group process that heals by embedding new memories in the brain and in the body

Most people consciously or unconsciously have memories – explicit or implicit – of 

1. deficits 

2. traumas 

3. having to take care of others when we were too young – e.g. protecting a sibling, providing the joy in the life of an unhappy parent, unconsciously becoming the ‘spouse’ of a widowed parent, or making the world right after hearing stories of injustice. 

When any of these three categories of memory appear in the client’s work, the client and therapist work together to externalise them, in order to illuminate the client’s ways of handling life and to facilitate change. The client is always in charge of this process – people and incidents from the client’s past will be symbolised in the here-and-now either by people in the group or by objects in the room, all chosen and placed by the client. 

The therapist then works with the client to facilitate an antidote to what happened in the past – a new memory which provides what the client needed at that particular time in their past, from a specific kinship figure. This new memory may be developed over several sessions in a number of steps. In the Pesso approach we don’t change our history; however, we do change our response to our history, leading to a new perspective. 

The way is opened to possibilities of greater pleasure, satisfaction, meaning, integration and connectedness.

 



Deborah has worked as a Performance Coach for over 16 years having trained with Coach U. Her background is in the arts as an actor, theatre director and artistic director. She has worked with a wide range of people from all walks of life. Having first encountered Pesso Boyden as a client, she felt inspired to do the training herself. Since graduating in 2013 she has been running Personal Development workshops using the Pesso Boyden system and is now accredited by the official PBSP U.K. organisation.

Notting Hill Therapist | Marcus Gottlieb Psychotherapist & Counsellor
Marcus Gottlieb is a highly experienced London-based psychotherapist with a particular interest in boarding school survivor syndrome. Having trained alongside Deborah directly under Al Pesso and his closest collaborator Lowijs van Perquin, he is steeped in the work of PBSP and a strong believer in the client’s genetic impulse towards health and expression of their unique potential and individual destiny. He became an accredited Pesso Boyden therapist in 2021.
An Introduction to the Pesso Boyden Method

 

An opportunity to learn about and observe the distinctive techniques of this respectful body-based psychotherapy.

Suitable for both psychologically interested professionals, people seeking personal development/CPD and for people not in the therapeutic professions seeking to address entrenched issues. For all those who are interested in living a larger life. A special price of £35 for the day includes lunch and refreshments. CPD certificates will be available.

PBSP (Pesso-Boyden System Psychomotor) is a powerful, deeply respectful, psychotherapeutic process that uses feedback, ritual, objects and role players in a unique manner to heal the traumas, wounds and losses that affect our personal map of the world.

Its central goal is the imaginative creation of an ‘ideal’ healthy past that a person’s brain processes so that they emerge feeling differently about themselves. As Albert Pesso said, ‘Humanity is responsible for the meaning that surrounds us. The task for each person is to create a meaningful life and then live it with existential courage and passion.’

As well as gaining new perspectives, clients often experience increased pleasure, satisfaction, meaning and connectedness following a PBSP session and find themselves psychologically freer to make the changes they wish for in their lives.
Date: Saturday 7 October 2017
Venue: Notting Hill, London W11
Time: 10.00 am – 4.30 pm
Cost: £35 (inc lunch & refreshments)

 

Register Your Interest


Boarding School Survivor Syndrome Conference

BOARDING SCHOOL: Surviving the Syndrome
Broken Attachment and Childhood Trauma

University of Brighton

Saturday 9 September 2017
9.30 am to 5.00 pm

Conference for psychotherapists, counsellors, mental health workers, boarding school survivors and other interested people.

Conference overall aims are to:
§ Present key aspects of what has been published about the psychological and other effects of boarding.
§ Explore helpful therapeutic approaches for clients who are former boarders.
§ Consider current research and a possible agenda for future research
§ Enable networking amongst those interested in this important topic

Chair: Pam Howard, School of Applied Social Science, University of Brighton.

Speakers: Nick Duffell, Joy Schaverien, Alex Renton, Thurstine Basset, Anni Townend, Olya Khaleelee.

Group Discussion Facilitators: Marcus Gottlieb, Leslie Lund, Nicola Miller, Simon Partridge, Boarding Concern Directors.

For more details, contact Laura Williams:
southcoastevents@brighton.ac.uk

Pesso Boyden Workshop with Ana María Ruiz Sancho and Marcus Gottlieb

 

Pesso Boyden Therapy is a respectful and highly respected, body-based psychotherapy with distinctive techniques aimed at addressing entrenched issues. It is an interactive process that creates new body-based memories to heal emotional deficits of the past.

An exceptionally powerful personal development tool, it uses feedback, systematic procedures, objects and role players in a unique methodology, in order to repair the early traumas, wounds and losses that can powerfully influence the brain’s map of the world.

In shifting underlying perspectives, the way is opened to the possibility of greater pleasure, satisfaction, meaning and connectedness, and an enhanced freedom to effect longed-for changes.

It is expected there will be between 8 and 12 participants, with an absolute maximum of 15. The day will start with an explanation of Pesso Boyden and an experiential introduction, followed by 4 actual client sessions of an hour each.

Venue: Philadelphia Association, 4 Marty’s Yard, London NW3 1QW
Date: Saturday 3 June 2017
Time: 0930 to 1800
Cost: £75

Register Your Interest



Ana María Ruiz Sancho is an experienced psychiatrist and a psychotherapist. She is also a specialist in group dynamics and an Institutional and Team Motivation Consultant.

Ana is the Founder and a Director of VocAcción, as well as being a qualified Pesso Boyden psychotherapist.


Notting Hill Therapist | Marcus Gottlieb Psychotherapist & Counsellor

Marcus Gottlieb works with relationships, sexuality, abuse and trauma, with a particular interest in boarding school survivor syndrome. Qualified in Pesso Boyden as well as other psychotherapies, he is also an Alexander Technique teacher.

Contact Marcus

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