Teddington · online by video, with the Hove room for occasional sessions
Couples therapy and relationship counselling for Teddington
If the two of you in Teddington have become an efficient team and rather lonely partners at the same time, couples counselling offers a regular hour to find each other again. Because Hove is around 80 minutes by road from Bushy Park, the weekly hour happens over secure video, with both of you on the sofa at one laptop or logged in from two rooms, and Intergen House kept for an occasional longer visit.
The practical facts for Teddington
- Where sessions happen
- A private room at Intergen House, 65-67 Western Road, Hove BN3 2JQ, or secure video.
- From Teddington by car
- About 80 minutes with clear roads (55.6 miles); longer at busy times.
- By train
- From Teddington, change at Clapham Junction for trains towards Brighton and Hove.
- Free NHS talking therapy (for one of you)
- Richmond Talking Therapies (NHS Richmond Wellbeing Service), 020 3513 4455
- 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.
Family life between Bushy Park and the lock
Teddington is largely a place of family homes, and that shapes what couples here carry.
The years of small children, buggies along Broad Street and Saturday mornings in Bushy Park are also the years when two adults can stop talking about anything except logistics. Sleep goes first, then patience, and the conversations that once came easily get squeezed into the tired minutes after bedtime. Work pulls in other directions. One of you may head off on South Western Railway while the other works locally at the National Physical Laboratory or LGC, where careful measurement is the whole job and that habit of precision can creep into how arguments at home are run. Later, the pressure often comes from the generation above, a mother or father who needs a little more help each month. These are ordinary strains, and between them they can turn two people into a well-run household with very little warmth left over.
When both of you are keeping score
In a first couples session, each of you has the same share of time to say what is going wrong and which parts of your life together you want to protect. I stay on neither side. What I listen for is the cycle: one partner arrives with a case, evidence carefully assembled, and the other hears a verdict and goes quiet. When both of you are good at being right, the relationship can lose even when someone wins. Naming that loop lets us slow it down as it happens and find the request hidden inside each complaint. The practical side matters too. New parents might agree how to share broken nights without keeping a tally. A couple caring for an ageing parent might work out how to protect some time that belongs to the two of them. After a death in either family, grief can land differently for each of you, and one partner's sorrow can look to the other like withdrawal. Rebuilding trust after an affair or a secret takes longer, and the work moves as slowly as the two of you need. Where one partner wants to come and the other does not, the willing one can begin alone. More than 25 years of counselling sit behind this, and my integrative approach is set out on its own page.
Pressures on Teddington relationships worth naming
A baby and two exhausted parents
Richmond PANDAS meets on the first Monday of each month in Teddington for parents finding things hard, and couples sessions can look at what the early months have done to you both.
Precision at work, scorekeeping at home
Jobs at the National Physical Laboratory or LGC reward exactness, and the same habit at home can turn every disagreement into a contest over who has the facts right.
Ageing parents on both sides
When a parent needs more help, Richmond Carers Centre supports the partner doing the caring, and the Elleray Centre on North Lane offers that parent company of their own.
One loss, two kinds of grief
The Teddington Parish Bereavement Café meets on the third Monday of the month with listeners trained by Princess Alice Hospice, and our sessions can hold how a loss has reached each of you.
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 Teddington
Richmond upon Thames has good free help for individuals, and couples work can go on in parallel. If worry or a flat, heavy mood is the bigger load for one of you, that partner can self-refer to Richmond Talking Therapies (NHS Richmond Wellbeing Service). RAID Counselling Service offers low-cost individual sessions at Waldegrave Road. If a partner's drinking is behind the arguments, the Al-Anon Teddington Sunday Evening group meets at St Mary's Parish Hall.
- Free NHS talking therapy (for one of you)Richmond Talking Therapies (NHS Richmond Wellbeing Service)020 3513 4455Free 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 itWithYou Richmond020 3228 3020Run by We Are With You (WithYou). Free and confidential.
- Local organisationRichmond Borough MindMental health charity.
- Local organisationRichmond Carers Centre
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.
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 Teddington ask before starting
Is there free couples help in Teddington, or a local charity worth trying?
Teddington's free and charity services are set up mainly for one person at a time. RAID Counselling Service offers low-cost sessions for adults at its Waldegrave Road offices, and Richmond Talking Therapies takes self-referrals on 020 3513 4455 if anxiety or low mood is adding to the strain for one of you. Seeing me as a couple can happen in parallel with both.
We've just had a baby in Teddington and keep snapping at each other. Can couples counselling fit around a newborn?
It can. Video means nobody has to find childcare or travel, and a session can happen while the baby naps, with a pause if needed. We look at sleep, fairness and the parts of yourselves that feel lost for now. Richmond PANDAS at St Mary's Parish Hall on Langham Road also offers peer support if either of you is finding parenthood tough.
Would we ever need to travel from Teddington to Hove together?
Only if you want to. Weekly couples sessions from Teddington happen on secure video, because 80 minutes on the road, or a change at Clapham Junction by train, is a lot for two people to fit in. If you would value one face-to-face meeting near the start, a 90 or 120-minute booking in Hove makes the trip worth it.
My partner drinks most evenings and it is behind our rows. Should we try couples sessions from Teddington?
Joint work can help when you both want it and both feel safe. For your own support, the Al-Anon Teddington Sunday Evening group meets at St Mary's Parish Hall on Langham Road, and WithYou Richmond supports relatives too. Fear of your partner changes everything, and in that case please turn to the domestic abuse safety information on this page first.
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.
Start with a short call from TW11, together or alone
When you feel ready, a short conversation is the easiest way to see whether we are a good fit. There is no obligation.