An integrative approach to counselling and psychotherapy

I can offer you a confidential and supportive space to share your thoughts and feelings and explore the areas of your life you would like to change.

Through therapy, you can gain a better understanding of yourself, your situation and your relationships with those around you and find your own answers to difficulties and make choices about your life. To help you explore your thoughts and feelings, I will listen, respond and sometimes challenge you.

My approach is integrative, which means I use a variety of counselling models to find a way of working which suits your needs. For example, if you would like to work in a creative way beyond simply talking I can facilitate this. You can bring drawings, dreams, poetry and music to sessions if this is helpful to you.

I also offer Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT) which is particularly helpful for addressing patterns of thinking and behaving in the present and Integrative Psychosexual Therapy which draws on my specialist knowledge around sex and relationships. I can integrate these approaches with counselling or offer them in a purer format depending on your needs.

We can explore which approach would be most helpful to your particular difficulties in the first session. However, research shows that the quality of the relationship between a client and therapist is more important than the theoretical approach used.

My theoretical background

My core training has been in integrative counselling and psychotherapy, an approach that uses a range of perspectives, including humanistic (person centred, existential and gestalt) transcultural and psychodynamic theory (such as attachment theory).

I believe that human beings become who they are through their changing relationships with other people, as well as a range of social, cultural and environmental influences. For this reason, in sessions we may focus on your current experiences and relationships and, if relevant, explore how these may relate to your previous experiences and relationships with others. Your early family experiences may be particularly relevant to how you have developed. At times we might explore the experiences that may emerge within the therapeutic relationship too.