Dr Sarah Quinley
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This professional is temporarily unavailable and will not be responding to enquiries until they return.
This professional is temporarily unavailable and will not be responding to enquiries until they return.
About me
If something feels stuck, overwhelming, or too heavy to carry on your own, you're very welcome here.
I’m Sarah, a Doctor of Counselling and Psychotherapy and a certified couples therapist with over a decade of experience. I offer online therapy to individuals and couples who are going through a difficult stretch and would like someone who understands and can help them navigate through it.
I grew up in California and trained in Edinburgh where I lived for six years. I have lived abroad for over a decade as a queer, neurodivergent immigrant within an intercultural family. This shapes how I work and the attention I give to context, culture, and relationships, all of which influence our inner world. I am interested not only in who you are as a person but also in how much of what you grapple with may make sense when we look at the environments you’re a part of.
People tend to come to me when something is not working anymore, and they may not be able to fully explain why. You might feel caught up in patterns you recognise but cannot shift, or carrying something that you simply want someone to hold with you and guide you through.
This can look like anxiety, burnout, or a sense that life has become too much.
It can look like issues in relationships, where communication breaks down, intimacy fades, trust has been damaged, or something no longer feels safe.
It can be about trauma or relational wounds that continue to shape how you feel, think, and relate to others.
It can be about how you see yourself, or how you perceive others to see you.
Or it may be a deeper question about identity and belonging, especially if you are living between cultures or feel different from the people around you.
Whatever brings you here, I won't offer you a generic approach. Therapy with me is empathetic, collaborative, and tailored to you. Together, we can make sense of what is happening beneath the surface, understand where it comes from with care, and gradually begin to shift the patterns that aren't working for you anymore at a pace that feels manageable.
We can work with both mind and body, and create space for what may be difficult to express. You do not need to have the right words or plan how to use our time. We can find the way and the words together.
If something here resonates, the next step is simply a conversation. I offer a short initial call so you can ask questions, get a sense of how I work, and see if it feels like a good fit.
Training, qualifications & experience
I trained at the University of Edinburgh, completing a professional doctorate in person-centred and psychodynamic psychotherapy. I was drawn to this way of working because it focuses on people's humanity and how they relate, rather than reducing experience to labels or problems to be fixed.
I later trained as a relationship counsellor with Relationship Scotland, developing specialist experience with couples navigating communication difficulties, intimacy concerns, and periods of real strain. Much of this work is about helping partners understand what is happening between them, and finding a way forward that feels honest and more connected.
Earlier in my career I worked in addiction and trauma services at Simpson House in Edinburgh. Those years shaped my understanding of how overwhelm, shame, and survival strategies can become held in the body and play out in relationships long after the original pain has passed.
I have continued to build on this foundation through further training in Internal Family Systems, CBT-informed approaches for nervous system regulation, compassion-focused therapy, and Cognitive Analytic Therapy. These sit alongside my core training and allow the work to be flexible, whether that means open-ended exploratory therapy or something more structured and time-limited.
Before moving into private practice, I worked across community organisations, charities, recovery services, and educational settings with adults, couples, young people, and children. For the past six years I have worked exclusively in private practice, supporting a wide and varied caseload over both shorter and longer periods of change.
I continue to engage in regular supervision, ongoing training, and reflection as part of my commitment to offering therapy that is thoughtful, ethical, and genuinely responsive to the people I work with.
Member organisations
BACP is one of the UK’s leading professional bodies for counselling and psychotherapy with around 60,000 members. The Association has several different categories of membership, including Student Member, Individual Member, Registered Member MBACP, Registered Accredited Member MBACP (Accred) and Senior Registered Accredited Member MBACP (Snr Acccred). Registered and accredited members are listed on the BACP Register, which shows that they have demonstrated BACP’s recommended standards for training, proficiency and ethical practice. The BACP Register was the first register of psychological therapists to be accredited by the Professional Standards Authority (PSA). Accredited and senior accredited membership are voluntary categories for members who choose to undertake a rigorous application and assessment process to demonstrate additional standards around practice, training and supervision. Individual members will have completed an appropriate counselling or psychotherapy course and started to practise, but they won’t appear on the BACP Register until they've demonstrated that they meet the standards for registration. Student members are still in the process of completing their training. All members are bound by the BACP Ethical Framework and a Professional Conduct Procedure.
Accredited register membership
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
Fees
£85.00 - £100.00
Concessions offered for
Additional information
Fees
£85 for individual therapy (50 minutes)
£100 for couples therapy (50 minutes)
I also offer a limited number of reduced-fee spaces for students, people who are unemployed, or returning clients, where availability allows: £75 for individuals and £90 for couples.
Please note: I’ll be accepting new clients again from October 2026 but welcome enquiries.
When I work
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