There are many reasons why someone may feel that they need to seek counselling. These may be related to feelings of depression, sadness due to a bereavement or other loss, low self esteem, difficulties with relationships, parenting issues, stressful work situations or coming to terms with a significant change in life. Sometimes it isn't easy to identify the reasons for feelings of depression or anxiety. Counselling can offer a place to express difficult emotions, help to unravel problems and offer clearer understanding with new ways of thinking and being.
Psychodynamic Counselling is a way of understanding a person in the context of their whole life and helping them to overcome their difficulties. This involves exploring the conscious and the unconscious, past and present relationships and ways of coping. These can then be thought through and used to help understand a person's current distress.
An initial assessment will give the opportunity to talk about difficulties or worries in a safe, confidential environment. We will think together about whether counselling will help you and then arrange further appointments. The sessions will be weekly and will last for 50 minutes. If we decide that counselling is not the best option I will try to help with a more suitable referral.
Short-term work can be useful for specific problems where you may want to focus on one particular issue and work to solve a problem or come to terms with a significant adjustment in life.
Longer-term open ended therapy helps with issues that have persisteed for some time.
Parent-Infant Psychotherapy can help mothers and fathers who are struggling with the transition to parenthood. Difficulties sometimes start in pregnancy with unwanted thoughts and feelings about becoming a parent. I work with mother's experiencing postnatal depression, anxiety or feeling that being a mum can sometimes feel overwhelming and hard to manage. These feelings may have been triggered by a difficult pregnancy, birth experience, feeding problems, baby not sleeping well or feeling that the bonding process is not how you expected it to be.
I work with mums and/or dads and babies and toddlers up to the age of 2 years. I sometimes use video to help parents make loving attachments to their babies. The focus of Parent-Infant Psychotherapy is the relationship between parent and baby/toddler.