Self-Harm

Understanding Self-Harm

Self-harm is a coping mechanism used by some individuals to deal with overwhelming emotional pain, stress, or feelings of numbness. It often involves intentionally hurting oneself, such as cutting or burning, as a way to manage difficult emotions. While self-harm provides temporary relief, it can lead to serious physical and emotional consequences.

The Role of Counselling in Addressing Self-Harm

Counselling provides a safe and non-judgmental space for individuals to explore the underlying reasons for their self-harming behaviors. Therapy focuses on helping individuals develop healthier coping strategies, understand their emotional pain, and work toward healing and recovery.

Building Emotional Awareness and Coping Skills

Through therapy, individuals learn to identify their triggers for self-harm and develop healthier ways of coping with difficult emotions. Counselling helps individuals build emotional awareness and provides tools for managing their emotions in a more constructive way.

Healing and Recovery

Therapy also focuses on helping individuals heal from the emotional wounds that drive self-harm. Counselling offers support in breaking the cycle of self-harming behaviors and finding healthier ways to cope with life’s challenges.

  • Understanding the root causes of self-harm
  • Developing healthier coping mechanisms
  • Building emotional awareness and resilience
  • Healing and recovery from self-harm
Find Self-Harm therapists in Brighton & Hove

Therapists who can help with self-harm

All therapists listed are verified and based in Brighton & Hove.

Alan Sparkes Hove

Alan Sparkes

Psychotherapist & Counsellor

An integrative psychotherapist with 20 years’ experience, working with shame and relational trauma, and with people who’ve had therapy before but found it didn’t reach the root of things.I often work with men who've spent years holding it together, and with women living with the effects of early or relational trauma. What brings people is usually anxiety or depression, but underneath there's something that has been there a long time: a harsh inner voice, a sense of never being quite good enough, relationship patterns that keep repeating, or simply not knowing why you feel the way you do.I don't do psychic amputation. You can't cut off the parts of yourself you don't like, or that cause you pain, without running into more problems. Therapy can help those parts be understood and integrated, so you can live more fully.I'm not a therapist who just nods and asks how that makes you feel. I'll tell you what I notice, and when it helps, I'll gently challenge you, always with care. I also work with couples, helping each partner understand what keeps happening between them.I am a UKCP-registered psychotherapist. I built and ran a multi-room therapy practice in Hove, lead peer groups for practitioners, founded Brighton Counselling Directory, and also counsel with the Terrence Higgins Trust in Brighton. Qualified therapists are welcome as clients.

BACPRegisteredUKCPAccredited

Joanna Miller Brighton

Joanna Miller

Integrative Psychotherapist

I’m an accredited psychotherapist with 15 years experience.I believe that the counselling relationship should be a creative space for both parties. It should feel comfortable and open enough to be free from anxiety and pressure in which new perspectives can emerge. In my view most mental activity takes place below the level of conscious awareness and my role is to help people gain access to it and insights from it.As an accredited therapist I am affiliated with several private healthcare companies including BUPA and AXA. I have an up-to-date DBS certificate which is registered on the update service. As well as working with individual adults, including trainee therapists, I have many years' experience working with children, couples and families. I have been a university counsellor so have a lot of experience working with students and young people and have also worked in secondary schools.  

BACPAccredited

Jaz Stroe Brighton

Jaz Stroe

Therapist / Counsellor

A Registered Member of the BACP, I've trained extensively in psychodynamic psychotherapy and counselling, working with the past, memories, dreams and the unconscious. I also volunteer with two leading mental health organisations and benefit from bi-weekly supervision to deepen my knowledge and approach.I’m also a third-culture person. I grew up in the UK with mixed Romanian and Serbian heritage. I know what it's like to perform versions of yourself while quietly feeling like someone else. Cultural identity, migration, belonging and othering are all woven into my psychology and therapeutic practice.I aim to maintain a genuinely inclusive space across culture, identity, sexual orientation, relationship structure, faith, and background. I don't work from a single script of what a person, a relationship, or a life should look like. I work within an ethic of non-harm, to self and to others, and I ask the same of the therapeutic space we share.Ultimately, I came into this work wanting to understand and aid my own mental wellbeing. I've had personal therapy for over a decade. I can only take you as far as I've gone myself, and I've gone deep. In other words, you're in safe hands, and you will be held week after week, for as long as you keep showing up.

BACPRegistered

Robyn Lang Brighton

Robyn Lang

Person Centred Counsellor

My approach is humanistic and person-centred. I offer a warm, confidential and non-judgemental space where you can slow down, feel heard and explore your experiences at your own pace. I believe that developing a greater understanding of ourselves can help us make sense of our emotions, relationships, patterns and the stories we carry with us.In addition to working privately I have also worked with Wellbeing in the Arts since 2023, offering low-cost counselling to creatives working in film, theatre and TV. I am a BACP Registered Counsellor with over nine years' experience and work in accordance with the BACP Ethical Framework. I bring a trauma-informed and inclusive approach to my practice.I offer in-person counselling in central Brighton, Hove, and online counselling across the UK. Couples counselling is also available in person in Brighton and Hove. If you would like to explore whether counselling might be right for you, please do get in touch.

BACPRegistered

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