Why I Do This Work: A Story I Don’t Often Tell - Gentle Support for Sensitive Women Cheshire West

Why I Do This Work: A Story I Don’t Often Tell

I was always different, even as a child. My mother used to say I was born three weeks late and had been “catching up ever since.” It was the first story I absorbed about myself — that something was wrong with me. That theme followed me for years.

I was the only biological child in a family where everyone else was adopted. And yet, I was the one who felt out of place. My childhood was filled with harshness — verbal humiliation, physical punishment, emotional absence. I can't honestly say I ever felt loved. I was constantly told I was behind, not good enough, not like the others. I was bullied at school, ridiculed for my name, my clothes, my interests. I didn’t fit in at home or in the world around me.

But I found solace on the Wirral Way, where I could escape to find horses.

From as early as two years old, I was drawn to them. While the other girls played with dolls and prams, I was mesmerised by farm sets, animals, tractors, and horses. I never liked dressing up or playing “house” — I wanted the fields, the trees, the quiet company of animals. I was never lonelier than when surrounded by people, never more whole than in the presence of horses and dogs. Even at school, I would sneak away at lunchtime to read horse books in a quiet, unused classroom.

Autism wasn’t spoken about back then — especially not in girls. Being different meant punishment, ridicule, and labels like “social retard.” Those words were used about me, in front of me, by family. It wasn’t until I had my two sons that I began to feel a sense of “normal.” They were like me — sensitive, thoughtful, different in the same ways. Later, we would learn that we are all neurodivergent. It explained so much — and yet, society still didn’t offer much support for families like mine.

But the horses? They always understood.

They were my sanctuary as a child, and they became the same for my children — a place of safety, calm, and unconditional acceptance. Not through riding or rigid programs, but through being. Grooming, sitting, breathing alongside them. They offered something few humans ever did: presence without judgment.

I’ve spent over twenty years studying coaching, energy work, mindset, and nature-based therapies. Not for prestige — but to survive. To heal. And now, to help others who carry similar stories, even if they don’t have the words for them yet.

This work doesn’t follow a script. It’s not clinical or structured in the traditional sense. It evolves naturally. A session might be quiet, tender, wordless — and yet shift something that years of talking therapy could not.

Clients have said that. I’ve felt it too.

This work exists because I needed it. Because my sons needed it. And because others — the sensitive ones, the misunderstood, the ones who’ve always felt a bit outside — need it too.

This is why I do what I do. A story I don’t often tell.

Chonti www.thequietherd.com

Why I Do This Work: A Story I Don’t Often Tell - Gentle Support for Sensitive Women Cheshire West