Drugs and substances
Confidential support for any kind of substance use.
Online Substance Use Counselling · Folkestone
Online Substance Use Counselling in Folkestone
Online substance use counselling for Folkestone, by secure video. From a base in Hove I work with people across Folkestone, from the Creative Quarter and the Leas to the streets around the Harbour Arm, 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 Folkestone
Substance Use Counselling for Folkestone, at a glance
- Areas covered online
- All of Folkestone: from the Creative Quarter and the Leas to Cheriton, Sandgate and Morehall
- Known for
- The Leas, the Harbour Arm and the Creative Quarter
- Region
- London & South East (England)
- Local NHS / support route
- Kent County Council's drug and alcohol support
- Format
- Secure video, UK-wide. In-person also available on the Sussex coast.
Life in Folkestone
What brings people in Folkestone to counselling?
Drug use in Folkestone spans a wider range of lives than the word usually suggests. There is the tourism and hospitality sector, where late finishes and cash-in-hand hours have always sat close to stimulants. There is shift work around the Eurotunnel terminal at Cheriton. There is the creative end of town, where an evening habit can pass for a working method for years on end. And there is long-standing use in Broadmead and East Folkestone with nothing to do with any scene at all. What connects them is a coastal town's particular privacy: everybody knows everybody, so nobody says anything.
Areas covered
Neighbourhoods in and around Folkestone
CheritonSandgateMorehallFoordBroadmeadEast FolkestoneHarvey CentralPark Farm
Wherever you are in Folkestone, the work is the same, a calm, confidential space shaped around you.
The local picture
The local picture in Folkestone
Official figures for Folkestone, for context rather than as a description of you.
2.6 adults per 1,000 were in treatment at specialist drug-misuse services in 2020/21, below the England average of 4.5 per 1,000. Source: OHID Fingertips – Adults in treatment at specialist drug misuse services (2020/21).
the rate of deaths from drug misuse was 4.8 per 100,000 in 2022 - 24, below the England average of 5.8 per 100,000. Source: OHID Fingertips – Deaths from drug misuse (2022 - 24).
Reviewed June 2026.
What actually happens in substance use counselling?
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.
The approach does not change with the postcode, so rather than repeat it on every page you can read it in full, the methods and what each session covers, on the substance use counselling page, alongside how I work and my BACP registration.
How does meeting by video work in practice?
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 nowhere in Folkestone to attend; Bradley works from Hove and everything is delivered by secure video. Where drugs are concerned that is an advantage rather than a compromise, because in a town this compact the walk through a named door is the part that stops people. Nobody watches the appointment happen. A laptop or phone, headphones and an hour with the door shut is all it takes, and a parked car counts.
Book a free 15-minute callWhat I help with
What does substance use counselling help with?
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 Folkestone
Why people in Folkestone come for substance use counselling
You are not asked to stop, and you are not asked to intend to. Making abstinence the condition of being heard produces a polite fiction rather than a conversation, so the work begins somewhere more honest. What does the substance do for you? Which part of the week leans on it? What has it cost so far, and what would have to be different before less of it felt survivable? Cocaine, cannabis, ketamine, stimulants taken to get through a season of late shifts, and prescription tablets that stayed past their purpose are all met the same way, without a lecture. None of it is medical. Kent County Council's drug and alcohol support covers prescribing, testing and harm reduction, and Change Grow Live runs the Kent Recovery Houses locally. The rate of deaths from drug misuse in this district was 4.8 per 100,000 across 2022 - 24, under the England average of 5.8.
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 Folkestone
My online counselling sits alongside the help available locally. In Folkestone, free local drug and alcohol support is available through Kent County Council's drug and alcohol support.
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 NHS 111 and choose the mental health option. The Samaritans are free, day or night, on 116 123, or 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.
Folkestone questions
Online Substance Use Counselling in Folkestone: common questions
Do I need to be ready to quit before I get in touch?
No. Being nowhere near ready is a perfectly good reason to talk, and it is where a lot of people begin. The free 15-minute call contains no assessment. If you want to continue afterwards, weekly sessions can usually start within a week or two of it.
What happens to the cost if work dries up in winter?
Fees stay at £80 an hour, £100 for 90 minutes and £120 for two hours; what changes is how often you come. Moving to fortnightly is common when seasonal work thins out, and it keeps the work going rather than ending it. Mention it early on.
What does Change Grow Live offer here?
It runs the Kent Recovery Houses covering this town as part of Kent County Council's drug and alcohol support, which is free and holds the medical side entirely: prescribing, supervised treatment, testing, harm reduction. Counselling does none of those things, and the two work perfectly well in parallel.
Is a video session secure?
The link is encrypted and nothing is recorded. What you say stays confidential within the usual legal limits, which get explained at the start. No notes go to a GP unless you ask for that, nothing appears on an NHS record, and no correspondence arrives at your address.
I have used since the season work started years ago. Has it become something else?
That is exactly the question to bring. Use that begins as a way of coping with a specific job very often outlasts the job. Whether it has changed shape is not something you can settle on your own, and it is answerable in an hour with somebody neutral.
It's part of the creative scene here, so is it really a problem for me?
It can be, whatever the setting. What matters is how it sits with you, not the crowd around it: whether it is creeping up, or you rely on it more than you would like. We can look at your own pattern honestly, privately, without any label being forced on you.
Can I get online substance use counselling quickly in Folkestone?
Generally yes. A free 15-minute consultation comes first, then a regular time, often within a week. There is no long trip along the coast to a clinic and no referral queue, so you can join securely from home near the Leas, in Foord or Cheriton, whenever suits.
Is substance use counselling free on the NHS in Folkestone?
There are free routes: your GP can refer you, Kent's drug and alcohol service takes self-referrals, and FRANK offers confidential national advice online or by phone. This counselling is private, at £80 for 60 minutes, £100 for 90 and £120 for 120, with a free consultation.
Online or in person in an outwardly buoyant but privately hard town?
Online often helps here, since a creative, buoyant place can mask a good deal of private struggle, and a session done quietly from home lets you speak plainly whatever face the town is wearing. Evenings work well. In-person meetings are possible in Hove, further along the coast, if you prefer.
Online Substance Use Counselling in Folkestone, 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 London & South East: Dover, Ashford. See all of London & South East.
Close to this in Folkestone, there is addiction counselling, counselling for drinking problems and anxiety counselling.
Some further reading, if that helps before getting in touch: calming a craving as it rises and once an addict, always an addict?.
For anyone near the coast, the same substance use counselling runs in person in Hove, where the room is. Every area covered is listed separately.