Nicole Berry Counselling & Therapy Services

28/12/2025

25/12/2025

Most people won’t notice this tonight. 🌸
But the sky is quietly smiling.
This evening, December 25, the Moon, Venus, and Jupiter align in a rare triple conjunction — forming a natural smile in the sky.
The crescent Moon curves below, while two bright planets glow above.
Look west shortly after sunset.
If the sky is clear, don’t miss it. ✨🌙🌓🌝

23/12/2025

Absolutely blown away to receive this review this morning. Sometimes even I’m left with no words… just a warmth of emotions ❤️🙏❤️

22/12/2025

Gentle reminder this season 💚

Children don’t learn regulation through fear or pressure — they learn it through safety, connection and calm nervous systems.

Swipe to read ➡️

22/12/2025

This season stretches nervous systems — especially young ones 🌙

As routines loosen and stimulation increases, children’s capacity to cope often reduces. From a neurobiological perspective, stress directly impacts the prefrontal cortex — the part of the brain responsible for impulse control, emotional regulation and reasoning. When this area is under pressure, behaviour shifts. Not because a child is choosing to be difficult, but because their system is overloaded.

During busy, unpredictable seasons, children move more quickly into survival states. Their bodies respond before their words can. When this happens, emotions come out through movement, volume, tears or shutdown — not because skills are missing, but because access to them is temporarily offline.

Regulation always comes before learning.

A dysregulated nervous system cannot process consequences, boundaries or logic. It is wired instead for protection. In those moments, children rely on co-regulation — borrowing safety from the calm, steady presence of an adult. This is not permissive parenting; it is neuroscience.

Once the nervous system settles, the brain reopens to reflection, responsibility and repair. Without felt safety, correction is experienced as threat — and the message is lost.

This time of year often places extra demand on everyone’s window of tolerance. Sleep changes, excitement rises, expectations increase and transitions multiply. Adults feel it too — which is why patience can feel thinner, even when our intentions are strong.

If big emotions are showing up more often right now, it doesn’t mean anything has gone wrong. It means nervous systems are working hard.

And despite what social media suggests, no household moves through this season without rupture. Every family has moments of overwhelm, raised voices and missteps. What supports emotional development is not perfection — it’s repair.

Children don’t need endlessly calm adults.
They need emotionally available ones who can return, reconnect and regulate alongside them.

Especially in seasons that ask more of everyone 🙏

— Nicole Berry
Trauma-informed reflection • 2025

22/12/2025

The sea was rough this morning — waves rising, crashing, releasing.
Nothing broken. Nothing needing fixing. Just energy moving through.

It felt like a reminder that when emotions feel big and unsettled, the work isn’t to calm them instantly, but to stay present, grounded, and safe while they pass.

Even the roughest seas find their rhythm again.

21/12/2025

Winter Solstice ❄️

December 21st marks the turning point of winter — the longest night, the shortest day. The moment when darkness reaches its fullest, not as something ominous, but as a pause. A stillness.

It’s the time of year when the sun seems to linger, almost holding its breath, before beginning its gradual return. For generations, this point in the year has been honoured as a reminder that nothing stays static for long — even the deepest darkness carries movement within it.

The solstice invites slowing down. Reflection. Trusting cycles we can’t rush. Endings making space for beginnings, even when we can’t quite see what’s next yet.

Tonight is about stillness — and the quiet reassurance that light always finds its way back. 🙏