Hackney · online by video, with the Hove room for occasional sessions
Psychotherapy for Hackney
If a pattern keeps coming back, in how you love, how you work or how harshly you talk to yourself, psychotherapy gives you room to understand where it comes from. If you live in Hackney, we'd meet weekly by secure video, because my one room is in Hove, well to the south. You could add an occasional longer session there.
The practical facts for Hackney
- Where sessions happen
- A private room at Intergen House, 65-67 Western Road, Hove BN3 2JQ, or secure video.
- From Hackney by car
- About 97 minutes with clear roads (72.3 miles); longer at busy times.
- Free NHS talking therapy
- City & Hackney Talking Therapies
- 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.
Old buildings, new neighbours and patterns that stay
Hackney holds a lot of history in a small space.
Sutton House dates from 1535, and St Augustine's Tower and the Hackney Empire theatre are still part of the borough's streets. Around them the borough keeps shifting, with neighbours moving on and new people arriving. A person's history works in a similar way. If you grew up here, you may have watched Dalston or Hackney Wick change around you while the patterns in your family stayed exactly where they were. If you moved in for work or study, the old patterns probably came with you in the boxes. Either way, psychotherapy looks at what repeats: relationships that end the same way, a harsh inner voice, the habit of bracing for something to go wrong. Hackney had the joint second-lowest median age in London in 2021, and your late twenties and thirties can be when those patterns become hard to ignore.
Deeper work on what keeps repeating
Shorter counselling tends to stay with the present. Psychotherapy goes further back and more slowly, asking where a pattern came from and what it has been protecting you from. We might notice how you act when someone gets close, what happens inside you when you're criticised, or why resting feels unsafe. There's room for memories, dreams and the feelings that turn up in the session itself, including feelings about me. The work is usually open-ended and often runs for many months, and we review it together regularly so it never drifts. For harder ground, a 90-minute session can give enough time to arrive, go deep and come back up before you return to your evening. I'm a BACP registered member, and my UKCP membership is at student level, which I'd rather you knew from the outset. Lived experience of recovery, and over 25 years in the counselling chair, shape how I sit with difficult material: steadily, without hurry and without judgement.
What longer work can hold for a Hackney life
Family stories that repeat
Patterns learned at home, whether that home was in Stamford Hill, Homerton or far from Hackney, tend to resurface in your own relationships and in how you parent.
A childhood shaped by scarcity
Hackney ranks second in England for income deprivation among children, at 64.1%. If going without shaped your early years, psychotherapy can look at what it left behind.
Surrounded, yet at arm's length
In one of England's most crowded boroughs you can be among people all day and still keep everyone at a distance. Understanding that distance is often the heart of the work.
A low-cost room close by
Centre for Better Health offers low-cost counselling and psychotherapy in person in Hackney, on a sliding scale for daytime sessions, if price or a local room matters most.
Free and low-cost support for Hackney
Free and low-cost help can run alongside longer private work. Without a GP letter, you can ask City and Hackney Talking Therapies for help with anxiety or a persistently low mood. The City and Hackney Wellbeing Network, reached through Mind CHWF, links you to groups and activities, including Core Arts on St Barnabas Terrace. Centre for Better Health runs therapeutic support groups as well as its low-cost psychotherapy.
- Free NHS talking therapyCity & Hackney Talking TherapiesFree 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 itCity and Hackney Recovery Service0345 144 0050Free and confidential.
- Local organisationMind in the City, Hackney and Waltham Forest (Mind CHWF)Mental health charity.
- Local organisationSt Joseph's Hospice, Hackney: adult bereavement service
- Local organisationCentral London Samaritans
For gambling, the National Gambling Helpline is free, day or night, on 0808 8020 133 (NHS gambling support).
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.
Local drop-in crisis support: City and Hackney Crisis Café (check opening times before you go).
What people in Hackney ask before starting
Does online psychotherapy from Hackney work as well as sitting in a room?
For longer work, steadiness matters a great deal, and from Hackney video is what makes a regular weekly session realistic. What helps most is a private space and the same time each week. If being in the room together matters to you, occasional longer sessions in Hove can be added, and we can talk about that early on.
How many months of psychotherapy should a Hackney client expect?
There's no fixed length. A focused piece of work might last a few months, while older, deeper patterns can mean a year or more of weekly sessions; the length follows what you bring and the change you are hoping for. We review progress together at regular points, and you decide when to stop, ideally with a planned ending rather than a sudden one.
Can I get psychotherapy free in Hackney?
Homerton Healthcare runs City and Hackney Talking Therapies, which you can contact directly about anxiety or a low mood, and your GP can tell you about other NHS options. For longer, low-cost work in person, Centre for Better Health in Hackney offers psychotherapy on a sliding scale for daytime sessions.
Which professional bodies do you belong to as a psychotherapist?
I'm registered with BACP, have practised for over 25 years, and hold student membership of UKCP. I describe myself as a counsellor and psychotherapist and work integratively, and I'm happy to answer any questions about training or membership when we first speak.
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.
Talk through longer work, from Hackney
When you feel ready, a short conversation is the easiest way to see whether we are a good fit. There is no obligation.