About
Hi there! I’m Suzanne Shoesmith, a Midlife Mums Mentor helping midlife mothers to stop abandoning themselves and their health for the sake of holding everything and everyone else together. Through using practical strategies and solutions, they rise out of survival based patterns and into self led embodied thriving in their body, mind and life, thus reducing their risk of illness, regret and loss plus creating strong sustainable foundations for fulfilling their soulful life desires, wants and dreams.
I am also the founder of the “THRIVE – In Your Body, Mind and Life” program. I am certified in the modalities of Hypnotherapy, Time Line Therapy, Life Coaching, Neuro Linguistic Programming (NLP) and Quantum Flow (sound, breath, movement and energy practice).
To understand why I do what I do, you need to understand about my story and how I arrived doing the work I’m so passionate about, which I know makes such a difference to so many. And perhaps you might recognise yourself in my story too…
When I was a young teenager, my mother appeared to become unhappy, stressed, angry and withdrawn.
I didn’t know why. She had emotional outbursts towards my father for no reason he knew of. A few short years later she was diagnosed with secondary breast cancer, and blamed my father for causing it. I watched her health, strength, independence and identity slowly disappear. I witnessed someone who was once healthy and vibrant become incredibly unwell, having previously lost a breast from the first round of cancer 10 years prior, then this time becoming skin and bone, confined to a wheelchair and needing so much help and support from her family. She passed away a short time later at age 52.
I developed grave fears, worries and anxieties about my own health and life, thinking and believing that I too would go through the same as what mum did and also one day leave my own future husband and children behind like she did in leaving 5 children behind.
That experience changed my life forever. At her passing, I made a decision. I never ever wanted to get cancer and experience the same outcome. I carried all this emotion and mindset with me for the next 15 years and I forever held onto that decision.
There was so much talk and information back then in the 90s which stated that if you had a loved one who got cancer and either survived it or died, then you have an 85% chance of getting it yourself through genetics. This created even more anxiety and fear in me.
About this 15 years time later when studying my Life Coaching Course, I faced my fear of getting breast cancer and going through the same as mum did. I chose the positive step forward of educating myself about cancer, what causes it, what are the risks, and preventative measures. What I learnt truly shocked and surprised me!
I learnt that about 90-95% of cancer cases are caused by major lifestyle factors that we all have control over and can change and that about 5-10% of cases are caused by genetics, age and sex. This was a far cry from what I previously learnt 15 years prior about genetics causing 85% of cancer cases. I held onto a belief that wasn’t even true!
From what I was learning I started implementing different practices and upped the anti on ones I was already doing. I was wanting to reduce my risk of cancer as much as possible and looking for ways and means of doing so.
Then things became even more challenging for me when my husband had to stop working due to an injury, and we faced financial struggles for over the next ten years. So I had serious money worries and anxieties on top of everything else that I was already struggling with. During this time, I was the sole manager of our finances and many times the sole earner too. As such, I carried the mental and emotional weight of all the financial blows that were hitting us frequently, one after the other.
I was already doing everything for our family. Then one day things got even worse.
I was going through our wardrobe drawers and found a credit card statement with thousands of dollars owing on it. You can imagine my reaction: surprise, shock and tears of hopelessness. My anxiety skyrocketed. I was hurt, felt unsupported and alone. Why did this happen? I was so angry. Obviously, the financial stresses took a toll on our relationship. Though I tried to shield our children from it as much as possible, one night my eldest daughter said “Mummy are you going to leave Daddy? Please don’t leave Daddy – there are too many kids in my class whose parents have split up”.
In that moment I made a ‘choice for change‘ to happen in our lives and to make things better. To find a way to keep our family and marriage together, improve our situation and look after my own health too. I began going on a long journey of self education, discovery and learning, looking for just one thing that would make the biggest difference.
After a few years of trying to find a way out of this stressful and worrying situation, I had a light bulb moment. I realised that I was causing and creating my own mental and emotional struggles through what I was thinking, feeling, and believing about my life, others, and myself. The one thing that I had been looking for that would make me know that my health, life, and family would all be okay was in fact me. It was me! I had to go within to find the solution to my problems. I had to heal myself, and change at an emotional, mental, and energetic level along with that of transforming my subconscious mind, rewiring my brain and regulating my nervous system, to attract more of what I wanted in my life, instead of all the bad things that had been piling up!
My journey has spanned more than two decades and during this time I have gained expansive knowledge about health, lifestyle, emotions, thoughts, consciousness, law of attraction, scientific universal laws and energies, vibration, frequencies etc. I became a qualified Hypnotherapist, Time Line Therapist, Life Coach, NLP (Neuro Linguistic Programming) Coach and Quantum Flow Practitioner (Sound, Breath, Energy and Movement) during these years and got my business back up and running.
I also too became a better mother and role model to my 3 daughters and built a stronger family and marriage. Plus I was finally able to understand about my mothers emotional behaviour and the words of blame she said to my father – she obviously had her own internal and unresolved anxieties, fears, worries, stressors, self doubt, anger etc issues and struggles going on about life, herself, others and cancer that she just wasn’t coping with or didn’t know how to.
My favourite clients are mums who are anxious, overwhelmed, stressed, lack confidence and motivation plus doubt themselves, maybe even hate themselves and their life. They resort to unhealthy ways and means of coping, finding external substances and stimuli to make them feel better, thus leading to bad habits and addictions they have difficulty breaking free from – I know it sounds a lot but maybe you can relate? It’s all too easy to get caught up in the chaos and complexity of life. Life throws its challenges at us and sometimes it’s one challenge too many. That’s where I come in.
Through my therapy and coaching work I help mums become happier, healthier, confident and to believe in themselves, so they can be amazing mothers and the best role models for their kids whilst creating and living a beautiful balanced life that their heart truly desires.
If this resonates with you, or you would like to know more or ask some questions, please book a free 30 minute chat.
Here’s what I know to be true: life really is meant for so much more and you truly can thrive in your body, mind and life!
