Winchester · online by video, with the Hove room for occasional sessions
Couples therapy and relationship counselling for Winchester
When conversations at home in Winchester keep circling back to the same hurt, couples counselling gives you both a steady hour with someone outside the relationship. The room is in Hove, 94 minutes away by car, so couples here usually meet me by secure video, sitting together or logging in from two places. You are also welcome to begin on your own.
The practical facts for Winchester
- Where sessions happen
- A private room at Intergen House, 65-67 Western Road, Hove BN3 2JQ, or secure video.
- From Winchester by car
- About 94 minutes with clear roads (72.6 miles); longer at busy times.
- Free NHS talking therapy (for one of you)
- NHS Talking Therapies Hampshire, 023 8038 3920
- 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.
Commuter timetables, ward rotas and ageing parents
Plenty of Winchester relationships are organised around a timetable.
One partner may be on a South Western Railway train to Waterloo early and home after dark, while the other holds the household together and works locally, perhaps in the county council offices on Castle Hill or on shift at the Royal Hampshire County Hospital. By the time you are both home, there is a meal to sort out and very little energy left for talking about anything that matters. The district is also an older one. At the 2021 census, 10.4% of its residents were aged 75 and over, and if you are in your forties or fifties you may find yourselves driving between Harestock and Olivers Battery to look after a parent while your children still need you. Caring can bring a couple closer, and it can also quietly turn partners into colleagues who only discuss logistics. Couples counselling makes room for the relationship itself again.
Hearing each other again, with a third person present
In couples sessions you both get equal time and equal attention. My role is to help you see the pattern you keep falling into, without taking sides or keeping score. That pattern might be one partner who raises everything and one who shuts down, resentment over who carries the visits to an elderly parent, or a commuter who has started to feel like a lodger in their own home. If you met at the University of Winchester, you may be working out whether the relationship can survive graduation, a first job and a move out of student housing. We slow the conversation down so that each of you can finish a thought without being interrupted, and we look at what sits underneath the arguments, which is often fear, tiredness or grief rather than the dishwasher. If one partner's drinking has become part of the strain, Inclusion Recovery Hampshire, the county drug and alcohol service, can give individual help alongside our sessions. If your partner isn't ready to come, the sessions can begin with just you, looking at your half of the dance. Joint sessions are for partners who each feel safe at home; where one of you lives in fear of the other, please read this page's safety section before anything else.
What can come between couples in Winchester
Different ends of the line
When one of you spends long days on the Waterloo line and the other's week stays in Winchester, it is easy to drift into parallel lives under one roof.
Mum or Dad needs us now
In a district with an older population, looking after a parent can fall unevenly between partners. The Princess Royal Trust for Carers in Hampshire stands by whoever carries the caring, while we explore what the imbalance does between you.
Rotas that never match
Shift patterns at the Royal Hampshire County Hospital, or any job with nights and weekends, can leave you passing each other in the hallway. Video sessions can be timed around the rota.
A young relationship, a university city
If you met at the University of Winchester, finishing a degree, leaving a student village or starting a first job can test a relationship in ways neither of you expected.
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 Winchester
Free services nearby can support each of you separately. Either partner can refer themselves to NHS Talking Therapies Hampshire (previously italk) for anxiety or low mood. Whoever is caring for an older parent can be supported by The Princess Royal Trust for Carers in Hampshire. When a partner's alcohol or drug use weighs on you both, Inclusion Recovery Hampshire is the county service to approach, and The Olive Branch Counselling Service offers low-cost individual counselling in the city.
- Free NHS talking therapy (for one of you)NHS Talking Therapies Hampshire023 8038 3920Free 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 itInclusion Recovery Hampshire0300 124 0103Free and confidential.
- Local organisationParent Support Link (PSL)
- Local organisationWinchester Bereavement Support
- Local organisationWinchester Hospice bereavement support (Allium café)
- Local organisationSolent Mind Winchester Wellbeing 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.
In this area you can also text HANTS to 85258.
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 Winchester ask before starting
Could we see a couples counsellor face to face from Winchester?
In-person sessions happen in my one room, at Intergen House in Hove, about 94 minutes' drive from Winchester, or by train with a change at Southampton Central. For a couple meeting every week or fortnight, secure video from home is usually much easier to keep up. You can still plan an occasional longer session in Hove together, if sitting in the same room as me matters to you both.
Does couples counselling by video work when one of us is on the Waterloo line from Winchester most days?
Yes. When one partner is stuck at a late meeting in London or on a delayed train, each of you logs in from somewhere private and the three of us share the screen. Headphones and a quiet room help. We would agree a regular slot you can both keep, which might mean an evening that fits around the Waterloo timetable.
Where can Winchester couples find free help alongside counselling?
The free routes around Winchester are aimed at one person at a time, and either of you can use them while we work together. NHS Talking Therapies Hampshire (previously italk), on 023 8038 3920, accepts either partner directly if worry or low mood is building. The Olive Branch Counselling Service offers individual counselling on a donation basis. For the partner doing the visits to an ageing parent, The Princess Royal Trust for Carers in Hampshire provides support of its own.
Is it worth having relationship counselling alone in Winchester if my partner says no?
It can be. Individual sessions about a relationship look at your part of the pattern: what happens in you when tension rises, what you hold back, and what you want the relationship to become. A shift on one side can change the feel of things at home, and a partner sometimes decides to join later. Where you feel afraid of your partner, the safety guidance on this page is the right first step.
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.
A first conversation, together or one at a time
When you feel ready, a short conversation is the easiest way to see whether we are a good fit. There is no obligation.