About Jelena Watkins - MA, UKCP registered

I am a UKCP registered psychotherapist and counsellor with 15 years of experience. I offer a compassionate space to adult individuals, couples and groups, seeing people both face-to-face, in consulting rooms in Ealing, West London and also via Zoom. I am committed to helping individuals find renewal and experience a meaningful, authentic and worthwhile life.  

I am interested in how psychotherapy and counselling can alleviate suffering and help provide a space for listening to creative impulses towards a more authentic expression in life. I believe that even extreme pain, whether individual or collective, can lead towards growth when attended to with deep attention, an open mind and wholehearted respect.

In addition to my private therapy practice, I have worked for the National Health Service (NHS) in a number of therapeutic roles, most recently in a hospital-based trauma service delivering specialist counselling to ICU staff, patients and their relatives. It has been a profound privilege to be a witness and guide to people, often at a most critical and challenging time in their own and their families’ lives.  I have found that in those darkest and frightening moments, when life of a loved one can be extinguished at any moment, there is to be found a deep well of love, wisdom and beauty of the human spirit.

I also have extensive experience in helping individuals and groups in the aftermath of disasters, having been directly affected by disaster first-hand. For many years I have also been training professionals in the field of collective trauma and am a co-founder of Centre for Collective Trauma, a collaborative network of professionals specialising in psychosocial aspects of collective grief, loss, trauma, and disasters. 

My work in the field of disaster is informed by my involvement with Disaster Action, a charity founded in 1991 by people with direct, collective experience of over 30 disasters as bereaved people and survivors. I am also the founding member and trustee of September 11 UK Families Support Group, an association formed by and for UK based bereaved relatives of 9/11 victims.

I share my ideas and experiences at international and national professional conferences and have published a number of articles in therapy journals.

 My training, qualifications and experience:

I originally trained at the Institute of Psychosynthesis, London and qualified in:

• Master’s degree in Psychosynthesis Psychotherapy awarded by Middlesex University
•  Diploma in Psychosynthesis Psychotherapy
• Diploma in Psychosynthesis Psychotherapeutic Counselling
•  UKCP Accreditation

In addition, my further training and experience includes:

• EMDR accreditation with EMDR Association UK. EMDR is a powerful form of therapy (NICE approved) that can help recovery from traumatic events.

• Trauma focused CBT - this is another NICE recommended method for processing trauma.

I am affiliated with the American Group Psychotherapy Association.

Enquiries:

My practice is located in Ealing, West London. I also work online via Zoom.

As a UKCP registrant, I abide by UKCP Code of Ethics.

I work in English and Serbian/Croatian.

For my counselling services please contact me here.

For any other enquiries please contact me here.