About me Dominique
Sakoilsky

Working in the arena of birth and family life for over 30 years

I have been working in the arena of birth and family life since the late 1980s, initially at the Active Birth Centre in London as a workshop facilitator and yoga teacher, and I have now returned as part of their professional team.

This early beginnings in the arena of birth and family life led me to explore and train in other modalities, as I realised that being born touches all aspects of our human experience, our earliest wounds, and yet our earliest impulse for life. From this place I have committed exploration to a continued and deeper understanding of how we inhabit our body, lives, and relationships.

Committed to on-going learning

After training with Janet Balaskas in 1990 and Lolly Stirk, I continued my studies with a two year yoga training with John Stirke and Sophie Hoare, and I continue my yoga study and practice today. I also trained with the Institute of Craniosacral Therapy qualifying in 2001, and continued postgraduate studies with Mathew Appleton in prenatal and birth experience and trauma, and prenatal and post natal psychology with Karlton Terry, for over 5 years.

I am passionate in engaging with what it means to be human, never more strongly experienced than in relationship. I am committed to living and learning how to support authenticity, freedom and heartful living, from the sanctuary of our self.

Couple, family and relational counselling

In 1999 I trained with Relate where I worked as a couple counsellor and then family counsellor for ten years, also teaching for 4 years on their professional teaching programme offering cpd for social workers and early years workers in basic counselling and conflict resolution training. In 2007, after completing a postgrad diploma in Systemic Family and Couple therapy, I set up the Relate Avon Family Counsellng Service with my colleagues.

My latest stretch into learning has been to train as a Relational Counselling Supervisor, which I qualified in January 2019, having trained with Karl Gregory and Sheila Mc carthy.

Training doulas and antenatal teachers

I have never stopped working with birth, running a company relaxed Birth and Parenting for over ten years, training doulas and antenatal teachers, and women’s health mentors in the UK and internationally.

The Seven Secrets of a Joyful Birth

I trained with James Burgess in 2006 as a 7 words mentor and coach, which led me to write my book The Seven Secrets of a Joyful Birth, published in 2013. This led me to running training and workshops for doulas and birth workers in Brazil, Lithuania, Portugal and in 2017 in India at the Womens Economic conference in Delhi where I was a speaker and workshop faciltator.

In 2018 I was a speaker and workshop trainer at the Birth Conference in Sao Paulo, Brazil, where they crowd funded to translate my book into Portuguese, it has since been published in Brazil. In May 2019 I was invited to teach in Istanbul alongside birth visionary Janet Balaskas, teaching around the psychology of birth for doctors and midwives.

My approach to life, therapy and healing

My curiosity lies in a relational approach to life, therapy and healing. We experience wounding in relationship, whether it’s historic, or present moment, and in relationship we can also heal our wounds, and in that I include relationship to self!