FAQs

Counselling is a therapeutic relationship in which you the client and me the counsellor are equals, so after first contact and an assessment session we can discuss the possibility of working together. My aim is to help you to be able to help yourself, I believe we only fulfil our dreams and wishes by ourselves.

I can provide a safe non-judgemental environment for you to be yourself. To talk and discuss anything that is on your mind causing you problems or issues in your life. Your mental health is important and I will provide support to help you get to where you want to be.

I will listen, reflect with you, challenge you and help you to deal or work towards finding a solution for yourself 

Counselling is a type of therapy and isn’t for everyone, that is one reason we will have an assessment session to see how we both feel about working together. I can hear your reasons for wanting counselling and what you would like the outcome to be, there is no guarantee that it will work for you but I do know the more committed you are the more likely progress will be made. 

If it doesn’t work, so if the ultimate outcome is not what you wanted it is more than likely that you will still have learnt more about yourself than before. The experience could be a stepping stone to either something else or future counselling with me or another counsellor. Sometimes we need to heal ourselves in small steps, get so far, apply what you have learnt to your life and then maybe do more work in the future. 

The first session will be an assessment, so me finding out more about you, what you want from counselling and both of us seeing if we can work together and then if we decide to continue we will go through the therapeutic contract.

Counselling is different for everyone, some people will attend a handful of sessions and feel ready to move on, where some people will find that longer term working will be needed or required. Upon hearing your issues and aims, I can suggest an amount of sessions which you agree upon. We will review after an agreed amount of sessions and the amount agreed upon is not fixed.

Trauma is relative to everyone, I will help you explore, come to terms and aid you getting to a place where the trauma becomes less prominent. Whatever trauma you have had, it is your feelings, emotions and reactions to it that I am interested in helping you with. Of course the nature of your trauma is important, but how it has affected you is where I can help.  

If you are interested in counselling but don’t have a specific problem you can identify, we can still work together to explore what it is that is not feeling right at the moment. If you are looking at attending counselling then you know you do not feel the best you can. So no matter how broad or unknown your issue or issues are, the fact that you feel you need counselling is a great start. Noticing something does not feel right is the first step to improving your life.

If you find it hard to talk and open up about your issue, don’t worry. The assessment session will give you a good idea how our future sessions will proceed and also at this moment in time I am a stranger to you, as you are to me. With time our therapeutic working relationship will deepen and being in a non-judgemental and safe space will hopefully make you feel safe to open up. If not maybe it’s not time for you to attend counselling.

Each session is 50 minutes long, 

Each session is £50

Not a problem, we all cannot make every appointment all the time, so once you know that you won’t be able to attend one week just let me know in advance. It will also work the other way too. 

Our contract will state weekly sessions but if you feel you need contact between sessions, you can contact me via phone or email. We can discuss your concern, decide if you are happy to wait for our next session or if you need one sooner, if so booking in an extra session can be made if space allows it.

Counselling is generally seen as a weekly thing, if you feel you need it less or more frequent there may be a possibility to accommodate this. This will be an issue discussed in the assessment and contracting session.