Dr Liddy Carver
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This professional is accepting new clients but may have a waitlist. Please enquire with them directly to discuss availability.
About me
I have a private practice based in Walton, Warrington, Cheshire. I am a Senior Accredited Counsellor/Psychotherapist with a PhD in Counselling and an MSc in Clinical Counselling. I am also an accredited EMDR practitioner (EMDR Europe) for trauma and a Clinical Supervisor.
Over many years as a psychotherapist, researcher, educator and supervisor, one question has remained remarkably constant: Whose voice is heard, whose knowledge is believed, and what happens when professional or social power shapes how someone’s experience is understood?
This question continues to influence my clinical practice.I am now a BACP Senior Accredited therapist and EMDR Accredited Practitioner, with particular interests in trauma, attachment, and my original therapeutic foundation was person-centred. I continue to believe that the client remains the expert on their own experience.
I have also researched what can happen when people’s experiences are dismissed, disbelieved or given less credibility because of how they are perceived by others or by institutions.For me, these have direct relevance to therapy. A client may arrive feeling uncertain, overwhelmed or disconnected from their own perceptions.This creates an ethical responsibility: professional expertise should support a person’s understanding of themselves rather than replace it.
Achieving BACP Senior Accreditation and EMDR Accreditation represents an important point in my professional development, but not an endpoint. The questions I return to is: How can therapy help people understand and reclaim their experience while preserving their voice, dignity and agency? That question remains at the heart of my practice.
Training, qualifications & experience
Qualifications
- Accredited EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitisation and Regulation) practitioner (EMDR Europe)
- Ph.D. A Co-operative Inquiry into Counselling and Psychotherapy Trainers’ Inter and Intra-Personal Concerns and Challenges in a Higher Education Context
- M.A. (Distinction) Clinical Counselling
- Senior Accredited Counsellor/Psychotherapist (Registered MBACP Senior Accredit.)
- Fellow of the Higher Education Academy
- Postgraduate Certificate (level 7) Clinical Supervision
When I look across my professional career, I see a number of different strands that have gradually come together: clinical practice, academic research, teaching, safeguarding, supervision and continuing professional development.
Clinically, I specialise in working with anxiety and panic attacks, depression, trauma, stress, anger, relationship difficulties, bereavement, childhood-associated issues and self-harm.
I am now a BACP Senior Accredited therapist and EMDR Accredited Practitioner, and EMDR has become an important part of my trauma-focused practice. My continuing development has included specialist training in trauma, complex trauma and dissociation, alongside CPD in somatic trauma, sexual violence, domestic violence, child protection and safeguarding, working therapeutically with suicidal clients, relational depth, Gestalt, existential approaches, group work, and issues relating to sex, gender and sexuality.
This breadth of training reflects something important about the way I understand psychotherapy: people’s difficulties rarely exist in isolation.
Anxiety may be connected to relationships.
Depression may be connected to loss, trauma or disconnection.
Difficulties with anger may have a history.
Panic may involve both present circumstances and earlier experiences of threat.
And what appears to be an individual psychological difficulty may also need to be understood within a person’s relationships and wider social context.
My academic work has developed alongside my clinical practice. I have written and presented on mental health, criminal victimisation and epistemic injustice, student counselling, workplace issues, violent offenders, therapy processes, reflexivity and counselling training.
The concept of epistemic injustice has been particularly influential in my thinking: what happens when someone’s experience is dismissed, disbelieved or not given the credibility it deserves.
This has relevance to therapy.
There is an inevitable difference in power between therapist and client. I bring professional knowledge and experience, but the client brings something equally important—their lived experience.
For me, good therapy involves bringing those two forms of knowledge into dialogue rather than allowing professional expertise to override the client’s voice.
My academic and professional roles have also included external examining for counselling programmes and peer reviewing for the British Journal of Guidance and Counselling and Illness, Crisis and Loss. I have contributed to safeguarding through roles with the Stockport Safeguarding Board and Stockport Child Sexual Exploitation Forum.
These experiences have shaped my understanding of professional responsibility.
They have reinforced the importance of safeguarding, ethical decision-making, reflexivity and recognising the wider context in which psychological distress occurs.
My current practice therefore brings together several strands:
Person-centred and relational therapy — keeping the therapeutic relationship, autonomy and lived experience central.
Attachment-informed practice — considering how relationships and earlier experiences can shape expectations of safety, trust and connection.
Trauma-informed practice — recognising the continuing effects of overwhelming experiences on emotions, beliefs, bodies and relationships.
EMDR — providing a structured approach to processing distressing experiences when clinically appropriate.
Reflexivity — remaining aware of my own assumptions, responses and professional power.
I don’t see these as separate techniques.
They are different ways of understanding and responding to the person sitting in front of me.
My aim is to provide a therapeutic relationship in which clients can explore difficult experiences without being reduced to a diagnosis or defined by what has happened to them.
For some clients, therapy may involve understanding patterns that have developed over many years.
For others, it may involve processing traumatic experiences.
For others, it may be about relationships, anxiety, loss, self-worth or finding a greater sense of agency.
The work begins with understanding what the experience means to that particular person.
My professional development continues, but the underlying principle remains constant: clinical expertise should enhance a person’s understanding and agency, not replace their voice.
Member organisations
school Registered / Accredited
Being registered/accredited with a professional body means an individual must have achieved a substantial level of training and experience approved by their member organisation.
BACP is one of the UK’s leading professional bodies for counselling and psychotherapy with around 60,000 members. The Association has several different categories of membership, including Student Member, Individual Member, Registered Member MBACP, Registered Accredited Member MBACP (Accred) and Senior Registered Accredited Member MBACP (Snr Acccred). Registered and accredited members are listed on the BACP Register, which shows that they have demonstrated BACP’s recommended standards for training, proficiency and ethical practice. The BACP Register was the first register of psychological therapists to be accredited by the Professional Standards Authority (PSA). Accredited and senior accredited membership are voluntary categories for members who choose to undertake a rigorous application and assessment process to demonstrate additional standards around practice, training and supervision. Individual members will have completed an appropriate counselling or psychotherapy course and started to practise, but they won’t appear on the BACP Register until they've demonstrated that they meet the standards for registration. Student members are still in the process of completing their training. All members are bound by the BACP Ethical Framework and a Professional Conduct Procedure.
Accredited register membership
The Accredited Register Scheme was set up in 2013 by the Department of Health (DoH) as a way to recognise organisations that hold voluntary registers which meet certain standards. These standards are set by the Professional Standards Authority (PSA).
This therapist has indicated that they belong to an Accredited Register.
Areas of counselling I deal with
Other areas of counselling I deal with
* Personal development
* Managing relationships in the workplace
* Performance-related issues at work
* Medico-legal treatment
* Family issues
Therapies offered
Photos & videos
Fees
£95.00 per session
Health Insurance/EAP
Additional information
£95 per therapy session for individuals (50 minutes)
£105 per therapy session for couples (60 minutes)
£95 per EMDR session (50 minutes)
£80 Clinical Supervision session (60 minutes)
£120 per Clinical Supervision session (90 minutes)
When I work
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Further information
Couples and Relationship Therapy
As an experienced therapist, I work with couples experiencing conflict, emotional disconnection, loss of trust, betrayal, recurring patterns of disagreement or difficulties communicating. My approach is relational and exploratory: rather than focusing only on the immediate argument, I help couples understand the patterns that have developed between them and the underlying needs, fears and vulnerabilities that may be driving those patterns.
If you find yourselves having the same arguments repeatedly, struggling to hear one another, feeling increasingly disconnected, or trying to make sense of a significant rupture in your relationship, couples therapy can provide a space to pause, reflect and begin to understand what is happening between you.
When couples become caught in cycles of criticism, defensiveness, withdrawal or escalation, it can become increasingly difficult to hear what the other person is actually trying to communicate. Therapy provides a confidential, structured and non-judgemental space in which both partners can slow these patterns down, understand their respective experiences and communicate with greater openness and emotional clarity.
Where trust has been damaged, particularly through betrayal, rebuilding the relationship may require more than improved communication. It can involve honesty, accountability, recognition of the impact of what has happened, a willingness to understand each other’s experience, and a realistic exploration of what is needed for trust to be rebuilt. Repair cannot be assumed or imposed; it has to be meaningful to both partners.
My role is not to take sides or determine who is right. I aim to create a space in which both people can be heard while also helping them take responsibility for their contribution to the relational dynamic. This may involve exploring attachment patterns, expectations, boundaries, emotional needs and the ways in which each partner responds when they feel hurt, threatened or disconnected.
The purpose of couples therapy is not necessarily to preserve a relationship at all costs. For some couples, therapy provides an opportunity to repair and deepen their relationship; for others, it may help them reach a clearer and more respectful understanding of their differences and decide whether continuing together is right for them.
Where separation is ultimately the outcome, therapy can still provide an opportunity to approach that process with greater understanding, dignity and care, particularly where there are significant emotional or relational consequences.
If you are finding it difficult to move forward together, I invite you to get in touch to discuss whether couples therapy might be helpful. You do not need to have decided what the outcome should be before starting therapy. The initial work can simply be about understanding what has happened, what is keeping you stuck, and whether there is a constructive way forward.
My aim is to help couples move beyond cycles of blame and defensiveness towards greater understanding, honesty, responsibility and choice—whether that leads to rebuilding the relationship or finding a constructive way forward separately.
EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitisation and Reprocessing)
Eye Movement Desensitisation and Reprocessing (EMDR) is a structured psychotherapy that is particularly well established for working with trauma and post-traumatic stress. I am an EMDR Accredited Practitioner, and integrate EMDR within my wider person-centred, relational and trauma-informed practice.
EMDR may be helpful if you continue to feel affected by something that has happened to you, even though you know intellectually that it is in the past. You may experience this through intrusive memories, nightmares, anxiety, panic attacks, distressing bodily sensations, avoidance, emotional numbness, heightened alertness, shame, guilt or a persistent sense of being unsafe.
Sometimes the connection with an earlier experience is obvious. At other times, people seek therapy because of difficulties in the present—such as anxiety, relationship problems, low self-worth, strong emotional reactions or recurring patterns—and only gradually begin to recognise how these may relate to earlier experiences.
Trauma does not always involve one clearly defined event. EMDR can also be considered where difficulties have developed through repeated or prolonged experiences, including childhood adversity, neglect, abuse, bullying, difficult relationships, domestic abuse, medical experiences, bereavement or other situations in which a person felt overwhelmed, powerless or unable to cope.
What happens in EMDR?
EMDR does not require you to describe every detail of a traumatic experience. This can be particularly important if you have previously found talking about what happened overwhelming, or if you struggle to find words for your experience.
Before any trauma processing begins, we spend time understanding what has brought you to therapy and identifying the experiences, situations or patterns that are causing difficulties now. We consider your current circumstances, emotional resources, relationships, strengths and capacity to manage distress.
Preparation is an important part of the process. We establish ways of helping you remain grounded and within a manageable level of emotional activation, and we agree how you can communicate if you need to slow down, pause or stop.
When you are ready, EMDR may involve focusing briefly on a distressing memory, image, belief, emotion or bodily sensation while engaging in bilateral stimulation, such as guided eye movements or another appropriate form of stimulation. You are not expected to force yourself to remember or relive everything that happened.
The aim is to help the experience become less emotionally overwhelming and less intrusive, so that it can be understood as something that happened rather than something that continues to happen.
EMDR and present-day difficulties
You do not necessarily need to arrive with a diagnosis of PTSD to explore whether EMDR might be appropriate.
For some people, the focus may be a particular traumatic experience that continues to trigger anxiety or panic. For others, it may be a phobia, distressing memories, experiences of rejection or humiliation, relationship-related triggers, grief, or longstanding beliefs such as “I am not safe,” “I am powerless,” “I am to blame,” or “I am not good enough.”
EMDR may also form part of therapeutic work where depression, anxiety, intrusive thoughts or low self-worth appear to be connected with significant earlier experiences. However, I would always assess whether EMDR is appropriate for your particular circumstances rather than assuming that it is the right treatment simply because you have a particular diagnosis or symptom.
Complex trauma and dissociation
When someone has experienced prolonged or developmental trauma, attachment difficulties or dissociation, the work may need to proceed particularly carefully.
In these circumstances, therapy may initially focus on safety, stabilisation, emotional regulation, understanding triggers and strengthening your ability to remain grounded in the present. Trauma processing is not something that needs to be rushed.
My approach is therefore individualised. We consider not only what has happened, but also how you are managing now, what resources you have, what support is available to you and what you feel ready to explore.
What might change?
Clients may find that memories become less vivid or emotionally charged, that previously intense reactions become more manageable, or that they can think about an experience without becoming overwhelmed by it. Sometimes changes are experienced through the body—for example, a reduction in tension, panic or a sense of threat.
The aim is not to erase memories or pretend that difficult experiences did not happen. Rather, it is to help you develop a different relationship with what has happened so that it has less power over your present life.
For me, EMDR is not simply a technique. The quality of the therapeutic relationship, careful assessment, preparation and your sense of safety and choice are central to the work.
If you are struggling with the continuing impact of something that has happened to you, EMDR may be one possible way of helping you move forward. We can discuss your circumstances first and consider together whether it is appropriate for you.
