Feeling Anxious or Depressed - What Can You Do About It?

Feeling anxious or depressed is more common than you may think and is typically caused by a past or recent traumatic experience.

One of the best ways to alleviate these feelings is through counselling. The purpose of which, is to help you explore and learn the impact that your traumatic experience has on your mental and on your emotional wellbeing.

Here at The Terrace, I can help you take those first steps in unravelling your experiences to allow you to become more aware of your thought and behavioural patterns and ultimately how they impact your daily life. I will help you to recognise those triggers, which typically cause anxiety and depression. Over time, through the counselling process, you will be able to develop and to adopt coping mechanisms to manage your anxiety and depression.

What to Expect from Counselling

The first priority will be for me to listen actively, in order to fully understand the problems that you are experiencing.

During your sessions we will look closely at finding and recognising your behaviour patterns. We take as much time as is necessary to work through sensitive topics and then work together to define the changes you want to make in your relationship with yourself and others.

As you progress further through your counselling sessions, you will start to reflect and gain further insight. This comes about by working through your past experiences and behaviours. We start to focus on the changes you want to make to your emotional resilience and your communication. We then create goals as you deepen your understanding and comprehension.

In our sessions, we establish achievable and purposeful personal changes. We collaborate on what works for you, cultivating positive, healthy and strong relationships with yourself and others.

To keep you motivated as we progress through regular therapy sessions, we work through your goals and adjust them as your symptoms improve, keeping you conscious of your thoughts and actions.

Each therapy is tailored to the individual, it is ultimately a very co-creative process. If we agree to work together, we then consider the treatment length – it may be just a few sessions or on an open-ended basis. It is helpful to work out a time frame from the outset, which we can agree and review as the work unfolds.

What type of therapies do I use?

I use a combination of therapies:

Person Centred Approach

I generally use this type of therapy for individuals who are undergoing situational types of stress and are lacking in self-esteem and self-confidence. Short term stressors often trigger anxiety or low mood. Situational problems include; parenting difficulties, relationship conflict, bereavement and frustration with work life.

A common trait in clients who benefit from the Person-Centred Approach is a need for greater self-confidence. This therapy steers away from the idea that human beings are flawed and require treatment for their problematic behaviours. Instead, it provides clients with the tools and resources they need to understand themselves and what they need to achieve to make positive change in their lives.

Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT)

This is a therapy that I use for individuals with long-term mental health issues including, but not limited to, Anxiety & Panic attacks and Depression

The purpose of CBT is to enable us explore and gain a better understanding of your thoughts and behavioural patterns.

Emotions: What we feel affects how we think and act

Thoughts: What we think affects how we feel and act

Behaviours: What we do affects how we think and feel

In our sessions, we work to identify and challenge negative thought patterns and behaviour. Having identified them, we then work to introduce coping mechanisms to develop positive thought patterns that ultimately lead to behavioural change. The skills learnt can be used time and time again after the sessions have finished.

Transactional Analysis

I use Transactional Analysis with clients who want to gain a better understanding of the way they communicate or interact with others.

It helps to be aware of how we feel, think and behave during interactions with others.

How we respond to situations and stimulate the other’s response in a conversation can depend on several areas:

• How did we respond to similar influences when we were young?

• What past traumas did we endure?

• How is the other treating us?

• What messages are our brains interpreting and what meanings are we getting?

• How important is the relationship I have with this person?

If any to these therapies sound like they appeal to you, then feel free to contact me at The Terrace to arrange an appointment.

Deborah Prossimo