Depression Therapy
Depression Therapy in Croydon
For when everything feels like effort
You're not sad, exactly. It's more like the volume's been turned down on everything. Food doesn't taste like much. Things you used to enjoy feel like obligations. Getting through the day takes everything you've got, and nobody sees how hard you're working just to function.
People tell you to exercise, get outside, think positive. As if you hadn't thought of that. As if wanting to feel better was the problem.
Depression isn't laziness
Most approaches to depression focus on activation. Do more things. Challenge negative thoughts. Build routines.
But depression often isn't about doing too little. It's about feeling too much, for too long, with nowhere for it to go. The shutdown isn't weakness. It's what happens when the system gets overwhelmed.
Psychodynamic therapy is interested in what got switched off and why. Often there's grief underneath: for losses you weren't allowed to mourn, for versions of yourself that never got to exist, for needs that were never met. The depression might be a kind of frozen mourning.
What we'll do
We meet weekly or twice-weekly and sit with what's actually there, even when what's there feels like nothing.
Sometimes we'll talk about your history. Not because the past is more important than the present, but because your early experiences shaped what you learned to do with difficult feelings. If sadness wasn't allowed, if need was met with rejection, if anger meant abandonment, your system learned to shut down instead of feel.
The work is slow. It has to be. You can't force thawing.
The practical bits
- Cost: £70 per 50-minute session
- Location: In person in Croydon (5 mins from East Croydon station) or online
- Frequency: Weekly or twice-weekly, same time each week
- Duration: Open-ended. We work until the work is done.