Isabel Pham

Working with me

My style is warm, grounded and direct, with attention to what you feel in your body. I listen without judgement and may put words to patterns in your experiences or relationships that have been difficult to see clearly.

I am comfortable with grief, anger, shame, uncertainty and contradiction. I welcome all of you.

I encourage you to question me, disagree and voice your perspective. When your needs and views have been pushed aside for a long time, learning to speak up for yourself can be an important part of regaining choice in your life.

Areas of focus

Power, exploitation and loss

Abuse of power can be difficult to recognise when it is presented as care, guidance, service, devotion or personal transformation.

High-control environments can take more than the freedom to make your own choices. They can take time, relationships, opportunities and important life milestones.

Leaving can also mean losing an entire social world. Smear campaigns and ostracism can affect someone's relationships, reputation, belonging and sense of reality. I understand how devastating this can be.

Recovery may involve grieving what cannot be recovered while asking: What was interrupted? What do I still want? What is possible now?

Family breakdown

Speaking the truth about harm can create a second wound when families respond with blame, disbelief or silence rather than care and protection. The loss that follows, and the sense of betrayal, can bring profound grief, anger and confusion, even when love remains.

Lived experience

I spent many years deeply devoted to a Buddhist community that became increasingly high-control before I left.

That experience taught me about the vulnerabilities of being human: our longing to belong, to matter and to understand spiritual truth, and how these can be exploited when trust and authority are placed outside ourselves.

My recovery accelerated when I learned to trust my heart and feelings while developing the critical thinking to distinguish what was real from what was not.

My experience is not a template for yours. I will not assume I know what happened or what you should do next.

Background

I am a social worker with experience in child protection, domestic and family violence, asylum seeker support, and complex problems involving relationships and wider social conditions. Through The Exit Clinic, I also work with cult recovery.

I consider people’s relationships, past experiences and wider social circumstances. What looks like an individual difficulty can sometimes be an understandable response to what has happened around you.

Qualifications

Bachelor of Social Work
University of Western Sydney