Yes, we take this12 to 20 sessions is the usual length
Not a bad week. The kind where you have stopped expecting it to lift.
Longer work, and slower. The first four or five sessions are usually spent getting a shape on it: when it arrived, what it took first, and what is still standing.
If you are already on medication we work alongside it and alongside whoever prescribed it. If you are not, we will not push you towards it or away from it; that is a conversation with a doctor.
Who would hold it
Where two names are here, either can take it. The call decides on the wait and on who sounds right to you rather than on a rota.
Counsellor · 17 years
Counsellor. Low mood that has lasted, retirement, bereavement.
2 weeks
Counselling psychologist, clinical lead · 22 years
Counselling psychologist and clinical lead. Twenty-two years, mostly loss.
4 weeks
The rest of the list
Nights that start at two in the morning and a day spent paying for them.
First session looks atWhen it started, what your nights actually look like hour by hour, and the list of things you have quietly stopped doing.
8–14sessions is usual
The ones that feel like a heart attack, and the fear of the next one.
First session looks atWhere you were for the first one, what you did to survive it, and what you have been avoiding since.
6–10sessions is usual
After a death, including the ones nobody around you counts as a big loss.
First session looks atWho died and when, what the last weeks were like, and what you have not been able to say out loud yet.
10–18sessions is usual
Together or on your own. We do not have a preferred ending.
First session looks atWhat each of you would call the problem, how long it has been that, and what has already been tried.
6–12sessions is usual
Including when it is only at weekends and nobody has said anything.
First session looks atA plain week: what you drank, when, and what was happening in the hour before.
10–16sessions is usual
The eleven o'clock emails, the Sunday dread, the thing you have become at work.
First session looks atYour actual hours for one ordinary week, and what happens in your body on a Sunday evening.
6–10sessions is usual
Assault, an accident, or a childhood you have never described to anyone.
First session looks atNothing about the event itself. Sleep, startle, what sets it off now, and who knows.
16–30sessions is usual
We are not fast enough. This is who is, and we are still here tomorrow.
Instead888-NEW-LIFE on 888 639 5433, around the clock, or the emergency department at UHWI or KPH.
Not ours
We do not write reports for people who are not you.
InsteadA registered clinical psychologist doing independent assessment work. Ring us for two names.
Not ours
Not on our own. With a doctor already watching, yes.
InsteadA physician or dietitian first. With monitoring already in place, ring us back and we will take it.
Not ours
Our youngest client is sixteen. Below that we are not trained for it.
InsteadThe Child Guidance Clinic, through a doctor or a school, or one of two private child therapists we can name.
Not ours
None of us can prescribe. A psychiatrist can, and we work alongside them.
InsteadYour own doctor, or a psychiatrist. We will keep working with you alongside them.
Not ours