Therapist Profiles

Introduction
We are a new expanding partnership of independent therapists. We are not a ‘club’ open to anyone wishing to call themselves therapist, psychotherapist or counsellor; instead we are a partnership of dedicated professional therapists who are building a reputation for providing high quality therapeutic services. Aside from all our therapists being qualified and reputable professionals they all are interviewed, CRB checked, (Criminal Records Bureau), professionally supervised, carry sufficient indemnity insurance and work within the ethical guidance of the BACP to ensure that you receive the level of service, professionalism and therapeutic care that you deserve. They also demonstrate a commitment to their own personal awareness and personal and professional development that is essential for effective client work and have undertaken personal therapy as part of their training and therefore understand what it is to be a client.

While we understand that even therapists are human and that we all have lives and issues past and present and therefore do not expect ‘perfection’ from our therapists; we do however expect a high level of professionalism, training, self awareness and personal development. We do not believe that a therapist can be one thing in their own lives and another thing in their professional therapeutic relationships with their clients. We do not believe that it is possible to maintain a water tight seal between the two nor do we believe that it is healthy or congruent to do so. We therefore expect to see within our therapists’ own lives demonstrable qualities of:

• Openness
• Courage
• Perseverance
• Congruence / Authenticity
• Resilience
• Self-Belief
• Patience
• Compassion
• Tolerance
• Personal Growth
• Self-awareness
• Acceptance
• And good humour

Put simply, how can a client expect to receive help with an issue like ‘low self worth’ if their therapist has the same issue and denies the effect it has on their own life and work. It would not be unreasonable in such a circumstance for a client to say, ‘physician, heal thyself’. Also, Jung and other eminent theorists and practitioners clearly state that a therapist can only ‘journey’ with a client the distance of their own ‘journey’. That is to say that Therapy is a state of ‘relative poverty’ in which if one measured the personal development of therapist and client, if the client is ahead of the therapist then the therapist has nothing in terms of therapy to offer the client regardless of the level of training and knowledge of the therapist. In this case all that is on offer is training and knowledge which will be useful but not therapy.

Simply put, being a therapist is not a ‘hat’ one wears or a ‘job’ one does because one is paid to and something that is put down at the end of one’s working day. Instead, it is a dedication to a way of being that one utilises in one’s own relationship and one’s client relationships to promote personal growth and understanding of oneself and others.

(If you are a therapist seeking to join such a partnership, please feel free to contact us.)

Profiles
More often than not clients are expected to choose therapists speculatively based on little or no information. All a client has to help them make a decision are minor personal details, e.g. gender, race, affiliations, age range and the like; Qualifications, which are difficult to assess and Experience, which can amount to ‘time put in’ rather that ‘effective client work’. Clients are expected to ‘risk’ or invest time and money into a therapeutic relationship in which they know little or nothing about the therapist. We understand that the focus of therapy needs to be on the client and often clients believe that therapists should have experienced themselves the issue the client is suffering from when actually the opposite is true, (see About therapy), and perhaps that is why many therapists reveal nothing of themselves to avoid being rejected because of a misunderstanding concerning the nature of therapy and the helping relationship.

However, Counselling, Psychotherapy and Therapy are ‘disciplines’ or ‘professions’ which are totally dependant on the therapist’s own personal development and their ability to form solid, open, healthy, encouraging, and growthful relationships. This being the case it is impossible to assess how useful or helpful a therapist will be from scant personal information, qualifications and experience. The best one can do with such information is make a ‘negative’ decision; i.e. that a therapist without qualifications and experience is most likely to be an unhelpful choice. Conversely, we believe in your right to make a ‘positive’ informed decision and are willing to cater for this. To this end we have included ‘Therapist Profiles’ that not only give information concerning qualifications and experience but also some idea of the therapist themselves.

Profile writing is time consuming and it is difficult to know what to include. If one writes too little one can be seen as hiding something; too much one can be seen as “full of oneself”; and if one makes mistakes one can be seen as a fool. As therapists we do not sit in judgement of others but instead accept their frailties, mistakes and humanity as we accept our own. Therefore please read the profiles with the same intent they were written, i.e. to give you the opportunity to gain some understanding about each therapist and to assist you in making a positive informed decision. And please do not judge harshly our therapists’ literary expertise or their imperfections. They are real people who offer the opportunity of real help within a professional and caring relationship in the form of mutuality and transformation.

Also please do not be concerned if a therapist has not had an experience similar to your own. Similar experiences tend to be a distraction focussing attention from you, the client onto the therapist. Most people have experienced expressing thoughts, experiences and feelings to a friend when they say ‘I know exactly what you are feeling because it happened to me’ and then they go on to tell you about themselves rather than listen to what we have to say. And of course, no matter the similarity of event, we are all different and therefore experience things differently. Thus it seems that similarity of experience distracts people from being able to listen to others; so it is therefore better to avoid therapists with ‘fresh’ experiences similar to your own. As well as solid training and client experience, you need a therapist who has a variety of life and emotional experiences so that from that pallet of emotional understanding they can understand and ‘track’ your experience and emotional content accurately and experience the world through your eyes.

Below are the personal profiles of some, but not all of our therapists. The profiles are designed to give prospective clients an idea of what a therapist may be like and take a little of the risk out of choosing a therapist.

Carlos
Carlos is a fully qualified and indemnified Therapist with over four years Clinical experience and hundreds of client hours. He is trained and experienced in working with both young people and adults, both men and women, and has helped many overcome a huge variety of issues and concerns. His gentle and empathic approach encourages clients to feel safe and facilitates their free and open expression without fear of rejection or judging and enables them to feel understood and accepted. Carlos is also an adept communicator and relationship builder which he combines with gifted analytical and interpretative skills enabling him to connect with his clients within a healthy Therapeutic Relationship in which their issues can be truly explored and understood. He has the courage and fortitude to work at depth, supporting clients through their issues which offers them the opportunity to be different, to relate to themselves and their world differently and to become more courageous, dynamic, adaptable, accepting and spontaneous in their lives.

Though Carlos’ experience is wide, he is happy to work with anyone who wishes to work with him and has no preference for any particular type of client work as his style of working focuses on clients as individual people rather than clients as issues. He also believes that a variety of work prevents stagnation and cynicism.  If your wish to contact Carlos please visit our contact us page.
More…

Suzanne
Suzanne is a fully qualified and indemnified Therapist with over three years Psychotherapeutic clinical experience. She is well prepared for the rigors of clinical work being dedicated to her own Personal and Professional development. Suzanne recognises that we all have issues in our lives and therefore, through her own personal Therapy she has worked diligently upon her own personal development growing beyond past issues and concerns and thus is able to enter the Therapy room with a client and remain solely focussed on the client and the Therapeutic Relationship without personal distraction. She is gentle and supportive in her approach whilst at the same time being insightful and extremely intuitive. Suzanne has a natural ability to see beyond the obvious and engage with her clients at the deepest of levels.
More…