Nobody wants to stay feeling stuck, sad, angry or confused. All we want is for these feelings to be magicked away – hopefully never to return. Rather than banish troublesome feelings, good counselling or psychotherapy helps us to understand where these feelings are coming from and sheds light on new…
In counselling and psychotherapy, we have the opportunity to ‘tell our story’ to someone who is able to hear it; someone who can help us think about it in new ways and support us while we are doing so. But what about outside the consulting room? What else can we do…
It can be hard to ask for help and particularly so if you are someone who has become used to dealing with your own difficulties alone. You may be making the assumption that asking for help is somehow a sign of weakness and that by allowing yourself to be vulnerable in front…
If, as children, we felt repeatedly hurt, humiliated, abandoned, suffocated or ignored by someone close to us and on whom we depended for survival (usually a parent), we might have made the perfectly logical decision – at least from a four-year-old’s point of view – to keep other people at bay.
Any therapist worth their salt will have gone through or be going through many months of their own therapy. Personally, as a client, I wouldn’t want to go to see any practitioner who hadn’t been through this experience and come out the other side – more or less still standing.
I am sometimes asked by potential new clients if I am prepared to see them fortnightly rather than on my usual weekly basis. I understand that counselling or psychotherapy is a major commitment both in terms of time and cost and that on the face of it meeting less frequently…
Most practitioners agree that is the strength of the relationship between you and your therapist that is the best indicator for a successful counselling or psychotherapy outcome. If the fit between the two of you is good, then the chances are you, as the client, will be able to make…
“How could you be so selfish?!” “I’m finding you aggressive right now!” “You’re jealous!”
For me, counselling is about change. You might consider visiting a counsellor when you are feeling uncomfortable or distressed about some aspect of your life. Together, you and your counsellor will explore what’s going on and consider options for making changes to the way you respond to certain situations and feelings.
