Anxiety and Depression
Anxiety and Depression Counselling in Clondalkin, Online and by Phone
Anxiety and depression are classed as mood disorders.
A person can have both together. In many ways, deciding if a client has anxiety or depression is a matter of opinion.
Depression is mostly associated with sadness and feeling unmotivated in life. Anxiety is more so when a person is physically or mentally agitated and can not settle to complete tasks.
Both can lead to suicidal ideation when the person feels continuously overwhelmed by them and sees no end to the pain.
Mood disorders generally come from two sources. Lived experience from the life the client grew up with or the client’s brain chemistry.
Brain chemistry-based mood disorder requires medical intervention. This issue is discussed under the “Specific Aspects …” heading below on this page.
What Approaches are used in Anxiety and Depression Therapy?
Person Centered Therapy highlights the role of unconditionally accepting the client’s story.
Such positive acceptance of the client struggling with low mood and anxiety helps them to develop trust with the counsellor.
This is the basis of a therapeutic relationship with a client.
Through this relationship, the client can regain a sense of significance and hope.
The therapist offers these attributes to the client in their working relationship. It is the client’s choice to accept them or not.
To learn more about Person Centred Therapy, click here.
The client may respond well to a cognitive approach such as choice theory.
Choice theory highlights that a client’s mood is influenced by the choices they make. We may directly or indirectly make choices that mean our basic needs in life are unmet.
This lack of fulfilment is what choice theory would claim is the cause of anxiety and depression.
The positive aspect of choice theory is that the client can choose to make decisions that can help them fulfil their needs and regain their hope for future progress.
To learn more about choice theory, click here.
How can Counselling help Anxiety or Depression?
Therapy helps the depressed client to have a space to openly share their negative experiences and beliefs about life.
As they share, they are not judged for this. Such acceptance helps them to regain their self-esteem.
They begin to believe that their life has meaning because the therapist directly and indirectly tells them their life has meaning.
In counselling, the client will loosen the hold their false beliefs have over their mood. False beliefs based on misperceptions of reality.
These misperceptions may be from many years ago. Believing this lie for many years makes it seem like a part of the client’s personality that can’t be helped.
Overcoming this lie can help restore the truth to the client of how they can cope with general life stress.
Specific Aspects of Mood Disorder Counselling
Medication is a frequent discussion with clients struggling with anxiety or depression. As someone with a background in psychiatric nursing, I am comfortable with people being on mood-stabilising medication during counselling.
Any medication regimen a client is on is entirely between the client and their doctor.
Generally, mood stabilisers should be given about a month to work.
This allows negative side effects to be properly assessed and any improvement in mood to be noticed.
The argument to combine medication with counselling is that it enables the client to be able to engage in therapy without the intrusion of severe mood swings.
It needs to be acknowledged that some mood disorders are based on brain chemistry issues.
If the client is deficient in dopamine, seritonin or other neurotransmitters, talk therapy will not change their mood.
It may help the client learn to manage their underlying mood “illness”, however.
The argument against medication, and what causes clients’ most concern, is dependency.
Drug dependency should not be an issue if the prescription is properly monitored by a doctor.
Please note that mood stabilisers are usually prescribed for a few months at a time and then reviewed.
This is normal.
If the doctor assesses that you need a long-term prescription and you disagree, discuss this with him.
Make a plan together. Do not come off your medications on your own. This is dangerous.
The most common side effect that clients complain of is feeling nothing. They seem to be unable to have any depth of emotion; happy, sad or anxious. If this persists, it is possible the doctor may change the prescription.
There are numerous choices of mood stabilisers available.
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Mood disorders can be dangerous to life.
You could feel overwhelmed by your mood and that you have lost control.This can lead to a sense of dispair and hoplessness.
If you sense this is begining to happen to you it is best that you get support quickly from a helpline service.
Longer term counselling maybe needed. -
You should expect the therapist to focus on building up a trusting relationship first with you.
If you feel uncomfortable with the therapist discuss this with him.
If circumstances don’t change get a new therapist.The counsellor should also be adaptive to your needs and abilities.
It is likely that along with psychoeducation and relationship building that the counsellor will focus on creating new positive core beliefs.It is possible the client may feel worse at time as they strugle to succeed with positive change.
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“How long is a oiece of string?”
The process of changing ones problematic mood or at least learning to cope with it is not a short process.
It can take 4 to 6 sessions for a client to begin to develop trust with their therapist.
In total it is likely that the work may take over 15 sessions.
Frequently Asked Questions about Anxiety and Depression Counselling
Book with Prevail for Anxiety or Depression Counselling
To book a session for anxiety or depression counselling with James, click here: