MEDICAL NEEDS, DIFFERENCE & DISABILITY
Mental wellbeing support for children with medical needs, disability and difference
Some children grow up alongside hospital appointments, diagnoses, treatments, and the quiet weight of being different from their peers. I'm Zara O'Brien — a psychotherapist, and a parent raising children with medical and additional needs myself. This is the work I care about most, and the work I've built this part of The Children's Psychology Hub around.
Chronic illness
Disability & Difference
Hospital anxiety
Coping with diagnosis
Self esteem
Feeling different
SEND
When a child's world includes hospitals, diagnoses, and being different
A child living with chronic illness or disability carries things most of their classmates never have to think about — and these aren't ordinary childhood worries. They don't respond to ordinary reassurance.
The medical reality
The fear before a procedure. Appointments instead of playdates. A body that won't always do what they want it to. Living with treatment, and with not knowing what happens next.
The emotional weight
Anxiety that builds before every hospital visit. The exhaustion of uncertainty. Feelings that surface long after the medical conversations are over, when everyone assumes things are fine.
The loneliness of difference
Being the one who misses school, who can't always join in, who gets looked at. Wondering why their body works differently — and whether that means something is wrong with them.
These children need support that takes the medical reality seriously — and takes the child seriously too.
WHY IT MATTERS
Built for these children, not adapted as an afterthought
Most wellbeing resources assume a fairly typical childhood. The children who need the most thoughtful support are too often handed tools that weren't made with them in mind. Everything here is built the other way round — starting from the child's actual circumstances, and working outward.
How I work
Therapy for children with medical and additional needs
I offer one-to-one therapy for children and young people, online across the UK and in person near Eastbourne. Sessions are child-led, paced to what each child can manage, and shaped around their medical and developmental reality — not squeezed into a standard format. I work with children facing chronic and complex health conditions, disability, medical trauma, anxiety around procedures and appointments, and the emotional weight of being different. I also work closely with the adults around them, because a child's wellbeing is held by their whole world.
Support that reaches your child wherever they are
I run an in-person room clinic in Eastbourne, and families travel in from across the surrounding area for sessions. If you're nearby, you're very welcome in person.
Many of the children I work with see me entirely online, from wherever they are in the UK. For some families this is simply easier — it removes the exhaustion of an extra journey on top of everything else they're managing. For others it's essential: online therapy means a child who is immunocompromised, in the middle of a long hospital stay, or too unwell to travel right now can still have consistent support, from a place where they feel safe. Treatment and recovery shouldn't mean a child loses access to help — so I've made sure they don't have to.
Frequently asked questions
EQUIPING THE VILLAGE
Resources designed for medical, disability and SEN circumstances
Alongside therapy, I design printable and physical resources for exactly these situations — to use at home, in clinic, in hospital, or at school.
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Flourish News
Every month I share free resources, honest thoughts , reflective questions, and content that makes you feel less alone in this work and parenting world!
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