Creative collective uses drumming to tackle anxiety

A Haringey-based counsellor is championing a unique approach to anxiety education. 

Amy Walshe, a psychodynamic counsellor who lives and works in Finsbury Park, is launching a series of drumming workshops in Alexandra Palace specifically for those who live with anxiety.  

Starting this week (Tuesday, 20th September) ‘Off Beat’ – from Amy’s collective ‘Totally Flawed’ – is a six-week course facilitated by a professional drummer and trained mental health professionals. Participants will be taught the basics of drumming, while also learning how they can channel those skills to manage anxiety disorder on a day-to-day basis. 

Amy said: “Often with anxiety, we’ll look at people’s breathing. Breath sets off fear in the rest of our body to say, hang on a minute, something is going wrong here. It’s to do with alerting the body that we’re scared. The good thing with drumming is that there’s the beat to it, so we do breathing exercises to the beat of the drum.”

Amy, who worked in the music industry before opening her practice in Haringey, has experienced eating disorders and panic attacks herself from a young age. She signed up for drumming lessons during the pandemic and quickly noticed how some of the techniques were benefitting her own mental health. 

“A lot of the ways that I was holding my body and the ways that I was sitting on the drum kit were things that I could use to inform people about how to manage anxiety. For example, anxiety tends to rise. Drumming uses the feet, so there’s a grounding to it.”

Given the growing NHS waitlist for mental health services and high cost of private counselling, Amy sees Off Beat as an alternative form of mental health support. The sessions cost £60 in total, and Amy ran a competition to win a free place for this month’s course. Moving forward, she will be offering free spots to those who need it. 

“There’s a massive gap where people aren’t getting help because of NHS waitlists, but can’t afford private counselling. I wanted to set something up which was a bit in the middle.”

Throughout the six week period, Off Beat will also provide signposting services, directing participants to further mental health support. Amy and her team have already rolled out two pilot courses to positive feedback and are seeking funding to run Off Beat on a regular basis.

To find out more about Off Beat, and to sign up for future courses, visit: totallyflawed.com