Paul Hapney

Appointment slots are mornings, afternoons, and evenings during the week.

Dr Paul Hapney (CPsychol).

I am a Chartered Counselling Psychologist (BPS accred. no. 243364; HCPC reg. no. PYL33170) specialising in online therapy.  Having gained high level specialist training (Professional Doctorate in Counselling Psychology) for providing counselling, my primary aim as a therapist is simple: to help people develop more fulfilling and less painful lives. 

I offer short term counselling to people experiencing temporary emotional distress such as can be triggered by life upheaval and change, relationship problems, or losses of various kinds. I also offer long term psychotherapy to people suffering with chronic problems such as being affected by persistent stress, anxiety, or anger, recurrent bouts of depression, debilitating low self esteem, or repeated relationship problems.

Sometimes people do not know what type of problem they have: only that something is wrong, they do not feel right, their life does not feel right, something is missing, relationships are not fulfilling, or they find themselves engaging in habitual unhealthy behaviours. With time and commitment these harder to name difficulties can also be understood and overcome.

Outside of my private practice I have provided therapy in NHS settings since 2010. I worked for many years as a Senior Psychology Practitioner and since 2018 as a Specialist MBT Practitioner offering individual and group therapy to people experiencing complex emotional problems, including personality disorder.

The use of the title Dr in this directory listing relates to the member’s doctorate qualification. However, this does not imply a general medical qualification.

I prioritise the gradual formation of an honest and open, trusting therapeutic relationship, from where I assist a person's efforts to really understand what they are experiencing inside, beneath their observable behaviours. Specifically, helping them articulate just what it is that they are feeling (which feelings constitute 'bad' or 'awful'; clarifying how they are understanding ('interpreting') events; bringing into focus limiting or defensive patterns of relating to, or being with, others, including those closest to them; and enabling a person to discover the nature of their relationship to themselves. It is from this place of fuller understanding that change is then possible, should a person wish to engage in the difficult process of changing their lives. 

Counselling Psychology is based upon an approach that adopts a holistic attitude to people problems, seeing them as emerging from the multiple contexts of people's lives - such as ongoing close relationships, developmental experiences, and social/cultural background. The strength of being a psychologist in private practice is that it allows me to hold this broad understanding of the nature of people 'problems in living,' whilst shaping my interaction to meet the needs of any particular client.

The breadth and length of my training enables me to draw upon differing psychological models to suit the character, problems, and needs of an individual client. This approach contrasts with both a standard counsellor or psychotherapy training wherein the practitioner normally focusses on one main model, and also the 'treatment' medical model approach used in health care settings where patients are offered a single module of therapy (such as counselling or CBT).

I believe that for therapy to be effective you need to feel:

• confident that you can (with time) develop high levels of trust in your therapist
• that your therapist has the ability to understand you at depth
• that your therapist can offer you a type of therapy that makes sense to you.

Booking up an initial consultation session will allow you to judge as to whether or not you feel that I can offer you these things. This initial meeting is full session in length and, given that its therapeutic focus is upon assisting you to deepen your self-understanding, I charge my normal session rate. My standard fee is £55 per session.