Anh Doan

Anh Doan MBACP

Couples & Individual Counsellor | ADHD & Relationships 
There are times when life can look fine from the outside, yet inside you may feel anxious, overwhelmed, disconnected or simply unsure of what to do next.

Perhaps your relationship has become difficult. You may be arguing more than you used to, struggling to communicate, feeling emotionally distant from your partner, or finding it difficult to rebuild trust. Or perhaps you are dealing with anxiety, low confidence, ADHD, neurodivergence, relationship difficulties or changes in your life that have left you feeling stuck.

I am a BACP-registered counsellor, psychotherapist, couples counsellor, Clinical Supervisor and Head of Counselling at Talking Counselling. I work with individuals and couples, offering a confidential and thoughtful space where you can talk openly about what is happening and begin to understand what may be keeping you stuck.

My approach is warm, calm and collaborative. I do not believe therapy is about simply being given advice or being told what to do. It is about having the space to understand yourself, your relationships and the patterns that may be affecting the way you think, feel and connect with others.

Couples counselling and relationship therapy
Relationships can become difficult even when two people still care deeply about one another.

I work with couples experiencing communication problems, recurring arguments, emotional distance, loss of intimacy, difficulties with trust, infidelity and affairs, differences in emotional needs, family pressures and uncertainty about the future of their relationship.

Sometimes couples become caught in the same cycle: one person feels unheard, the other feels criticised; one withdraws while the other pursues the conversation. Over time, these patterns can create loneliness, resentment and disconnection.

Couples counselling can provide a space to slow these patterns down and understand what is happening underneath the conflict.

We can explore:

Communication difficulties
Constant arguing and recurring conflict
Emotional distance and disconnection
Trust difficulties and betrayal
Affairs and infidelity
Intimacy and relationship difficulties
Attachment and emotional needs
Family and cultural differences
Separation and uncertainty about the relationship
Rebuilding trust and emotional connection
My aim is not to take sides. I work with both partners to understand the relationship and the patterns between you, helping you have conversations that may previously have felt too difficult to have.

ADHD, neurodiversity and relationships
I also support individuals and couples where ADHD or other forms of neurodivergence are affecting emotional well-being, communication or relationships.

ADHD can affect much more than attention and organisation. For some people, it can influence emotional regulation, communication, confidence, expectations within relationships and the way conflict is experienced.

Partners may find themselves misunderstanding one another or feeling that they are constantly having the same argument.

Counselling can provide an opportunity to understand these differences without blame and explore how both people can communicate more effectively and feel more understood.

I can support people experiencing difficulties associated with:

ADHD and relationships
ADHD and communication
Emotional regulation
Neurodivergent relationships
Dyslexia and self-confidence
Feeling different or misunderstood
Emotional overwhelm and stress
Low self-esteem and self-criticism
Work and study pressures
Identity and self-acceptance
Family and relationship difficulties
The focus is not on trying to make someone fit a particular idea of how they should think or behave. Instead, we can explore how you experience the world and develop ways of understanding yourself and your relationships that feel more manageable and compassionate.

Individual counselling
I work with individuals experiencing anxiety, low mood, depression, stress, loneliness, low self-esteem, relationship difficulties, bereavement, life changes and emotional overwhelm.

You may be someone who is used to coping, managing responsibilities and appearing as though everything is fine, while privately feeling exhausted or disconnected.

Therapy can give you somewhere to put down some of that responsibility.

Together, we can explore what you are experiencing, understand where your feelings may be coming from and consider what you would like to change.

I work with people experiencing:

Anxiety and panic
Depression and low mood
Stress and burnout
Low confidence and self-esteem
ADHD and neurodivergence
Relationship and family difficulties
Childhood and complex trauma
Grief and loss
Life transitions
Identity and belonging
Emotional overwhelm
Difficulties with communication and boundaries
Trauma and complex experiences
I have particular experience supporting people who have experienced trauma, including childhood trauma, domestic abuse, exploitation, human trafficking and modern slavery.

Trauma can affect far more than our emotional well-being. It can influence how we see ourselves, how we trust others, how we manage relationships and how safe we feel in the world.

My approach is sensitive and carefully paced. I aim to create a therapeutic relationship where difficult experiences can be explored without rushing the process or becoming overwhelmed.

A culturally sensitive approach
I understand that our relationships with family, culture, identity and community can influence how we understand ourselves and our emotional lives.

I also provide therapy in Vietnamese, offering culturally and linguistically sensitive counselling to Vietnamese-speaking clients in the UK and internationally.

My role at Talking Counselling
As Head of Counselling at Talking Counselling, I also lead and supervise a clinical team of counsellors and psychotherapists.

I oversee assessment, clinical matching and clinical quality, helping individuals and couples find appropriate therapeutic support.

This gives me a broad clinical perspective while allowing me to remain closely connected to individual and couples work.

A space to understand what is happening
You do not have to wait until things become unbearable before seeking counselling.

Perhaps you are struggling with anxiety. Perhaps your relationship has changed. Perhaps ADHD or neurodivergence has made certain parts of life and relationships more difficult to understand. Or perhaps you simply know that something needs to change but are not yet sure what that change looks like.

Therapy can be a place to slow things down, make sense of what is happening and begin to find a different way forward.

I offer individual counselling and couples counselling online across London and the UK.

If you would like to explore whether counselling may be helpful for you or your relationship, you are very welcome to get in touch.  You can book directly into my diary via our website:  www.talkingcounselling.co.uk 

Supporting Vietnamese Human Trafficking/Modern-day Slavery Survivors — Specialist Trauma Practice

Among the most profound and humbling aspects of Anh Doan's clinical work is her dedicated support of Vietnamese human trafficking survivors — one of the most underserved and misunderstood client groups in the UK.

Drawing on both her clinical expertise and her own cultural understanding, Anh offers a rare combination that few therapists can provide: specialist trauma therapy delivered with genuine cultural competency. For survivors whose first language is Vietnamese, whose experiences of institutions and authority figures may be deeply fraught, and whose cultural context shapes every aspect of how distress is carried and expressed, this matters enormously.

Anh works with survivors navigating the complex, layered aftermath of trafficking — including:

Complex PTSD and trauma responses — hypervigilance, dissociation, emotional dysregulation, and intrusive memory
Isolation and displacement — the profound disorientation of being far from home, family, and everything familiar
Loss of identity and autonomy — rebuilding a sense of self after sustained exploitation and control
Mistrust of services and systems — working sensitively with clients who have every reason to be cautious
Shame, stigma, and silence — creating a space where survivors feel safe enough to speak, at whatever pace they need
Family separation and grief — the particular pain of displacement from cultural roots and loved ones
Re-integration and rebuilding — supporting survivors as they begin to reconstruct a life on their own terms
 
A Culturally Informed Approach

Language is not simply a practical consideration in this work — it is therapeutic in itself. Anh's ability to work bilingually, understanding the cultural nuances, family structures, and societal pressures that shape the Vietnamese experience, means her clients are not simply heard — they are truly understood.

This is specialist work that demands not only clinical skill, but profound patience, cultural humility, and an unwavering commitment to the dignity of every person who walks through the door.

Anh brings all of this — and 15 years of hard-won clinical experience — to every session. 
Collaboration & Referrals

Anh works collaboratively with specialist charity organisations, social services, governement agency, immigration and refugee support networks to ensure her clients receive holistic, coordinated care. Referrals from statutory and voluntary sector partners are welcome.

This work is close to Anh's heart — and it shows in every session.

Initial Assessment £50 | 1 hour

Before beginning therapy, we start with a dedicated one-hour assessment. This is a chance to explore what has brought you here, understand your goals, and begin shaping a personalised plan for our work together. I will tell you more about my approach and the style of therapy I offer — and most importantly, we will get a sense of whether the working relationship feels right.

Because in therapy, that connection matters above everything else.

Individual Therapy

Trainee Counsellor
£50 per session (50 minutes)

Anh Doan and Qualified Team— Qualified Psychotherapist
£125 per session (50 minutes)

 
Couples Therapy

Trainee Couples/Relationship Counsellor
£125 per session (50 minutes)

Anh Doan — Qualified Couples Relationship Psychotherapist
£250 per session (50 minutes)

Session Information

All sessions are held online weekly at the same time every week via secure video call.
48 hours' notice required for cancellations

A Note From Anh

"Our initial assessment is about getting to know you and understanding what you need. We will discuss how we work together, and make sure everything feels right before we begin. A good therapeutic relationship is the foundation of everything."

— Anh Doan, Head of Counselling, Talking Counselling Ltd

THE FIELD | WELLBEING For those who understand that true performance — in the saddle and in life — begins from within

 
The Quiet Authority of Anh Doan
How one London psychotherapist is changing lives — one honest conversation at a time. 

There is a particular kind of resilience that the equestrian world understands better than most. The willingness to get back up. The discipline to show up, day after day, regardless of what the previous session brought. The ability to present a composed exterior whilst navigating, beneath the surface, something altogether more complex.

It is a world, in other words, that knows a great deal about carrying on. And rather less, perhaps, about putting things down.

This is precisely where Anh Doan comes in.  A Practice Built on Fifteen Years of Genuine Expertise

Anh Doan is not the kind of therapist who arrived at this work by accident. With over 15 years of clinical experience as a qualified psychotherapist, couples counsellor, and clinical supervisor — shaped by years of practice in the rigorous Harley Street tradition — she brings to her work something that no training programme alone can manufacture: the quiet, earned authority of someone who has sat with hundreds of people at their most vulnerable, and helped them find their way through.

Her specialisms read like a map of the modern interior life. Anxiety that hums beneath every surface. Depression that makes even the most familiar landscape feel foreign. Childhood trauma that resurfaces, uninvited, in adult relationships. Family conflict that runs along fault lines so old that nobody can quite remember where they began. Relationship difficulties that leave both partners — however committed, however capable — feeling profoundly alone.

And yet what distinguishes Anh's practice is not simply the breadth of what she treats. It is the quality of how she treats it.

 
Congruence as a Clinical Philosophy

In therapeutic terms, congruence refers to the alignment between a therapist's inner experience and their outward expression — the absence of performance, the presence of genuine human contact. It is, in the view of the person-centred tradition that underpins Anh's work, not merely a desirable quality. It is the very engine of change.

Anh embodies this with a rare naturalness. Warm without being familiar. Direct without being cold. She meets each client — whether an individual navigating the wreckage of a difficult childhood, a couple sitting on opposite sides of an invisible wall, or a high-achieving professional who has finally admitted that capability alone is not enough — with the same quality of unhurried, undivided, genuinely human presence.

In a world increasingly populated by curated wellness and performative self-improvement, this is — quietly, powerfully — rather radical.

"Our working relationship needs to be right," she has said. "That matters above everything else. A good therapeutic relationship is the foundation of everything."

It is a statement of philosophy as much as practice. And it is one that her clients, across fifteen years and hundreds of sessions, have found to be entirely, life-changingly true.

 
The Work of Lasting Change

What Anh offers is not a quick fix. It is not a wellness retreat, a weekend workshop, or a rebranded self-help programme. It is the slower, deeper, more demanding work of genuine transformation — the kind that changes not just how a person feels on a given Tuesday morning, but how they move through the world.

Her integrative approach draws on the full breadth of evidence-based practice: person-centred therapy, trauma-informed care, Transactional Analysis, Cognitive Behavioural Therapy, and attachment theory. For couples, she brings the clinical precision of the Gottman Method and the relational depth of Emotionally Focused Therapy, alongside the luminous insights of Esther Perel into desire, distance, and what keeps intimate partnerships alive.

But what her clients most consistently report is something that no theoretical framework quite captures. It is the experience of being, perhaps for the first time, truly heard. Of having the patterns that have quietly governed their lives — the people-pleasing, the anxiety, the self-abandonment, the inherited family scripts — named, understood, and gently, firmly, released.

The impact is not incremental. It is, for many, the difference between a life half-lived and a life fully inhabited.

 
Autonomy, Congruence, and the Better Self

Central to Anh's philosophy is a concept that the equestrian world will recognise instinctively: autonomy. The sense of agency. Of being, genuinely and consistently, the author of one's own life.

For many of her clients — people who have spent years accommodating the needs of others, shrinking to fit, managing their emotional lives in private whilst presenting a seamless surface to the world — this is the most transformative shift of all. Not simply feeling better. But becoming, in some essential way, more fully themselves.

This is what Anh means when she speaks of congruence: the closing of the gap between the person one presents and the person one actually is. Between the life one is living, and the life one genuinely wants. Between the relationship one is enduring, and the connection one deserves.

It is slow work. It is honest work. It requires courage from the client and genuine skill from the therapist. And in Anh Doan's hands, it changes lives.

 
Specialist Work — Where Few Others Go

Among the most remarkable dimensions of Anh's practice is her dedicated work with Vietnamese human trafficking survivors — a client group carrying some of the most complex, layered trauma that clinical practice encounters. Complex PTSD. Profound isolation and displacement. The near-total dismantling of identity, autonomy, and trust.

Here, Anh's clinical expertise is matched by something equally rare: genuine cultural competency. Working bilingually, with a deep understanding of the cultural nuances, family structures, and social contexts that shape the Vietnamese experience, she offers her clients not merely professional support but the profound relief of being understood in full.

It is, by any measure, exceptional work. Conducted with exceptional care.

 
Talking Counselling — Excellence, Delivered Online

As Head of Counselling at Talking Counselling Ltd, Anh leads a hand-picked team of qualified, accredited therapists offering individually matched online therapy to clients across the UK and internationally. All sessions take place via secure, confidential video call — accessible from home, from the yard, from wherever life finds you.

For a world that has always understood the value of the right coach, the right trainer, the right mentor — the right therapist, it turns out, is no different.

 
To Begin

Initial assessment £50. Individual therapy from £125. Couples therapy from £250.

Fully online. Confidential. UK-wide and international.

📞 07960 333 256 🌐 www.talkingcounselling.co.uk

All enquiries handled with complete discretion.