About Grounded

Grounded is a Community Interest Company set up by Dr David Hughes and his partner Fiona Johnson. Before they met, both David and Fiona had lived experience of the impact of trauma. Their personal journeys led to a desire to understand the causes and impact of trauma at a deeper level and to find ways of dealing with it. Their shared interest in neuroscience, psychology and mental health informed their thinking in this area and motivated them to train in the somatic therapies they now provide.

Grounded is their co-creation.

The CIC was set up primarily to provide support for parents of neurodiverse children, those with special needs, attachment issues or mental health challenges. However, the somatic practices offered can benefit anyone with unresolved trauma.

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David

David spent 30 years working in healthcare in academia, health policy and healthcare provision. His research focused on the effectiveness of healthcare interventions and organisations, and he was awarded his PhD from the University of London in 1998. After a decade of research and teaching he moved into health policy and worked at the Department of Health and HM Treasury where he was health policy adviser to Gordon Brown. David was visiting Professor of Health Economics at the University of Chester and has held a number of board level senior positions across the NHS including a National role as Executive Director of Information Analytics and LifeSciences.

However, his passion has always been in the area of mental health and he sat on the National Board for Mental Health from 2016 to 2018. In 2019 David set up a men’s support group and qualified as a TRE practitioner in 2021. He is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts.

Meet Fiona

Fiona

Fiona is a qualified secondary school teacher and an adoptive mum of two girls. She gave up her teaching role to look after her children full time. Her role as an adoptive parent has provided an insight into the impact of adverse childhood experiences and neurodiversity on children’s development. Fiona’s parenting journey has given her first-hand experience of secondary trauma and ignited her passion for learning about effective interventions to help improve outcomes for children and their parents.

She is a qualified mental health first aider and has completed additional training in trauma and attachment. Fiona has trained in a number of somatic based modalities and is a fully qualified EFT, Breathwork and TRE practitioner and works with parent support charities across the Wirral.

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