Dean Goodchild

Hello and welcome to my profile.

Making the decision to enter counselling can be hard. And choosing the right therapist is crucially important because all counsellors are different. So that you can get to know me better I have set out ‘who-I-am’ under headings below. If you look at my website you will find more pictures.

Dean Goodchild’s Qualifications and experience

I have a Doctorate level Qualification in Counselling Psychology. This means I am a Psychologist with special training in personal therapeutic work. I have a Psychology degree and six years post graduate training in Psychological Counselling.

For twenty-five years I have been helping people in the most desperate situations from my professional hospital and local authority posts. These include:

• people who have attempted suicide,
• people who take drink and drugs,
• people who have suffered trauma and life jeopardy,
• people with depression and worry problems (including cleaners and checkers),
• people in bad marriages and partnerships,
• people whose children are out of control or failing to thrive,
• people who have been sexually or emotionally abused,
• people recovering from an abusive relationship,
• women with pregnancy, miscarriage and termination issues,
• people caring for disabled relatives,
• people who have suffered loss, loss of hope, and bereavement,
• people living with a gambler or an addict,
• people with work related problems, bullying etc,
• people with diagnosed psychotic or long term conditions,

Throughout my career I have worked with the loneliest and most desperate people but I maintain everyone deserves a chance.

I now work exclusively from my private practice in Upminster. This means I can offer high quality therapy without the red-tape and delays associated with large corporate organisations.

Dean Goodchild’s Professional status and ethical standards

I am a Practitioner Psychologist, registered with the Health and Care Professions Council, (no. PYL05983). This is the regulatory body for all Health and Care Professionals. I am bound by their ethical standards and I follow their ethical code. I am accountable to this body.

I am a Chartered Counselling Psychologist registered with the British Psychological Society (no. 130426). This is the professional society for psychologists in the UK.

I appear on the British Psychological Society testing standards register as competent in Ability and Personality testing.

You can check both the HCPC and the BPS registers online to verify my credentials.

I regularly undertake continuing professional development training and personal exercises. I have a recent Enhanced Disclosure and Barring Service certificate (Formerly CRB) showing that I have a clean record.

My therapeutic technique

My technique has been on a journey. I started with Person-centred counselling. Carl Rogers believed that we all have a natural drive for health. He believed that people are genetically set to grow healthier in the right environment. That is, if they experience a ‘therapeutic relationship’ (a special blend of warmth and empathic connection). In this therapy, clients have the power and therapists follow.

During my psychology degree I learned to practice Cognitive behaviour therapy, which my subsequent training developed. CBT works from the premise that we are all subject to patterns of rewards and punishments in our lives. We internalise these patterns as causal sequences and call them beliefs. Sometimes, our beliefs become distorted and this represents neurosis. By correcting our belief systems to match reality, health may be restored. Research shows that this model works well but I believe people are ‘meaning-makers’ not simply lists of reward schedules. I therefore use this model judiciously. CBT therapists hold power in the session.

I then trained in Gestalt-therapy. Gestalt-therapy seeks to facilitate deep personal understanding about our perceptions of the significant events in our lives. A Gestalt-therapist seeks personal and interpersonal authenticity. Yet we can only know ourselves in the context of our relationships. Through using techniques of personal discovery we can resolve incomplete gestalts. Paradoxically, change often comes from fully accepting ‘what-is’ rather than constantly striving to be different. Therapists and clients jointly dialogue their present experiences searching for meaning. Power is shared between therapist and client.

I practice Systems psychotherapy. People are not islands, we exist in relationships that have repeating patterns of interaction or scripts. When one part of the system changes, the other parts of it often seek to return the system to its status-quo. Hence, individual therapy may fail because the client’s friends and family ‘gang up’ to reverse any changes. Knowledge of such systemic influences can lead to positive changes that are durable.

I have studied Attachment theory, which is a psychoanalytic model of personality development. From Bowlby’s early work it has grown into the most robust body of mental health literature and it informs all of my assessments.

Building on Attachment theory literature, I have trained in Mentalisation-based psychotherapy. In this model clients learn to focus on their own internal processes and those of others in an attempt to deepen their understanding of their own and others behaviour. I believe that It is similar to highly focussed person-centred therapy, in that clients lead and hold power in the sessions and therapists seek to adopt a transparent authentic relationship with clients.

My personal details

I am a home based married man in middle life. We, my wife and I, have two offspring. I won’t call them children as they are both adults now. Our son works for Essex County Council. Our daughter has quadriplegic cerebral palsy but a lovely personality and a wicked sense of humour. Our dog Merlyn is a typical Border Collie and keeps us busy. I was born in Oldchurch Hospital Romford and went to school locally. I attended the UEL for my Psychology BSc. and my MSc. in Counselling Psychology training. I met my wife at Southampton University.

I enjoy DIY and my daughter calls me ‘the inventor’, which I love. I like to think that I bring my creative side into my therapeutic work too. I like to sail yachts but we can’t afford to buy one. I love the feeling of freedom, being able to catch the wind for power and go anywhere. Our daughter loves it when the boat heels over and waves crash over the deck. Our son likes the GPS, planning and tracking our passage. I thank you for reading my profile and I hope that it has given you a glimpse of my character to help you decide whether you could work with me.

You only have one life, make the most of it.

Psych Counselling services I charge per 55 minute hour, 60 minutes for private health agency clients.