Jay Dudley

Jay is a Psychotherapist, Supervisor, Groupwork Practitioner and Trainer with many years’ experience working in mental health services in the NHS. Alongside his private practice, he works in a Specialist Therapeutic Community within the Personality Disorder Service in Devon Partnership NHS Trust. He works with both individuals and groups.

Jay brings together ideas from CAT, Object Relations and Group Analysis to inform his practice and understanding of psychotherapy.

We come into being, and our identity is ‘shaped’ – so to speak – through important early childhood relationships. But problematic experiences in our development can lead to patterns of relating that seem only to lead back into a repetition of the past, as well as limiting our growth and potential. Their familiarity makes it hard to detect since it is hard to see who we are from ‘outside’ ourselves.

By paying close attention to the therapeutic relationship in the present, and working collaboratively with you, the past can slowly begin to emerge into conscious awareness, which in turn can bring choices and change closer to hand. The process of psychotherapy invites us to question and explore who we are and uncover what’s hidden.

Jay believes it is through the rhythm, boundaries and containment of the psychotherapeutic relationship, that new meaning, beginnings and understandings can emerge.

He offers both short and long-term psychotherapy, as well as CAT training therapies. He is also available for supervision (UKCP Registered) and consultation. Jay’s clinical experience and interests include treatment for personality disorders; complex trauma and dissociative processes; eating disorders; OCD; anxiety and depression.

He runs a weekly psychotherapy group for people to meet, explore and learn how being in a group can help to increase awareness of our interpersonal processes’ and relational identity. Groupwork can bring deep and lasting understanding and change.

Jay has been Course Co-Director for Somerset’s CAT Practitioner Training, and has taught and presented CAT in numerous settings. He is the current Chair of ACAT (Association of Cognitive Analytic Therapy).