Counselling & Psychotherapy
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Welcome
I provide psychotherapy and counselling to help you better understand yourself, your situation or a problem you may be experiencing. During therapy, we will work together to develop pathways towards a more positive outcome.
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What do I offer?
I offer Individual and Couple Therapy.
I aim to understand and connect with your experiences, while helping you work to resolve the issues you bring to therapy and reach your desired outcome. I provide a supportive, respectful, and non-judgmental space to work within.
I offer treatment for a range of issues, including anxiety, panic attacks, health anxiety, generalised anxiety, social anxiety, obsessive compulsive disorder, feeling sad, phobias, depression, low self esteem, anger issues, trauma, relationship issues, stress management, coping with long term physical health issues, loss and bereavement and adapting to life changes.
Thinking about starting therapy?
If you are thinking about starting therapy, please contact me and we can arrange a no fee appointment lasting up to 30 minutes. During this appointment I will ask questions to get to know more about you and what you would like to get from coming to therapy.
If, after this initial meeting, we both decide I am the right therapist for you, we can book in a full session at a convenient day and time.
At present all therapy sessions are held online or via the telephone. Once the guidelines change I will resume face to face sessions. If you wish to continue online or telephone work that is fine.
Contact me on 07835 763 287 or email info@amycoopercounselling.co.uk for an informal chat.
Please view the information below for more about me and the therapeutic approaches I use.
About me
Alongside running my private practice, I also work as a Cognitive Behavioural Psychotherapy (CBT) / Couple Therapy for Depression practitioner at an NHS psychological therapy service working with people with anxiety and depression. I am an advanced trainee in a psychotherapy approach called Transactional Analysis (TA). I am member of the UK Association for Transactional Analysis (UKATA). I have a diploma in TA counselling and have been in advanced training for 8 years. I am a qualified and accredited CBT therapist registered with the British Association for Behavioural & Cognitive Psychotherapies (BABCP). Both the UKATA and BABCP subscribe to a code of ethics which I aim to adhere to.
The approach I use
The main approach I use is Transactional Analysis (TA). The underpinning ethos of this approach is that ‘people are ok’. That means you, I and others have worth, value and dignity. Problems often arise when we do not believe ourselves and/ or others to be ‘OK’. We may have more negative or painful beliefs about ourselves and others that cause us to feel anxious, angry or low in mood. Throughout your life, you will have learnt different ways of reacting to stress and problems. In TA, we understand this by using the ego state model. The ego state model is a way of explaining why and how we have different thoughts, feelings and behaviours at different times or in different situations. Below is a description of the different ego states.
Parent ego state
If you are in a Parent ego state, you will think, feel and act in a manner that is a copy of one of your parents or a parent type figure from your childhood. This can be useful, for example, you may replay nurturing behaviours of a parent. Other times the copied thoughts, feelings and behaviours may be unhelpful, they may be more critical and destructive and can cause problems.
Adult ego state
If you are in an Adult ego state, you will use your full grown-up resources when you think, feel and act. Your response will be appropriate to the here and now situation.
Child ego state
If you are in a Child ego state, you will think, feel and act in ways you used to as a child. This may include feeling scared or angry or not knowing how to think or feel.
Life script and games
Life script is an unconscious life plan. A person’s life plan grows out of decisions made during the early years of their life. These decisions are an infant’s way of surviving a complex and confusing world. The decisions we make in childhood stay with us as we move into adulthood and can distort the way we perceive ourselves, others and world. TA theory states we play ‘games’ as a means of staying in our life script. A game is described as engaging in repetitive transactions (out of our awareness) which end up confirming our unhelpful beliefs. Do you ever find the same thing keeps happening? For example, do you ever think ‘Why does everyone let me down?’ ‘Why do I always get rejected?’ These are examples of the payoff when engaging in games, the confirmation of our script beliefs. I may teach you more about this during therapy but do not feel overwhelmed or worry you should know the theory. This approach helps me understand you at a deeper level and guides the treatment plan.
Cognitive Behavioural Therapy
I also use Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT) interventions to help people work toward their goal and experience symptom relief. CBT can help people identify unhelpful thoughts and develop a more balanced perspective of themselves, others and the world. People also learn to identify behaviours they engage in that may keep the problem going. In therapy people can experiment with changing these behaviours, often resulting in positive changes to the way they see themselves and others, and the way they feel.
Fees
My fee is £50 per session for individual sessions and £65 per session for couple therapy.
I have a limited number of appointments available at a reduced rate for people on a lower income or who are struggling financially. Please contact me if you would like further details.