Victoria O'Callaghan

Everyone needs support

It might relate to a diagnosis like anxiety, depression or an eating disorder. Perhaps a bereavement, break-up or job loss has left you feeling lost and low. You might have feelings you don't understand or are struggling to manage day to day living. Perhaps you need someone warm and compassionate to help you make sense of past traumatic experiences and mental pain.

Whether you seek support for feelings of anxiety, depression, stress, help with experiences of trauma or the losses shading our lives, I offer a therapeutic service that can help you cultivate the self-awareness needed for lasting change. I can help you make sense of your experiences and develop new ways of living well.

An opportunity to know yourself more deeply

I believe therapy gives us a space to put aside the demands of life and reflect on what matters most to us. Working with me is an invitation to explore current difficulties, past experiences and longings to live more authentically. We think together about how you feel, any patterns and feelings of stuckness, and how these might be protecting you from pain.

While there is no one-size fits all approach to feelings of stuckness or distress, more multidisciplinary research evidences how psychological problems can have roots in early experiences. We will spend time exploring these together, potentially making links between past experiences and present challenges,  developing a therapeutic relationship suited to your needs.

Working together

As a psychodynamic and psychoanalytically-oriented practitioner, I have deep respect and compassion for the unconscious patterns, narratives and beliefs we develop in early life. Working psychodynamically means respecting the unique and unexpected influences these have on our lives. With curiosity we can understand how these attempts at protecting ourselves might be blocking our efforts to live creative, fulfilling lives.

Learning how to live

My practice involves being alongside you as you discover your capacity for living fully as yourself.  I provide a safe, reflective space where you can become curious about what this means for you.

My practice is based on three values:

Curiosity: Being open-minded, non-judgemental and inquisitive about our experiences.

Connection: Recognising the bonds we have to others and how interrelatedness affects us all.

Courage: Appreciating the strength it takes to explore difficult experiences in the hope of freeing ourselves from their influence.

I hope that our work together will help you cultivate these, learning to use them when grappling with the complex challenges and joys of being alive in a rich and diverse world.

Ways of working together

Psychological issues are common and there are different ways to approach them. Some can benefit significantly from shorter-term therapy (30 sessions or so) while others may be better suited to longer term, open-ended work.

I work online and in-person. We will meet either once or twice a week, at the same time, for 50 minutes. I have clinics in London Bridge and central Brighton.