Stephen Brown

My name is Stephen Brown and I am a Psychodynamic Counsellor and Psychotherapist. I have a private practice, working with adults, based at HQ Therapy Rooms in Haggerston, Hackney, London E8

My work

What are your concerns? What are the issues you face? Therapy is about allowing yourself the space to think about and to work through your particular problems. To gain a better understanding of your life and where you would like to go.

Working with you isn't about finding a "cure" but about improving and deepening self-awareness by identifying and exploring your issues. These may be to do with relationships, work and family, loneliness, or just an incomprehensible lost-ness.

Depression can be felt in many ways, including overwhelming anxiety and feeling low. From not wanting to get out of bed to a manic cheerfulness and coping too well; these are some of the ways we manage our psychic pain, and I am ready to work with you with patience and attentiveness.

I also work with trauma, loss and grief: I am an experienced bereavement counsellor. I work with sexuality, gender issues and also eating disorders, self-harm and pre-suicidal states. I have expertise in working with issues around ageing.

Therapy is about the relationship in the room: I set out, from the start to establish a safe and containing therapeutic alliance, based on building trust and the capacity to listen well and to think with you about what is most troubling you, and to work with you over time to improve things, where you can set a better course in life.

After an initial phone conversation, we will first meet for an introductory fifty-minute consultation where I can find out more about you and what brings you to Psychotherapy: what are the problems you face and the symptoms and issues that are holding you back.

This is also where you can get an idea of who I am and how I work – and whether you would like to continue. If we do go forward, sessions would normally be weekly and will be for fifty minutes.

Experience and qualifications

I have an MSc in Psychodynamic Counselling and Psychotherapy, from Birkbeck, University of London and am a Registered Member of the BACP (British Association of Counselling and Psychotherapy) and work within their ethical framework. I am experienced at working in both a time-limited and open-ended setting.

Alongside my private practice I work as a student counsellor at the University of the Arts London, and as a counsellor at Chai Cancer Care. I was a psychotherapist for three years within City and Hackney Specialist Psychotherapy Service, NHS East London Foundation Trust.

I have particular experience working within the Jewish community and for several years practised as a counsellor at Raphael Jewish Counselling. I have regular supervision and keep up to date with Continuing Professional Development.