Janet Bell

Janet Bell is an integrative counsellor, drawing primarily from person-centred, attachment theory and transactional analysis therapeutic models. She holds a diploma in therapeutic counselling and is BACP-registered. Janet works in private practice at The Awareness Centre in Clapham as well as a music and performing arts college in Brighton, counselling students aged 16+.

Warm, empathic, experienced and good-humoured, she most commonly helps with anxiety, depression, low self-esteem, relationship and family issues, life transitions, trauma, identity and loss. She supports people from diverse backgrounds, cultures, ages, gender and neurodivergent conditions (particularly ADHD and autistic spectrum), working inclusively with compassion and respect. Janet has particular experience with the music industry, performing arts, addiction (drug and alcohol misuse) and boarding school related issues.

Fundamental to any successful work is a trusting, empathic, consistent and boundaried relationship and this underpins Janet’s therapeutic approach to all her clients whether adult or adolescent. Having the space to feel safe, un-judged and listened to, perhaps for the first time, can be transformative.

Janet works collaboratively with you to explore concerns, identify and gently challenge patterns, limiting beliefs and ingrained narratives to facilitate meaningful change at your own pace. She believes that our past affects our present and will help you join the dots to make sense of your issues and develop a stronger sense of Self.

Part of Janet’s work is with people in recovery from substance misuse. Additionally, clients affected by loved ones’ misuse or who may have experienced addiction in their own upbringing. Previous years in substance misuse services included different approaches to client work: SMART recovery, the 12 step Minnesota model, Gabor Maté’s Compassionate Inquiry, and the impact of adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) and early years attachment. Janet draws on her breadth of experience to fit and empower each individual client with the aim of developing self-awareness, self-compassion and achieving your desired outcome.

Boarding School Syndrome has only in recent years become recognised as a psychological trauma. The child’s sending away from home necessitates the development of a strategic survival personality to cope with 24/7 institutional life. Where people experience physical, sexual and emotional abuse, this is additional trauma. The condition can result in relationship and parenting difficulties, isolation, substance misuse, workaholism, further institutionalisation, PTSD, burnout, lack of empathy and difficulty expressing or even recognising emotions. This is often bound up in the perception of privilege, perhaps sacrifice, meaning that feelings become obscured, unacknowledged or denied, perhaps until mid/later life when coping mechanisms (the survival personality) malfunction or break down.  Janet’s experience and training in this area allows for building a specific therapeutic relationship which makes possible the process of recognition, acceptance and change.