Yasmin Shaheen-Zaffar
Creative Health Innovator & Artist Practitioner, Trainer and Educator | BACP Accredited Counsellor
Yasmin Shaheen-Zaffar is a Creative Health Innovator & Artist Practitioner, a trainer and educator, and a BACP Accredited trauma and relationship counsellor (MBACP Accred). She is the founder of Glad We Talked®, Polyvagal Teen® and Scribbledeedo®, brands of Watoto Play Ltd.
She specialises in communication, emotional safety, neurodiversity, relationships, and nervous-system-informed approaches to connection. Her work brings together professional training and lived experience of neurodivergence, and of mixed heritage and mixed faith.
She created Glad We Talked® from a belief that people should not need a diagnosis, the perfect words or the ability to explain everything before they can begin to understand themselves and feel supported.
Training and work
- BACP-accredited counsellor and psychotherapist (MBACP Accred)
- Creative Health Innovator & Artist Practitioner
- Trainer and educator
- Founder of Glad We Talked® and the Finding My Steady programme
- Creator of How I’m Wired, a free strengths and needs reflection tool for adults
Articles by Yasmin Shaheen-Zaffar
- Why can’t I just start? Planning, focus and executive function, without the shame
- What is masking? The hidden cost of fitting in, and why unmasking is a choice
- Why can I cope one week and not the next? Capacity, resilience and the different parts of us
- A Short Guide to Therapy: What It Is, Who It's For and How to Start
- How Do I Know What Support I Need? Resources, Courses, Memberships or One-to-One Therapy
- How to Communicate Your Needs When You're Neurodivergent
- Why moving helps: a polyvagal-informed way for teens to talk about feelings
- What Happens in Your First Counselling Session?
- Emotion cards for teenagers: 7 ways to use feelings cards at home, school and in sessions
- Before We Call It Behaviour
- Always Chosen, Never Choosing
- When Nervous Systems Collide at Home
- When Nervous Systems Collide
- Beyond “How Do You Feel?”
- The Person Who Says Less May Not Feel Less
- Do I Need an ADHD or Autism Diagnosis to Get Therapy?
- Polyvagal-informed activities for young people: using cards and movement in sessions
- How to Choose a Counsellor: 10 Questions to Ask Before You Book
- Counselling for Multi-Heritage and Mixed-Race Identity
- Rejection Sensitivity and Neuroception: What If Your Radar Sharpened for a Reason?
- Neurodivergent-Affirming Therapy: Support Before, During or After Diagnosis
- Zones of Regulation for teenagers? A nervous system approach that teens take seriously
- How to Get the Most Out of Therapy
- Polyvagal theory in the classroom: supporting dysregulated students
- Talking Isn’t Just Talking: Why Communication Doesn’t Always Mean Speaking
- Emotional dysregulation in teens: the signs and what helps
- Watoto Play Receives National Autistic Taskforce Founder’s Award to Launch Accessible Parent Wellbeing Programme Across Yorkshire
- From Quiet Support to Official Partnership: Why Becoming a Patron and Children’s Mental Health Ambassador Matters
- Polyvagal parenting: how to help a dysregulated teenager
- A No Filter Day – To Be Seen
- Everywhere and Nowhere: The Truth About Belonging
- How Hard It Is To Do the Right Thing?
- What Music Unlocks in Us
- Beyond the Four Horsemen: Why I Found Gottman’s Model a Bit Shamey (and What Helped Instead)
- To Be Loved
- The Stuckness of Regret: Exploring Why Neurodivergent Minds Get Stuck – and How to Move Forward
- Navigating a Relationship with an Autistic Partner or Child – Whether They’re Younger, a Teen, or an Adult: Understanding Dismissiveness and “Talking Over”.
- Why I Chose a Circle (And What It Means for Glad We Talked™)
- Masculinity, Language, and the Stories We Tell Boys
- Unlearning Independence: Embracing Co-Regulation in a “Do-It-Yourself” Culture
- What Are We Teaching Them? When Boys Learn to Pay for Connection and Girls Learn to Sell Their Feet at 13