About me
What you bring to counselling will be handled with care and confidentiality; I am respectful and have a genuine desire to help. I offer the core conditions of empathy, congruence and unconditional positive regard and I have an unfailing hope that potential and worth may be realised in the room.
I started my journey in 2005 when I volunteered for Samaritans, but perhaps I started it even earlier still when I attended Al-Anon meetings and felt truly listened to and supported at a time when I really needed it. Whilst at Samaritans, I experienced face to face contact with people coming in off the street, and realised that I preferred the intimacy of the face to face relationship. I enquired about training as a counsellor at ACIS (Aberdeen Counselling and Information Service) and was accepted for the course. I volunteered at ACIS from 2008 until 2018 and during that time completed a Post Graduate Diploma in Person-Centred Counselling. My belief, passion and trust in the relationship has never waned. This is what I carry forward, within myself and when I first meet that tentative face in the waiting room. I offer myself and know that this will be enough. This faith has come with time, experience, self-growth and a complete trust in the process and the power of the relationship.
People look for help from counsellors and psychotherapists for many different reasons, most often (though not always) because they are in a personal crisis of some kind. This could be, for example, a bereavement, the ending of a long-term relationship, feelings of overwhelming anxiety, or just plain unhappiness.(Merry ) (page 69) Merry, Tony. Person-Centred Practice the BAPCA Reader. Herefordshire, UK: PCCS Books Ltd, 2000. Print.
Training, qualifications & experience
Post-Graduate Diploma in Person-Centred Counselling (University of Aberdeen).
Diploma in Psychology (Aberdeen College).
Registered Member of BACP (The British Association of Counselling and Psychotherapy).
Member of Mental Health Aberdeen.
Member of Aberdeen Counselling Forum.
Voluntary counsellor at ACIS (Aberdeen Counselling & Information Service) from 2008 until 2018.
As a registered member of BACP, I take being trustworthy as a serious ethical commitment and am committed to sustaining and advancing good practice. I am committed to ongoing professional development and have attended regular CPD's held at ACIS in the past, and currently at Aberdeen Counselling Forum and other.
Member organisations

British Association for Counselling & Psychotherapy
BACP is one of the UK’s largest professional bodies for counselling and psychotherapy. Therapists registered with the Association fall into a number of different membership categories such as Individual Member, Registered Member MBACP and Registered Member MBACP (Accred), each standing for different levels of training and experience. MBACP (Accred) and MBACP (Snr Accred) members have achieved a substantial level of training and experience approved by the Association.
Registered members can be found on the BACP Register, which was the first register to achieve Accredited Voluntary Register status issued by the Professional Standards Authority. Individual Members will have completed an appropriate counselling and/or psychotherapy course and started to practise, but will not appear on the BACP Register until they've progressed to Registered Member MBACP status.
All members are bound by a Code of Ethics & Practice and a Complaints Procedure. Accredited by the Professional Standards Authority.
Accredited register membership

Accredited Register Scheme
The Accredited Register Scheme was set up in 2013 by the Department of Health (DoH) as a way to recognise organisations that hold voluntary registers which meet certain standards. These standards are set by the Professional Standards Authority (PSA).
This therapist has indicated that they belong to an Accredited Register.

Areas of counselling I deal with
Therapies offered
Fees
£40 per 50 minute session. Concessions available upon request.
Further information
Please contact me in confidence and should I not be available, leave a message and I will come back to you.