THERAPIST & COACH
My Story
‘If I can just get into my patient’s head,’ I said to a friend, an osteopath, after another difficult case in my medical practice. ‘We did all possible tests and scans, but cannot find any physical cause for her suffering. Two specialists sent her back to my surgery with the note that there's nothing wrong with her. Yet I am convinced that the pain she is feeling is real. Surely painkillers are not the only solution? And she's not the only case. At least a third of my patients falls into the same category.’
‘You need to widen your horizon. Go and find out about Ericksonian Hypnotherapy,’ my friend suggested.
This is exactly what I did. I enrolled for a course in Ericksonian Hypnotherapy and discovered Ego State Therapy and Somatic Experiencing along the way. I learned that most pain is caused by trauma. Erickson knew that he could never change someone’s past, but that he could aid a patient in living with it. My new skills not only enabled me to help many of my patients to attain a better quality of life, but the therapy sessions I had to undergo as part of my training empowered me to overhaul my own life and career.
‘We all have within ourselves the resources to heal ourselves,’ as Milton Erickson taught his students.
I discovered the courage to listen to my own voice and not that of conventional society: I closed the medical practice I built up in Windhoek Namibia over twenty-three years and followed my passion. With my wife, Lydia, I embarked on a journey which took us thousands of kilometres through the remote parts of Namibia. We travelled in our old Land Rover Defender, doing rural medicine along the way. Our wanderings nudged us to Germany, where I deepened my training and polished my newfound skills. It sent us across the globe to New Zealand, Singapore and Shanghai, to experience life from a different vantage point. When we grew weary, we took a breath in Hermanus, at the southern tip of Africa, to contemplate the ocean and marvel at whales. Where ever we went, I found an opportunity to hone my skills, while Lydia completed and published her book, 'A yellow butterfly on an elephant's foot', about our life and travels in Namibia.
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I grew up on a farm amongst the endless dunes of the Kalahari, in Namibia. Though firmly rooted in Africa, I am also tethered to Germany by a long line of forebears, stretching all the way to Hamburg and Mecklenburg-Vorpommern. Just when our four adult children, themselves adrift all over the globe, started to complain about not having a 'family home' to return to anymore, we stumbled upon a fairytale town in Bavaria, Germany, called Landsberg am Lech, and decided to stay in one place for a while. So, should you feel you may benefit from my therapies, I am available for consultations in Landsberg am Lech, or on-line, via ZOOM.
Should you be interested in booking a session with me, please contact me here.