Sutton · online by video, with the Hove room for occasional sessions
Couples therapy and relationship counselling for Sutton
For couples in Sutton who have started to feel more like colleagues running a household than partners, relationship counselling here happens over secure video. You might share one laptop on the sofa, log in from two different places, or start alone while your partner makes up their mind. My one room is in Hove, so from here video is the usual way.
The practical facts for Sutton
- Where sessions happen
- A private room at Intergen House, 65-67 Western Road, Hove BN3 2JQ, or secure video.
- From Sutton by car
- About 61 minutes with clear roads (43.3 miles); longer at busy times.
- Free NHS talking therapy (for one of you)
- Sutton Talking Therapies, 0800 032 1411
- 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.
One of you on the London Bridge train, one on the High Street
A Sutton household can run on two timetables.
One belongs to the railway, with direct services up to Victoria, London Bridge and Blackfriars that take one partner out early and return them tired. The other belongs to the town itself, a High Street stretching nearly a mile from Sutton Green to the station, with the St Nicholas Centre and Times Square shopping centre, where weekend shifts fall on the very days a commuter has free. If one of you works those shops and the other works in the City, you can share a house in Benhilton or Rose Hill and barely share a waking hour. Illness can rearrange a couple too. With the Royal Marsden on Downs Road and St Helier Hospital just over in Carshalton, a cancer scare or a long run of treatment can turn one partner into a patient and the other into driver, note-taker and nurse, roles neither of you chose. When that happens, the relationship is often the thing that gets whatever attention is left over.
What a couples hour looks like when time is scarce
A first session usually begins with each of you telling me, without interruption, what has gone wrong and what you would hate to lose. I don't keep score. I listen for the loop the two of you get caught in: one of you raises the bank balance at ten at night, the other hears criticism and goes quiet, and the quiet sounds like not caring. Seeing the loop together gives you something to talk about other than who started it. If illness has reshaped things, we make room for what neither of you has managed to say, such as the fear the patient hid to protect the other, or the resentment the carer feels guilty for feeling. After months of appointments, closeness and sex often drop away, and that can be talked about plainly here. With a teenager at Sutton Grammar School or Greenshaw High School, exam years can pull every conversation towards the children and away from the two of you. A 90-minute session often suits two people, because each gets a fair turn. If one of you won't take part, you can come alone and look at your own side of the pattern.
Where Sutton partners tend to lose each other
Patient and organiser, not partners
When months of appointments on Downs Road made one of you the patient and the other the organiser, and neither of you has found the way back to simply being a couple.
The City train and the shop floor
One of you leaves early for Victoria or Blackfriars, the other works weekends on Sutton High Street, and the only overlap left is a tired Sunday evening.
Exam years at home
A teenager at Sutton Grammar School or Greenshaw High School, revision timetables on the fridge, and two parents who now only ever talk about the children.
Two places, one session
If one of you is at a desk near Sutton Park House and the other is at home in Belmont, you can each join on your own device, provided both of you can speak privately.
If you are afraid of your partner
Couples counselling is not safe or suitable where one partner is afraid of the other. You can book the free call on your own. What you tell me on your own is not passed to your partner without your agreement, except where someone's safety is at serious risk; I explain those limits on the free call. In your message, tell me the safest way and time to contact you. Video sessions from a shared home are not private if you could be overheard or your devices are checked. If you are in immediate danger, call 999.
If there is violence, threats or controlling behaviour, the National Domestic Abuse Helpline is free, day or night, on 0808 2000 247. The Men's Advice Line is on 0808 801 0327. If you are worried about your own behaviour towards a partner, the Respect Phoneline is on 0808 802 4040 (Monday to Friday, 10am to 5pm).
Free and low-cost support for Sutton
I can't name a free couples counselling service in Sutton from what I've verified, but each of you can get help on your own. Sutton Talking Therapies, the NHS service, takes a self-referral from either partner for anxiety or low mood. Where one of you drinks or uses drugs and the other is left coping, Cranstoun Inspire Family and Carer Support (Sutton) is there for the one coping. Sutton Carers Centre supports carers, and Cruse Bereavement Support, Sutton, helps after a death.
- Free NHS talking therapy (for one of you)Sutton Talking Therapies0800 032 1411Free 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 itInspire (Cranstoun Inspire), Sutton's Adult Drug & Alcohol Service020 8773 9393Free and confidential.
Private counselling with me can run alongside any of these; you do not have to choose one or the other.
If you need urgent help now
If you need help right now, please don't wait for a session.
The South London NHS Mental Health Crisis Text Service is another option: text 80991 or WhatsApp 0303 330 1511. Local drop-in crisis support: Sutton Crisis Café (check opening times before you go).
If you, or someone you live with, drink heavily every day, or take drugs such as benzodiazepines or GHB daily, do not stop suddenly without medical advice. Withdrawal can cause seizures and can be dangerous. Your GP or the local drug and alcohol service can arrange medically assisted withdrawal. Call 999 or go to A&E if someone in withdrawal is shaking visibly, unusually restless or agitated, confused, seeing or hearing things that are not there, or has a fit. For milder symptoms, such as a slight tremor or sweating, contact your GP or NHS 111 the same day (NHS guidance). Counselling works alongside medical support, not instead of it.
What people in Sutton ask before starting
Does anyone in Sutton offer couples counselling for free?
Not that I can verify. The free services in the borough are mostly for individuals. Should anxiety or low mood be weighing on one of you, Sutton Talking Therapies, run by South West London and St George's Mental Health NHS Trust, takes self-referrals on 0800 032 1411. Couples sessions with me are private and can run alongside that, so one route doesn't close the other.
One of us commutes to London Bridge. Can we join couples sessions from different places?
Yes. Sitting side by side at one screen is ideal, though it isn't essential. One of you can join from a private room near work and the other from home in Sutton, each on your own device with headphones. What matters is that neither of you can be overheard, so both of you feel free to say what you really think.
My partner has just finished treatment at the Royal Marsden. Is it too soon for couples counselling?
There's no right moment. Often the strain shows once treatment ends, because the emergency that held you together has eased and the feelings it pushed aside come forward. I'm not part of the medical team and won't comment on anyone's care. We'd go at a pace that suits the partner who has been ill, and either of you can say when something is too much for one session.
How do we get started with relationship counselling from Sutton?
Whichever of you feels ready can book the free 15-minute call. Tell me briefly what has been happening, and I'll explain how joint sessions run and tell you honestly when a weekly time could open up. If your partner wants a word with me before agreeing, that's fine. Nothing is booked until whoever will be in the sessions has agreed, so if you're starting alone, your own yes is enough.
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.
One call, and room for both of you to be heard
When you feel ready, a short conversation is the easiest way to see whether we are a good fit. There is no obligation.