About Me

My name is Steven Crichton, & I facilitate each of the talks & workshops at Silence Speaks.

Before becoming a private counsellor, I started my career working in advertising & sales, before spending almost a decade working for charities in a variety of roles, going from volunteering to managing teams, events, offices & fundraising.

As I made my way up the ladder in my professional career, from answering calls to managing teams & projects, I experienced what I’ve come to understand as Imposter Syndrome, high levels of Stress, & the early signs & stages of Burnout. Fortunately for me, I was made redundant.

I say fortunate, as it meant no longer having to wear a professional mask from 9-5. It meant I could start over.

During the last 2 years of my employment, I had been attending college part time to train to become a counsellor. The redundancy provided me with a chance to pursue this further at university, full time.

But why counselling?

Well, at the age of 6, I lost my father to suicide, less than a week after the photo on the left was taken. There was no immediate response from me in the days, or even the first few years that followed. Just a lot of silence.

At 9 years old we moved to N.Ireland. Even with decades worth of hindsight behind me, it’s still quite difficult to identify the exact moment when things started to spiral, but missing Scotland v England during Euro ‘96 to spend the night sitting in a police station after causing over £2,000 worth of vandalism at 11 years old certainly seems to be one of those moments. I learnt my lesson & stopped causing trouble outdoors, & began to cause trouble for myself, indoors. External chaos moved internal, by 13, drugs replaced crime.

I finished my high school education in Belfast, before moving on to Wales. Leaving behind old habits & friends, at 16 it was a chance for a fresh start. It went well for a year or so, leaving most of my destructive behaviours & toxic traits behind to form new, healthy relationships & friendships. But the more that I felt like I was achieving the right kind of life on the outside, the more detached I felt with myself internally.

It was around that same time that I had become obsessed with Nirvana, & “Heavier Than Heaven” became the one space that I could escape to where I felt understood. Then one day, I read a line that filled in that space that I had lost, the space between outside me & inside me … “Kurt believed that suicide was genetic, & that he would eventually suffer the same fate as his two uncles” (who died by suicide).

There it was, in black & white. I was just delaying the inevitable, that’s why I was suffering, & if I just let go, it would all stop. I found a notepad, picked up a pen & started writing my plan & note.

22 years later I’m still here & now understand that I won that battle, but at the time, it felt like I had failed to do the one thing that I had to, needed to. The shame meant I couldn’t speak up, the guilt meant I couldn’t let go.

Those feelings turned inwards & I leaned on old habits, finding new ways to source a release from the pain. But the old ways weren’t enough, they needed to be stronger, more numbing. Within 12 months, I had found heroin.

I don’t have any photos or references to make to this time, a black rectangle seems symbolic enough. But it didn’t last, by 23 I had reset again & by 25 I had my son & started a career.

For years I managed to cope ‘ok’ with my mental health, building up a life that seemed to make up for the missing parts of my childhood. But at 32, when my son was 6, his mother & I separated. Everything I had been covering over remerged, the feelings returned & the thoughts even more intrusive. “He’s 6, you were 6”. It was then I decided to finally return to counselling, & by 34 I had finally, finally, moved on.

After understanding the significance of counselling in my own journey, I attended USW & attained First Class Honours in Psychology with Counselling.

I have since went on to support others with their journey through counselling, founding Silence Speaks with the full support of USW Startup Stiwdio. I am also a proud founding member of The Mental Health & Wellbeing Network.

All of Silence Speaks Talks & Workshops are designed & delivered by myself, informed through a mix of academic, professional, & personal experience, providing a service that is truly based on lived experience.

To the left is a recording of a presentation that I delivered to The Mental Health & Wellbeing Network in Cardiff in August 2025, extending on what I have covered above.

I look forward to hearing from you. Steven.