Steps2Wellbeing (S2W) is a psychological therapies service designed to help people in our community suffering mental or emotional distress. We offer therapies to people who are finding that distress is stopping them living the life they’d like to. We treat conditions like anxiety, post-traumatic stress disorder (not complex PTSD), low mood and stress.
We have an employment advisory team who offer support for poor mental health affecting work.
Many people come to us for many reasons. Take Liz, finding it difficult having her partner and the kids at home during lockdown because this is when she would compulsively clean the place because of unhelpful and horrifying thoughts that something bad will happen to them if she doesn’t. Add to this that money is tight and her husband may lose his job having been furloughed.
Cecil, who has lost his wife and misses her dreadfully. His family live abroad. He is struggling to manage normal day to day activities because of breathlessness, caused by a long term heart condition and back pain from old rugby injuries. He can’t find the energy or any good reason as to why to bother.
S2W assess and work out with you what sort of therapy will best help. Clinicians are trained and supervised, offering treatments including therapeutic and psycho educational courses, counselling, cognitive behavioural-based therapies, mindfulness programmes, EMDR (a treatment in this service for single incident traumas). Treatment lasts for an average of 10 sessions and many are offered as courses. These are proving to be extremely useful because everyone present, whether therapist or participant, has something to offer and we realise we are not alone.
Being a short term treatment service S2W is not suitable for everyone but we are able to refer to sister NHS teams or advise about other ways to find treatment.
As we are part of the NHS, we are free.
At the moment most work is by phone or digital delivery maintaining safety in these strange times.
At times of severe distress we recommend you see your GP, use 111, Samaritans 116123 or jo@samaritans.org, SHOUT text service 85258 or crisis support 0300 123 5440 for high-risk situations especially those people with strong suicidal thinking.
(All names changed and cases created from similar symptoms but are not real people.)
