Ruth Herrtage
Member of BACP
The Woodbridge Complementary
Health Centre
Sandy Lane
Martlesham
Woodbridge
Suffolk
IP12 4SD
Tel: 01394 388 234
About Counselling
What is my counselling service about?
My service provides a safe and confident3r of embarrassment, being judged, rejected or hurting someone. Sometimes we can’t even make sense of it ourselves. This is when we need to someone to listen – but listen deeply. I am trained to help you develop a deeper understanding of your problems and facilitate positive change.
How might counselling help you?
With commitment it is an empowering process which helps develop insight and provide you with strategies that help you cope with the challenges of life. It will help you ‘know yourself’ on a deeper level and by doing so you will identify both positive and negative recurring patterns of behaviour, thoughts and responses that perhaps do not serve you well. Counselling will help you develop new patterns that will have a positive impact on your life and on how you feel about the world in general.
What is it like to work with a counsellor?
It is different depending on the counsellor you choose. A therapeutic and honest relationship develops with the sole aim of benefiting your life. I can promise that you are truly listened to and acknowledged and will become more aware and in control of the choices that are available to you. I have a flexible approach to suit individual needs and difficulties. I provide an emotional ‘space’ in which you can exercise your thoughts and feelings without the worry of friends and loved ones responses. Essentially, it’s all about YOU.
Situations where counselling can help and support you:
Management of emotions – identify ways to control your emotions more positively and effectively. We often struggle to maintain control when dealing with difficult situations.
Management of stress – by increasing awareness of your stress symptoms and the causes and effects you can improve management of day-to-day issues very effectively. We don’t always recognise the symptoms until we’ve reached an emotional crisis or burn-out. Know yourself. We all have different levels of stress that we can cope with.
Depression – Most of us feel ‘down’ occasionally and need help to deal with life. Symptoms can also be a lot more severe when everything is an effort and harder to do. Somehow it doesn’t seem worthwhile. Counselling can help you find the light again and move forward positively.
Anxiety – Suffering with panic attacks or general worry and anxiety? Identify your symptoms and discover how you can control it in everyday life. Don’t allow it to control you.
Low Self-Esteem – I can help you identify, understand and challenge basic assumptions about yourself and the world. Raise your confidence levels by developing positive skills to prevent low self-esteem from negatively impacting your life. See yourself in a more positive light, eliminate learned assumptions and adopt healthy beliefs in line with your reality as an independent adult.
Decision-making –We all have difficult decisions to make from time to time. The process can be made harder by the pressures of loved ones and the desire to please others - sometimes to our own detriment. Counselling can help to increase your awareness and develop a healthy balance between objectivity and subjectivity in your decision making processes so you can make beneficial and informed choices.
Communication – Do you feel constantly misunderstood? Do you find it difficult to ask for what you need? Are you surprised or disappointed by the responses you receive from others? Has it become impossible to communicate effectively in your relationship? Develop your understanding of communication and help maintain positive and rewarding relationships. Good communication skills also enhance assertiveness.
Relationship issues – Communication, compassion and understanding are crucial to healthy relationships. It is so common to make the mistake of ignoring the issues for too long before attempting to address them. Often couples seek help only after they have given up hope on the relationship and on some level already made a decision to let it go. Relationships can be repaired more effectively if you seek help in the early stages of difficulty. Delay results in unnecessary hurt and suffering and only serves to magnify the problems.
Equally, when a decision has been made to end a relationship it’s not easy to do so without damaging emotional consequences, particularly when children are involved. Relationship counselling can also be effective in this context by seeking a third party to facilitate separation with a view to minimise emotional suffering as much as possible.
Bereavement – Loss is a challenging experience for most of us whether it impacts through the death of friend or loved one, redundancy, illness or physical disability.
Counselling can help support you through the process of bereavement - whatever the cause. Do you feel you can’t talk to someone close? Do you feel you’re a burden? Whatever the reason there is no need to struggle through alone – seek help through counselling.