Denise Nosrati
Denise Nosrati (52) is a Sheffield-based former horticulturalist, hotel receptionist, care home manager and English teacher who is now a leading sports hypnotherapist with practises in Ecclesall Road and London’s Harley Street.Denise was born in London’s Charing Cross Hospital within the sound of Bow Bells, making her a true Cockney! She was brought up in Wembley and soon got used to the roar of the crowds and at 25, that unforgettable day that was LiveAid.
Her father was a policeman and her mother made curtains for the local department store, brother Ray is 6 years older- an ordinary happy family upbringing.
Although she did very well at school and had an early interest in sport playing hockey, like so many teenagers Denise couldn’t wait to leave so that she could earn her own money and go out and have fun. Her careers officers and parents tried to convince her to stay on and do A levels, but Denise knew better – she was absolutely set on being a gardener!
“I was looking at the council’s jobs news when I noticed there was a vacancy for a gardening instructor in a new rehabilitation unit opening for people with physical disabilities, so I went for the job and got it,” smiles Denise. The job was more successful than her next holiday to Ibiza. “You know how when we go abroad, we often come back with things we really don’t want or need?” muses Denise, “well I certainly did – a husband from Mansfield!” They were married in 1985 one year after they met in Ibiza. He was running a snooker club and was moving to manage one in Sheffield, which is how Denise ended up in South Yorkshire and in 1986 Denise’s parents retired and moved to Chesterfield to be near her.
When she arrived, she couldn’t find anything similar to the job she had loved so much in London, so she ended up buying a burger van which she ran for a year. The collapse of her husband’s new business and his drinking took their marriage with it. Denise carried on working night shifts in the snooker club for a year. It was while she was working nights that she met an Iranian man who used to sit at the bar and talk to her, “He was watching me all the time and we got together - he seemed really nice. After time, we moved in together and were very happy for about a year. Then everything started to unravel, I discovered he was taking prescription drugs, codeine in huge quantities.”
With Denise’s help, he seemed to conquer the habit, but two years on he admitted to being back on the drugs, promising to get professional help and withdraw properly. Denise became pregnant and despite problems, in August 1999 she had her first son Daniel.
Two years later and pregnant again, Denise discovered her partner was back on drugs again. “Our second son David was just two weeks old when my partner came home saying that he had a huge bust up at work with a colleague that he had been sacked for being abusive and threatening. He was in total denial. It was a living beyond anything I could have imagined. He started following me to my mum’s and making her life hell too. We plodded along with him controlling and suspicious behaviour, living on benefits while I took a TEFL (teaching English to those speaking foreign languages) course through Hallam University.”
The threats turned to violence and Denise sought help to flee to a refuge in Chesterfield. A further attack during contact caused her to be hospitalised. It was a traumatic time for everyone, and the children now have no further contact with their father other than four letters a year.
As the little family finally settled into their new council house, Daniel started school and David was at nursery. Denise was now qualified, but unsurprisingly so protective of the boys and her mum that she didn’t feel able to work. To ease back into employment, she took a part time job at night a couple of days a week at the Travel Lodge in Chesterfield and her mum looked after the boys.
This is where the story turns for the better…she met Paul through a twist of fate when she sent a fax to the wrong machine. A year later and the boys asked if they could call him dad.
In 2006, Denise was invited to teach English to students at Rotherham Adult Community Learning. “I enjoyed teaching but the funding was drying up and it became harder and harder to get classes so I took a hypnotherapy and counselling Diploma at Nottingham University in 2009, as I had managed to stop smoking using hypnotherapy. Then some Reiki treatment with a friend helped me decide to train as a 1&2 practitioner initially. I found it made me more centred and less stressed, so I talked to my Reiki master and trained to become a Master Practitioner myself, although it wasn’t enough to make a living.”In 2010 she studied sports hypnosis as she had experienced and seen how effective it was on her son who was a nervous swimmer. She could see how it could be used as a tool for sports enhancement as the visualisation was so powerful. Her son had difficulty jumping and diving off the top board in the swimming pool through nerves and following treatment was not the slightest bit nervous.
“I recognised that there were wider uses to this technique in relation to sport, so I took a course in sports hypnosis in Croydon through the Centre for Sports Hypnosis. Once I had become a fully qualified sports hypnotherapist, I decided Sheffield was the place to base myself as we are City of Sport with the most amazing range of UK-leading facilities. I have based my consulting suite centrally on Ecclesall Road in the new Portergate building, where as a master I can teach Reiki and specialise in counselling for psychological issues.”
Denise is currently working with clients such as a 16 year old snooker player who needed to work on his recovery and is now winning matches again and a Jiu –Jitsu Black belt who
would go to pieces in a competition just because she lacked confidence and felt she struggled to teach- now she is running both children’s and adult classes!
Denise has many clients for her hypnosis outside of sport too. Current clients include clients requiring help getting over nerves presenting in business situations and students struggling
with exam nerves.
Denise is now offering sports hypnosis at her clinic No 1 Harley Street every Monday and the rest of her week at her busy Portergate offices on Ecclesall Road.“I’m working exclusively in sports hypnotherapy and Reiki,” she says, “which is much bigger in London than it is in Sheffield, courses and treatments are both growing organically. We are targeting athletes at all levels and with the 2012 Olympics coming, working towards getting British athletes to the top of their game. It’s what I like to call harmony plus capability.”
Denise has been on local radio and in the press. She can talk expertly and enthusiastically to the media on the following areas:
Enabling people to raise their performance in:
- Presentations (building confidence)
- Sports (returning from injury, overcoming slumps in performance)
- Conquering fears and barriers (mental blocks, improving focus & concentration)
- Reducing nerves (competitions, exams, flying)
- Motivation (weight loss, smoking cessation)
Expertise in:
- Sports, watching and following people in sport
- Negativity (redundancy)
- Hypnotherapy
- Abuse/refuge issues
- Motivation
Profile released on behalf of Inner Vision Faye Smith, Keep your Fork Marketing
07985 038265
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