Why "Asterales"?

When I first decided to formally open a practice and to give it a legal identity - name, website, all that jazz, I was really stuck on a name ... 

I didn't want to be boring and use my name and therapist when broken the wrong way in a line can look a bit - well, dodgy! There are memes around the internet that explain why so I'll let you work that out yourself! 

But essentially, I was working with all sorts of people and all sorts of problems and mental health was, even before Covid, but after Brexit, causing stress and anxiety, depression and sleep issues, to people that had never found themselves suffering any form of issues before - so I wanted to name it something all encompassing and all inclusive. 

Asterales is the largest genre of plant types - the ones that have been flowering across meadows and fields for over 140 million years - but include some of the most common and every day and frequently recognised plants that we all know and love. 

So it seemed pretty easy to make that decision - I wanted something that covered the every day, the easy to recognise, the fully inclusive and the well loved. The non-threatening and the pretty and commonly found - to show that we can be truly ourselves and yet find ourselves in places that, in other times, we might not be worried about, but sometimes are a bit overwhelming and a bit scary - but which can be talked through and resolved. 

So - that's why Asterales - and why it's a deep part of my name and practice - and why I still have it as a huge part of my practice name - and why one of my emails is "[email protected]"!