Counselling for Men’s Issues
Do you feel like you can no longer do anything correctly? Do you find yourself responding with anger or with a short fuse? Do you feel like you are stuck or spinning your wheels? Maybe you feel depressed, hopeless or lost? Individual counselling can help improve all of these problems. With counselling, you can feel better and have more control of the problem.
Taking the first step with counselling requires courage, willingness, commitment and hope. Hope for positive change and better control of what’s happening in your life.
Men often report feeling out-of-control, hopeless, stuck, weak, broken, lost or overwhelmed about what’s happening in their life.
Men often believe they need to be the quiet ones and that reaching out for help is a sign of weakness.
Maybe you feel like you don’t have the power to make anything better. You might feel like you suffer from anxiety or depression, but don’t know what the first step is to better managing your problem.
Individual counselling can help improve all of these problems or issues. You can feel better and have more control of the problem.
If you have experienced childhood abuse, neglect or trauma, healing is possible.
If you have issues with anger, rage or violence, this can change.
Counselling for men helps.
How do problems start?
From a young age, most men are taught rigid masculinity – that is to be strong and to keep their emotions to themselves. This often leads to many men feeling isolated, anxious and depressed. The very emotions they should seek help for, they often ignore and try to move forward on their own. Stuffing their emotions often seems like a better idea than opening themselves up to the stigma of seeking counselling.
Men are far more likely to use/abuse alcohol and drugs to manage their problems. Many men tie their success to their worth or value in their job, yet economic factors sometimes impede them. Many men have been the victim of bullying or trauma. Research shows that men are more affected by these issues due the social taboos surrounding males expressing themselves.
There is no denying that mental health issues manifest differently in men than in women. Men often minimize or don’t understand their own emotional pain. With men, their problems often go completely ignored and untreated. In fact, men may feel depressed for years without going to talk to anyone about it.
Counselling for men
What counselling can help with
Individual counselling can address men’s issues, including:
- Anxiety
- Depression
- Anger
- Sadness
- Feeling lost or lonely
- Lacking purpose
- Low self-esteem
- Workplace stress
- Feeling inadequate
- Transitional changes
- Relationship issues, including separation and divorce
- Infidelity
- Sexual issues
- Sexuality issues
I provide evidence-based, high-quality, in-person counselling/ psychotherapy in Barrie/Simcoe County, or virtually, across Ontario.
I am committed to helping clients improve their mental health and well-being, and in a safe, confidential and professional way. I look forward to being part of your path toward healing, growth and change!
My Approach
Assess/ Clarify Situation
Through careful consideration, curiosity and open dialogue, together, we can identify a newfound way of thinking about and understanding your situation.
Goal Setting
In order to be effective, it’s typically best to aim for setting SMART goals, as they are easier to achieve.
SMART stands for: Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Realistic, Timely. Let’s get goal setting!
Implementation
Together, we will explore and create habit-forming strategies to support you and help you achieve your goals. Your progress will be reviewed and adjustments will be made to keep you moving forward towards long-lasting change.
The Starting Point
Scheduling a 15-minute consultation with me is the starting point to making the type of change you are ready for.
FAQ
What is counselling and how does it work?
Counselling aims to investigate the root cause of your thoughts, emotions, and behaviors, so that you can function better, feel better and feel more in control of your life. I can help with increasing clarity on the issues you are facing and assist you with adjusting and coping in a more meaningful way. Counselling can help you to develop better tools, awareness, and resources aimed at developing a healthier sense of self and self-esteem. Work may also be done to improve one’s self care, boundaries, coping skills, emotional regulation, and shame.
Counselling works best when you: actively participate in making decisions; when you are honest and open; when you are open to new ideas and methods of doing things; have an openness to communicate your thoughts, feelings, and experiences; when you develop a plan of when you want to attend counselling and stick to it! It is important to remember not to expect instant results. It can also be difficult and painful to work through emotional issues, but I can help guide the process to make it as safe as possible. Before you start to observe results, you might require a few sessions.
I believe every human being has the capacity to fulfill their potential. Individual counselling means choice, not force, not advice. With counselling, it is the client who takes the decisions so that the solutions and goals or adopted are more likely to be appropriate. An appropriate solution or goal will be one that the person can follow with successful results. The ultimate goal is to help you fulfill your potential, feel better and to live a happier and healthier life.
What will the first counselling session be like?
To take some of the pressure off, bring an open mind, but also bring your questions and concerns to that first session.
Be open to doing some work together–that’s the best way to navigate the process during the first session. Some clients prefer to write down a few notes before the session, others have their talking points in their head and come ready to discuss things.
During the first session, I will confirm a few things related to confidentiality and get your informed consent to proceed. I will always ask if the session is staying on the topic you were hoping to discuss. At the end of the session, together, we will decide next steps. As the session wraps-up, you may want to jot down a few notes.
How many counselling sessions are needed?
Of course, this is impossible to answer, but there are a few principles I follow that may help bring clarity to that question:
- Getting right to work: In any counselling you want to get right to work. It’s important to address the issues of concern and set a goal in the first session, as this guides future sessions
- A short-term/brief framework is often used to guide individual counselling. Some clients need fewer sessions (4 to 8), while others need more sessions. Some clients prefer to develop a long-term counselling relationship. There is no pressure to commit to a certain number of sessions, or the frequency of the sessions.
What is your counselling session rate?
The fee for an individual counselling session is $125.00 and sessions typically run around 50 minutes in length. Session fees are due the day the session takes place and payment can be made by cash, e-transfer or credit car. A receipt will be provided.
Explore
Individual Counselling
Now that you know men often have different ways they respond to their problems, would you like to know more about how individual counselling works. While there isn’t a roadmap to the process, it usually starts with a hope for change. Click now to better understand how counselling works.
Anxiety
Whether you have a diagnosis of anxiety, or simply feel the impact of anxiety on a regular basis, counselling can help you discover new coping strategies to take charge of your symptoms. Wouldn’t you like to live in better control of your symptoms? Click now for more information on anxiety.
Depression
Depression presents differently in everyone, but no matter how it is impacting you, counselling can help, once you have strategies to manage it more directly. Often, the biggest barrier to accessing help is admitting you need it. Click now to better understand depression.