The LGBT Excellence Centre offers a free telephone listening service to all callers who need someone to talk to in regards to sexual orientation or gender identity matters.  

What is counselling?

Counselling is a process which takes place over time and in the context of a therapeutic relationship.  The therapeutic relationship is at the heart of our service.  We aim to provide a safe space for you to explore any issue you choose to bring to your sessions. Counselling is the support given in private to deal with personal difficulties and is often known these days as a “talking therapy”.

Counselling aims to give an individual the opportunity as well as the time and the space to discuss issues which are negatively impacting on their life. The idea is to enable an individual to reach choices and decisions of their own in order to cope with their issues/difficulties. 

All humans feel angry, depressed or sad at different times in their lives and this is perfectly normal. However we all differ greatly in our abilities to cope with the pressures and stresses life throws at us. It may be helpful to seek professional support when problems persist, ignoring our problems can not only affect our abilities to enjoy life but ultimately may go on to damage our health. 

It is human nature to want to discuss our problems with someone but it may be difficult to find the right person to listen to us. Sometimes people have issues that they feel they cannot or do not want to discuss with family or friends. This may be because the issues involve them or simply because their advice may not be that helpful and they do not necessarily know what the right help is to offer in a specific scenario. 

The decision to seek professional help should not be an embarrassing one and certainly does not indicate failure of the individual. Many people find that attending some form of professional counselling enables them to go on to make a success of their lives. Counselling is a confidential and non-judge mental interaction with a qualified therapist. Although a counsellor will not offer solutions or advice they are trained to listen and offer support using their experience and specialized knowledge to help an individual reach their own decisions and solve their difficulties.

If counselling is for you, we can arrange for you to meet one of our in-house counsellors or put you in touch with a counsellor in your area.

How counselling can help

 Counselling can help you to make sense of your experiences and provides a source of emotional support.  Counselling is confidential and is an opportunity to share personal issues that perhaps you've never been able to share with anyone before.

It can help to have a therapeutic space for yourself, whilst perhaps you're living in a particularly stressful situation or are struggling to make sense of your own feelings, thoughts or behaviour on your own. You're likely to feel less alone, especially if you have no-one else who really listens to you.  It can also offer you impartial support whilst making decisions or changes to your life.

Everybody's process is unique to them, however in general, you can expect the counselling process to help you develop a more positive relationship with your self and others.  It can facilitate your self-awareness and nuture your self-confidence.  This, in turn, can help to improve your emotional resilience and overall well-being.

Other Therapies

Our Service

Depending on each individual's circumstances, counselling might be totally free or there might be a small charge.

Whilst we have a commitment to making sure that we deliver support to all our callers, the costs of running a free service are often very difficult to fundraise for, so we rely on volunteers counsellors that either donate their time to us or on good-will to give us discounts.

Nevertheless, we do request for those people who can afford counselling to pay for the service so that we can reach out to those that really cannot afford it.

During the counselling session

During the counselling session, you will have the time to use as you wish, to explore your feelings without being judged.

People come to counselling for many reasons. Some of the areas that we talk to people about are:

Confidentiality

W aim to make your counselling session as relaxing an experience as possible. We also endeavour to create a safe, secure and confidential environment enabling openness and ease of disclosure of what can be delicate, sensitive and often painful issues. Confidentiality is taken very seriously by all our professional Counsellors and Psychotherapists and everything that is discussed is kept in the strictest confidence.

Counselling Service Information

Code of Conduct

Complaints Information

Other Counselling Services

Our in-house Counsellors