MEET THE TEAM
MY APPROACH
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EMMA CRAIG
Founder & Counsellor
Hello & welcome, I'm Emma. I fully qualified within Professional Psychotherapeutic Counselling back in 2019 after studying at an advanced diploma level 4, my studies have been with Belfast Met College, ACAP & CTAA. I have completed training in delivering Counselling & Psychological services via Telehealth, Mental Health First Aid & Safeguarding. I have been working full-time in private practice for 3 years now.
I'm from Northern Ireland, and I went down the path of starting my career as a Mental Health Counsellor at a time when I was also battling with my own mental health struggles. My passion and advocacy for mental health stems from my own personal experiences of dealing with childhood trauma, dysfunctional family dynamics, self-esteem and an overuse of defence mechanism's.
Prior to my training, I sought help from a Counsellor, done a lot of work on myself, found hope, healthy coping tools and was able to step into being my true self.
This lead me onto my career as a Mental Health Counsellor to provide therapeutic services as I believe my soul purpose is to help people find hope and feel lighter. I believe by nature that I'm a deeply empathic, warm and compassionate person. I use both my own personal journey and professional experiences combined to assist clients on a healing journey of increasing their overall feelings of self-worth. I appreciate the variety of human experience and culture.
I strongly value the importance of providing a space that involves confidentiality, genuineness, warmth, unconditional positive regard and to be nurtured within a non-judgement relationship. When attending my sessions, I have an overall aim to reduce the incongruence between the client’s concept of self and ideal self. I feel that there is immense power in feeling seen, heard and understood.
When I previously lived abroad as an expat in 2018 and was beginning to build up my private practice, I worked in-person supporting clients in Sydney, Australia and completed various volunteering and agency work. This work involved supporting individuals in the community with learning disability and autistism, aiming to promote their independence and wellbeing. I done work with Victim Support Services which involved working closely with victims of domestic violence and or victims impacted by crime, assisting them to regain control of their lives. I also worked closely with a Men's hostel that allowed me to support male client's who struggled with substance misuse, homelessness, schizophrenia and borderline personality disorder. Working in these roles enabled me to further grow upon my skill set as I got the opportunity to work with a diverse range of individuals from many different backgrounds and worked collaboratively with other professionals such as psychologists, psychiatrists, GPs and acute mental health team.
I have extensive experience of working with common issues such as anxiety, stress, depression, grief, childhood trauma, domestic abuse, self-harm / suicidal ideation, expats living abroad / returning home, relationship difficulties, self - esteem issues, and most recently the Covid-19 response.
I use an integrative approach in sessions and integrate three main modalities - Person Centred, CBT & Psychodynamic therapy. This allows me as a Counsellor to explore where each individual client is and what they need from sessions. I believe by tailoring my approach around each client helps to bring the best outcome for each individual, as we all cope, feel our emotions and learn in different ways.
My therapeutic style is a Humanistic / Person-Centred approach which focuses on the importance of helping you to develop a strong and healthy sense of self, where we work collaboratively to explore your feelings, find meaning, focus on your strengths and a best possible outcome for you individually. Through seeking ongoing therapy it is important for me to help you to maximise your overall well-being whilst also giving you the opportunity to learn tools that will sustain your needs for the future.
I believe that events in our childhood have a great influence on our adult lives and play a huge part in shaping us now in terms of our interpersonal relationships and how we deal with our emotions. It is therefore important for me in my work to get to the core of client's presenting issues and to safely uncover and resolve repressed conflicts, in order to process and experience the emotions that have been buried deep inside.
I'm drawn to working with trauma and continuously keeping up-to-date with trauma healing work. In 2021, I completed Trauma-Informed training. Trauma informed practice means that you are trained professionally to understand the impacts of interpersonal trauma and how this can impact and affect you as an individual and most importantly, you are able to help you understand what is happening and help reduce some of the symptoms of trauma that you may be experiencing and this is what I aim to do when working with clients who have experienced trauma.
I believe to be an effective Counsellor, I need to constantly strive to increase my self-awareness and learning, there is always more to learn and every new relationship gives us the opportunity to discover more about ourselves. I therefore support my practice with regular professional development work including my own personal therapy, mandatory clinical supervision on a monthly basis, and I do regular CPD training courses.
Outside of my client work, I am a Listening Volunteer with The Listening Place and see visitors fortnightly. A London based Charity that offers free, confidential and ongoing face-to-face support to anyone who is struggling with suicidality.
I also value spending my time with loved ones and enjoy reading books, journaling, baking, exploring new places and attend regular yoga and gym classes to sustain my own well-being.
I hold business insurance and have internationally recognised memberships with the Complementary Therapists Accredited Association (CTAA), International Therapist Directory. I'm currently working towards accreditation in the UK with The British Association for Counselling and Psychotherapy with an aim to open my own clinic in the future and to train as a Supervisor Counsellor.
I'm based in London and I'm working online remotely with clients across the globe offering sessions via phone call and zoom video call. I aim to keep my waiting times to a minimum as I understand seeking public mental health support involves lengthy wait times due to these services being over stretched and I also aim to keep my fees low-cost as no one’s financial status should be a barrier for seeking help.
If you are a new client requesting an appointment, please book a FREE 30 Minute phone call consultation via the link below at a day / time that is most suitable to you and we will be able to have a chat before you begin to make sure we are a suitable fit to work together.