Lisa Hitchen

Hello. If you are reading this, you might be reaching out for some counselling support. What I can offer you is truly empathetic connection, a safe and calm listening space, the time to learn about yourself and to explore what is happening for you present, past and future.

I provide confidential counselling to people of all ages and backgrounds and have helped clients with a range of different issues.

Feeling overwhelmed, anxious or depressed are often reasons clients contact me. These might be compounded by relationship, family or work challenges. I will use my learning from different counselling approaches to find the best way we can work together to help you to manage these.

My experience includes coordinating a counselling service for clients aged 14-24 years for a national charity, supervising trainee and qualified counsellors, running a counselling service in a school, bereavement counselling in a hospice, counselling people living with HIV, from diverse racial backgrounds, those on low income, asylum seekers, people with disabilities and those from the LGBTQ+ community. I also work with people with neurodivergence and those seeking to understand it and explore diagnosis. 

I have a Psychology and English degree, a diploma in Therapeutic Counselling, a certificate in Therapeutic Supervision and a certificate in Counselling Couples. I also also trained to work with children and young people. I am an EMDR therapist and offer this therapy to those who have experienced trauma and want to set themselves free from the emotional stranglehold of past events. I am currently training in CBT to diploma level to learn this approach at greater depth. 

I am an accredited member of the BACP and follow its ethical guidelines for working safely and professionally.

My counselling room in Grove Park is a warm, calm space for in-person counselling. I also offer online therapy and telephone counselling during the day and some evenings. Please contact me if you feel I can help you. 

EMDR – it is for me?

Are disturbing memories from the past still coming into your everyday world? This might be in the form of dreams, flashbacks, nightmares, night terrors, sudden hijacking, paralysing or distressing thoughts and huge feelings accompanying all or any of the above? If this sounds like you, then EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitisation and Reprocessing) therapy could help.

What I offer

I am a qualified EMDR Therapist, having completed Levels 1-4 accredited EMDR training and offer this therapy in person and online. I am a member of EMDR Association UK and am supervised by an EMDR Consultant.

How does EMDR work?

Although it’s not fully known how EMDR works, it seems to directly influence the way that the brain functions, restoring normal information processing. After EMDR, this means that disturbing memories are experienced as ‘neutral’ instead of upsetting when brought to mind.

It is possible that EMDR is a conscious harnessing of the brain’s natural processing in dreaming or REM (Rapid Eye Movement) sleep. In EMDR, clients are asked to bring up a disturbing memory and then follow a therapist’s repeated hand movements known as bilateral stimulation. It is thought that this creates biochemical changes in the brain that aid processing of information. It is likely these changes occur in the limbic system.

How long does it take?

This depends partly on what the individual has been through. With single incident trauma, it can take as little as 1-3 sessions of EMDR therapy. With more complex trauma it can take longer. EMDR therapy can be up to 1.5 hours per session and involve resourcing to help you to calm and ground yourself at the end and in between sessions. We’ll work together to find out more about your circumstances and history and for you to understand the process before we begin.

Want to find out more?

Contact me for a discussion: Lisa@talkdynamic.co.uk

What do clients say?

‘The EMDR has been absolutely fantastic. I’m noticing a massive difference in terms of shame and guilt that I was feeling at the start of my sessions. Those feelings have definitely lessened. Very happy with how much I feel that I’ve progressed.’

"Lisa suggested EMDR as a way to work through memories of events in my childhood and early adulthood that were coming up too regularly as intrusive thoughts, affecting my mood and ability to manage my reactions to smaller frustrations day to day. I found EMDR very helpful as a way to reprocess those events and I believe it's had a positive impact - I think about them less often and when I do, I'm having a much healthier emotional response.’

In the initial session, we’ll work together to find out more about your circumstances and for you to understand the process before we begin.

In exploring your emotional history, we can work out what you would like to focus on first and I will explain how we will work on this together step by step. 

Before we start opening up the disturbing memories, you will learn calming and grounding techniques that we can use at the end of each session and you can do yourself between sessions. 

EMDR therapy can be up to 1.5 hours per session however the initial sessions are usually up to 50 minutes. 

Supervision is an essential part of the process of being a counsellor. I believe it should be a safe and supportive space that can build your confidence in your work with clients but also challenge and stimulate you to learn and grow.

I provide one to one and group supervision for trainee and qualified counsellors at my practice room in Lewisham, by telephone and online. We can openly consider what might be going on for your clients and explore this without judgement. I am open to working with the different ‘languages’ of different approaches and ways of working with clients.

I am interested in systems and how individuals interrelate to themselves, others and to their environment. Because of this, I find Hawkins and Shohet’s Seven-eyed supervision model helpful in my supervisory work. Most importantly, it puts the client at the centre and sets them within the context of the counselling and supervisory processes that are working to support them.

The Seven-eyed model also considers the relationships between client, counsellor and supervisor, the interventions used and the connections of each to the systems within which we all exist.

In addition, I hold in mind Proctor’s tasks of supervision to encourage, to teach and to manage. These are the functions of supervision but the doing is only a part. The being is crucial too. So my supervisory practice offers a place where your feelings and ideas around your clients and around your own personal processes can be explored without prejudice.

I have a CPCAB Certificate in Therapeutic Supervision and have supervised the work of trainee and qualified counsellors in charities and schools.

I am based in Grove Park. If you are interested in working with me, please get in touch.