
Our new Local Community Garden built by our incredible speaker & volunteer!
Our incredible speaker & volunteer Nadia has built & donated a beautiful garden bed to
About EDQ
Through individual and group therapy, peer mentoring and community building, we aim to alleviate the impact of eating disorders for everyone concerned.
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EDQ provides treatment and support through four different avenues.
Click on the menu to the right to see which one fits your needs best. Always feel free to call and ask for assistance if you are unsure – we have a dedicated Care Navigator who will be able to help.
Queensland Health (QH) provides funding for Individual and Group treatment and Peer supports.
You may be able to use your NDIS plan for Therapy, Dietitian, or Recovery Coaching appointments. EDQ is a registered NDIS provider.
If you have a Medicare plan, you can access treatment under EDQ’s Medicare arm.
There are two group options available through this funding avenue, regardless of any other services you might be accessing.
Contact EDQ if you would like to connect or find out more about our services.
Family members and carers play a key role in supporting a loved one’s recovery journey.
A ‘carer’ is anyone supporting an individual with an eating disorder.
As a GP, you are likely to be the first health professional a person with an eating disorder or carer will come in contact with. A GP’s role in the treatment of eating disorders can include prevention, identification, medical management in a primary care setting and referral (NEDC, 2015).
EDQ is a self-referral clinic. GPs are welcome to send referral paperwork or GP reports to EDQ (via email), and we will keep it on file until such time as the client reaches out. We do not have the capacity to contact each client that is referred to us.
This online training is about helping you gain knowledge and skills and improving your confidence around meal support.
Our incredible speaker & volunteer Nadia has built & donated a beautiful garden bed to
We are a team of caring, qualified individuals, many with a lived experience with eating disorders, who are here to help you.
A skilled, dedicated and passionate feminist Senior Social Work Clinician.
SENIOR PRACTITIONERS
Senior Eating Disorder Practitioner
An accredited social worker in the Individual Clinical stream.
Senior Carer and Family Coach
(Maternity Leave)
A registered Psychologist, with a Bachelor of Psychological Science.
Senior Carer & Family Coach
An early career Social Work Clinician with a Bachelor of Behavioural Science.
PUBLIC HEALTH TEAM
Care Navigator & Public Health Lead
Linking clients, staff, and external organisations.
Research Administrative & Public Health Officer
Jess undertakes internal program evaluations for EDQ’s individual and group therapies.
CLINICAL TEAM
Eating Disorder Practitioner
A practitioner in the Individual Clinical stream, with a Masters in Counselling.
Eating Disorder Practitioner
A lived-experience counsellor and group facilitator, with a Degree in Psychology and Masters in Social Work.
Eating Disorder Practitioner
An early career Social Work Clinician with a Bachelor of Behavioural Science.
Eating Disorder Practitioner
Sarah is a practitioner in the individual clinical stream.
Eating Disorder Practitioner
Lucy has 10 years social work experience across the community sector.
Eating Disorder Practitioner
Bachelor of Psychological Science with Honours.
Eating Disorder Practitioner
Master of Psychotherapy with Honours and Bachelor of Science (Psychology)
Eating Disorder Practitioner
Bachelor of Psychology and Master’s in Public Health (Health Promotion)
CARER & KEY SUPPORT TEAM
LIVED EXPERIENCE SUPPORT WORKERS
Laura is a photographer, freelance writer and a fully qualified recovery coach. Laura’s framework is collaborative and person-centred.
Mandy has over 20 years’ experience providing peer support, recovery coaching and care services both in the community and private practice.
Amira has moved into the Peer Worker position after completing her Masters of Social Work placement at EDQ. With a lived experience, she hopes to support people move towards their ideal life free from the eating disorder.
ALLIED HEALTH TEAM
Contracted Dietitian
(Medicare & NDIS)
Bachelor of Exercise and Nutrition Sciences and a Master of Dietetic Studies.
Mental Health Social Worker
(Medicare & NDIS)
Utilising CBT, ACT, Internal Family Systems and more.
Contracted Dietitian
(Medicare & NDIS)
Bachelor of Nutrition and Dietetics and a Credentialed Eating Disorder Clinician.
EDQ BOARD
Karen Dare
Chairperson, Director
Expertise: Community Sector
Karen has a social sciences background and over 35 years of experience in the community sector, working with Communify since 1994. She works with a strong community development focus and has extensive experience as a board member for prominent community and other organisations. Karen is recipient of the 2001 Centenary Medal and the Brisbane Australia Day Award for her contribution to the community sector.
Stacey Horder
Secretary, Director
Expertise: HR
Stacey has worked across the full growth cycle of companies – from start-ups, to mergers and acquisitions, alongside managing billion-dollar ventures. Throughout her career, Stacey has consistently advocated for culture and creating organisations that have a strong sense of community. She also spends time mentoring for start-ups and being involved in a Director capacity for not-for-profits.
Karolina Pemberton
Treasurer, Director
Expertise: Finance
Karolina is a qualified accountant with over 17 years of experience across a range of sectors and specialities, including Financial and Management accounting, Budgeting and Forecasting, and not-for-profits. Outside her professional life, Karolina has a love of family, cooking and tennis.
Susan Gobbart
Banking Signatory
Expertise: Psychology/Service Delivery
Susan is a psychologist with a special interest in complex trauma, co-occuring AOD and mental health concerns, and Clinical Governance, particularly program evaluation and service/client outcome measures. She is currently working with an Indigenous Birthing program as a Perinatal and Parenting Psychologist. She has over 30 years of professional experience across a range of areas in the mental health field.
Rex Brar
Ordinary Member
Expertise: Finance and Business Development
Rex is a Chartered Accountant with public practice experience and with commercial exposure in business operations, financial and management reporting, leading ERP implementation, improving business efficiencies, project management, MandA deals and currently setting up a start-up business.
Anastasia Blake
Ordinary Member (Banking Signatory)
Expertise: Nutrition
Anastasia worked in Education for more than 20 years, primarily in Computer Education and Policy managing initiatives. She has extensive experience in managing and delivering food programmes in various settings. Anastasia first began volunteering with EDQ in its very early days. She now supervises Health Science Dietetics students and is finalising a cookbook with Dr. Leanne Barron for those recovering from eating disorders.
Marc Bryant
Ordinary Member
Expertise: Carer/IT
Marc is a current member of the Qld Government Advisory Group (Eating Disorders), and also has more than 20 years’ experience in State Government public service, including various expert panels and consulting groups, with special interest in IT systems and information management. Marc has had approximately 6 years’ lived experience with eating disorders as a carer and has mentored other carers.
Suzannah D’Juliet
Director
Expertise: Legal
Suzannah is a commercial lawyer who works in Executive Management in the Resources Industry. She has special interests in insurance, risk and compliance and has experience as a Non-Executive Director in the private sector. Suzannah has a lived experience of eating disorders and is passionate about EDQ’s quality, client centered care and service delivery model.
Eating Disorders Queensland
We support a vibrant community of individuals recovering from an eating disorder, including people with lived experiences, carers and family members.
LOCATION:
51 Edmondstone Street,
Yuggera Country,
South Brisbane, QLD 4101
CALL: (07) 3844 6055
Partners
Belinda is a skilled, dedicated, culturally sensitive and passionate feminist Senior Social Work Clinician, who holds a BA (Health Sc & Soc. Services), MSocWK degree. She has practiced in the field of complex mental health, dual-diagnosis (alcohol and/or other drugs), trauma (sexual assault, domestic violence), and eating issues for over 19 years in the not-for-profit sector.
Belinda is experienced in leading teams in these complex areas, as well as navigating ethical and service delivery issues in a proactive and creative way within the boundaries of service and funding agreements and AASW practice standards. A caveat progression of her career has been to move into a broader systems reform practice, pinpointing service delivery gaps for clients and implementing reform initiatives.
She has achieved this due to a strong caveat ability to connect with various inter-disciplinary sectors and has developed substantial interagency connections with links across the NGO sector, public mental health sector and primary health care. Belinda is a mother to two extraordinary young women, has been married for 30 years, and values spending time with her family. She has deep spiritual connections and is an avid paddle boarder.
Christophe is an accredited mental health social worker with AASW and a practitioner in the Individual Clinical stream of EDQ’s services.
Practicing for 10 years in the fields of youth, disability, refugee, and mental health, Christophe is experienced in working with a diverse range of client backgrounds and is committed to ensuring mental health recovery is possible and reducing the stigma and shame associated with eating disorders. His broad engagement and understanding of mental health issues (mood disorders, psychotic disorders, personality disorders, complex trauma, substance abuse) has lead him to wanting to make a difference in the field of eating disorders.
Christophe is particularly passionate about mental health recovery, believing that hope and recovery is possible despite the sometimes-overwhelming nature of illness. Like previous recovery work, Christophe draws upon authentic, strengths based, collaborative, and person-centred principles and draws heavily from community development and feminist practice frameworks.
More specifically, Christophe adopts the approaches of Acceptance and Commitment Therapy, Cognitive Behavioural Therapy, Narrative Therapy, Problem Solving, and creative expression to assist those with an eating issue work on their recovery. Christophe’s aim in practice is to make those who seek the service feel comfortable, listened to, and hopeful for the future so that a purposeful, therapeutic relationship can take place. Christophe values time with his wife, young son, family and friends. He plays guitar for personal pleasure and occasionally plays shows when he has the time.
Having Scottish and French heritage, Christophe is also a keen football fan and enjoys being part of the world cup football family. Going on camping trips and spending time in the garden are some of his favourite activities.
Emma is a registered psychologist with AHPRA and holds a Bachelor of Psychological Science.
She has worked in the field of mental health for the past 6 years with children, adolescents and adults providing assessment and therapeutic support. Emma started her career working as a support counsellor in eating disorders for families and carers and Emma has continued to work with eating issues in youth support and private practice alongside anxiety, depression, complex trauma, autism and others.
Emma is passionate about increasing awareness and understanding that any individual can experience an eating issue. Emma believes recovery from an eating disorder is possible and hopes to see increasing access to eating disorder services. She further hopes to be a part of reducing shame, isolation and stigma that surrounds eating issues and mental health and help individuals create a positive, compassionate relationship with their body, mind and whole self.
Emma’s framework is collaborative, strengths-based and person-centred. Emma’s goal is to help each individual feel safe and supported on their recovery journey. She works from a range of approaches including Acceptance and Commitment Therapy, Dialectical Behaviour Therapy, Cognitive Behavioural Therapy, Narrative Therapy and Expressive Therapies. Emma enjoys spending time with her family, friends and dachshund, listening to music, road trips and sitting by the water.
David is an accredited social worker with the Australian Association of Social Workers and a practitioner in the Individual Clinical stream of EDQ’s services. He has been at EDQ for over two years, starting his journey as a social work student from February 2018 to June 2018, he joined EDQ as a practitioner in July the same year. David works with clients in both individual counselling and group settings. Over the past two years, David has taken a key role in the development, delivery, and subsequent evaluations of EDQ’s meal support group program ‘The Community Table’.
David is passionate about mental health recovery and believes that recovery is possible, even though at times the challenges of recovery may feel overwhelming. He uses connection and story sharing to reduce the impact of isolation, shame, and stigma that may be associated with experiencing mental health concerns, including eating issues.
David has an eclectic range of interventions including Acceptance and Commitment Therapy, Dialectic Behavioural Therapy, sensory strategies, and problem-solving. His work grounded in a strengths-based and person-centred approach, which is underpinned by a Feminist perspective.
This foundation honours the individual’s strengths and acknowledges the effects of power, with the aim of empowering the individual to make change. David enjoys connecting with his family, friends, and nature. He also enjoys listening to music, podcasts, and audiobooks.
Rohie is usually the first person you’ll meet or speak to at EDQ.
She arranges contacts between clients, staff, and external organisations to ensure that everyone is supported in the way that suits them best. She also provides administrative support and event management, and creates all of EDQ’s Health Promotion campaigns.
Rohie has ten years of administrative and clinical experience in the dental industry and has recently completed her Bachelor of Public Health – undertaking her placement at EDQ before she moved into her current role.
She’s focused on improving client experiences in the health industry and sees facilitating referral pathways as a great way of doing this. Rohie is also passionate about diversity in practice and ensuring that clients of all backgrounds feel safe and comfortable accessing our services.
Jess undertakes internal program evaluations for EDQ’s individual and group therapies and conducts internal research projects. She also provides administration support.
She has previous experience as a Research Assistant in the field of Public Health, has a Bachelor of Psychological Science with Honours, and has recently completed her Master of Public Health, majoring in Epidemiology and Research Methods – undertaking her final master’s research project at EDQ before moving into her current role.
She is focused on utilising her previous studies in Psychology and Public Health to undertake research in the areas of mental health and health promotion and promote research that reduces stigmas surrounding mental health. Jess is also passionate about diversity and gender equity in research.
Jess values time with her friends, family, and cat. She enjoys going on camping trips, hiking, and spending time at the beach.
Nat is a practitioner in the Individual Clinical stream of EDQ’s services, (Masters of Counselling), who has been working as a counsellor and case worker for over 10 years in the areas of homelessness, mental health, women’s services and eating issues.
She also is a qualified yoga teacher for both adults and kids. Nat see her work as an exploration with people to enquire and find healing, freedom and contentment in their lives. She works from a range of approaches and values the therapeutic relationship as restorative and a place for change.
Nat enjoys spending time with her family and animals (2 dogs, 2 cats and 3 chickens), camping and road trips to the Outback, playing football and being by the water.
Lisa is a lived-experience counsellor and group facilitator at EDQ, with a Bachelor’s Degree in Psychology and a Master’s in Social Work. Lisa has been involved in the EDQ community for over five years in different capacities as a Mentor, Senior Mentor, Speaker and Peer Support Worker. Lisa has experience working with clients of all ages living with eating issues, disability, and mental health concerns. Lisa identifies as half-Vietnamese and has an understanding for the importance of cultural sensitivity in therapy for clients who come from ethnic minorities or backgrounds.
Lisa is trained in a blend of therapies and believes that therapy is a space for healing, growth and empowerment. Lisa takes a compassionate, trauma-focused, and person-centred approach which values all individuals as experts of their own lived experience. Lisa seeks to maximise client’s involvement, direction, and control in sessions. Lisa believes that therapy should be a safe and supportive space for clients to explore any barriers they wish to focus on, to heal harmful relationships with food and body, and to support them to connect with the life they would like to lead, free of eating issues.
As a professional Social Worker Lisa is committed to her ongoing professional development and is involved in a range of activities to ensure that her practice is current and relevant to clients’ needs and community issues.
Outside of EDQ, Lisa is an artist and musician, loves baking, going swimming and spending time with the many pets that don’t belong to her, but are in her life.
Sarah is a practitioner in the individual clinical stream. Sarah has completed a Masters in Counselling and has a background in eating disorder support, and supporting carers and families.
Sarah is passionate about empowering clients through a strengths-based approach. Sarah endeavours to create a safe and open space within individual and group support. Sarah aims to bring her own values of compassion, connection and authenticity into her work with clients.
Sarah works from a strengths-based approach and uses the following frameworks within her individual sessions: Acceptance and commitment therapy, Dialectical Behaviour Therapy and Internal Family Systems.
In Sarah’s spare time she enjoys reading, writing, playing with her 2 cats and being outside.
Lucy comes from a social work background and has 10 years of experience across the community sector. She has supported young people, adults and families in the fields of mental health, eating disorders, substance use, homelessness and refugee settlement.
Alongside her social work practice, Lucy is an accredited yoga and mindfulness teacher and incorporates these skills into her therapeutic approach. With strong values in community and connection, Lucy strives to support people to overcome barriers and move toward their hopes and dreams.
Registered provisional psychologist with AHPRA. Bachelor of Psychological Science with Honours.
Amber’s approach is governed by a person-centred framework where she aims to meet clients where they are in recovery and is guided by their goals in every session. Amber is passionate about empowering clients through identifying their strengths and values. She endeavours to create a safe space for sharing by building a strong sense of connection and trust. She works from a range of approaches including Acceptance and Commitment Therapy, Dialectical Behaviour Therapy and Gestalt Therapy in her practice.
Amber recognizes that whilst individual recovery journeys are different, recovery is always possible.
She enjoys gardening and being in the sun and values spending time with her friends and family.
Poppy is a registered psychotherapist with PACFA and holds a Master of Psychotherapy (Hons) and Bachelor of Science (Psychology).
Having had a lived experience of eating disorders, Poppy is aware of the bravery, courageand strength it takes to reach out for support and join the path towards healing. Poppy is passionate about supporting and empowering those in their own unique journey through eating disorder recovery.
Poppy works in a psychodynamic frame with a focus on the future, drawing upon a wide variety of approaches to suit each individual’s experiences and needs. Some examples include Psychodynamic, Person-Centred, Compassion-Focused, Emotion-Focused, Strength-Based, Solution-Focused and Trauma-Informed approaches.
Outside of work Poppy enjoys being outdoors, hiking, reading, strength-training, and spending time with her partner and their rescue cat. Poppy is passionate about nature and animals which were a large part of her life growing up in her home country Aotearoa New Zealand
Kayla is a practitioner in the clinical stream delivering brief intervention counselling and groupwork.
She uses Acceptance and Commitment Therapy to help clients identify areas of strength and develop practical skills to lead a meaningful life throughout recovery and beyond.
Kayla has a Bachelor’s Degree in Psychology and a Master’s Degree in Public Health (Health Promotion). She is also currently furthering her studies in Psychology. She seeks to combine her knowledge of Psychology and Public Health by empowering clients to recognise the impacts of harmful societal structures and messaging and how to heal from these. Having lived-experience, Kayla is especially passionate about challenging diet culture.
In her spare time, Kayla enjoys listening to live music, dancing, going to the beach, and trying all sorts of different creative hobbies.
Mary-Ann has a Bachelor of Applied Social Science (Counselling) and works as a Carer and Family Coach at EDQ.
Mary-Ann has worked in the field of eating disorders for 6 years including short term support and group facilitation for people with eating disorders as well as carers, families and friends. For the past two years, Mary-Ann has supported carers individually and in a group setting, to help them improve their understanding of eating disorders and ways they can support their loved one.
Mary-Ann’s work is informed by Professor Janet Treasure’s work, and she is passionate about helping families work towards a collaborative approach to recovery.
Mary-Ann particularly enjoys facilitating the family skills workshop. Mary-Ann enjoys spending time with her family, being in the outdoors and by the water.
Rohani holds a Bachelor of Arts with Honours in Psychology, and a Postgraduate Certificate in Health Promotion.
Rohani has worked in the social services sector for 10 years, previously in mental health and psychosocial disability, domestic and family violence, and sexual assault. She has also worked in policy and advocacy, community engagement and international development. She has recently started studying a Master’s.
Rohani values a person centred, strengths-based, and recovery-oriented approach, and is passionate about the value of lived experience and peer support. As a carer and family coach, Rohani’s work is based on Professor Janet Treasure’s evidence informed collaborative, skills-based approach.
Rohani enjoys patting dogs, bushwalking, creative arts and music, and mindfulness.
Laura is a photographer, freelance writer and a fully qualified recovery coach.
She has been living in Australia for 3 years after moving from England where she ran her photography business while overcoming her own eating disorder. She found freedom using her love of helping others, education and humorous honesty. Laura’s framework is collaborative and person-centred. Laura provides a positive, entertaining voice alongside support and education to anyone with eating disorders, body-confidence struggles and anxiety through harnessing the power of sharing, intuition and non-judgmental acceptance of one another.
She speaks, mentors and supports both publicly and privately about her lived experiences of eating disorders alongside Eating Disorders Queensland, The Butterfly Foundation and The Wandi Nerida Facility. She further hopes to be a part of reducing shame, isolation and stigma that surrounds eating issues and mental health and help individuals create a positive, compassionate relationship with their body, mind and whole self.
In her spare time she loves good gelato, travelling and reading.
Mandy has over 20 years’ experience providing peer support, recovery coaching and care services both in the community and private practice. Her multiple decade lived experience background in eating disorders, family breakdown and trauma gave her a heart to be involved in this line of work. Residing in Cairns, Far North Queensland, she works remotely when not visiting Brisbane.
Mandy has been with EDQ for 5 years in numerous roles including Peer Mentor, Senior Mentor, Peer Support Worker and more recently Psychosocial Recovery Coach working with NDIS clients.
Loving people and their stories, Mandy believes that recovery is possible and not something that has to be sold, but modelled. Present life finds Mandy enjoying simple pleasures of time with family, walking, writing, and getting side tracked with a good book – all made better with the accompaniment of black coffee.
Amira has moved into the Peer Worker position after completing her Masters of Social Work placement at EDQ. With a lived experience, she hopes to support people move towards their ideal life free from the eating disorder.
She was inspired by studying anthropology during her undergraduate degree, so is keenly aware of the way culture shapes how we understand and behave in the world, and more specifically how cultural mores contribute to eating disorders.
She is passionate about supporting people to move towards the life they want, and believes recovery is possible for every person. Amira always aims to move through the world non-judgementally with kindness and open mindedness.
Amira enjoys board game nights with friends, watching funny British Panel Quiz Shows and doing yoga to relax.
Megan is a graduate of the University of Queensland; she holds a Bachelor of Exercise and Nutrition Sciences and a Master of Dietetic Studies.
Megan is a strong advocate for recovery, non-diet nutrition and body acceptance. She believes empathy, compassion and expertise are the foundation of supporting individuals with eating concerns.
Megan has undertaken research in the eating disorder field, works as a peer mentor with individuals pursuing recovery, and is active in the pro-recovery social media space.
Jane is an Accredited Mental Health Social Worker who has experience of working with eating disorders, problematic substance use and trauma.
She believes all of us are experts on our own unique internal systems. She sees her role as a support for clients in accessing this knowledge and better understanding their responses to situations and to increase their capacity to choose responses that are more in line with their own values.
She utilises various modalities, including CBT, ACT and Internal Family Systems. She likes to bring humour into the counselling room alongside her honest and down to earth approach to life.
Sarah graduated from Griffith University, Gold Coast 2018 and has been working with individuals during their recovery for the past four years. Sarah has experience working one-on-one and running community workshops for mental health services.
In addition, Sarah is experienced in managing chronic health conditions, sports nutrition, and has treated a range of individuals living in Far North Queensland Rural communities.
Sarah is committed to working with individuals, families, and carers to either prevent or manage and help individuals with their recovery. Sarah is passionate about educating and empowering those she cares for so they can rebuild and maintain a healthy relationship with food and their body.
Sarah is an amateur green thumb, has been practicing yoga in her free time for over 10 years and recently become a mother.
Estimated completion time is 10-15 minutes.
This form is for individuals seeking treatment for themselves.
If you are a carer/key support person, or looking for treatment for another person, please email admin@edq.org.au instead.
Hello, this will be your first step of engaging with Eating Disorders Qld. We acknowledge that it can be difficult to discuss your experiences with eating disorder/s and body image issues, particularly at first.
To make it a bit easier, we have developed this form that you can complete and send back to us before we call you.
You will receive a call to discuss the information provided, or we are happy to complete the form with you. During this call we can discuss any questions or touch on issues pertaining to the questions on the form.
After the phone assessment has been completed and we both feel that EDQ is a good fit one of our practitioners will arrange a more comprehensive ‘intake’ session.
During an intake session, you and the practitioner will review your needs, recovery goals and expectations of therapy/holistic recovery needs. This session takes around 90 minutes.
We will also go through Confidentiality and our shared Rights & Responsibilities. Looking forward to meeting you!
Due to the high demand for EDQ’s funded services, and allowing for fair equitable distribution of therapeutic resources to the community:
• EDQ requires 48 working hours’ notice of cancellation for all appointments
• In the event of 3 late cancellations or no-shows, your practitioner will discuss other support options with you before booking another appointment
EDQ acknowledges recovery and the therapeutic process is not linear. Please discuss any changing needs or barriers with your practitioner so EDQ can best support you and the greater community.
To access services with EDQ, we require that you engage regularly with a GP to monitor your medical stability. As part of this process, a GP will need to sign EDQ’s client medical clearance form. Medical monitoring is required for all clients, no matter what kind of eating disorder behaviour is present. Eating disorders have significant impacts on physical health.
If you do not currently have a suitable GP, please let us know and we can assist you to find one.