About Me
I offer counselling and coaching services to cater to a wide variety of needs, located in Melbourne. I treat everyone from individuals to couples and families.
Additionally, I offer:
Services remotely via either video chat or phone call at the same cost for those who prefer it.
Services at your preferred location if needed.
Accessible hours: weekdays, weekday evenings and Saturday appointments.
Private Health Insurance rebates may be available. Eligible police health members may be entitled to a benefit.
Services
Half-hour session
30 mins
$50
For weekly catch-ups and conversations.
Hour session
60 mins
$100
Slightly longer for those more difficult days.
Extended session
Full session
120 mins
$190
90 mins
$150
An extended session to really get things off your chest and break things down thoroughly. Great for those really tough weeks and nuts and bolts to get through.
More in-depth discussions.
This length is encouraged for your first session, as it allows you to introduce yourself and get familiar with your counsellor.
Blog
To be able to reduce stress, you need to be able to maintain some degree of control and predictability. Other ways of reducing personal stress can be via maintaining social connection to supports. We know that those who maintain connections to people or groups will often live longer than those who are socially isolated
Why are you here on Earth? What are you meant to be doing? How can you make a difference in their lifetime? You can’t just manufacture purpose in life. You can, however, work at increasing more of it.
I’ve recently been referred a client who rang me and asked me if they could ask me some questions. I told them something I say to all my new clients: “I may not necessarily be your cup of tea”. And this is important, because how clients choose a counsellor or therapist is very important, and there’s some criteria I have used in the past to identify for myself whether a counsellor I was seeing was the right fit for me.
What was discovered in the research was that the assumptions we make about our partner and whether they did or didn’t do something is what is called an attribution pattern. Basically, this relates to whether you judge your partner’s behaviour through jumping to conclusions or through thinking through their possible choices.
Niksen. This is a concept designed by the Dutch that means spending time doing basically nothing. The art of Niksen is spending time avoiding being productive or achieving, so putting aside time to simply be rather than doing. In reality what does this look like? This might mean putting aside five to ten minutes to just gaze out of a window or look at a piece of furniture in your room and allowing your mind to wander.
Here are four positive keys to remember and try to practice together in your relationships to better the way you understand each other and care for each other.
When we fail it has an impact on our self-esteem and we feel negative emotions such as anger, anxiety and shame. It depends on how we cope with the self-esteem hit in relation to (1) whether the failure impacts our future performance, (2) whether we face failure and accept we may do better next time and (3) accept that it is useful to fail for future success.
It is very normal for couples in long-term relationships to argue - and arguing in itself is not an issue. Conflicts are necessary as a partnership involves two people who will have different emotions, concepts and values. These need to be negotiated regularly. The issue is HOW to argue.
By dealing with chronic pain myself through migraines, I understand the pain that is often separate from the actual pain. It’s the pain of constantly having to catch up when you’re well and relying on others. If you suffer from chronic pain, there are three aspects of self-compassion that you should embrace, discussed in this blog.
Migraines and Me blog
This is what I hear myself thinking as another caring soul tells me to try another headache removal technique they've used in the past. Most of the time I just nod and thank them for their supportive advice but I do wander away and feel more isolated.
Migraines are such a complicated condition, as those of you who experience them are fully aware. With over 23 years of experiencing migraines as both occasional and chronic, meaning that more than half my month is spent with headache/migraine days, I have certainly tried nearly everything offered and suggested by my neurologists and GP's.
A one day migraine can have a three or four day affect. What this means is a migraine that begins on Sunday morning is still having an impact Thursday day.
Testimonials
“I always leave feeling that I will be able to cope with whatever comes my way, even if it may be difficult. Prior to counselling, I didn’t really see any way out, and that I would just have to accept my circumstances. It is great to be able to talk about life’s challenges, but also feel equipped to tackle them better when I leave.”
Client
“Sharon's previous experience lends her invaluable perspective into the lives and stresses of a junior doctor. Her empathy and insight makes it effortless to open up, and I found every session with her left me feeling both lighter and more able to deal with the pressures of my work.”
Junior Medical Officer
I started to think about what the 80-year old me might say to myself about this pandemic and living through this period of time. I was to imagine being an 80 year old version of myself and if that version of me was sitting sharing a cup of tea with someone and they wanted to know about living through the pandemic and what I had learnt from it, then what would it be? What things would I have learnt through it?