Karen MacKey

Counselling offers effective ways to manage difficult situations and feelings. If you have problems with self-esteem, confidence or self-worth, taking time to make sense of it, is time well-spent and can help you. There are also ways of shifting overwhelming anxiety and depression. If the relationship between you and your partner is not working so well, communication can often be a factor which we can explore alongside healthier ways to resolve conflict.

Many problems are just too difficult to resolve on your own; family and friends may try to help but sometimes their advice or judgement create their own pressures.  When you are experiencing difficulties and looking to find your strengths, speaking to someone outside your social and family groups  and who understands, helps. 

Counselling takes place in a calm, friendly and relaxed environment, giving you the space to fully explore what is happening and get things going in a direction which works better for you. In counselling, we will focus on what you bring and how you see the world because whatever you choose needs to make sense and work for you.  In that way you can begin to make meaningful, and possibly life-long, changes. For people with neuro-diversities such as ADHD or ASD, this affirmation of who you are and how you see things can be especially helpful.

My work is with adults: individuals and couples, wanting short to long term Counselling.  I am a qualified, Accredited Counsellor with many years experience. I counsel with RASASC, a charity in Guildford providing support for survivors of rape and sexual abuse and have previously been a Counsellor and Assessor at Catalyst, a Guildford based drug, alcohol and well-being charity, and with the YMCA in Guildford.  Counselling is always about change of some kind and comes about through talking and using the carefully chosen practical tools and ideas which will help you as an individual. 

It is vital that the Counselling relationship will work for you, that you feel comfortable talking to me and trust me.  My aim is to provide a flexible Counselling service which adapts to your needs and as part of this I offer a free 15 -minute phone or Zoom call to help you decide whether to book a first appointment. For individual clients, following an initial one-hour face to face appointment, there is also the option of shorter 30-minute sessions over Zoom. I am aware that need does not always coincide with income so am willing to consider lower fees where it is necessary.  I have a limited number of lower cost spaces available.

Individual Counselling

Your uniqueness as a person with your own individual understandings, underpin my Counselling.

Depending on the situation, Counselling could involve exploring situations or thoughts which are emotionally triggering and getting to the underlying causes behind these.  Often we fall into habitual ways of managing which are no longer helpful and we can consider other options which could work better for you.

Where there are relationship problems, communication is often involved and we would look at ways of managing this.

*Please note: if you are looking to explore a relationship with your partner, I strongly recommend you come along as a couple.

Couples Counselling

I offer Counselling to many kinds of partners: same sex, heterosexual, married or in a less formal partnership.

When many people think of relationship counselling, they see lots of drama. My Couples Counselling is about creating a calm, safe and balanced space where each of you can talk and be heard by the other.  Your relationship will be the focus of Couples Counselling and if you are looking to develop and deepen it, we can explore ways to strengthen and nurture it.  If you are both seeking an amicable ending, we can examine what is blocking this and how to resolve that. Work will include understanding what each of you brings to the relationship, where that has come from and how that plays out for each of you. 

I hope, like many of the couples I have worked with, you will leave with more knowledge and understanding of your relationship, enabling you both to protect and  grow within it. You will also know yourself and your partner better.

Couples Counselling can feel very different from having individual therapy partly as it is likely to feel structured and perhaps more directed.  There needs to be a willingness on both sides to engage in the process and commit to it, data protection legislation also requires permission for me to use both your contact details.  For these reasons I need both partners to contact me independently. 

If you would like an introductory call, could you please request this at a time when you can both be present.  

And please ...

Contact me if you need more information or have questions.  You can get in touch with me by email at: wokingcounselling@protonmail.com or call or text me on 07495 267944.  .

My website address is:  www.wokingcounsellingsupport.co.uk

I also work with people who want to take stock in their lives and to consider whether how they are living makes sense to them.

Individual Counselling Sessions:

£50 for 50 min - 1 hr Individual Counselling session

Some concessions are available.

Couples:

£65 for 50 min - 1 hr Couples Counselling session .

Some concessions are available.

I am based on the outskirts of Woking, going in the Guildford direction.  There is easy parking just outside.

For individual clients, after an initial one hour appointment, I am now offering the option of 30 minute sessions over Zoom.