What is the counselling process?

Every individual's situation is unique and as a result the goals for counselling depend on the person's presenting concerns. But through the therapy process, you will have an opportunity to discuss your current life situation, your personal history as it relates to your presenting concerns, and build on insights from previous counseling sessions. The stages for counseling include the following:

• Assessment: This is where you’ll work with your therapist to identify your counseling goals, the factors that may hinder your progress, and consider ways to overcome some of these obstacles.
• Safety and Stabilization: Therapy involves hard work in terms of emotional and cognitive processing. It’s very important that you feel safe and stabilized. Safety is required to ensure that you can emotionally manage discussing difficult life circumstances and stabilization is necessary for incorporating strategies to cope with difficult emotions.
• Processing: Here, you will work with your therapist to determine whether it would be helpful to process important contributing events (such as past difficult relationships, trauma, and/or abuse) of your situation. Expect this to be the longest phase of your therapy.
• Reconnection: Here, you will decide on how you want your present life to be after having overcome difficult emotional blocks. This is the most rewarding phase of your counseling journey, and it will help you determine what you want to do now that you’ve dealt with your challenges successfully.