Subscribe to our newsletter

Chiron has been a companion in my thinking for a long time. His wound, and the way he lives with it, offers a way of understanding the emotional life of our public systems of care. This piece explores what happens when dependence becomes difficult to acknowledge, and how that shapes the relationships between clinicians, institutions and the communities that sustain them. It is an invitation to think about vulnerability, responsibility and the tensions that arise when care is

I have been revisiting the fairy tale Bearskin in preparation for an upcoming workshop. It is a story that helps me think about what it means to arrive depleted, and about the ethics of waiting when people, and systems, are under strain. In the tale, a soldier returns from war with nothing. He has lost his home, his place, and his usefulness to the world he once served. Offered an impossible bargain, he agrees to live for seven years wearing a bearskin, unable to wash, groom

I keep returning to the old tale of the fisherman and the flounder. It turns up in supervision and in my own thinking at moments when effort feels endless and strangely unquestioned. In the story, a poor fisherman casts his net into grey, restless water and pulls up not an ordinary fish but a talking flounder. Flounders are creatures of the seabed, almost invisible against the sand until they are disturbed. This one is enchanted and pleads to be set free. The fisherman lets i

Professional loneliness has become one of the quiet epidemics of our time. It shows sometimes through dramatic burnout, but more often, you find it in the small, private moments when practitioners realise they are holding far more than their frames were built to contain. It is the loneliness of shouldering clinical risk in overstretched services, of making decisions without adequate consultation, of offering containment that one is not receiving in return. It is subtle and cu

A reflection on Antigone, the NHS, and the moral task of mourning in group life. Much attention in psychoanalysis (and by extension, group analysis) has been given to the Greek myth of Oedipus. We are fluent in the language of the Oedipal triangle: the child caught between love and law, desire and prohibition, longing for union and fear of punishment. The myth has become almost synonymous with psychic development, shaping how we think about authority, rivalry, and individu

I recently came across a comment by Rupert Lowe, a figure often associated with right-wing conservative politics in the United Kingdom. Unexpectedly, I found myself agreeing with much of what he said. His remarks were not about immigration or the usual theatre of culture wars, but about work – the relentless, anxious, and precarious life of the small business owner. He spoke of a Parliament full of people who “don’t get it”, who have never run a business, never lived the 24-h

It has long been debated in clinical literature that children suffer not from hostility but from neglect. Winnicott suggested that the psychological wounds of neglect can cut deeper than the pain of conflict. The absence of protection, comfort, or containment creates a void that shapes the child’s developing self. The hopeful child protests, the hopeless child performs compliance. In psychodynamic terms, protest is often a sign of vitality. The hopeful child still believes th

mem When the Body Won’t Stay Quiet Fairy tales say things our theories often cannot. They bypass the defended mind and speak in symbols, archetypes, and the secret language of the body. Lately I have been thinking about a lesser known fairy tale: The Singing Bone. Collected by the Brothers Grimm in 1812, it is not a story of heroism or redemption. But of betrayal, lies, and what happens when a group mistakes performance for truth. To me, the singing bone is not merely a met

"Without the hands—without the ability to act, work, create, and touch—we are not whole. Yet in the ordeal of their loss, a woman comes to understand the deeper forces of transformation that shape her life." ~ Clarissa Pinkola Estés, Women Who Run With the Wolves Recently, in the UK, two men were found guilty of criminal damage after deliberately cutting down a tree. For the uninitiated, this may sound like a trivial offence. But the tree was ancient and culturally sacred. I

The Vow and the Cradle: A Nation That Made a Promise In the Brothers Grimm's tale of Little Briar Rose, a long-awaited child is born to a rejoicing court. In celebration, twelve fairies are invited to bestow gifts—wisdom, beauty, grace. Yet a thirteenth fairy, uninvited and excluded, interrupts the blessing with a curse: the child will prick her finger on a spinning wheel and fall into a sleep lasting one hundred years. Despite every attempt to destroy all spinning wheels and

“The wish to be endlessly needed is one of the most exhausting forms of love.”—James Hillman We inhabit a care system that is fracturing—not merely from budget cuts or staff shortages, but under the weight of its own mythology. The National Health Service (NHS)—a vast, intricate weave of human effort, compassion, and suffering—transcends its role as a healthcare institution. It has become a psychological crucible, reflecting a deeper crisis: the fantasy of limitless caregivin

These reflections on Hansel and Gretel arise from workshops exploring the tale’s resonance in our lives. The story serves as a mirror, revealing struggles with burnout, willpower, and acceptance. The insights below are offered as openings for thought rather than definitive interpretations. The Witch: Willpower and Denial Emerging from 14th-century Europe's famine-scarred landscape, Hansel and Gretel reflects more than physical deprivation. The famine symbolizes inner scarcity

I’ve recently been reflecting on The Golden Bird, a Brothers Grimm fairy tale first published in 1812 as part of their collection Kinder- und Hausmärchen (Children's and Household Tales). The story resonates with quest narratives where unlikely heroes—often underestimated—succeed through perseverance and the guidance of a wise mentor. In the tale, a king’s prized golden apples are mysteriously stolen each night, leading to the revelation that a dazzling golden bird is the cul

Over the summer I took a camping trip to the Isles of Scilly. For anyone who hasn’t been, these are a small group of extraordinarily beautiful islands off the Cornish coast. As an English woman, I was left with an uncanny feeling of the familiarity of being in the UK yet in a landscape that feels other worldly. On Fraser island we came across a golden sand beach inlet, filled with seals. I witnessed more than 20 seals poking up their heads just off shore, with two intrepid s

What do we do when there is nothing left to offer? That is the dilemma many health care professionals face when going about navigating their daily work activities. The dilemma reminds me of the nursery rhyme: There was an old woman Who lived in a shoe She had so many children, she didn't know what to do. She gave them some broth without any bread; Then whipped them all soundly and put them to bed. The earliest printed version of this rhyme is in Joseph Ritson's Gammer Gurto

By Dr Libby Nugent, First Published Nov 15 2021 09:46AM You messaged me asking to talk and I agreed to zoom. We met online and you told me how fed up you are, how you feel exhausted at work and how you couldn’t bear being there anymore. You said maybe you just needed better supervision and support in your workplace. I said you sounded very unhappy and wondered if you needed to enjoy your life a bit more and how important it is to have community, rest and creativity. You wonde