with Luke Hicken MSc MBACP (Accred)
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Welcome to my private practice. I'm an Integrative Psychotherapist, Supervisor and Educator.
For better or worse, relationships shape, and can transform, our sense of self and feelings of (in)security in the world.
I offer psychotherapy to adults, clinical supervision to fellow therapists, and training workshops to organisations.
Email me to book a free 30-minute Zoom chat.
Main Qualifications:
Other Relevant Qualifications
Continuing Professional Development (CPD)
My philosophy of psychotherapy is is relational and integrative.
My approach is also bespoke, collaborative, and trauma-informed:
Relational
I believe that our relationship, between you and me, is the most important factor in you getting what you want from therapy.
From birth, and throughout life, we form beliefs and expectations from our experiences of being in relationship with others.
In the same way that we build an internal ‘model’ of the house we grew up in (such that you could close your eyes and walk around that house in your imagination), we also build internal models of our relationships (which become the starting blueprint for future relationships) and ourselves (because we learn who we are through the mirror of others).
Our models contain beliefs and rules about how the world, and the people in it, work, and include beliefs about ourselves: our competence, our social ‘rank’ and our sense of worth.
Therefore, they impact all our interactions, interpretations, expectations, wants, feelings, thoughts and reactions, and even the thoughts and feelings we have with ourselves, when alone.
These models become the ‘truth’ through which we filter reality. And yet we are so immersed in them that we may be completely unaware of them — like the proverbial fish, who, so immersed by water, couldn’t comprehend what water was.
Our relational models contain strategies for protecting ourselves from relational pain (say, from being judged, misunderstood, neglected, bullied, dominated, belittled, rejected, abandoned, and being in and around arguments and conflict).
And the ongoing use and consequences of these defences usually become the reasons that we come to therapy. They include:
Our tasks in therapy, then, are to make sense of your suffering and self-protective strategies, process the pain from which they attempt to protect you, and to create new experiences of being in relationship — with others in your life, in our relationship, and in relationship with yourself — in order to transform outdated internal models.
Integrative
I have gained value personally and professionally from all the major approaches to psychotherapy — psychodynamic, humanistic and cognitive-behavioural — and integrate aspects of each into my relational approach.
This integrative approach looks to bring the different therapies together: to acknowledge similarities, and be curious about and differences, in order to move towards a more unified field.
This is a movement away from the more tribal ‘Us vs. Them’ mentality that can be found at the extremes of different psychotherapy schools.
I also resonate with the second meaning of ‘integrative’ put forward by Erskine & Moursund (1988), who propose that an aim of therapy is to help clients integrate their conflicted or fragmented aspects of self, to form a more congruent, harmonious whole.
References
Erskine, R. G., & Moursund, J. P. (1988). Integrative psychotherapy in action. Sage.
Bespoke
As opposed to offering you a ‘one size fits all’ system, I aim to tailor my approach to best fit you and your issues, desires, needs and goals.
In this vein, I aim to facilitate your exploration of your own mind and personal experiences, and perhaps offer a sprinkle of my professional knowledge, in order to help you build an understanding of the ways in which you suffer, the meaning of this suffering, the ways in which you would like things to be different and a road-map for how to move from one to the other.
Building this formulation and treatment plan is an ongoing part of our work together, and naturally evolves over time as you gain more insight.
Collaborative
I aim for us to build a collaborative relationship. This means I don’t aim to diagnose and then ‘treat’ you from a position of authority, like a medical doctor, but neither do I aim to sit back and let you do all the work.
Consider the two most common complaints I’ve heard about people’s experience of therapy:
These are perhaps caricatures of what are termed ‘non-directive’ and ‘directive’ therapy, respectively.
In contrast, I offer a collaboration. I view us as equal partners in a shared project. I aim both to understand and empathise with you, and also to be an active partner, offering you guidance, skills and tools, where appropriate.
Trauma Informed
A trauma is an experience so extreme that it overwhelms the defences of the nervous system, and immediately after which there is inadequate social support, such that the experience cannot be processed.
The experience remains locked-off and isolated in the mind and body, until various triggers cause it to leak out, resulting in post-traumatic stress responses, such as flashbacks, panic, rage, dissociation and night terrors.
Traumas might be most commonly thought about as single events like a war or car crash. But somewhat more insidious and complex trauma can occur through repeated relational experiences in childhood, where one’s needs went unmet through (often subtle but chronic) neglect or abuse throughout these dependent and formative years.
You don’t necessarily know if you have unprocessed trauma. Being trauma-informed means I’m aware of the warning signs and risks surrounding trauma, and bare this in mind when creating a safe supportive environment, ensuring you have grounding tools, so we can work to stay in your ‘window of tolerance’ (Siegel, 1999) when challenging defences and processing old wounds.
Reference
Siegel, D. J. (1999). The developing mind: Toward a neurobiology of interpersonal experience. Guilford Press.
I offer relational psychotherapy to adults, clinical supervision to fellow therapists, and training workshops to organisations.
Psychotherapy helps with psychological and/or relational issues. These concerns usually revolve around:
In general, these issues and suffering are centred around self-preservation strategies such as:
You may also just have the sense that something’s ‘not right’, but otherwise can’t put your finger on what. This is a completely normal starting point for therapy.
It’s also common to start therapy off the back of a difficult life event, such as a loss, break-up, career or education change. These tend to be overwhelming if they expose other long-standing chronic stressors.
If you’re unsure whether your concerns are appropriate for psychotherapy, feel free to get in touch. We can book a free chat to discuss this.
Sessions are 50-minutes long, weekly or fortnightly.
Number of sessions are not limited.
Appointments between 8.45am and 2pm Monday-Friday.
£50 per 50-minute session
(The full session fee is payable if a session is cancelled with less than 24-hours’ notice.)
I’m currently working exclusively via online-video (Zoom).
It can be hard to find the right therapist for you.
Email me asking to book a free 30-minute Zoom call. There, you can let me know a bit about your situation, ask me any questions, and see if we’re the right match.
Or, if you’d like to explain things in writing first, fill out this referral form.
Either way, I’ll get back in touch with you to book in a free chat.
I believe that supervision shouldn’t be a passive chat, nor a shame-inducing threat, but a safe and enjoyable challenge.
I offer you a space to ‘feel felt’ (Siegel, 1999), and to process your client work. I will encourage your critical thinking. And I will hold in mind your career path as a whole, by encouraging us to get to know your strengths and weaknesses, and pitching-up in your ‘zone of proximal development’ (Vygotsky, 1967).
I see that the purposes of supervision are:
The supervision I offer is based on the Integrative Developmental Model (IDM; Stoltenberg and McNeill, 2010), and utilises the Seven-Eyed Model (Hawkins and Shohet, 2012).
References
Session length and frequency can be tailored to your needs.
But it’s common to have a monthly 1.5 hour session, as this meets the BACP supervision requirements.
Supervision appointments between 8.30am and 2pm Monday to Friday.
£56 per hour (i.e. £84 per 1.5 hour session)
I’m currently working exclusively via online-video (Zoom).
It’s difficult to find a supervisor you click with.
Email me asking to book a free 30-minute Zoom call. There, we can ask each other questions and see if we’re a good match.
Or fill out this referral form.
Either way, I’ll get back to you to book in a free chat.
I aim to respond to any contact within two working days.My office hours are 9am-4pm (UK) Mon-Fri
An essential aspect of therapy is knowing that what you speak about won’t be discussed with anybody else. Thus, confidentiality is integral to the therapy relationship, and I will maintain it within the BACP Ethical Framework and legal requirements.
The only exceptions to total confidentiality are:
Wherever legally and ethically possible I will attempt to discuss with you any considerations I have about breaching your confidentiality.
No. I do not ask you to sign up to any number of sessions.
If your circumstances change such that you no longer want, need or are able to continue psychotherapy, then, of course, you may discontinue sessions whenever you like.
The only commitment I ask you to contract for is that if you cancel a booked session with less than 24-hours notice, then you agree to still pay the full session fee.
No. I offer a bespoke service; how long it takes to process your experiences, gain clarity and reach your goals will differ hugely from person to person, circumstance to circumstance.
Having said that, successful therapy does, of course, end. So when, how and why we end your therapy will be an ongoing, collaborative discussion-point in our relationship.
We all have history of ending relationships in one way or another, oftentimes without closure and with things left unsaid. So it important to me that we end our relationship openly and clearly, so that you experience a healthy relationship ending in a positive way, with closure and transparency, left on good terms.
It’s important to me that the conditions are right so that you feel safe to explore your thoughts and feelings — it can be very uncomfortable and frustrating to share something difficult, only to find the connection had dropped and you’d not been heard.
I will do my due diligence to ensure adequate technological conditions, such as reliable, up-to-date hardware and software; technical knowledge of my equipment; sufficient internet and phone signal; and sufficient battery charge. I recommend you attempt to provide such conditions on your end, too.
If, despite our efforts, our internet signal cannot sustain the session, I will call you and the duration of the session can be continued via phone.
In the unlikely event that a session cannot continue neither via Zoom nor phone due to my technical faults, then I will not charge you for the session and will make every attempt to solve the issue and offer you an alternative appointment.
If a session cannot continue via Zoom nor phone due to your technical faults, I still charge for the session.
No. I offer sessions remotely, either via online-video (Zoom) or telephone.
No. I take data protection seriously. As such, I choose third parties carefully and keep them to a minimum.
For this reason, I use only one online-video platform, Zoom.
No. I offer sessions 9am-4pm Monday-Friday.
I have found these hours best fit my energy levels and body clock. If you require therapy outside of these hours, you may find an alternative therapist on the BACP register.
No. I do not have the specialised training I believe is required to work with couples.
If you require couple’s or relationship therapy, you may find an alternative therapist on the BACP register.
No, I do not have the specialised training I believe is required to work with children and young people (under 18 years old).
If you are, or are looking on behalf of, a child or young person, I recommend seeking a therapist with appropriate training on the BACP register.
