After an initial conversation with your counsellor, you have decided to begin counselling and arrive for your first session.
What can you expect?
A warm and friendly welcome, I'll be considerate of how you are feeling, with compassion and understanding of your start to counselling. I know you may be feeling nervous and unsure as to what to expect. So, we'll go at your pace.
As your counsellor I cover the therapeutic contract during the first session. This is our working agreement that is in place to provide safety, transparency, and professional boundaries. This lets us both know what we can expect. I'll send you an email copy to read before we have our first session.
You will be able to refer to your contract at any time during our work together if needed and ask any questions that you may have or that arise.
The Counselling Contract Contains:
How often your sessions will be and where.
The cost involved and how payment can be made.
Our confidentiality policy and any exemptions you need to be aware off.
Cancelation policy and information about contact between sessions.
Holidays and breaks.
GDPR
How often we review our work together to ensure it is still beneficial to you.
This information helps us to understand and have knowledge of how we will work together. Having clear boundaries helps to have clear expectations about counselling.
In our first session:
We'll go through your details, and I will do a small assessment.
This includes contact details, address, and the name of your GP surgery for my records.
Some basic questions about your medical history and your general wellbeing.
Some people have accessed counselling previously, many have not. We'll discuss if you've have had counselling before and what that experience was like. Past experiences may alter your expectations, or your perception of what counselling involves. As with people, counsellors are individuals, all with a personal approach. I'll explain the way I work to ensure that feels right for you.
Together we'll explore what you wish to gain from counselling, your specific goals if you have them. Knowing what your expectations are ensures you know when you have achieved them. Even if this is just as simple as '' I want to feel better'', there is an end goal, and we can explore what this means to you. Gaols/aims may change and move as you go along as the process unfolds. that's natural and okay. We'll regularly check in with this.
We can look at how we will acknowledge each other should we happen to meet outside the counselling room. This is your decision; we'll do what feels right for you, as this may be a concern for some people.
We'll go over these things together and you can ask any questions you have at any time, we can discuss any worries or concerns you may have regarding your counselling. I am a warm and approachable person and welcome any questions.
I will try to ensure a comfortable and collaborative experience. This is a two-way process where, if you want to, we can talk further about anything that feels important to you. It provides me with your background information and your expectations from our work together. We'll know where we are heading, and together, we can start that journey. This will be the only time I take notes during our sessions for my records.
After this initial beginning of the session, you will be able to begin your counselling journey and spend the remainder of the session talking about what is happening for you. What has brought you to counselling now. At the end of this and with all sessions you can decide if you wish to book the next session. This session is an opportunity for you to see how you feel working with me. To decide if I am the right counsellor for you.
I hope to make your introduction to counselling as comfortable as possible, with a warm and supportive approach. If you need to discuss something really pressing in your first session, as long as we are clear regarding confidentiality the session format is open to change to suit your needs.
If you would like support with something that is impacting you or your life, get in touch. Let's see if working together could make a difference for you
Tel 07360287003Â Â
Email. michellecobbinfo@gmail.com
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