Rebecca Nyamah

Rebecca Joseph Nyamah is currently in her second year of the Working with Children, Young People and Families: A Psychoanalytic Observational Approach Masters course at the Tavistock and Portman NHS Hospital Trust. Her journey to this point has not been straightforward but more of an exploration and reflective activism that has resulted in her being exactly where she is supposed to be.

Rebecca’s educational and career paths have demonstrated an interlinked tango of resilience, joy, disappointment and success, with an audience of wonderful relationships built along the way. It was a life-changing event that changed Rebecca’s career path from the law as a criminal defence barrister towards education as a teacher. Such paths have awarded her the opportunity to witness the positive and negative impacts of childhood experiences, disadvantaged socioeconomic backgrounds, trauma, and toxic environments. Rebecca has experienced the privilege of making a positive impact in the lives of others, especially during transitional periods of their life journey. However, she has identified the need to delve underneath the layers of historical difficulties and address them to enable an individual to truly move forward towards their potential as they enter adulthood.

Rebecca vividly remembers the immediate aftermath of the Grenfell Tower fire, when she arrived on site as a volunteer and worked with the children living on the Lancaster Road (West) housing estate, many of whom were worried about their friends who lived in the Grenfell Tower block. Rebecca knew then that she wanted to help children who have experienced severe trauma during childhood and shape the progression of their child development, especially when addressing the cognitive process and complex emotions that such experiences will raise throughout a lifetime. For Rebecca, longevity is key, and it is this that ignited her focus on becoming a highly skilled Child and Adolescent Psychotherapist. Rebecca believes that the Tavistock and Portman is the best place to receive the extensive training necessary to achieve this, namely because of the requirement to include child observation as part of the training path. This provides an extraordinary level of expertise in the development of identity and child development.

The global experiences of COVID-19, international warfare, domestic abuses and the current living crisis have and will continue to bring a tsunami of mental health issues in children, adolescents and adults that are yet to be exposed. Rebecca plans to be a sustainable instrument in shaping the impact upon the life events and mental wellness of the next generation. Rebecca intends to begin and complete the Professional Doctorate in Child and Adolescent Psychoanalytic Psychotherapy (DPsych), an ambition only made possible with the support of The Stuart Hall Foundation.