Ten tips for clients when doing online counselling.
Online Counselling Tips. I have been a client with online counselling for a while, and also I am a counsellor! So I thought I would share some tips on how to get the best out of your online therapy sessions, some points are relevant for in-person sessions too.
Make sure you write your appointment in your diary or on your phone. Pretty much all counsellors charge for missed appointments and they are small businesses trying to stay afloat in these difficult times. If you have a free session it’s equally important to keep your appointment or cancel with plenty of time to spare as your session could be given to someone else.
Keep your appointment if you can.
Make sure you take notice of your counsellors required cancellation notice which should be on your contract.
If you are too physically ill to attend even an online session consider whether it would be worth doing the session online anyway. Sometimes we can be ill to avoid doing challenging things and so if you think this rings true to you try to push yourself out of your comfort zone a little, but not too much that you feel unsafe.
If you feel too mentally unwell to do the session consider letting your counsellor know this so they can help you talk through these difficult thoughts rather than hideaway with them. However, please also consider your limits. You could have a session which focuses entirely on your self-care and self-soothing strategies.
In the time between your session maybe keep a simple list diary of things that you wish to use your session time for. If you are anything like me you will forget your more challenging times and not be sure what to talk about in the session. If you find this happening, try the list idea. For example, I am taking two difficult dreams to my therapy that I was sure to forget about but that shows me that I am still in grief for a past relationship/dream.
Preparation
When preparing for your session make sure you switch your computer on in enough time for it to load etc. (if it is an older computer), also make sure you have a good internet signal or clear phone signal.
Get yourself a drink. You could just have water, as you would expect to find in the real therapy room, or you could make yourself some tea. I like to ask my clients what they’re drinking and let my therapist know what I am drinking. If you are drinking alcohol this would be something very interesting to look at. You should not turn up to sessions drunk, this is a safety issue. But your counsellor can help you find out what difficult emotions and feelings you may be “swallowing down”.
Same goes for smoking… it’s your house so I guess if you want to smoke you can smoke! But again this is an opportunity to maybe look at what emotions and difficult things you are trying to “create a smokescreen around” or indeed “breathe away”, “get off your chest”.
Yes, us counsellors really do talk in such language. The human body is an amazing instrument that counselling helps you get a greater awareness of.
Self Care
More Online Counselling Tips. Make sure you have some tissues handy… your tears are welcome in counselling! In a real therapy room, there would also be tissues, it’s up to you if you use them of not. Also, a clock may be handy, but ultimately it is your counsellor’s responsibility to manage the time.
Reflect on how you feel after the session. Think about things like… how you felt talking, what it was like being really listened to, whether you talked about the things you wanted to talk about or whether you talked about something totally different. It is really helpful if you can share these with your counsellor, though it can be really difficult to as well.
Make sure you do something nice for yourself afterwards too. This is self-care, self-soothing. Write a list of your top 5 things to do, however small, even if it’s just a walk, shopping, or eating.
Please let me know what you think in the comments, any other tips/feedback from clients or counsellors would be amazing.
Author: Jennifer
