Joanne O'Shea

My working days are Mondays, Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Fridays.

I have availability for telephone and Zoom appointments. I can usually respond to your initial inquiry within 24 hours and hope to be able to offer you an initial session within a week. I offer both short-term and long-term therapy.

My normal working hours are between 9 and 6 but I can offer some evening sessions via Zoom and telephone on Mondays, Tuesdays, and Wednesdays.

Do you feel overwhelmed and dread Monday mornings and the thought of returning to work? Counselling can help you manage work-related stress and anxiety and help you to start living your life how you want to.

Perhaps stress at work is leaving you struggling to switch off and relax; you lie awake at night worrying and overthinking, unable to sleep. Maybe you constantly question whether you are good enough, resulting in constant anxiety about making mistakes, and you worry about what colleagues will think of you. Or perhaps you feel that work is all consuming – taking over your time, thoughts, feelings, and energy – which may be impacting your relationships and home life.

Thank you if you’ve chosen to read my profile. I’m guessing that the idea of counselling is starting to appeal to you if you have got this far. However, you might be worrying about having to fit yet another thing into your stressful busy week. The good news is that counselling doesn’t have to take a lot of your time. Sessions are just 50 minutes per week and because I offer online counselling sessions through Zoom or over the telephone, this allows you to have the sessions from the comfort of your own home, with no travel time to factor in. I am also able to be more flexible with appointment times for you because I work online. Another concern may be worrying about not knowing what to say. Having gone through therapy myself, I remember how nervous I felt so I understand. I will gently work together with you to explore what’s brought you to counselling and what your needs are.

Counselling can be transformative and give you new and different perspectives on your relationship with work. It can help you to recognise what is causing you stress at work and the underlying reasons. This can help you to develop coping strategies and to start making different choices about how and who you want to be. Talking about your feelings of not being good enough without fear of judgement can help you to develop confidence and recognise your skills, expertise, and experience. Ultimately through greater self-awareness and self-compassion, you can learn to value yourself. Counselling can also help you to set boundaries and manage other people’s expectations, giving you more time for your relationships and to live a more fulfilling life.

I haven’t always been a counsellor and have personal experience of living for the weekend and getting the Sunday night blues every week. Since retraining as a counsellor, I have worked with many clients who for many reasons have felt unhappy at work. They often felt alone with their issues and did not want to burden their friends and family. In our counselling sessions they have been able to unburden themselves which has helped them to feel understood, lighter, and less alone. I have listened and supported them to decide what changes they needed to make to gain more freedom and a better work life balance. The average person will spend 90,000 hours at work in a lifetime – that’s a huge amount of time. Would you like more freedom and to feel less stressed? I would love to help you to find the tools, coping strategies and changes that will help you to make that happen. So, if you have read this far and some of what I have said is resonating with you, please get in touch. I look forward to hearing from you.

After your initial enquiry, I will arrange a time for your first session. During the first session we will complete an assessment in which we will discuss your need for counselling, your goals and answer any questions you may have about the counselling process. If after this first session you want to go ahead we will arrange a regular time for future sessions. 

There is no obligation after the first session to continue with counselling. Some people change their mind or feel that therapy is not for them and that's ok. In order for counselling to be successful, you have to be willing and ready to engage with the process.