Ongoing NHS counselling

[Foggydog]

Hello, I have a question.

I've been having one-to-one counselling on the NHS for the last couple of months. The sessions have been helpful but it's felt mainly like me just off-loading - not much in the way of actually dealing with anything and some of the subject matter is quite grim and spanning a long period of my life. I have 4 of my 12 allocated sessions left and I know I need more help, whether more of the same or something different. The person I've been seeing (final year trainee) will not be able to continue in my borough after October so there would be no further contact specifically with them.

Does anyone know, in their experience, if the NHS will extend counselling if requested or suggest it themselves. Alternatively is this something I might have to push for. The NHS website for my area is vague on the subject. Group or online self help wouldn't be much use in this situation and I can't afford private. Many thanks for any info.

I work for the nhs as a therapist, I’m assuming you’re under an IAPT (improving access to psychological therapies) service. Unfortunately it all depends on funding and different services offer different numbers of sessions. 12 sessions for counselling is actually a lot more than what some services offer however I agree in a lot of cases it’s not enough. It might be worth asking your therapist if there are options for extension, or if not if you can re-refer back in at a later date (I know this is not ideal but may be the only option)

Thanks so much @Brightstar29 and I am on the IAPT system. I actually raised the topic loosely at the end of my session this week as I'm getting closer to the end of the 12 sessions and my therapist said we could look at options next week, so hopefully I'll have a better idea then.

I’m a therapist (private and charity not nhs) and in my area it’s 12 weeks but you can then get another 12 weeks of CBT if you go back on a waiting list.

There are a lot of charities and CICs who offer affordable therapy for more than 12 weeks so talk to your therapist if they can signpost you to something else after.

I meant to come back a few weeks ago and update this for anyone who may have read it and was in a similar position. My therapist, the week after I started this thread, told me that her supervisor had suggested a 9 week extension to our sessions, which I agreed to. I totally appreciate how lucky I am/we are to have any of of this available on the NHS and particularly to get the extension but I was wary of how little I was getting from the sessions in general and was finding them exhausting and depressing, only one step up from talking to myself really. However my therapist noticeably changed gear after that - I don't know if that was down their supervisor or off their own back and not massively but appreciated either way. I did get something out of those sessions and I'm also pretty sure that the focus of their training was not the best type of therapy for me - something to keep in mind if I seek further therapy at a later date (which I imagine I will) For now I feel a bit stronger and I'm also really glad that I completed the sessions, which was important to me. I also have more of an understanding of what I need from a therapist going forwards so it's a firm foundation.