Kasia Wawrzyniak

Kasia Wawrzyniak is the lead psychotherapist at Psychology 4U

I am a fully accredited Cognitive Behavioural Therapist registered with BABCP (British Association for Behavioural and Cognitive Psychotherapies).

Check my accreditation status on the BABCP website.

I work with adults (18+) with various difficulties including worry, rumination, depression, anxiety disorders, low self-esteem, PTSD, and phobias.

I am a compassionate, kind and enthusiastic CBT Psychotherapist with a completed BSc degree in Psychology and I always collaboratively work with clients helping them to become their own therapists.

I am highly committed to the development and practice of CBT by ensuring I stay abreast of the latest developments.

Experienced Therapist

My journey and passion for working with mental health difficulties began in 2006 in a residential care home as a project worker and then as a mental health social worker.

These experiences enabled me to explore and gain knowledge about complex psychological problems from the client’s perspective and helped me to consider clinical problems in their wider social, and cultural contexts.

I become interested in Cognitive Behavioural Therapy whilst studying psychology at Middlesex University and I decided that I would like to undergo formal training to gain more understanding of the foundation of CBT principles and practice in order to be able to deliver psychological interventions in the Community Mental Health Team I was working at the time.

I started my first formal CBT therapist job in IAPT Primary Care Psychological Therapies Service in December 2014, where I provided CBT to individuals presenting with common mental health problems at varying levels of severity.

I have always wanted to help clients with more complex needs, and since January 2018 I have been working in secondary care psychology service providing CBT and third-wave interventions (e.g. ACT, mindfulness).

About the therapy we offer

(Please note that we currently only provide remote therapy)

We mainly offer CBT therapy, however, we will discuss with you at the assessment which type of psychological approach will be the best match for you and your difficulties. It may be that we may start with CBT and then add mindfulness or ACT techniques later on in the treatment.

Cognitive Behavioural Therapy

Cognitive Behavioural Therapy is the most researched and wildly used therapy these days.

It is recommended by the National Institute for Clinical Excellence (NICE) in their developed guidelines for the treatment of the majority of mental health difficulties.

It is a type of talking therapy that research has identified as successful in helping people manage anxiety problems, depression, and phobias and it is based on the idea that what we think and do affects the way we feel physically and emotionally.

In CBT you will work together with your therapist to identify the links and patterns between your thinking, how you feel, your behaviour and the effects on your life.

Together, you will develop a shared understanding of how your difficulties came about and what keeps them going.

You will then be able to identify your therapy goals, action plans and strategies to focus over the course of treatment.

Acceptance and Commitment Therapy

(ACT, typically pronounced as the word “act”) is a type of psychotherapy that helps you become aware and adjust to your thoughts, feelings the difficulties rather than engage in constant struggle with them.

It is about getting out of your mind into your life as ACT is a behavioural therapy and it’s about taking action – not just any action but values-guided action.

What do you find meaningful in life?

What do you want to stand for in life?

ACT gets you to think about these things and gets you in touch with what really matters to you. It is about taking action whilst being present, mindful so you get to learn some mindfulness skills in order to be able to do that.

So in summary ACT can help you create a rich, meaningful life whilst accepting the emotional pain that life brings.

The aim is to learn more helpful ways of coping with your current and future problems and eventually become your own therapist.

The sessions last 50 minutes long and can be provided weekly or fortnightly.

It is a time-limited therapy ranging from 6 to 20 sessions depending on your needs.

Mindfulness Based Cognitive Therapy (MBCT)

Mindfulness Based Cognitive Therapy (MBCT) is recommended by the National Institute for Clinical Excellence (NICE) in their guidelines for people who experienced two or more episodes of depression.

MBCT has been designed specifically to help people who struggle with reoccurring spells of depression to help prevent the depression from coming back, MBCT was developed by Zindel Segal, Mark Williams and John Teasdale and based on Jon Kabat-Zinn’s Mindfulness-based Stress Reduction (MBSR) programme.

MBCT can help you become more aware of your thought patterns, emotions, and physical sensations and will teach you how to approach them nonjudgmentally, but also learn to shift into the present moment.

The research conducted by Jon Kabat-Zinn and his colleagues had shown that mindfulness could be highly effective for people who suffered long-term physical health conditions that had been having a big impact on the quality of their lives.