Depression Counselling

A male client was very negative and depressed. He was in his early forties and said he had always felt this way. He felt there was more to life and wanted to experience happiness. We worked with him on defining exactly what, for him, constituted happiness. He defined it as feeling heard by others more in everyday situations and feeling “lighter inside”. Using CBT techniques, we began to practice assertiveness strategies both in the therapy room and in ‘real life’ scenarios, using the feedback to inform our next steps. He began to describe feeling more joyful on waking in the morning and, as this feeling was reinforced, it grew in frequency and became almost an everyday experience. He began to be more aware of his feelings, learning to express them in constructive ways, and developed the habit of looking more positively at his everyday life.