John Hicks explaining the future of The Studying With Dyslexia Blog
We have been on a journey together and now we are at a crossroads. Let me tell you about my next chapter.
At time of writing it is the 21st December 2022 and Christmas is almost here.
For the past ten years I have been on a journey starting out with a painful experience in senior management that I believe, now, was down to challenges with managing undiagnosed ADHD/ADD, which resulted in leaving that role and starting my own company.
Shortly afterwards, my daughter Jess was diagnosed with Dyslexia and as a family we had to learn how to understand her neurodiversity and be able to communicate with her school to get the support that she needed. These experiences culminated in me starting the Studying With Dyslexia Blog, a personal journey of understanding dyslexia and sharing that information to the community. Six years ago I started the Parenting Dyslexia community on Facebook which now has about 2.5k members who are parents looking for information about how to get support for their children.
In this period I also worked to support parents with one to one coaching sessions as well as provide webinars and public talks across the country.
One highlight for me was to work with the British Dyslexia Association to influence politicians about the emotional impact of dyslexia, sharing the insights of some 1300 parents.
Of course, during this time we have also experienced a pandemic and we are currently in turbulent times financially with war on our doorstep.
In 2015, I realised, how passionate I was about what influences people, whether those influences are internal thoughts and feelings about past experiences or external influences. I realised that so often we don’t feel like we have a choice in how to feel or interact with the world around us and how so often we can feel powerless and overwhelmed. when we feel powerless and overwhelmed we simply do not live at our best.
For many people with dyslexia of all ages, thinking differently can result in one feeling powerless and overwhelmed, but it doesn’t have to be this way.
So I commenced my training as a therapeutic counsellor with the purpose of helping clients to believe in how their unique way of thinking could change the world and since then I have been developing my counselling practise working face to face and online, locally and internationally with clients who want to feel confident and empowered.
What’s Next?
Everything I have done, I have done on my own and so I have come to a decision about where I need to put my time and focus. I have decided that I am going to make my main focus counselling clients who want to feel confident and empowered. This is open to anyone who feels that my work as a counsellor could be useful to them.
For more information about my work as a counselling click here.
In terms of the Studying With Dyslexia Blog and Parenting Dyslexia, I am going to do the following:
The Studying With Dyslexia Blog
Continue to make the Studying With Dyslexia Blog an available resource with hundreds of articles about Education, Mental Wellbeing and Assistive Technology that have been written over the past six years. I will of course add articles from time to time and I would welcome guest articles from anyone who is a credible supporter of our dyslexia community.
Please feel free to email me if you have an article that you would like to contribute by clicking here.
Parenting Dyslexia
I will continue to maintain the Parenting Dyslexia Facebook community, but the Parenting Dyslexia Direct initiative is now closed.
My online courses for parents are available and you can get to them by clicking here.
I am available for consultation if you would like to develop influencing skills as you seek to negotiate support for your child with your school.
You can book a consultation session with me by clicking here.
And Finally…
It has been an absolute joy and honour to serve you as described above. I am not going anywhere but I am simply changing how I support members of this wonderful community.
As this year comes to a close, I would like to wish you a very merry Christmas and a wonderful New Year.
Are difficult thoughts and feelings holding you back?
Work with Therapeutic Counsellor, John Hicks to help you to understand yourself better and be able to choose how to live your life with confidence.