Desnee Cunnane

                                       About me

  I hold a Diploma in Integrative Counselling and Psychotherapy (Minster Centre, London 1993), a Diploma in Clinical Supervision and Consultancy (CPPD 1999), and am an  

Accredited member of  British Association for Counselling and Psychotherapy (BACP).
I have worked in the area of mental health for 25 years including NHS, social services and mental health voluntary organisations including Mind. I was counselling manager at Pace (LGBT) for six years. I have also worked in private practice for much of this time.

One of my main interests is working with difference and diversity and I acknowledge the social context in which we live and how people are discriminated against because of their age, class, disability, gender and sexuality among many others.  

In my counselling practice I see people from a wide variety of cultural, racial, sexual minority and religious backgrounds. The issues I have worked with include: relationships and midlife transformation, spirituality, sexual abuse, trauma, bereavement and loss, sexuality and sexual identity, dream-work and creativity, mental health issues and wellbeing and work related issues, I also offer Professional Clinical Supervision to Counsellors, Trainee Counsellors and Care Organisations.

How I work

I provide a safe non-judgemental space for you to explore your life, feelings, thoughts and actions. The therapeutic basis of Integrative and Humanistic therapy draws from many sources in the belief that no one approach has all the truth. I appreciate the importance of the uniqueness and individuality of each person and mould my therapeutic approach to each person's individual needs. 

My main theoretical framework is psychodynamic which seeks to understand both the roots of psychological problems in the past, as well as their purpose in forming the person we are still becoming in the present. The insight you develop as our work progresses, enables you to discover how relationships, events and beliefs from past experiences are unhelpfully influencing the way you are now. Keeping you stuck in old habitual thoughts, emotions and unhelpful patterns of behaviour and preventing you from enjoying your life, making good relationships and realizing your potential.

My overall aim is to help to develop your own inherent self worth and your potential. By working with you at your own pace, I help you to gradually let go of these unhelpful ways of being, and develop inner resources and choices. I support you all the way through your process of change.