Drugs and substances
Confidential support for any kind of substance use.
Online Substance Use Counselling · Craigavon
Online Substance Use Counselling in Craigavon
Online substance use counselling for Craigavon, by secure video. From a base in Hove I work with people across Craigavon, from Lurgan and Portadown to the streets around the lakes, with the same BACP-registered, confidential support as an in-person session, and no journey.
BACP registered member25+ years of experienceLived experience
ConfidentialA safe, private space
Person-centredThe therapy fits you
In and around Craigavon
Substance Use Counselling for Craigavon, at a glance
- Areas covered online
- All of Craigavon: from Lurgan and Portadown to Brownlow and the linked centre
- Known for
- The lakes, the linen heritage and the Lough Neagh shore
- Region
- Northern Ireland
- Local NHS / support route
- ASCERT, which supports people across Northern Ireland with drug and alcohol use
- Format
- Secure video, UK-wide. In-person also available on the Sussex coast.
Life in Craigavon
Why do people in Craigavon reach out?
Drugs in Craigavon have no single setting. The estates sit apart from each other, joined by roads rather than by streets, so use happens in houses and cars rather than anywhere public. Tablets circulate. Cocaine appears at weekends among people holding down full-time jobs and mortgages. Younger use around Drumgask or Tullygally can look like boredom long before it looks like anything else, and boredom is no small matter where getting anywhere at all needs a lift. The linen heritage of Lurgan and Portadown is a memory now, and much of the work that followed it is short-term. Very little of any of this reaches a service.
Areas covered
Neighbourhoods in and around Craigavon
LurganPortadownBrownlowBlearyLegahoryMandevilleDrumgaskTullygally
Wherever you are in Craigavon, the work is the same, a calm, confidential space shaped around you.
The local picture
The local picture in Craigavon
Official figures for Craigavon, for context rather than as a description of you.
There were 14 drug-related deaths registered in the Armagh City, Banbridge and Craigavon council area in 2023, out of 169 across Northern Ireland (NI age-standardised rate 9.1 per 100,000). Source: NISRA - Drug-related and drug misuse deaths in Northern Ireland, 2023 (2023).
In Armagh City, Banbridge and Craigavon, 4.0% of adults reported a low life satisfaction score (4 or below out of 10) in the year ending March 2023, compared with a Northern Ireland average of 5.2%, a difference the survey's margin of error does not confirm. Source: Office for National Statistics (ONS), Personal well-being estimates by local authority (Year ending March 2023 (2022-23)).
Reviewed June 2026.
What is substance use counselling, in practice?
Substance use counselling here is non-judgemental and one-to-one, working with the pain, fear or loneliness the substance has been managing, at a pace that protects your sense of safety.
What actually happens in the room is the same everywhere, so it is written up once: see the main substance use counselling page for the methods, how I work for fees and session lengths, and my credentials and registration if you want to check who you would be working with.
What do I need for an online session?
Sessions run over a secure, encrypted video link, held to the same BACP confidentiality as meeting in person. After a free fifteen-minute call, you join from any private space on a phone, tablet or laptop.
There is no room in this town, so everything runs online by secure video from Hove. That answers a genuine local problem, because asking for drug support usually means arranging transport and then being seen to arrive somewhere. Here there is nothing to arrive at. The hour can be taken from home in Lurgan, Portadown or anywhere in between, and it can be shifted when a week goes badly rather than simply lost.
Book a free 15-minute callWhat I help with
Which difficulties does substance use counselling address?
The false self
Letting go of the protective self that no longer serves you.
Specialised attention
One-to-one sessions shaped entirely around you.
Self-discovery
Rediscovering the authentic self beneath the coping.
Anxiety and low mood
Treating what the substance has been masking.
Sustainable change
Growing into recovery rather than forcing it.
Substance Use Counselling in Craigavon
Why people in Craigavon come for substance use counselling
Nobody is asked to be abstinent to begin, and nobody is asked to justify their use before it will be listened to. Judgement gets people to say less rather than use less, which helps no one at all. The hour is for understanding the function: what the drug reliably provides, what it has cost by now, and what would have to change before stopping felt possible instead of theoretical. In practice that means talking about sleep, anxiety, money, grief, or something in the past that has never been asked about. The context is worth stating plainly, since 14 of the 169 drug-related deaths registered across Northern Ireland in 2023 fell in the council area covering Craigavon. Medical care and prescribing go through your GP and Health and Social Care, while ASCERT offers drug and alcohol support and the NHS find a service directory shows what else is open.
A free, unhurried first step
Not sure if it is right for you? A free fifteen-minute call is a no-obligation way to talk it through.
Book a free 15-minute callDrug, alcohol & addiction support in Craigavon
My online counselling sits alongside the help available locally. In Craigavon, your GP can refer you to local drug and alcohol services, and you can find support through ASCERT, which supports people across Northern Ireland with drug and alcohol use.
For confidential information and advice, FRANK (on 0300 123 6600) and Drinkline on 0300 123 1110 are free, and Alcoholics Anonymous and SMART Recovery run peer-support meetings you can find online.
Other local and national support verified for this area includes:
If you need urgent help now
This is not a crisis service. If anyone is in immediate danger call 999. For urgent mental health support, call Lifeline free on 0808 808 8000. Lifeline is free on 0808 808 8000, the Samaritans are on 116 123, and you can text SHOUT to 85258.
If you drink heavily or use drugs daily, do not stop suddenly on your own. Withdrawal can cause seizures and can be dangerous. Speak to your GP or a local drug and alcohol service first, and they can arrange a safe, medically supported withdrawal. Counselling works alongside that, not instead of it.
Craigavon questions
Online Substance Use Counselling in Craigavon: common questions
Will I be told to stop before you will work with me?
No. That condition would exclude nearly everybody who needs the conversation. You can be using regularly and still get a great deal out of the hour, and being able to say so accurately is worth more to the work than any promise made in advance.
What would the sessions cost me?
They are the same as for any other work: £80 for sixty minutes, £100 for ninety, £120 for two hours. No fee attaches to the initial 15-minute call. No fee changes because of what you use, and nothing is added for evening appointments or for using the telephone instead.
Who provides drug services officially in this area?
Health and Social Care does, entered through a GP referral, and ASCERT works across Northern Ireland and can be contacted directly. Craigavon Area Hospital covers acute medical need. Counselling belongs beside those rather than instead of them, and it never involves prescribing anything.
Nobody at home knows. Can I do this without them finding out?
Yes. Nothing is posted to your address, nothing arrives by letter and no local service is told your name. Many people take the hour when the house is empty, or from a car parked somewhere ordinary, and decide much later who else needs to know.
What if I turn up to a session having used that day?
Then we work with the day you are actually having. It is more useful than a rehearsed version and it tells us something about how the week is going. The only thing that gets in the way is being too far gone to take in the conversation while it happens.
Do I have to stop using before counselling can help?
No. Counselling starts wherever you are, whether or not you have cut down. There is nothing to prove first. Held online by secure video across Northern Ireland, sessions let you talk honestly from home in Craigavon, working gently towards change at your own pace.
How quickly can substance use counselling begin in Craigavon?
Often within days. A free 15-minute call helps us see whether this feels right, then we set a first session soon after. It is all online by secure video, so the dispersed layout makes no difference to how soon you can start from home in Craigavon.
Is substance use counselling free on the NHS in Craigavon?
NHS drug and alcohol services here sit within the Southern Trust and cost nothing, though access can take time. My sessions are £80 for 60 minutes, £100 for 90 and £120 for two hours, with a free 15-minute consultation first and no waiting to begin.
Are evening online substance use sessions available for Craigavon?
Yes. An evening hour from home saves driving between the scattered communities that make up the town. Sessions run by secure video, so from Brownlow to Bleary you can take part in private, needing only a quiet space and a reliable connection to join.
Online Substance Use Counselling in Craigavon, whenever you are ready
A free fifteen-minute call is the simplest place to start, no obligation, just a chance to see if we are the right fit.
Also available online across Northern Ireland: Lisburn, Newry. See all of Northern Ireland.
Also available in Craigavon: addiction counselling, counselling for drinking problems and anxiety counselling.
There is more on this in my writing: three ways to handle a craving and calming a craving as it rises.
For anyone near the coast, the same substance use counselling runs in person in Brighton. Every area covered is listed separately.