Samantha Woodhead Counselling

Sam

Welcome

Hi, I'm Sam. I'm a qualified Counsellor offering a safe and confidential counselling service in Horsforth, Leeds.

I practise counselling with an integrative approach; this means that I use a range of tools and techniques depending on the issues you may want helping with, so I focus on you as an individual. I will look at the background to your problems which may have built up over a long period of time using a range of psychotherapeutic techniques.

I'm a registered member of the British Association for Counselling and Psychotherapy (BACP) and my working practices adhere to their ethical framework and standards for professional conduct, so you can be confident that you're in safe hands. I discuss my work in confidence with a counselling supervisor, who oversees the quality of my work. The counselling supervisor is also bound by the same code of ethical framework as me.

Counselling and Psychotherapy

On this site you I’ll tell you what Counselling and Psychotherapy is and the kind if issues they can be used to address. These issues may vary from a temporary lack of confidence, or dealing with a recent bereavement; through to deep-seated problems of child-hood sexual abuse that you may never have felt the need to share with anyone before.

I’ll tell you about what you can expect to happen during a session of counselling, especially the initial sessions. I'll also give the details of duration and cost.

Get in touch

Finally, when you’re ready to start the process of counselling there are details of how to contact me.

What is Counselling?

Counselling offers you a time to explore issues that are causing you despair, confusion or concern, in confidence, with someone will not tell you what to do, judge or reproach you.

Your Counsellor is trained to offer therapy by helping you understand yourself and your feelings and emotions, by encouraging you to explore your options in a safe and trusting environment.

Most importantly your Counsellor will help you to understand why you are feeling a certain way, how your problems arose and help you to learn how to avoid similar problems arising again.

Counselling is not about fixing problems, it is about changing your understanding and view of the problems, so that you can begin to work towards living in a way that you find more satisfying. In essence counselling is what is called a “talking therapy”. You and your counsellor will sit down together in a room for a fixed period and this time is just for you to talk about whatever is troubling you from your perspective. Your counsellor will listen actively to what you say, reflecting back some of this, with the aim of enabling you to recognize and explore your feelings around the matter.

What use is just talking?

Often in life we don’t really talk to people about how we feel. Instead we give what we think are required responses, for example when someone says “how are you” we often reply “fine”, even if we don’t always feel fine. We do this because:

Your counsellor will be unlike the majority of the people in your life as they have no expectations of you. For that reason, whatever you choose to disclose about yourself, they will not feel let down by you. Unlike most people in your life, your counsellor wants you to talk about the things that are important just to you; they will not expect you to enquire about them. Your sessions are time just for you. This unique time allows you the space to listen to yourself and identify your true feelings as opposed to glossing over them; as we so often do in day-to-day life. Your counsellor will take the time to actively listen to you and to understand your experiences from your perspective as you tell your story. So, talking to someone outside of your family or circle of friends, will allow you to gain a new insight on what is troubling you.

Who can benefit from Counselling?

There are many different reasons that someone might to seek help from a counsellor, these can include:

In each case, your counsellor will help you understand the underlying causes, rather then seek quick fixes.

First session

Our first session will be an opportunity for you to explore what has brought you to counselling and to decide if I am the right person to help you. You can outline your worries, issues, concerns and fears; whether they are current problems or experiences from the past which are still causing you distress. In this session, we will discuss what you are hoping to achieve from counselling, so that we know where we are aiming for in our work together. This is important, as it allows us to review our work at regular intervals.

Next sessions

Many issues can be resolved with short term work of typically 6 to 12 sessions, whilst some may need longer term therapy. This will be discussed when we meet. In our sessions we will work at your own pace, as you dictate this by what you bring to the sessions. This means that you won’t feel under any pressure to move too quickly through events. Equally, we won’t discuss any painful or personal events until you’re completely ready to explore them. Counselling offers a safe and respectful space to work through your difficulties and will support you as well as challenging you; as appropriate, to move forward. Everything that is discussed between us is kept confidential. The only exceptions to this would be if I:

Any personal details I keep are stored securely, together with any aide memoir notes that I may make, under the terms of the 1998 Data Protection Act.

What will be different for me following counselling?

I believe everyone has the desire and ability to fulfil their own potential. I also think that we all can change and grow as people, if we are given the opportunity to see how to do this. Counselling “holds a mirror” up for you to see how you really feel about past issues and events. It allows you to see new possibilities and make choices and changes that may give you a more peaceful outlook on life.

Next Steps

To start the process of counselling, please contact me. Each counselling session of 50 minutes costs £58, with payment bank transfer, cash or cheque please. Should you need to cancel a session, please give one week’s notice where possible; but in all cases 24 hour notice is required in order to avoid payment. This is because your appointment time is secured for you each week so it can not be taken by anyone else.

Contact me

Each counselling session of 50 minutes costs £58, with payment by bank transfer, cash or cheque please. You can contact me by giving me a call on 07948016355. Please leave a message with your contact details and I'll get back to you. You can email me at samanthawoodheadcounselling@gmail.com.


BACP BACP 092756