Sarah Sivasundaram

Face-to-face and online sessions during the day and evenings available. Please contact me to check availability. 

In my private practice, I work with adults (18yrs +) in-person (Barnet) and online (anywhere in the UK). Under my qualifications and training I am able to offer a blend of counselling/therapeutic approaches including humanistic and CBT frameworks, tailored clients' particular challenges.

This might look like helping a client reflect on their childhood and make useful links with how events might effect them in adulthood whilst also providing tools to foster change and self-compassion and self-acceptance. Or it might look like concentrating on one specific goal. The work can be open-ended or time-limited.

I have professional and personal experience of neurodivergence specifically ADHD and ASC and have trained to bring a neuroaffirmative approach to my practice alongside tools and helpful strategies to support clients.

Alongside my private practice, I work for the NHS Talking Therapies Service via Mind in Hertfordshire. In this work I specialise is helping clients getting to the root of their symptoms, often in the form of acute/moderate anxiety and acute/moderate low mood and depression. Aligning with my private practice I use both a person-centred client-led approach and CBT techniques to help clients achieve their therapeutic goals and improve symptoms.

I hold a professional therapeutic qualification to work as a trauma-informed counsellor and offer trauma-informed skills. I also work as a perinatal outreach worker for Mind Enfield to fulfil a community based role.

My areas of expertise include: anxiety, low mood/depression, understanding a neurodivergent diagnosis, combatting low self-esteem, examining your harsh inner critic, stress, understanding your anger, maternal mental health, parenting, domestic abuse and recovery work, recovery from being in a relationship with a narcissist, childhood abuse, bereavement and loss, career transitions, life transitions, boarding school syndrome and sleep issues.

 What to expect in therapy:

Therapy can be a scary prospect. What do I say? How can I be vulnerable with a stranger? Will it work? Are all normal questions. My intention is to, over a few sessions, start to create a trusting working relationship. If a client doesn't know where to start I can helpfully prompt and guide.

Key aspects of my modality:

Integrative provides a structured, integrative form of psychotherapy that combines elements of CBT and psychodynamic (looking at the past). It works by helping individuals identify and change deeply ingrained negative patterns of thinking and behavior. Sessions mightinvolve cognitive, behavioral, and experiential exercises to break these patterns on a deep emotional level.

My way of working:

I offer a non-judgemental, safe space. I can listen empathically and offer different perspectives. I collaborate with the client to outline therapeutic goals and can integrate your sessions with tools to help you navigate today’s often fast-paced and unpredictable world.

I offer a 30 minute free one-off consultation online or on the telephone and prior to our first formal session I email out a therapeutic contract outlining my policies and procedures and a document asking for client contact details/GP details which the client signs. I adhere to the BACP ethical framework.

Getting curious:

Often our inner voice, the voice that pops up when we haven’t achieved, haven’t completed, or haven’t communicated is a harsh inner critic. Do you imagine how life might be if that voice was kind, forgiving and full of love? Do you ask yourself 'what's wrong with me?'. Curiosity is a superpower. I offer a free half hour consultation for help you start your journey of curiosity. 

In the first session, usually, the client goes into what they are hoping to achieve in therapy in more detail. There is no formal assessment in the session, time is used as the client wishes and I hold in mind any gaps of information and aim to cover these informally during the session. Building rapport and a therapeutic relationship is paramount to the work I do with clients and these first few sessions are aimed to let the client settle and go at their own pace. This looks different for every client.

Other useful details regarding starting:

I offer a free 30 minute consultation session either online or on the telephone so that the client and myself can see if we might work therapeutically together. In this shorter session I also ask some questions about the client's history and what has brought them to counselling.

The first session and subsequent sessions will cost £80. Details of confidentiality, risk assessment, payment procedures, cancellation policy, holidays and absences are outlined in my counselling contract which the client receives when we have agreed to work together.  

Face-to-face and online sessions available both during the day and evenings. Please contact me to check availability.

In my private practice, I work with adults (18yrs +) in-person (Barnet) and online (anywhere in the UK). Under my qualifications and training I am able to offer a blend of counselling/therapeutic approaches including humanistic and CBT frameworks, tailored clients' particular challenges.

This might look like helping a client reflect on their childhood and make useful links with how events might effect them in adulthood whilst also providing tools to foster change and self-compassion and self-acceptance. Or it might look like concentrating on one specific goal. The work can be open-ended or time-limited.

I have professional and personal experience of neurodivergence specifically ADHD and ASC and have trained to bring a neuroaffirmative approach to my practice alongside tools and helpful strategies to support clients.

Alongside my private practice, I work for the NHS Talking Therapies Service via Mind in Hertfordshire. In this work I specialise is helping clients getting to the root of their symptoms, often in the form of acute/moderate anxiety and acute/moderate low mood and depression. Aligning with my private practice I use both a person-centred client-led approach and CBT techniques to help clients achieve their therapeutic goals and improve symptoms.

I hold a professional therapeutic qualification to work as a trauma-informed counsellor and offer trauma-informed skills. I also work as a perinatal outreach worker for Mind Enfield to fulfil a community based role. 

My areas of expertise include: anxiety, low mood/depression, understanding a neurodivergent diagnosis, combatting low self-esteem, examining your harsh inner critic, stress, understanding your anger, maternal mental health, parenting, domestic abuse and recovery work, recovery from being in a relationship with a narcissist, childhood abuse, bereavement and loss, career transitions, life transitions, boarding school syndrome and sleep issues.

What to expect in therapy:

Therapy can be a scary prospect. What do I say? How can I be vulnerable with a stranger? Will it work? Are all normal questions. My intention is to, over a few sessions, start to create a trusting working relationship. If a client doesn't know where to start I can helpfully prompt and guide.

Key aspects of my modality:

Integrative provides a structured, integrative form of psychotherapy that combines elements of CBT and psychodynamic (looking at the past). It works by helping individuals identify and change deeply ingrained negative patterns of thinking and behavior. Sessions mightinvolve cognitive, behavioral, and experiential exercises to break these patterns on a deep emotional level.

My way of working:

I offer a non-judgemental, safe space. I can listen empathically and offer different perspectives. I collaborate with the client to outline therapeutic goals and can integrate your sessions with tools to help you navigate today’s often fast-paced and unpredictable world.

 I offer a 30 minute free one-off consultation online or on the telephone and prior to our first formal session I email out a therapeutic contract outlining my policies and procedures and a document asking for client contact details/GP details which the client signs. I adhere to the BACP ethical framework.

Getting curious:

Often our inner voice, the voice that pops up when we haven’t achieved, haven’t completed, or haven’t communicated is a harsh inner critic. Do you imagine how life might be if that voice was kind, forgiving and full of love? Do you ask yourself 'what's wrong with me?'. Curiosity is a superpower. I offer a free half hour consultation for help you start your journey of curiosity. 

In the first session, usually, the client goes into what they are hoping to achieve in therapy in more detail. There is no formal assessment in the session, time is used as the client wishes and I hold in mind any gaps of information and aim to cover these informally during the session. Building rapport and a therapeutic relationship is paramount to the work I do with clients and these first few sessions are aimed to let the client settle and go at their own pace. This looks different for every client. 

Other useful details regarding starting: 

I offer a free 30 minute consultation session either online or on the telephone so that the client and myself can see if we might work therapeutically together. In this shorter session I also ask some questions about the client's history and what has brought them to counselling. 

The first session and subsequent sessions will cost £80. Details of confidentiality, risk assessment, payment procedures, cancellation policy, holidays and absences are outlined in my counselling contract which the client receives when we have agreed to work together.