What can I expect of counselling?
Within the counselling relationship you are given the time and space, to explore your feelings in relation to the trauma. Our aim in counselling is to help you reach your full potential, so that your experience of sexual violence no longer controls or overwhelms your life, behaviour and choices. The counsellor is a neutral professional so you do not need to protect them from the intensity of your feelings or the details of your trauma, as you might feel obliged to do with the family or friends you confide in. You do not have to report to the gardai, go for a medical exam and it does not matter how long ago the assault happened for you to see a counsellor in our Centre.
How long will I be in counselling?
The pace of healing is very individual and is affected by such things as the duration and intensity of the sexual violence, the person’s relationship to the perpetrator, previous traumatic experiences and the degree of support available to the client outside of the counselling setting. You may be with us for six sessions or sixty. People will usually have weekly sessions for some time, and begin to spread out the time between sessions as they feel necessary.
Will I see the same counsellor all the time?
Yes. The first time you come to the Centre, however, you might be met by a particular counsellor whose job it is to explain about how we work and following that introductory session you will be contacted by the counsellor who will work with you for as long as you may need.
Is there any help for my partner/family/friends who may be upset about what I have told to them?
Learning that someone you care for has experienced sexual violence can be quite a shock and may leave a supporter feeling helpless. Our services are available to supporters and they will be allocated a counsellor who can talk this through with them either on the helpline or face to face.
For more info please click hereWill counselling help me forget?
Forgetting events of such an extreme nature as sexual violence is not a realistic goal of counselling. What the counselling process can hope to achieve is that the event becomes something which no longer takes over your day to day life. You may in fact find in the course of counselling that you begin to develop positive aspects of yourself that have been dormant or under-developed. Counselling will help you understand that what you are experiencing is in fact a normal reaction to an abnormal event. This does not in any way minimise the range and intensity of feelings experienced by you but re-affirms their normality in the context of what has happened to you.
Call us on 1800 750 780 we are here to listen and support you.