Sue Stephenson

Experience and qualifications

I am an experienced Integrative Psychotherapist, Counsellor and Supervisor, a Senior Accredited member of the British Association for Counselling and Psychotherapy (BACP) and registered with the United Kingdom Council for Psychotherapy (UKCP).

My private counselling and psychotherapy practice is based in Wokingham (Berkshire Counselling and Psychotherapies). I work with clients, and also with trainee counsellors and psychotherapists who are required to undertake personal therapy as part of their training. I am a qualified Supervisor of individuals and groups, working with qualified psychotherapists and counsellors as well as students in training. My work is regularly supervised in accordance with the requirements of my professional registrations.

I have worked in both the private and public sectors, including the Priory Hospital Woking and the NHS IAPT Talking Therapies service, seeing clients presenting with a wide range of difficulties including depression, stress, anxiety, panic attacks, loss, self-harm, relationship and work-related problems and eating disorders.

I have a specialist interest in adults who experienced the physical and/or emotional loss of a parent during childhood, eg. through death, divorce, separation, abandonment and neglect.

I was a Visiting Lecturer at a London University for nine years, where I co-facilitated experiential groups of student counsellors and taught the theory and practice of psychodynamic and person-centred therapy. During that time I was also involved in psychotherapy research and publication.

What I offer

I offer weekly therapy sessions of 50 minutes duration in a confidential setting where together we can think about and explore your problems and concerns. Talking with an experienced professional counsellor or psychotherapist who you feel listens and understands you can help you to make more sense of life's difficulties, painful experiences and emotional stress.

Through this experience, where your thoughts and feelings have the time and space to be explored, choices can become clearer and new ways of relating to yourself and others can develop. Our work would be either open-ended or time-limited to a specific number of sessions, which would be agreed upon during your first session.

Alongside in-person sessions in Wokingham, I also offer online therapy and telephone counselling for clients across Berkshire and beyond.

Approach and orientation

I have a Master of Science degree in Counselling and Psychotherapy from the University of Surrey. My clinical practice reflects my training in the main research and evidence-based psychotherapeutic approaches — psychodynamic therapy, person-centred therapy, existential therapy and cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT) — all of which I draw upon as appropriate in my relational work with clients.

Philosophy on counselling and psychotherapy

My philosophy of counselling and psychotherapy incorporates the ideas located within the psychodynamic and person-centred approaches, which I use to inform my clinical practice. I believe that one of the most helpful experiences for someone seeking counselling is to feel listened to fully, and through this experience become more able to acknowledge the feelings that emerge through the process. This can then help with making the changes necessary to experience a more satisfying life.

I am also guided by the psychodynamic view that patterns created in our early family relationships impact on, and can be detrimental to, current relationships and situations. Bringing these patterns into awareness in a safe and confidential space can bring significant relief to distressing feelings.

My ongoing commitment to professional development has enabled me to integrate different approaches into my work, and so offer a broad range of understanding in the clinical setting.