Janine Charles

I work Monday to Friday from 8am onwards and can accommodate some early evenings as well. I may have Saturday morning availability.  Appointments are fixed weekly sessions unless you are a shift worker in which case I can support flexible dates when agreed ahead.   

I am a Psychodynamically trained Counsellor with extensive experience of working successfully with a wide range of difficulties including depression, anxiety and related symptoms such as OCD, eating disorders, phobias and fearfulness. In addition lots of my work has been around childhood trauma including childhood sexual abuse, Boarding School syndrome, parental mental health problems, parental drug/alcohol dependency, loss of parents or siblings, parental separation, adoption and care.

If you are starting therapy for the first time or training to be a therapist or taking your next step on an existing therapeutic journey please get in touch and I will aim to meet your needs.  I am trained to help you connect your current difficulties in life to experiences in the past including in childhood and the family.   For many people who experience trauma in their lives evidence shows that a more integrated approach is best placed for overcoming the symptoms of trauma and post traumatic stress, and as part of your therapy I may suggest more lifestyle based ideas for helping with this.  

Through experiencing therapy with me I aim to help you make sense of how things are now, overcome trauma, develop yourself  and your approach to life in transformative ways.  I hope I will be able to help you to experience life as you wish to in future.

My initial training was in Child Psychotherapy and using Creative Arts in therapy, but following a change in direction I instead qualified as a Psychodynamic Psychotherapeutic Counsellor working mainly with adults and some adolescents.  Both trainings have been very influential in my thinking about the difficulties that clients bring to therapy especially understanding how we are formed through our experiences in childhood and through relationships we have then. In adult life patterns seem to repeat and difficulties can get worse over time, becoming more established symptoms such as anxiety or depression.  Support through therapy can help us relieve these symptoms and change patterns, developing our 'self' as someone who can manage life better and enjoy our experiences to the full.  I work quite intuitively, aiming to attune to you and to offer a relational experience that will help you to develop as you need. 

More recently I have built on my initial trainings with specialised training.  I have graduated on The Unmaking of Them post graduate training with Nick Duffell in working with Boarding School survivors and the trauma experienced in separation from families during childhood.  I have also undertaken LINK Barnados training and qualified as an Adoption Support Therapist to support clients who have experience of any area of adoption (including experience of the care system, being adoptive parents, failed adoptions and adults who were adopted).  I am currently training to work as a supervisor to other counsellors.

I offer an initial 30 minute assessment session (please contact me to enquire about costs and payment).  During this I will ask you for some background information about yourself,  any current difficulties and your family history.  This is also a chance for you to meet me online initially and ask any questions about how things work and to see if you wish to proceed.  We will look at our diaries at that time to see if I can offer a suitable appointment time and day for your session each week.  I can offer appointments in person in Brighton or online via Zoom.