Chatham · online by video, with the Hove room for occasional sessions
Psychotherapy for Chatham
Perhaps the same difficulty keeps coming back for you in Chatham, at work, in love or in your harshness towards yourself, and psychotherapy offers a longer, steadier look at its roots. I hold BACP registered membership, and with the UKCP I'm a student member. Hove is 88 minutes' drive from Chatham, so we'd meet weekly by secure video, with Hove visits only now and then.
The practical facts for Chatham
- Where sessions happen
- A private room at Intergen House, 65-67 Western Road, Hove BN3 2JQ, or secure video.
- From Chatham by car
- About 88 minutes with clear roads (73.5 miles); longer at busy times.
- By train
- From Chatham, change at London Bridge for trains towards Brighton and Hove.
- Free NHS talking therapy
- NHS Talking Therapies Kent and Medway, 0333 091 0414
- Fees
- £80 for 60 minutes, £100 for 90, £120 for 120. The first 15-minute call is free.
- Registration
- BACP registered member, no. 109340 (check the register); UKCP student member in advanced psychotherapy training.
A town that has had to rebuild itself
From 1567 until 1984, Chatham's working life turned on the Royal Naval Dockyard.
Its closure hit jobs and the town's prosperity hard, according to a draft neighbourhood plan on Medway Council's site, and in some families a change like that goes on being felt long after anyone stops discussing it. Military life still shapes the town too, with the Royal Engineers at Brompton Barracks and the Great Lines above the streets. Growing up in a family that moved with the services, or where the work was who you were, can leave patterns that last into adult life: never quite settling, keeping feelings to yourself, being the one who always copes. Those patterns rarely announce themselves. They show up as the same row, the same retreat or the same quiet dread on a Sunday evening, whether you live in Walderslade, Troy Town or on St Mary's Island. Psychotherapy is a regular hour to notice them as they happen now and follow them back to where they began.
Longer work, and exactly where my training stands
Shorter counselling usually works on what's happening now. Psychotherapy goes on for longer and asks why the same things come round again: relationships that end the same way, anger that arrives too fast, or the feeling of being an outsider in your own family. Sometimes a pattern appears between the two of us in the session, and then we can look at it while it's happening. My approach is integrative, often drawing on Internal Family Systems to get to know the sides of you that drive, guard or judge. Nobody fixes the number of sessions at the outset. We keep the same weekly time, review together every few months, and you decide when to stop. I have more than 25 years of counselling behind me and am a registered member of the BACP. On the UKCP side I'm not yet registered: I'm partway through psychotherapy training, so I hold student membership for now. If a short course of help eased things for a while and then the old difficulty returned, longer work gives us time to understand why. My own experience of recovery is part of what I bring to that.
Patterns that can bring someone from Chatham into longer work
A childhood that kept moving
Growing up around service life, perhaps near Brompton Barracks, and finding as an adult that you never quite unpack, settle or let people come close.
What the dockyard years left
A family shaped by the dockyard closing in 1984, where work and pride went together, and a sense of not being enough that seems to have come down to you.
Starting over at Chatham Maritime
Enrolling at the University of Greenwich Medway Campus, in its old Royal Navy buildings, as a mature student or a first-time leaver, and hearing old self-doubt in every seminar room.
Help that worked, for a while
Counselling or a MEGAN CIC peer group eased things, then the same difficulty came back with a new job, a new partner or a new home in the Medway Towns.
Public health figures for the area
These are local authority figures from the Office for Health Improvement and Disparities. The figures describe a whole population over a period, not any one person.
Free and low-cost support for Chatham
MEGAN CIC offers peer support groups at The Magpie Centre on Magpie Hall Road, open to anyone 17 or over, whether or not anything has a formal name. For anxiety or low mood, the free NHS Talking Therapies Kent and Medway service will hear from you directly, with no GP letter. Where drinking or drug use is tangled into the pattern, The Forward Trust and Open Road jointly deliver Medway (RIVER) Treatment and Recovery Service, with daily provision at 411 High Street in Chatham.
- Free NHS talking therapyNHS Talking Therapies Kent and Medway0333 091 0414Free NHS talking therapy for anxiety, low mood and related difficulties. You can refer yourself, with no GP referral needed.
- If drinking or drug use is part of itMedway (RIVER) Treatment and Recovery Service0300 123 1560Free and confidential.
- Local organisationSamaritans of Medway, Gravesham and SwaleLocal Samaritans branch.
For gambling, the National Gambling Helpline is free, day or night, on 0808 8020 133 (NHS gambling support).
Private counselling with me can run alongside any of these; you do not have to choose one or the other.
If someone at home is hurting, threatening or controlling you, the National Domestic Abuse Helpline is free, day or night, on 0808 2000 247.
If you need urgent help now
If you need help right now, please don't wait for a session.
What people in Chatham ask before starting
Before I choose a psychotherapist from Chatham, can you tell me whether you're UKCP registered?
I'm a BACP registered member with over 25 years' experience as a counsellor. My UKCP status is student member, because I'm still completing my psychotherapy training, and anyone in Chatham weighing up a therapist deserves to know that clearly. You're welcome to ask about my training and supervision on the free call, and to take your time deciding.
Will longer psychotherapy hold together on video when I'm in Chatham?
It can, because longer work rests on trust and regularity, and both build on screen. The room in Hove is 73.5 miles from Chatham by road, so video is what keeps a weekly hour realistic. You'll need a private room, a steady connection and a time you can protect from the commute or a shift. If the call drops, we reconnect and pick up where we left off.
How many months might psychotherapy take, and what's the first step from Chatham?
There's no fixed length. It may be several months or considerably longer, and we review regularly whether it's still useful. On the free 15-minute consultation, a sentence or so about what keeps coming round is plenty to go on. I'll tell you plainly whether a regular time is free now. If you'd like free support meanwhile, MEGAN CIC runs peer groups in Chatham.
My family's history in Chatham feels tangled up in how I am. Is that something psychotherapy looks at?
Very much so. Psychotherapy often looks at what was handed down: how your family dealt with work, money, absence or loss, and what was never said aloud. Whether that's a parent who served at Brompton Barracks or a household changed when the dockyard closed, we'd look at how that history lives in your reactions now, at a pace you set.
How much do sessions cost, and is the first call free?
Sessions are £80 for 60 minutes, £100 for 90 minutes and £120 for 120 minutes, the same in person in Hove or by video. The first 15-minute call is free, with no obligation to book. There is no NHS referral needed to see me privately.
Begin with a short call about what keeps returning
When you feel ready, a short conversation is the easiest way to see whether we are a good fit. There is no obligation.