Anthony Ambrose

I currently offer online sessions only (usually via zoom).  

My usual practice days are:  Monday, Wednesday and Thursday in the afternoon/early evening,  with occasional late morning or Tuesday alternatives (e.g. in place of a bank holiday Monday).   I don't offer sessions on Fridays or at weekends.  

I offer a therapeutic relationship that affirms creative renewal, trauma recovery, integration and wholeness - promoting self-compassion and clarity, safe grounding and embodiment. 

A core interest is the coping/survival adaptations & self-alienation that can often persist from chronic childhood relational distress, deprivation and trauma (including attachment trauma & complex ptsd/chronic developmental trauma).  I work with how such difficulties compromise relational trust and engagement (with self, and others), and can impact self-image/esteem, diminish expectations of self, others and life, and be a significant factor in various chronic limiting issues/patterns, compulsions and addictions.

By affirming the stability and the felt sense of safety needed to emerge from life-stresses and trauma, we can anchor more fully in the present, and become better able to relate to and regulate distress, and identify life/relational needs (including addressing any current life issues/stress/trauma).  We can better manage and regulate more intense feelings/experiences and trauma, and optimise self-care - so that we can feel increasingly safely embodied and at home in the present.   

This kind of therapeutic process can help to cultivate greater clarity, peace, self-connection and acceptance, creative renewal, fulfilment and joy in life.   My relational approach is especially informed by the work of clinicians/authors in the fields of trauma and attachment/relational neuroscience over the last 20-30 years - including Janina Fisher, Bessel van der Kolk, Stephen Porges, Allan Schore, Richard Schwartz (originator of Internal Family Systems - I completed a 15 day level 1 IFS training in 2016), Bonnie Badenoch, Sue Johnson, Daniel Siegel, Tara Brach, Louis Cozolino, Peter Levine and Daniella Sieff, among others.  

I am an associate psychotherapist of the the Gestalt Centre London NW1 (1996-present, UKCP Registered). 

I now work online (usually via zoom) so can offer UK wide sessions when this feels therapeutically appropriate/suitable (and if sufficient speed/stability of internet connection is available).  

Other biography:  Associate Tutor, University of Surrey Psychology Dept (2010-2018) facilitating personal/professional development groups for Counselling Psychology doctoral students. Also a past group facilitator/supervisor with the Gestalt Centre London. Counsellor (1990-present) Reg. MBACP: Co-founder (1999), counsellor (1999-2004) with The Cancer Counselling Trust;  counsellor with CancerBackup charity (1997-99);  and placement bereavement counsellor Trinity Hospice, Clapham (1990-93).

Format-wise I first ask clients to complete an initial assessment / consent form, to provide relevant background information for possible therapy/counselling, and for risk assessment, to gauge potential compatibility for working together (and that my training/experience seems a suitable/good match for client therapeutic issues/needs).  

The initial form also includes GP details and contact consent, without which I am unable to offer sessions (I would only propose contacting your GP after discussing this with you (except in an emergency - details are on the form), where this seems relevant/advisable - in order to uphold duty of care/shared care, for risk assessment, and possible referral to/liaison with other/NHS services or resources).  

I also provide a GDPR (General Data Protection Regulations) form which gives details/terms of all personal client data that I hold, and for clients to provide data retention consent, without which I am unable to proceed with sessions - this is in order to meet UK GDPR legal requirements.   

I then first arrange 1-3 initial assessment sessions, to further gauge therapeutic needs/issues and compatibility for working together.  At initial sessions we can discuss further what needs/issues you wish to explore in sessions, and I also further assess  suitability for online sessions (and/or for possible specialist onward referral).  

If we agree to continue I then arrange a follow-on initial series of 6-8 sessions, to begin working together, better assess/clarify needs, and review at session 5-6 re possible continuation (usually on an ongoing basis, with periodic reviews as needed), or to bring sessions to a close, with possible onward referral/resource suggestions.