FAQ
Think of the questions your customers ask most frequently and write them here along with the answers.
- What is a FAQ?
- How long will it take before I'm cured?
- Will the counsellor analyse me?
- What if I don't like my counsellor?
- Will I have to lay on a couch?
- What if it makes me worse, or I go crazy or it gets too scary?
A:
FAQ is an acronym for "frequently asked questions."
Q: How long will it take before I'm cured?
A:
Firstly we offer an unlimited number of sessions so you can work entirely at your own pace.
Secondly counselling will help you explore your life, patterns of behaviour and resolve issues you may have held onto for a long time.
Counselling can help you learn new behaviours and healthy coping mechanisms and can give you support while you make decisions about things in your life or about how you feel about things in your life.
Counselling is not about being 'cured' in the sense of erasing the potential to experience psychological distress in the future or feeling hurt in response to your future or past experiences.
Counselling will help you build the skills you need to prepare yourself for how to deal with future problems and improve your self-esteem, sense of self-worth and coping skills.
Q: Will the counsellor analyse me? A:
Depending on their therapeutic approach the counsellor will help you to figure yourself out and find answers for yourself;
they can offer you suggestions on different ways to think about things.
The answers that are right for one person will not be right for another - your counsellor will help you come to the answers that are right for you.
Q: What if I don't like my counsellor? A:
We have many different counsellors, with many different therapeutic approaches and different personalities:
male and female, white and bme, disabled and physically abled
if for any reason you don't get on with your counsellor or their therapeutic approach we can refer you within our own service or to another counselling service.
Q: Will I have to lay on a couch? A:
No, that's a stereotype of Psychoanalysis and you will be seated opposite your counsellor in a comfy room
(see photos for more information)
Q: What if it makes me worse, or I go crazy or it gets too scary? A:
Many people fear that counselling will 'open the flood gates' and they will never be able to close them again but this is unlikely.
You have a lifetime of keeping your emotions under control and using your own coping skills and defence mechanisms (even if they are not healthy coping mechanisms) to protect yourself from mental breakdown.
Raising your awareness of how you effect your life, and exploring your experiences and what you have taken from them might be painful at first but is part of the process.
An analogy is that it is like re-opening a physical wound which has never healed properly; you must clear the infected tissue before you can heal.
You counsellor will help you work at your own pace and replace unhealthy coping mechanisms with healthy ones as you work together on your issues.