AIBU to spend £90 an hour on this?

[Joolsy]

I have a phobia that I'd like to get sorted. A therapist friend of mine recommended a friend of hers who can treat phobias with the "human givens" approach which I don't completely understand but she reckons is brilliant and says the friend of hers is the best person for the job. Trouble is, it's £90 a session though I rang the lady and she says it usually takes no more than 2 sessions. She has treated lots of phobias successfully apparently. However if it doesn't work I'll be gutted that I've wasted my money. Any advice please?

The Friendly Spider Programme at London Zoo sorted out my spider phobia in an afternoon. I can't recommend it enough.

By the end, I had had a house spider running over my hands and had held Polly the Tarantula and enjoyed it!

www.zsl.org/experiences/friendly-spider-programme

£90 is on the expensive end of the scale but in London people often pay around £65 per session for longer term therapy so it's not unreasonable for something that only takes a couple of sessions.

(Therapy is so expensive because the training and continued professional development, room hire, insurance, supervision etc. are all a huge expense therapists need to cover + there's no sick pay or paid leave in private practice.)

Hmm... there are some very well tested and well established psychological treatments of phobias.

I can't say what might work for you (no one can), but I can say that, as someone who has some training in the field (I'm a clinical psychologist by trade), this would not be my first choice if I had £180 to spend on treatment of a phobia.

That's great Lindt that it worked for you - I went on the same course about 10 yrs ago but it didn't work for me

Joolsy yes I will do that. I was seriously impressed watching Dr Pixie - she couldn't go anywhere near spiders then did the app and put her hand in a tank and touched a tarantula

If she is a member of the BPS or similar I would pay this - if not, then I wouldn't.

Boffin, being a member of the BPS is a start (means you have some sort of psychology qualification), but it really doesn't guarantee much. Plenty of BPS members have very little training and practise methods which are not well researched.

Not everyone who is qualified in Human Givens, is a member of the BPS. Human Givens qualifications are not recognised by the BPS.