Lorraine McDonnell
Helping people move beyond worry and overthinking
About Lorraine
Lorraine McDonnell is a counsellor with four years of clinical experience and a BACP registration. She focuses on helping people feel less overwhelmed when worry, negative thoughts or life changes make daily life hard. Her manner is calm and straightforward, with an emphasis on listening and practical steps people can use between sessions.
She brings personal understanding of anxiety to her work and blends that with evidence-based techniques. Sessions aim to reduce unhelpful thinking patterns and build skills for managing strong emotions.
Background and approach
People come for help with stress, grief, low self-esteem, depression, addictions and sleep difficulties among other concerns. Her style is person-centred: the client’s experience guides the pace and focus of therapy. Cognitive behavioural ideas are used to identify and change thinking that keeps problems going.
The approach is flexible and responsive to what a person needs in the moment. Sessions also draw on psychodynamic ideas to look at repeated patterns from the past that affect current feelings and choices. Solution-focused techniques help set clear, achievable goals and track small changes.
Lorraine aims to make sessions a respectful space where people can be heard and practise new ways of coping. Therapy can include short-term problem solving or longer work on deeper issues. People who want clear steps, emotional understanding and a collaborative approach often find this mix helpful.
What Lorraine works with
How Lorraine works
Listed by Lorraine among the ways they work.
Listed by Lorraine among the ways they work.
Listed by Lorraine among the ways they work.
Listed by Lorraine among the ways they work.
Sessions & fees
How Lorraine’s approaches translate to online therapy
Client-Centred Therapy focuses on listening, acceptance and helping people make sense of their own experience. It is useful when someone needs a supportive space to talk through emotions and get clearer about what they want to change. Cognitive Behavioural Therapy, or CBT, looks at how thoughts, feelings and behaviours interact. It gives practical strategies for reducing anxiety, improving sleep and shifting unhelpful thinking patterns.Choosing the right approach is part of the work. Lorraine will talk with each person about their needs, goals and preferences and suggest which methods to try. That choice is made together and can change as progress is made or priorities shift.
Online sessions are offered by video call, phone, live chat or text-based messaging to provide flexibility. Video lets people use visual cues and more in-depth conversation. Phone sessions can be simpler and need less bandwidth. Live chat or messaging suits brief check-ins, ongoing coaching-style support or days when writing feels easier. These options help fit therapy into busy schedules and different lifestyles.
| Session length | Typically 50 minutes |
|---|---|
| Client ages | Adults, 18 and over |
| Fees | Subscription via BetterHelp, cancel anytime |
| Insurance | Not billed directly |
Questions people ask
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Areas of focus
What this therapist works with
Most often
Also listed
- Addictions
- ADHD
- Aging and geriatric issues
- Anger management
- Antisocial personality
- Body image
- Cancer
- Career difficulties
- Caregiver issues and stress
- Chronic pain, illness, and disability
- Coaching
- Commitment issues
- Communication problems
- Compassion fatigue
- Control issues
- Coping with life changes
- Depression
- Drug and alcohol addiction
- Emptiness
- Family conflicts
- Forgiveness
- Guilt and shame
- Hospice and end-of-life counselling
- Isolation / loneliness
- Jealousy
- LGBT
- Life purpose
- Midlife crisis
- Money and financial issues
- Mood disorders
- Obsessions, compulsions, and OCD
- Panic disorder and panic attacks
- Parenting issues
- Post-traumatic stress
- Relationship issues
- Self-love
- Sexuality
- Sleeping disorders
- Social anxiety and phobia
- Trauma and abuse
- Women's issues
- Workplace issues
Therapeutic approaches
- Experience
- 4 years
- Registered with
- BACP
- Languages
- English
