What Can I Expect?

Free telephone consultation

If you would like to book an appointment or would like to briefly talk to someone about whether psychological therapy is the right step for you then we offer a free initial 15 minutes telephone consultation. If you would like to book your first appointment then we can discuss your availability and choose the right time to fit your needs. We offer a variety of times and days to choose from such as evenings and weekends. 

Assessment for the suitability of therapy

We call our first appointment an assessment session. The first session is a chance to explore your needs and any difficulties you are having and start to reflect on a potential formulation about any factors that may be influencing or maintaining your difficulties. At the end of this session we will make some suggestions based on the types of approaches you would benefit from. Sometimes we may need more than one session to reach this conclusion. It is also a chance for you to see if you feel comfortable with your therapist. If we do not think you would benefit from psychological therapy we will be honest and open with you from the start and make suggestions about what may help.

Therapy Sessions

All sessions last around 50 minutes and some people like to come weekly or fortnightly. It is important not to leave too long a duration between your sessions in order to maintain the progress you are making. 

Each individual may require a different amount of sessions. We can give you a rough idea at the start about the amount of sessions you may need. Sometimes we reccomend a set amount of sessions and then have a review. 

If you have a budget, we can hold this in mind and plan your sessions around this.

Session fees

All fees for the sessions are payable on the day. If you would like to pay by cheque or bank transfer then funds must be cleared by the day of your appointment. Please note, we do not have access to a card machine at this time.

If you have private health insurance, you may be able to claim your sessions back. We are registered with some providers already.

If you would like to cancel your appointment, we ask if you could give 48 hours notice. If not, it is very unlikely that we can fill this slot in the short space of time so your session fee will still be chargeable.  

Please contact us further for session fees.

Crisis - Or need urgent help

Unfortunatley we are unable to provide crisis support to clients outside of the sessions we have together. Due to the nature of our work, we may not be able to answer telephone messages straight away. Therefore, if you are in crisis or need urgent help, please contact your GP, contact emergency services on 111 or go to your nearest A&E department.

You can also get help from the following agencies:

www.samaritans.org - or call 116 123

www.sane.org.uk

www.mind.org.uk