My name is Alena Quartermaine, psychotherapist with over 16 years of counselling experience, offering short and long term therapy for individual, adult clients and couples.

My professional training is integrative, which means that I draw upon different counselling and psychotherapy approaches to fit individual client’s or couple's needs.

To continue with my professional development, adding further to my counselling/psychotherapy skills, I had decided to pursue my interest in Human Givens (HG) therapy. I have recently become a trainee member of the Human Givens Institute (HGI), after successfully completing part 2 of HG Diploma.

I'm now working towards obtaining full qualification and become registered HG therapist, therefore I'm currently offering * free of charge, individual HG therapy for clients experiencing mild to moderate symptoms of anxiety and/or depression to enhance my skill in this approach.

* Please contact me for further details about free of charge HG therapy 

HG approach to therapy is to help clients achieve their goals in as few sessions as possible.

The concept behind HG therapy is understanding that when one or more our physical and/or emotional needs - need for security, intimacy, community, attention, control, privacy, achievement, status and meaning is not met in our environment, we can suffer considerable distress.

My aim as a HG therapist in training, would be to help you identify your current unmet needs. Encourage and support you in getting them met in a balance way, using problem solution, here and now approach, building on your confidence and drawing upon your inner and life resources, so you can start to lead fulfilling life going forward.

Please feel free to find out more about Human Givens therapy here:

https://www.humangivens.com/human-givens/about/

As an accredited member of the British Association of Counselling and Psychotherapy (BACP) and of The National Counselling & Psychotherapy Society (NCPS), I adhere to BACP's Ethical Framework for Good Practice and is recognized as safe, competent and ethical to practise the vocation of counselling and psychotherapy. I am a member of ico and hold an up to date DBS certificate. I am fully insured and receiving an ongoing supervision and CPD training.  

Apart from working privately, I offer my services to employment assistance agencies EAP. I am an affiliated counsellor for Health Assured, the UK and Ireland’s most trusted independent health and wellbeing provider.

I also work with university students through ProblemShared platform

My special interest is in counselling for anxiety, relationship issues, depression, low self- esteem and lack of confidence.

I hold an Edexcel Level 5 BTEC Professional Diploma in Therapeutic Counselling and NCFE Level 2 and 3 Certificates in Counselling Skills and Theory.  As a part of my ongoing professional development (CPD) I have attended various trainings.  

Among these are:

Conducting Online Therapy Sessions that Deliver Results; Practical Interventions for Anxiety and Acute Traumatic Stress (Nscience); The Fast Trauma and Phobia Cure training; How to Lift Depression; Guided Imagery and Visualization for Therapeutic change; Relationship training (Human Givens Institute); Anger, Rage and Relationships; Infertility Treatments and Adoption-the struggle to become a parent (Tavistock Relationship Institute); Counselling Children, Families and Young people training (Fenix Centre), Couples Therapy training ( Centre for Counselling and Psychotherapy Education); Cognitive Behavioural Therapy training CBT ( Relate Institute) and Neuro-Linguistic Programming Diploma (NLP Excellence).

Throughout my counselling experience I have been working with a wide range of issues, including but not limited to:

Emotional, Psychological, Physical and Sexual Abuse, Affair, Anger management, Anxiety, Abortion, Bereavement, Betrayal, Bullying, Childhood related issues, Confidence issues, Depression,  Domestic violence, Divorce, Family related issues, Financial issues, Fear, Identity, Loss, Low self-esteem, Miscarriage, Neglect, Obsessive Compulsive disorder OCD, Postnatal depression, Panic attacks, Relationship difficulties, Self harm, Separation, Stress, Sexuality, Suicide, Termination, Tourette’s syndrome, Trauma, Work related issues...