Gillian Walton 23 February 1945 to 12 August 2022 A Personal Appreciation

Gillian and I met in the late 1970s when we were both training to be couple therapists at the London Marriage Guidance Council (LMG), an organisation that separated out from the National Marriage Guidance Council as it was then known (now Relate), to champion a psychodynamic approach to helping London-based couples and individuals seeking psychotherapeutic help. This was a place where many interesting men and women were starting a new professional life.

In this stimulating milieu, Gillian stood out as especially impressive. As I recall, a weekly therapeutic session was a feature of the training. Later, when we saw clients under supervision, we brought our problems to the group as well. Gillian's contributions were always thoughtful, open-minded, and respectful of other people's perceptions. She never sought to score points or to demonstrate how much and how widely she had read. She was never competitive and never dismissed the thoughts and feelings of other members of the group. When she spoke of her encounters with clients, it was clear that she was seeking, in her sensitive way, to understand why they were feeling

and behaving in the way they were in order to help them change. It seemed that she was as generous to her clients as to her friends.

Eventually, I left LMG and Gillian became its Director of Training, a post she held from the late 1980s until its demise in 2004. She designed the original PGDip course (which was subsequently developed to become the clinical qualification in couple and individual psychodynamic counselling and psychotherapy now run by Tavistock Relationships (TR)) and was responsible for gaining the validation of the original course with the British Association of Counselling and Psychotherapy. She also oversaw the development and validation of the first psychosexual diploma course at LMG, precursor to the diploma currently run by TR. Our friendship developed slowly but surely over