Name: Anna Koolen
Address: Surbiton, Surrey, KT6, GB
Telephone: +447976970036
Price range: £80.00 per session

About me

People usually come to therapy at a crunch point, not when life feels like smooth sailing, but the reasons and the timing are as individual as we all are. How we work together is shaped by where you are and where you’re hoping to go - even if that’s not yet clear. Some people arrive in crisis, others with a quiet sense of being stuck, disconnected or tired of carrying things alone.

Sometimes there's something you can name clearly: old wounds that still haunt you, or something that's just happened. Other times it's harder to pinpoint – a nagging discontent or a vague sense that life should be different somehow. Maybe it's something you are terrified of approaching, things you have carried alone that feel too difficult to be with and need a safe space to do so.

Whatever it is for you, I'm glad you're here. I've worked successfully across a wide range from the everyday weight of stress, anxiety and feeling low, to more complex presentations like trauma and disorders. In short – anything and everything that makes us human.

My approach is relational and exploratory, and we go at the pace that's right for you.

Therapy is often about loosening what has become tightly tied in knots: trauma, shame, addiction, patterns that no longer serve you but keep playing out, loss and grief, life changes, or simply a sense of being stuck without fully knowing why. There isn't always a neat explanation and we don't need one to begin.

My goal is to create the conditions where change can happen at a pace that feels possible. You set the direction and we start where you are.

I care deeply about the people I work with. I'm warm and steady, and I will always be honest about what I'm noticing and hearing. I believe real therapeutic work needs both compassion and truth, and that its core is relational. There is immense power in connection and feeling understood.

I'm a qualified and accredited psychotherapist. My foundation is integrative, meaning I draw on a range of therapeutic approaches and adapt them to you, rather than fitting you into one fixed model. I trained further in existential psychotherapy, which makes space for the bigger questions many of us wrestle with – about meaning, identity and purpose – and I'm currently doing further training in reflective practice, which sharpens how I use what happens between us to understand you more fully.

Three things sit at the heart of how I work:

1) Person-centred – I trust you already have what you need to grow, and my role is to create the conditions for that growth and be your companion on that journey, not lead you there. 2) Phenomenological - I'm interested in your experience exactly as you experience it, not a label or theory laid on top of it. 3) Relational – the relationship itself is often where change happens, not just what we discuss. The therapy room is a microcosm of how we relate to ourselves, the world and others, and a safe space to explore what plays out.

At the centre of everything I do is a steady belief in our potential to grow and change.

Training, qualifications & experience

I’m a qualified integrative therapist (CPCAB L4 Diploma in Therapeutic Counselling) and fully registered member of the BACP and an accredited member of the NCPS.

Qualified Recovery Coach Professional (CCAR).

One year training with SAFPAC: Existential Psychotherapy.

Current study: Reflective Practice (The Metanoia Institute).