Counselling is free for Women Victims of Childhood Sexual Abuse living in Leicester, Leicestershire and Rutland.
What is counselling?
Counselling is a talking therapy that allows you to discuss problems and difficult feelings in a safe, confidential environment. Counselling can help if you want to change something in your life, find ways to cope with mental health issues or simply explore your thoughts and feelings in more depth.
Your counsellor is there to listen to you and help you to find ways to deal with your individual issues. They will empower you to make changes and find positive ways to cope with past experiences. The counsellor will not tell you what to do. Instead, they will encourage you to talk about what’s bothering you and find ways to move forward. A counsellor will listen and support you without judgement or criticism. They will work with you to identify your specific ways of thinking and strategies you can use to improve your wellbeing.
What can counselling help with?
Counselling can help anyone who wants to explore their thoughts and emotions further related to a specific event in their lives. People may choose to speak to a counsellor because they feel they cannot speak to their partner/friends/family about the issues, or they may simply want to speak to a professional with an objective viewpoint.
At Quetzal, we support women recovering from the trauma of childhood and help them cope with:
- mental health conditions. For example, depression, anxiety, personality disorder, eating disorder or addiction
- an upsetting physical health condition, such as infertility, cancer
- a difficult life event, such as further abuse, bereavement, a relationship breakdown or work-related stress
- difficult emotions – for example, low self-esteem, anger, suicidal thoughts
any other issues that pertain to the individuals’ identity.
What do we offer?
We offer the following counselling services:
There are different types of counselling available. At Quetzal, the type of counselling used is called integrative counselling. Integrative counselling is a combined approach that brings together different elements of specific therapies. Our counsellors take the view that there is no single approach that can treat each client in all situations. Hence, we try to make the counselling process tailored to individual needs.
Counselling formats
We offer our counselling in a variety of formats, including:
What is the process to receive support from Quetzal?
The process is as follows:
How can counselling help?
The way counselling can help will depend on the person receiving the treatment, their individual circumstances and what they would like to achieve. For some people, having a safe, confidential environment to talk about their feelings and emotions is enough. For others, there will be specific issues they would like to address, for example low self-esteem.
Counsellors do not give you concrete advice or a checklist of things to do in order to feel better, instead they help you uncover your own insight and understanding of your problems. You work with your counsellor in order to develop the tools needed so you can move forward.
In the majority of cases, a single session will not be enough to help overcome the issues you are facing. Counselling is a journey, and it takes time and consistency to work effectively.
Is there a cost?
Quetzal provides counselling free of charge to women who live in Leicester, Leicestershire or Rutland. There is a cost to run our services and therefore we welcome donations from past and current clients. Donations can be made at a session or online but are not required to access our service. You can also fundraise for Quetzal.
Our Other services
To further support our clients we run a number of complementary services alongside our counselling, including:
