Specialization and Qualification

As a counsellor, I focus primarily on psychological treatment for individuals who suffer from depression, depressive moods and emotional distress. My practice also specializes in the treatment of depression during pregnancy and during the postnatal years. I provide counselling for a broad range of related issues, including anxiety, life transitions, interpersonal conflict, eating disorders and low self-esteem. I hold a Masters degree in Clinical Mental Health from Bar Ilan University, Israel, and Post.Grad.Dip. of Counselling and Psychotherapy from Cairnmillar Institute, Melbourne. I am an accredited member of AASW and a certified provider of Medicare Australia.

What is therapy?

Therapy, or counselling, is a treatment process that uses particular practices that have been designed to offer effective, long-lasting help for people suffering from a wide range of difficulties. Such techniques are implemented within the context of a supportive and caring therapeutic relationship. Therapy can help to alleviate emotional distress such as depression, anxiety, fears or a clinical disorder. It can enhance one’s capacity to cope with a significant loss, or adjust to a significant change in life. Therapy can also help fulfill aspirations for personal growth or self-improvement.

A major misconception about therapy is that seeing a therapist is a sign that one is flawed in some way. In fact, quite the opposite is true. Recognizing the need for help and seeking professional therapy is a sign of one’s determination to take responsibility for confronting and overcoming difficulties, in order to live a more productive and meaningful life.

In therapy we will work at gaining an understanding of your current situation and present difficulties. We will collaboratively work at untangling the issues in the circumstantial, emotional and psychological sphere, and work at relieving your depression and anxiety.

The process of overcoming the pain will involve shedding light on your private world and will be facilitated via empathic and non judgmental acceptance of everything that is YOU.  We will explore your past and present ways of thinking and relating, your philosophical outlook and beliefs, the concerns that are seeded in your existence and the emotional experiences that come along with them. Together we will aim at catalyzing your will to act, your ability to enjoy, feel and be in touch with the people and world around you.

Therapeutic approach

As a counsellor I employ an integrative therapeutic approach based upon my training in Cognitive-Behavioural, Existential-Humanistic, Schema Therapy and Psychodynamic approaches. Interventions are tailored to accord with the specific needs and concerns of each client. The interventions incorporated are drawn from aspects and techniques of the following:

Cognitive Therapy – Cognitive therapy focuses on the clinical observation that depressed moods often seem to be related to negative patterns of thinking and behaving that are neither realistic nor pragmatic. In cognitive therapy, we will work together to determine what types of negative thinking are problematic, and what types of coping or balanced thoughts can be used to provide a better perspective, to lift your mood, and help you function better.

Behavioural Therapy – Diminishing hurtful or personally disadvantaging behaviours and enforcing the use of more realistic and rewarding behaviours. The goals are identification and development of skills necessary to manage tasks and interactions more satisfactorily.

Existential Psychotherapy – An approach to therapy which takes seriously the human condition in the world. It is an optimistic approach in that it embraces human potential, while remaining a realistic approach through its recognition of human limitation and fallibility. This approach to therapy deals with such issues as isolation, freedom, choice and responsibility, and with the anxieties that accompany our confrontations with them.  It emphasizes the choices one makes in the present and future, and looks into enabling the client’s freedom, responsibility and the will to act.

Experiential and Psychodynamic Therapy – The goals are resolution of complicated grief following loss, separation, traumatic experiences and life transitions. This approach encourages the expression of feelings, and the use of the therapeutic relationship in ‘working through’ interpersonal conflicts and traumatic experiences.

Therapeutic values