Counselling & Psychotherapy

We value creating a personal therapy that is tailored to your specific needs and requirements.

When behaviours around food, eating and exercise feel out of control, and your head is spinning with anxiety about your weight and body image, knowing where or how to start therapy can feel confusing and hopeless.

It can take a lot of courage to make contact, and we want to support you through the first step of getting in touch.

You can complete one of our website forms, call us or send us an email. One of the team will contact you to arrange a 10-15 minute call.

We will listen to your story to understand what you want to get from therapy. We will ask if you have a preference for a particular therapist, the times you are available and the budget you are working with.

Together we will explore options to find a therapist that is the best fit for you, and arrange the next step of the process.

Experience tells us that good rapport between client and therapist is essential for successful therapy, and that’s why we ask you to come and meet a therapist for a 30 minute Discovery Session.

You get a chance to meet and describe the changes you are looking for, and your therapist will explain how individual therapy can best work for you.

Together you can then decide if working together feels right.

Once booked in you will receive some documents to complete before your initial session, which gives your therapist some context about your eating history and behaviour.

Sessions last for 50 minutes, but some therapists can offer longer sessions on request. Initially we like to work with you on a weekly basis, but for some people twice weekly might be a better option.

The length of therapy depends on your individual needs and requirements, and your therapist will work with you to find the right time to end.

Your therapist will take time to understand you and the problems you are bringing to therapy, exploring how you perceive different elements of your life.

Understanding the issues you are struggling with around weight, food, eating and body image allows your therapist to plan how best to support you.

Together you will agree areas to focus on that will move you towards the change you are looking for from therapy.

We ask you to keep a food diary for a few weeks, so we can highlight patterns of behaviour that cause you distress, and explore the symptoms you are experiencing.

We look at the big picture of how your nutrition is affecting your physical and mental health and suggest small changes to eating and lifestyle so you can feel better.

Reducing symptoms of anxiety, stress and cravings allows us to explore the underlying psychological factors behind your experiences.

This is where we explore the reasons why you struggle with your eating behaviour. Understanding your ‘food script’ helps us identify why, when and how your distorted patterns of eating took hold, and gives us a clear focus for psychological interventions that will support you in moving forwards.

We can be hungry for other things in life, that food can replace, and our eating can often provide us with momentary comfort.

We work with you to bring unhelpful patterns of thinking, feeling and behaviour that are connected with food into awareness.

Your therapist will support you in teasing apart these unhelpful connections, providing you with skills to create change in your life.

Our clients come to us with some form of distress around food, eating, weight and size. As they progress through therapy many realise that their eating behaviour and size often represent layers of distress, coping and unresolved issues from other aspects of their lives.

The permission is that you can bring all of yourself to therapy. Our therapists are trained to deal with areas such as trauma, abuse, addiction and bereavement.

We invite you to share with us any topic or theme in your life that is making you unhappy.

The length of therapy is dependent on many factors that are personal to you. We offer short-term therapy, which can target symptom reduction and may be suitable if you have budget constraints.

We also offer longer term therapy if you want to work at a deeper level and need more ongoing support in your process of growth and change. Ending therapy is something you can discuss with your therapist at any time.

They will explore your motives and feelings about this, and together you can agree a suitable end date that will facilitate a positive and nurturing end to your relationship.