WHAT IS PSYCHOTHERAPY?
What is psychotherapy exactly?
Psychotherapy can be a profound, life changing experience that can help improve mental health, confidence, self understanding, resilience, interpersonal relationships and much more. It is a form of talking therapy, where a client and therapist meet at regular intervals for a set amount of time to work through issues. There are many types of psychotherapy. You may have heard of psychoanalysis, or CBT for example.
With training in Integrative Psychotherapy, I work in different ways depending on the needs of each client. I draw from different theories, including psychodynamics which looks into how your past may affect you right now, phenomenology, which examines very closely your personal experiences of life, events, and feelings, and I believe that every human is utterly unique.
I find that calming the nervous system to ease anxiety can be very helpful in and out of a therapy session, so may also introduce grounding and breathing techniques as well as other bodywork, when relevant.
How do counselling and psychotherapy differ?
Both counselling and psychotherapy involve talking with a trained practitioner to help with emotional, relational or psychological issues. Counselling often focuses on one issue in particular, and usually takes place over a shorter term.
Psychotherapy is typically longer term, allowing time to build a trusting relationship and go deeper, identifying and working with more complex underlying issues that affect behaviour, emotions and relationships. Psychotherapy contains elements of looking into the past to see how it affects the present day, and can also help identify current patterns, coping strategies and more which can help clarify what is currently causing distress.
How I work
A private space
I aim to offer you a warm, safe, non-judgemental space in which to share openly, with confidence that you will be respected and accepted. I ask relevant questions to really understand your subjective experience of events and then we work together to make things better for you.
Confidentiality
Confidentiality is crucial to psychotherapy, where trust plays a major role in the success of the sessions. Everything you say in our sessions will be treated as strictly confidential
Collaborative work
I like to work collaboratively to help you meet your goals. I will listen to what you are hoping to get from therapy and check in along the way to ensure we are meeting your expectations.
A diverse network
I work within a network of experienced psychotherapists with varying areas of expertise, so if I feel as though I might not be best suited for your needs I will offer you a referral on.