At Speakeasyservices, I provide professional counselling and effective strategies for managing stress and anxiety.
Welcome! If you are reading this you are most likely to be suffering from stress, anxiety or burn out. You may be struggling with lack of concentration at work, challenges in your personal relationships, having trouble sleeping, be angry, frustrated or experiencing panic attacks. Sometimes we don’t notice the more subtle changes, drinking more than usual, lower levels of confidence or feeling disconnected.
Extreme stress and burnout are complex systemic issues. We often compound this by viewing them as something we should be able to solve ourselves. You will already have realised you can’t think your way out of it and willpower isn’t cutting it!
Finding yourself at this point enables you to:
I specialise in empowering individuals through personalised counselling services. I am committed to helping you navigate stress and anxiety challenges. Whether you're seeking to enhance your coping strategies or require support, I am here for you.
My name is Alex McCall. After studying at university in the late 70s I spent many years in a stressful sales management environment and eventually ran my own international trading company. Since I was young, I have always been interested in the human experience and in what makes people "tick." If I went for a walk, I'd invariably meet someone who would end up opening up to me and telling me their life story. I then had an epiphany and retrained as a mental health nurse aged 48 in order to help others. Perhaps because of my early life experience, “helping others” has always been one of my core values, and it gives me great satisfaction and meaning in my life. After qualifying, I worked in acute psychiatry for 18 months, then spent 5 years working as a community psychiatric nurse for Combat Stress treating military veterans. I then worked for a further five years with the MOD treating serving military personnel. During this time, I became an accredited EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitisation and Reprocessing) therapist. EMDR is one of the main treatments for Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. After Covid hit I left the MOD and worked in the community with the elderly as a mental health nurse, until February 2022. I now work part time for a registered mental health charity, alongside my developing private practice.
What to expect working with me?
My experience is that whatever treatment modality is used to help people, the main benefit from formal talking therapy comes from connecting with another empathetic, knowledgeable, and understanding person. Someone non-judgemental who can use not only their professional skills but their own life experience and people skills to help you gain insight into why you behave the way you do and its consequences for your work and personal life.
I offer you:
The tools in my tool kit:
How you to work with me: I have developed a 6-step assessment and counselling programme to help people suffering from stress and anxiety. This can be face to face, via Zoom or by telephone. Each weekly session will be a minimum of one hour. There will be “homework” before the next session, mainly short videos to watch on YouTube to support you with the recommended strategies. In the first instance, please feel free to contact me, so we can discuss how I might best help you on 07542 502082.
Fees
What would work best for you?
I offer an initial 20 minute phone or video call free. Let's see if we would work well together. After that £50 per hour for telephone or video conferencing. If you're busy in the daytime I can offer evening calls.
After an initial free consultation of up to 20 minutes typically I would offer six hour long sessions. Each session costs £50.00. During this time we would have a comprehensive look at your current issues and how best to help you move forward. We'd look at your lifestyle; your views on the world and relationships; your values, hopes and dreams; what motivates you and what you avoid; your diet and exercise and your fears.
During this time we can identify what approach would work best for you. I usually try and encourage and inspire people to start to meditate and I can help you start a daily practice. If you are hard on yourself and excessively self-critical I can teach you how to develop self-compassion and to start to calm down your own self-imposed threat system.
Having had many years experience in mental health if I feel you are suffering with a depressive illness or a serious anxiety disorder I can signpost you to the relevant services and offer advice.
Availability
I work in my private practice Saturday/Sunday/Monday and offer appointments from 9.30 am - 5.00 pm.
I also offer appointments in the evenings 7.00pm - 9.00pm Tuesday/Wednesday/Thursday.
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