Frequently asked questions
The questions people ask before they book
Therapy is one of the few things people buy without being able to see what they are buying. This page is the plain version: what happens, what it costs, who hears what, and what to do if things get worse at three in the morning.
There are 28 answers below, grouped into six sections. They are written to be read by someone who has never been to therapy and is not sure they want to go now. If the question you have is not here, ask it — nobody will think it is a silly one.
Jump to a section
Every answer below opens and closes on its own, and each one has its own web address — so if you want to send a particular answer to a partner or a parent, you can link straight to it.
Section one
Getting started
Working out whether this is the right kind of help, and what actually happens first.
How do I know whether I need therapy, counselling or life coaching?
The rough distinction is direction of travel. Counselling and therapy usually begin with something that hurts — anxiety, low mood, grief, a relationship that keeps breaking in the same place — and work backwards to understand where it comes from and what keeps it going.
Coaching usually starts from a steadier baseline and works forwards: a decision to make, a change to plan, a boundary to hold, a habit to build. It is future-facing and practical, and it is not a substitute for therapy when something underneath needs attention first.
Plenty of people arrive genuinely unsure which they want, and that is a perfectly normal place to begin. In a first conversation we talk about what is happening and agree together which of these fits. If it becomes clear part way through that you started in the wrong one, we say so and change it rather than carrying on regardless.
What actually happens in a first session?
Mostly you talk and we listen, with some questions along the way to fill in the picture. Expect to be asked what brought you now rather than a year ago, what you have already tried, what your day-to-day life looks like, who is around you, and what you would like to be different.
Practical ground is covered too, and it is covered at the start rather than left to be discovered later: confidentiality and its limits, fees, cancellations, how sessions are recorded and stored, and what to do if you are struggling between appointments.
Nothing is compulsory. You can decline a question, say that something is not for today, or ask why you are being asked. You will not be pushed into your worst memory in the first hour.
By the end you should have a reasonable sense of what the work would involve and whether you want to book another session. Taking a few days to decide is fine.
Do I need a referral from my GP?
No. Private therapy and counselling in the UK are accessed directly — you can get in touch yourself and book without going through anybody.
A GP referral only becomes relevant if you intend to claim on a private health insurance policy, because many insurers require one before they will authorise sessions. If that applies to you, sort it out before the first appointment rather than after.
You are welcome to tell your GP that you are having therapy, and some people find that useful, particularly if medication is part of the picture. It is your decision and it is not a condition of being seen.
If it becomes clear that what you need sits with your GP or with NHS services — a medication review, a formal assessment, or a level of support a private practice cannot safely provide — we will say so plainly rather than keep you in the wrong room.
How long will it take?
Honestly, it depends, and anyone who gives you a precise number before meeting you is guessing. A focused piece of work on one clear difficulty often runs to somewhere between six and twelve sessions. Longer-standing patterns, trauma, and work involving a whole family usually take longer than that.
Progress is reviewed openly at intervals rather than allowed to roll on by default: what has shifted, what has not, what is getting in the way, and whether this is still the right work with the right person.
There is no minimum commitment and no block of sessions to buy up front. Sessions continue only while they are useful to you.
Where possible, ending is planned rather than abrupt — a session or two to draw things together tends to make the gains hold better than simply stopping.
What if I do not click with the therapist?
Say so. The quality of the working relationship is the part of therapy that most consistently matters, and it not fitting is not a failure on either side.
You can raise it directly in the room. A therapist should be able to hear that without defensiveness, and surprisingly often naming it is the thing that unsticks the work.
If it still does not fit, you are free to stop at any point, and you will be helped to find someone else rather than talked out of leaving. You are not obliged to explain your reasons or to attend a final session to justify the decision.
Section two
Sessions and practicalities
Length, frequency, what to do between appointments, and what happens if you are struggling.
How long is a session, and how often would we meet?
Individual sessions usually run for around fifty minutes. Couples and family sessions are often longer, because there are simply more people who need to be heard properly.
Weekly is the most common rhythm at the start. Momentum matters early on, and a fortnight is long enough for a hard week to be half-forgotten by the time you sit down.
Once things are steadier, some people move to fortnightly or monthly sessions, and some return occasionally for a review when life changes. The pattern is agreed with you rather than imposed, and it can change as your circumstances do.
Exact session lengths and the current fee for each type of session are set out in full on the fees page.
What if I cry, or cannot get the words out?
Crying in therapy is ordinary. It is not an embarrassment, an interruption, or a sign that something has gone wrong — often it is the moment something true has finally been said out loud.
There are tissues in the room, nobody will rush you, and you will not be asked to explain yourself or apologise.
If words will not come at all, that is workable too. Silence is allowed. There are other ways in: writing something down beforehand and handing it over, starting from what your body is doing rather than the story, or beginning at the edge of the thing rather than the middle of it.
You will not be pushed to talk about anything before you are ready to.
Can I bring my child, or somebody else, with me?
For your own individual sessions, please arrange childcare if you possibly can. A child in the room changes what you feel able to say, and the hour is meant to be yours.
If childcare is genuinely the thing standing between you and getting help, say so when you get in touch. An online session, an evening slot or a Saturday appointment often solves it.
For family work, children and young people are frequently part of the sessions by design, and who attends which session is planned together in advance rather than assumed.
If you would like a partner, relative or friend to come along to a first appointment for support, that can usually be arranged. Ask beforehand rather than arriving with them, so the session can be set up properly.
Will you speak to my GP or anybody else involved in my care?
Not without your consent, except in the narrow circumstances where the law or a serious risk to life requires it.
Sometimes joined-up care genuinely helps — if you are being reviewed for medication, or an NHS team is already involved. In those cases you would be asked first, told exactly what would be shared and why, and a letter would go only with your agreement. You can read it before it is sent.
You can say no, and saying no does not affect your sessions or how you are treated.
If risk became serious enough that information had to be shared without consent, you would normally be told what was being shared, with whom, and for what reason, and involved in that conversation wherever it was safe to do so.
Is there homework between sessions?
Sometimes, and never as a test. Approaches such as cognitive behavioural therapy — the model NICE recommends for depression and for the anxiety disorders — work partly because something is practised between sessions: noticing a thought pattern, keeping a short record, trying a small behavioural experiment.
Other pieces of work involve nothing more than living your week and bringing back what you noticed.
Anything suggested is agreed with you, kept realistic for the life you actually have rather than an imaginary one with spare evenings in it, and reviewed rather than marked.
If you did not do it, that is useful information about what got in the way. It is not a reason for a telling-off.
What if I am in crisis between sessions?
Family Restore Ltd is a planned, appointment-based practice. The phone and inbox are not monitored around the clock and we cannot provide crisis or emergency cover, so please use a service that operates twenty-four hours a day.
Call 999 if a life is at immediate risk. Call 111 and choose the mental health option for urgent NHS advice at any hour. Call Samaritans free on 116 123, at any time, from any phone — you do not have to be suicidal to call them.
If you are already working with us, this is discussed early rather than left until it is needed, and a short written plan is agreed for difficult nights: who you would contact, in what order, and what has helped before.
The urgent help page lists every service in full, including text-based support, domestic abuse lines and services for under-19s.
If you need help right now
This practice works by appointment and does not provide crisis cover. If you cannot keep yourself safe, call 999. For urgent NHS advice at any hour, call 111 and choose the mental health option. Samaritans answer free on 116 123, day or night.
No question here is too small to ask before you book. If it matters enough to make you hesitate, it is relevant.
Section three
Confidentiality and records
What stays in the room, the limits that apply, and what happens to the notes.
Is what I say confidential?
Yes. What you bring is treated as private. It is not discussed with your family, your employer, your insurer or anybody else, and you will not be identified to anyone as a client of the practice.
Two ordinary exceptions are explained to you in writing before the first session rather than discovered afterwards.
The first is clinical supervision. Every responsible UK practitioner takes their work to an independent supervisor who is bound by the same duty of confidentiality; clients are normally discussed without identifying details. This is a safeguard for you, not a loophole.
The second is the small set of legal and safety limits set out in the next answer.
When would confidentiality have to be broken?
In a small number of situations, all of which are explained before you start rather than at the moment they arise.
If there is a serious and immediate risk to your life or to someone else's, information may be shared with emergency or NHS services so that you can be kept safe.
Where a child or an adult at risk may be being harmed, safeguarding duties apply and the relevant local authority may have to be told.
Certain statutory duties also override confidentiality — for example, disclosures required under terrorism or money-laundering legislation, or an order made by a court.
Wherever it is safe and possible, you would be told what is being shared, with whom and why, and be part of that conversation rather than the subject of it.
What happens to my notes, and how long are they kept?
Brief, factual working notes are kept for each session — enough to hold the thread of the work between appointments, not a transcript of everything you said.
They are stored securely, access is restricted to your practitioner, and they are never sold, shared for marketing, or used to train any automated system.
Under UK GDPR your notes are special-category health data. They can only be kept while there is a lawful reason to hold them, and they are securely destroyed after that.
The exact retention period this practice applies, the lawful basis for holding your information, where it is stored and who processes it are all set out in the privacy notice. If anything there is unclear, ask before you book rather than afterwards.
Can I ask to see what is written about me?
Yes. UK GDPR gives you the right to ask for a copy of the personal data held about you — a subject access request — and the practice must respond within one month, free of charge in normal circumstances.
You can also ask for factual inaccuracies to be corrected, ask what is held and why, and object to certain uses of your information.
There are narrow exemptions. Information may be withheld where releasing it would identify another person who has not consented, or where serious harm to someone's physical or mental health could result.
If you want to see your notes, simply ask. A request is not treated as an act of hostility, and it will not change how you are worked with.
Where the detail lives
The answers above are the summary. The privacy notice is the document that governs it: the lawful basis for holding your information, how long records are kept, who processes them, where they are stored, and how to make a subject access request or a complaint to the Information Commissioner.
Section four
Fees and cancellations
What sessions cost, insurance and employer schemes, and what happens if plans change.
What does a session cost, and how do I pay?
Current fees for each type of session — individual, couples, family and coaching — are published in full on the fees page, along with the accepted payment methods. You will be told the fee that applies to you in writing before you book anything.
Nothing is added afterwards. There is no assessment fee, registration fee or admin charge on top of the session fee.
Fees are reviewed occasionally. If they change, you would be given notice in advance rather than finding out from an invoice.
If cost is the thing stopping you, say so when you get in touch. It is a practical question, not an awkward one.
Can I use private health insurance or an employer scheme?
It depends entirely on the policy, so check before you book rather than afterwards.
Most UK insurers will only fund sessions with practitioners on their own approved panel, and many also require a GP referral plus pre-authorisation and a claim number before the first appointment takes place. Sessions booked before authorisation are frequently refused.
Employee assistance programmes generally work the same way, providing a set number of sessions through their own provider network, often with a limit on what happens afterwards.
Tell us at the enquiry stage exactly what your insurer or scheme requires and you will get a straight answer about whether it can be met. Where it cannot, you are of course still welcome to book privately.
What happens if I need to cancel or rearrange?
Let us know as early as you can and the appointment will be moved wherever there is a slot to move it to.
A session is time held exclusively for you, so a cancellation made with less than the agreed notice is normally still chargeable. The notice period is stated on the fees page and repeated in the working agreement you receive before your first session, so it is never a surprise.
Genuine emergencies and sudden illness are treated as what they are. Repeated last-minute cancellations are treated as something worth talking about in the room, because avoidance is often part of the difficulty rather than a scheduling problem.
If you need to pause for a few weeks, say so. A planned break is a very different thing from disappearing, and it is much easier to come back from.
What if I cannot afford the full fee?
Ask. Whether any reduced-fee appointments are free changes over time, so the honest answer is that it depends on availability when you enquire — and it is worth asking rather than assuming.
It is also worth knowing that good, free and low-cost options exist alongside private practice. NHS Talking Therapies services in England take self-referrals directly, without going through your GP. Many local charities and voluntary-sector services offer counselling at a low or donation-based fee. Some university training clinics offer heavily reduced rates with closely supervised trainees.
Nobody here will be offended if you use one of those instead. What matters is that you get support, not that you get it from us.
Current fees for every type of session, the accepted payment methods and the cancellation notice period are all published on the fees page. Nothing is quoted only in private, and nothing is added after you have agreed to it.
Section five
Couples and families
Arguments in the room, taking sides, reluctant partners, and who should be there.
What if we argue in the session?
Many couples do, at least early on, and it is far more useful than a polite hour in which nothing real is said.
The difference is that the argument happens with somebody in the room whose job is to slow it down: to interrupt the loop before it runs to its usual ending, to name what just happened between you, and to help each of you hear the thing underneath the volume.
Sessions are structured so that both people get time and neither can be talked over indefinitely. If it escalates to the point where it is no longer safe or useful, the session is paused and redirected rather than allowed to run.
Where there is fear of a partner rather than anger at one, joint couples work is not the right setting. That is not a judgement, it is a safety matter, and safer options would be discussed with you separately.
Will you take sides?
No. The working position in couples and family therapy is multi-partiality rather than blank neutrality: the aim is to be genuinely on each person's side at the same time, not to referee and award points.
In practice that means both of you should feel heard, and both of you should occasionally feel challenged. If only one of those is happening, something is off.
Systemic approaches deliberately look at the pattern between people rather than hunting for the one person to blame, which is why family therapy avoids treating any single member as the identified patient whose fault it all is.
If it ever feels as though the balance has slipped, say so in the session. It is important information and it is entirely fixable.
What if my partner does not want to come?
That is common, and it does not have to be the end of it.
Reluctance is usually less about refusing help and more about a fear of being outnumbered, blamed, or asked to talk in a way that has never come naturally. Knowing what actually happens in a session often lowers the barrier more than persuasion does.
Sometimes it helps for the hesitant partner to agree to a single session with no commitment beyond it, on the explicit understanding that they can decide afterwards.
If they still do not want to attend, individual work on a relationship is entirely legitimate. Your own patterns, boundaries, choices and reactions are all workable without the other person in the room. What we would not do is coach one partner to manage or change the other behind their back.
If I say something privately, is it kept from my partner?
This is agreed at the very start and then applied consistently, because inconsistency here destroys trust quickly.
The working stance is a no-secrets one. Information shared individually may need to find its way into the joint work, because a therapist holding one partner's significant secret cannot work honestly with the couple and the sessions quietly become useless.
That does not mean anything you say is repeated back verbatim or without warning. You would be supported to bring it yourself, in your own words, at a pace that is manageable.
There is one important exception. Disclosure of abuse, or fear for your own safety, is never handed to a partner. It is held separately and handled with your safety as the first priority.
Ask about this in the first session so that you know exactly where you stand before you say anything you cannot unsay.
Should our children be in the room?
Sometimes, and it is planned rather than assumed.
Systemic family therapy often works best when the people who are part of the pattern are actually present, and children regularly say things in a session that shift an adult conversation which has been stuck for months.
Not every session needs everybody, though. Parents are often seen alone for part of the work, siblings are sometimes seen together, and young people are usually offered some time of their own.
Age matters. Younger children may take part through play, drawing or short appearances rather than sitting through an hour of adult talk.
What children are told beforehand is agreed with you in advance, because a child brought to a session with no explanation tends to arrive frightened and stay silent.
Section six
Online therapy
Whether video sessions work, what you need, and what to do about privacy at home.
Does online therapy work as well as meeting in person?
For most people and most common difficulties, video sessions have been found to work comparably well to being in the same room, and remotely delivered therapy has been a mainstream part of UK practice for years rather than a stopgap.
What changes is the texture more than the outcome. Less of the body is visible, silences feel longer, and the first ten minutes can feel more awkward before it settles.
It suits some people better than in-person work — people who are housebound, exhausted, caring for somebody, living rurally, or who simply speak more freely from their own kitchen table.
It is a poorer fit where the connection is unreliable, where there is nowhere private to sit, or where risk is high enough that being physically in the room matters. We will be straightforward with you about which of those applies.
What do I need for an online session?
A device with a camera and microphone, a reasonably stable internet connection, and somewhere you will not be interrupted for the length of the session.
Headphones make more difference than anything else. They improve what you hear and they stop your side of the conversation carrying into the next room.
Set up a few minutes early so the session does not begin with a technical scramble, and sit with the light in front of you rather than behind you.
A glass of water and a box of tissues within reach is a small thing that people are consistently glad of.
What if I do not have anywhere private at home?
This is one of the most common practical obstacles and it is worth solving properly rather than working around badly.
A parked car is a genuinely popular option and works better than most people expect. Others use headphones with a white-noise app playing outside the door, book a quiet room at a library or at work, or take the session at a time when the house is empty.
If none of that is possible, an in-person appointment is usually the better answer, and there is no awkwardness in asking to switch.
What we would not recommend is holding sessions somewhere you have to censor yourself. Half a session is not half as useful — it is a different thing entirely.
Can we mix online and in-person sessions?
Yes, and many people do. A standing in-person appointment with the occasional video session when you are travelling, unwell or short of time keeps the work continuous instead of losing a fortnight to a diary clash.
For couples it is usually better for both people to be in the same place — either both in the room or both in front of the same screen. Two separate screens tends to fragment the conversation and makes it harder to catch what happens between you.
One practical limit: sessions can only be provided while you are physically in the United Kingdom, because professional insurance and regulation are jurisdiction-specific.
Tell us in advance if you are going to be abroad and the schedule can be planned around it.
Still not answered?
Ask it before you commit to anything
Most people who get in touch have one specific worry rather than a general enquiry. Ask that one. You will get a straight answer, and there is no obligation to book afterwards.
Call and ask
If a session is in progress the phone will not be answered. Leave a name and a number and the call is returned within one working day.
07395 854051Write instead
Easier for some people than speaking. Keep it brief — email is not a secure channel, so please do not include clinical detail before we have agreed how to handle it.
info@familyrestore.co.ukUse the booking form
A short, accessible form for arranging a first appointment, including a box for the question you would rather ask before you arrive.
Go to the booking form
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