I Need Counselling; Should I Go Private?

You're asking the wrong question. The question isn't whether you should go private. The question is whether you can afford to keep waiting for a system that treats your mental health like an admin problem.

Let's be clear about what's happening. You're struggling, properly struggling, and you're trying to decide between paying for help now or joining a queue for help that might not even be helpful when it finally arrives.

What the NHS actually offers

Six to eight sessions of CBT. Sometimes less. Delivered by someone following a manual, focusing on symptom management rather than understanding why you have symptoms in the first place.

Group therapy where your individual patterns get addressed alongside seven strangers with completely different histories. Or worksheets about challenging negative thoughts, as if you haven't already tried thinking your way out of this.

If you dare suggest eight sessions might not be enough for a lifetime of patterns, you're "treatment-resistant." The problem, apparently, is your lack of engagement, not the impossibility of the task.

I'm not saying NHS mental health workers aren't trying. They're doing their best in an impossible system. But that doesn't change what you actually get.

The impossible position

The system puts you in a perfect bind: Pay for therapy and feel guilty about spending money on something that should be free. Or wait months while things get worse.

Then, when six sessions of CBT don't fix you, the system suggests you need to "engage better with the process." As if complex human psychology can be resolved through standardised protocols delivered at speed.

What you're actually paying for

When you go private, you're buying time. Actual time. Time to develop trust. Time to understand patterns that took decades to form. Time to work out why you are the way you are, not just manage it better.

You're paying for someone who can hold complexity. Who understands that healing happens through relationship and insight, not homework sheets. Someone who's done their own work, not just learned to deliver a protocol.

You're paying for consistency. The same person, every week, who remembers what you talked about. Who doesn't cancel because of staff shortages. Who has space for you to be contradictory or resistant without labelling you non-compliant.

About that guilt

You've absorbed the idea that paying for mental health care is somehow selfish. That "real" people use NHS services and only the entitled go private.

But you wouldn't feel guilty about paying for dental care when NHS dentists aren't available. You wouldn't apologise for buying glasses if there was a six-month wait at Specsavers. Your mental health isn't less important than your teeth.

The system's failure to provide adequate mental health care doesn't make it your moral duty to accept inadequate care.

The real cost of "free"

NHS therapy isn't free - you pay differently. You pay with months of deterioration while waiting. You pay with the cost of staying stuck in patterns that wreck your relationships, your work, your sense of self.

You pay with what doesn't get addressed. The root causes that surface-level interventions miss. The additional therapy you'll need later because the quick fix didn't actually fix anything.

Free therapy that doesn't work is expensive in ways that don't show up on bank statements.

What private therapy actually looks like

It's not luxury - it's sufficiency. Sufficient time to understand your patterns. Sufficient expertise to handle complexity. Sufficient consistency to build trust.

It's therapy that adapts to you rather than expecting you to adapt to it. It's being seen as an individual whose struggles make sense given their history, not a problem to be processed.

It's having choice. Interviewing therapists. Finding someone whose approach and experience fit your specific situation. Not just accepting whoever's available at the local IAPT service.

The investment argument

Good therapy changes how you navigate everything. Relationships improve. Work becomes more bearable. Your capacity to handle difficulty expands.

You stop repeating the same mistakes. You stop sabotaging opportunities. You stop exhausting yourself with patterns that don't serve you.

The money often comes back through better decisions, improved relationships, reduced medical needs. It's an investment in every part of your life.

The actual question

Instead of "Should I go private?" ask: "How much longer can I afford to stay stuck?"

What's it costing you to keep repeating the same patterns? To stay in relationships that don't work? To feel anxious or depressed without understanding why?

What would be possible if you had real support instead of crisis management?

If you can afford it

If you can afford private therapy - properly afford it, without putting yourself in financial distress - then the question changes. It's not whether you should. It's whether you can live with not doing it.

The guilt about spending money on therapy is real. But it's also a symptom of exactly what needs addressing: the belief that your wellbeing matters less than keeping money for "real" necessities.

Your mental health is a real necessity. Understanding yourself is a real need. Being genuinely okay - not just functional, but okay - that's not a luxury.

The system that can't provide adequate mental health care is the same system that taught you to feel guilty for seeking it elsewhere.

You're allowed to get help. Even if you have to pay for it. Even if others can't. Even if it feels wrong.

Actually, especially if it feels wrong. That feeling might be the first thing worth bringing to therapy.