Andrew Norman

I meet with clients in my own counselling room in Sidmouth which is comfortable, quiet, easy to find and has plenty of parking space. 

If it is easier I am able to make home visits.

I also work with clients online with Zoom. That might make it possible for you to fit counselling sessions into the time you have available, and without having to travel wherever you are in the UK. 

I see clients on Tuesdays and Thursdays, and from early morning until early evening.

I am also able to offer counselling in the form of a quiet hour’s walk along a local path by the river.

My standard rate is £50 per session, or £180 paid in advance for six sessions, or £30 per session for students and trainee counsellors. 

A good rapport with the counsellor allows the client to make progress; talking works, we all have more potential than we realise, and neuroplasticity makes change possible.

As a qualified therapist I aim to be professional and competent, warm and reliable. I value working with all sorts of people, young and old. Walking with each client along their own path I work especially with anxiety and anger, loss and bereavement, relationship issues, ageing and dementia, sense of self and spirituality. 

How I work with clients, my person-centred therapeutic method, is described on my website.

Client testimonial from E VR, February 2021: “Andrew was a skilled, intelligent and very kind counsellor to me at a low point in my life. I consider myself very fortunate as I often found him leading me skilfully and professionally to find my own solutions and answers to my concerns and questions usually much to my surprise. This ability to guide me and yet show me that I was not always correct and as clear in my thinking and perceptions as I thought I was, always with a gentle smile, means that I trust Andrew absolutely. I always felt safe with him, from the first appointment."

"Andrew has excellent time management skills and I never felt rushed. The last session with him was positive and affirming with many good memories. He guided me to feel empowered again and to value myself.”

My therapeutic method is Humanistic, Person Centred, Existential, Integrative and holistic:

Humanistic in always valuing the client's own personal experience and perspective;  principally it is Person Centred in establishing a basis of empathy, genuineness, and unconditional positive affirmation (and following the work of Carl Rogers and his successors); Existential in recognising that anxieties and uncertainties, such as death, the fear of the unknown and the meaning of life are a fundamental part of existence, but that we all nonetheless have the capability and personal responsibility to make our own positive choices; and in practice Integrative in drawing on insights and resources from the wide range of counselling approaches; so aiming to be thoroughly holistic. 

See my website for more details of my therapeutic method.

I remember feeling quite nervous when I went to my own first  session of counselling as a new client. So I was grateful that my therapist welcomed me warmly, explained things clearly, and put me at my ease. I now try to do the same myself.

Our first session will be to identify what has prompted you to consider counselling, to see what you want the therapy to help with - and the right place for you to start.

We can discuss together and agree key matters such as confidentiality. These will include all the practicalities which will ensure that our sessions remain a safe space for you in line with the BACP Ethical Framework and the law relating to the protection of your data.

If you then decide that you would like to continue working with me we would agree on a helpful schedule. 

Talking to someone who really listens well is so simple but can be so helpful. It's how we are as human beings. We need to see ourselves holistically and through some of the veils that come to be there for each of us.

I hope that today might be the time for you to take a further step in that process.