Counselling disclaimer

Please read this before booking a session or taking one of our courses. It forms part of our Terms of Service.

In an emergency, do not use this site

This is not an emergency or crisis service. Nobody is monitoring this website, our inbox or our phone line at all hours, and a message sent here may not be read until the next working day.

If you or someone else is in immediate danger, or at risk of harming yourself or anyone else, go to your nearest hospital emergency department, or call emergency services on 112 or 199, or reach out to someone you trust who is physically with you.

What counselling here is

Counselling is a conversation with a trained counsellor about what you are carrying — your relationships, your family, your work, your faith, your grief, whatever has brought you. It is a space to think, to be heard, and to find a way forward.

Our counsellors work in a way that is sensitive to faith. You are welcome here whatever you believe, and you will not be pressed into a conversation about belief you did not ask for.

What counselling here is not

Counselling with us is not medical or psychiatric treatment. Our counsellors do not diagnose illness, do not prescribe or adjust medication, and do not provide psychiatric care.

Nothing said in a session, and nothing in our courses, is a substitute for advice from a doctor, psychiatrist, lawyer or any other professional. Please do not stop, start or change any medication because of something discussed here. Speak to the doctor who prescribed it.

If what you bring needs medical or psychiatric care, your counsellor will say so and help you think about where to go next.

Outcomes

Counselling can help a great deal, but no counsellor can promise a particular result. How much it helps depends on what you bring, the work you do between sessions, and things none of us controls. We will not tell you otherwise in order to sell you a session.

Confidentiality, and its limits

What you say to your counsellor is treated as confidential and is not discussed outside the practice.

There are limits, and they are the ordinary ones. Your counsellor may need to pass information on where there is a serious risk to your life or someone else's, where a child or vulnerable adult may be at risk of harm, or where the law or a court requires it. Where that happens, your counsellor will normally talk to you about it first.

Counsellors within the practice may discuss their work in supervision, which is a professional requirement and is itself confidential.

How your information is stored and who can see it is set out in our Privacy Policy.

Online sessions

An online session depends on your internet connection and on the video service carrying it, neither of which we control. A session may be interrupted; if it is, we will arrange to continue or to rebook it.

Please take the session somewhere you will not be overheard. We cannot protect the privacy of the room you are sitting in.

Courses

Our video courses are educational. They are not personal counselling, they are not tailored to your circumstances, and watching one is not the same as speaking to a counsellor. If the material raises something you need to talk about, book a session.

Who counselling here is for

Our services are arranged for adults. Where a young person is involved, that is arranged with a parent or guardian directly rather than booked through an account here.