Meet Your Trainer, Consultant-Supervisor, Therapist:

Susan Darker-Smith

Susan Darker-Smith is the clinical director of the Child Trauma Therapy Centre. She has written multiple chapters in leading academic and clinical books in the field of EMDR (Oxford Handbook, Springer) in the areas of EMDR with neurodivergent children and adolescents, EMDR with perinatal mental health, EMDR with neurodivergent Mothers, Eating Disorders with Neurodiversity.  

She has presented nationally and internationally at conferences and delivered EMDR Europe Accredited Child & Adolescent Trainings  for diverse countries such as Ireland, Poland, Greece, Russia, Lebanon.   

She has over 20 years experience in providing clinical supervision to NHS Trusts, Organisations and Individuals alongside providing therapy for Children, Adolescents, Adults and Families.

Susan is a Europe Accredited Senior EMDR Child & Adolescent Accredited Trainer and believes passionately in making all trainings accessible to all.  This involves all trainings being inclusive of attendees with neurodiversity (such as Autism or ADHD), learning difference (such as Dyslexia), learning styles (such as visual or kinesthetic learning styles), physiological challenges (such as hearing impairment or physical mobility issues) or life challenges (such as economic or geographical constraints, being a carer for family members or a single parent).

Susan is actively involved in several charities including being

• Founding Member of the Global Child-EMDR Alliance (Registered Charity)
• Founding Trustee for the Trauma Response Network UK (Registered Charity)
• Director of CHILD Non-Profit (Child Humanitarian Intervention Learning & Development)

Susan currently sits on the board of the EMDR Association UK and is the co-chair for the EMDR Child & Adolescent Trainers under EMDR Europe. 

She is currently mentoring EMDR Child and Adolescent Trainers in Training in countries including Italy, Turkey, Sweden, Denmark, Russia, Romania.  Susan believes that it is imperative to support countries in developing their own Child & Adolescent EMDR infrastructure and pathways, rather than simply delivering training for that country.  She has been actively involved in providing affordable and low-cost (or pro bono) supervision for some of these countries, to assist them in developing their own accredited Consultants for their  Country’s future – as the best EMDR Trainers and Consultants for a Country are the ones who understand best the language and culture of that Country. 

Susan believes that one therapist can make a difference : but an EMDR community can create miracles… 

Meet our Training Facilitators 

All of our Training Facilitators are EMDR Europe Accredited Consultants and where they are facilitating on the EMDR Child & Adolescent Training, they are additionally accredited as EMDR Europe Accredited Child & Adolescent Consultants.  

Their expertise is wide and spans a variety of clinical applications and presentations, including: 

• Neurodiversity
• Cultural and Ethnic Differences
• Working with Asylum Seekers
• Looked after & Adopted Children
• Complex PTSD
• Pain & Medical Trauma
• Attachment Wounds
• Child & Adolescent Forensic & Harmful Sexual Harm 

Some of our Facilitators speak another language, including British Sign Language.  Some have expertise in specific areas or come from similar clinical backgrounds to yourself.  

If you have a particular need, either for yourself or your clients, please reach out to us.  We will try to help, to the best of our availability and may be able to let you know which training has a Facilitator that is best able to meet your needs. 

Meet our Admin Team

Marie Atkinson is our admin person who alongside our accountant, Duncan, ensures invoices are raised, training materials sent out and queries answered.  

She is a multi-juggling genius who has an interest in mental health and is currently studying to be a counsellor.  

Duncan Philip-Tate is our accountant who is a genius with figures and with explaining them to non-mathematical people (namely, Susan!)   He is like a ship which sails steady, regardless of the chaos of end of year taxes!

If you have any queries, it is likely you will speak to one of these lovely people.