Counselling and Therapy
Mary is happy to receive self referrals and referrals from health care professionals. She is Hampshire based but will accept referrals from anywhere in the south of England.
If you wish to make an appointment to speak to Mary we have several options available to you ranging from one to one individual sessions in north Hampshire, email or telephone consultations to intensive 3 or 5 day therapy in north Hampshire or your own location.
If you would like to arrange an initial consultation to see if therapy might be a way forward for you, please give Mary a call on 01264 358853, or, if you prefer, send an e-mail to mary@maryclegg.co.uk
Psychotherapy
Couples Therapy
Psychosexual Therapy
What happens in Therapy
What is psychotherapy?
Many people view psychotherapy or therapy of any kind as an admission of defeat; that they can’t sort out their own problems without help. However there will be times in all of our lives when we will experience emotional difficulties and living our day to day life has become problematic. This may be a time when we do not have the ability to think clearly and constructively and it can help to talk to others. For various reasons we may not choose to talk to family or friends, but in some cases it can help to talk things through with someone who is professionally trained to help and support you. I see therapy as a supported way forward. You may only need one or two sessions or you may need to be supported more long term. Whichever you choose, therapy has a good track record and there is good evidence to show that if you seek help sooner rather than later outcomes can be more optimistic.
Integrative psychotherapy makes use of a number of different therapeutic theories and techniques to help you understand yourself and your situation more clearly. If you chose short term work we may work more with your behaviour, feelings and emotions affecting you now and work with discovering new ways to think, feel and act. Using a longer term approach you may choose to look much more deeply at your past to understand your thoughts and feelings and look for more gradual changes for your present and future life.
Many people find that psychotherapy has helped them resolve difficulties that have their origins in their past, have more confidence to deal with the present and look at change as a new concept for personal growth which will serve them well for their future.
Psychotherapy may be able to help with:
• Stress, anxiety, anger issues, panic attacks or depression
• Coping with things that happened to you in the past
• Exploring your current situation and how to make positive changes for the future
• Bereavement, separation or other painful loss
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Couples Therapy
There is much pressure on couples to “Live the Dream” of the perfect relationship. When we are courting at the start of a relationship, we are happy to let the world know of every detail but as the relationship becomes more permanent and longer lasting our ability to discuss our relationship seems to get more difficult. So it can be hard to talk about relationship difficulties, even with our partners, and many of us go through periods when our relationships make us unhappy or ill at ease. The inability to discuss these feelings makes us even more unhappy and worried and we may become anxious too. Some people feel they have no one to turn to and feel the problems have become unsolvable. Couples therapy can offer a safe space to explore and understand what is going wrong and to work together on the difficulties. Poor communication or difficulty handling conflict are some of the typical issues raised.
As you are in a relationship together it is preferable that you attend together, because relationship and sexual difficulties rarely (if ever) “belong” to one partner or the other. If you don’t have a partner or s/he is not willing to attend, you are welcome to come to sessions on you own.
Couple Therapy may be able to help with:
• Understanding where and how the problems affecting you and your partner have arisen
• Difficulties around jealousy and trusting each other
• Recovering from affairs
• Constant bickering or arguing
• Problems arising from a change in life circumstances (such as having children, caring for elderly relatives or employment changes)
• Sexual problems (which may have many causes, including physical, psychological, emotional or circumstantial)
• Recovering intimacy
• Communication issues
• Managing separation (if unavoidable) through collaborative processes in the best way for all concerned
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What is Psychosexual Therapy?
Psychosexual therapy is the process of addressing both sexual and relationship difficulties on either an individual or couple basis. The physical and psychological aspects of the individual or couple are explored using full clinical assessment in order to produce the best possible treatment options.
Some of these problems may be physical, like an inability to achieve an erection or ejaculation, orgasm problems for men or inability to become aroused, and for women, orgasm difficulties, loss of lubrication and/or painful intercourse. Or they may be psychological, like loss of interest or desire for sex, addiction or obsession with sexual stimuli, sexual violence or abuse or negative childhood messages.
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What happens in Therapy
Mary is able to offer short or long term therapy or intensive short term therapy over a few days to individuals or couples over 18. The first appointment is always an assessment appointment so that I can listen to your difficulties and we can talk about how therapy may help you. This will be an opportunity for you to ask any questions you may have about therapy and your difficulties. There is absolutely no obligation to continue therapy after this first session. However if you do decide this would be a good avenue to pursue, then we will discuss the best way to work together and the time scales of the therapy. All of this is open to negotiation at the start and during therapy.
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