About Paula
Paula Otley welcomes people feeling overwhelmed by stress, anxiety, grief or life changes. She offers calm, straightforward support and aims to make sessions feel manageable. Paula meets each person where they are and works with them at a pace that suits their needs.
Paula has 16 years of experience, including longstanding work as a bereavement support volunteer. That experience shaped her decision to train as an integrative counsellor, drawing on person-centred and psychodynamic ideas.
How Paula works
She later added cognitive behavioural therapy to her practice in 2020 to broaden the range of techniques she can offer. Sessions focus on practical conversations about what is happening now and how past experiences influence current feelings. Paula values a warm therapeutic relationship and uses it to help people notice patterns, try small changes and build new ways of coping.
She works with issues such as relationships, self‑esteem, addiction, trauma, parenting stresses, sleep and eating concerns, and compassion fatigue. Her background includes work in GP practices, the NHS, charities, community counselling services, independent practice and employee assistance programmes. Those different settings have given her experience with a wide range of life situations and pressures.
Paula offers sessions in English and accepts international clients. She uses a subscription model for sessions which can be cancelled at any time. To begin, people select the Start Therapy button, complete a short matching questionnaire and schedule according to availability.
Paula lists 6 ways of working on the entry:
What Paula works with
The areas below are the ones Paula selected when setting up a profile. The first few are listed as the main focus; the rest are also named.
- Stress, Anxiety
- Relationship issues
- Grief
Also listed
- Abandonment
- Addictions
- ADHD
- Adoption and foster care
- Aging and geriatric issues
- Anger management
- Attachment issues
- Autism and Asperger Syndrome
- Bipolar disorder
- Blended family issues
- Body image
- Cancer
- Career difficulties
- Caregiver issues and stress
- Chronic pain, illness, and disability
- Codependency
- Commitment issues
- Communication problems
- Compassion fatigue
- Control issues
- Coping with life changes
- Dependent personality
- Depression
- Dissociation
- Divorce and separation
- Domestic violence
- Drug and alcohol addiction
- Eating and food-related issues
- Eating disorders
- Emptiness
- Family conflicts
- Family of origin issues
- Family problems
- Fatherhood issues
- Fertility issues
- Forgiveness
- Guilt and shame
- Hospice and end-of-life counseling
- Impulsivity
- Infidelity
- Intellectual disability
- Intimacy-related issues
- Isolation / loneliness
- Jealousy
- LGBT
- Life purpose
- Men's issues
- Midlife crisis
- Money and financial issues
- Mood disorders
- Obsessions, compulsions, and OCD
- Panic disorder and panic attacks
- Parenting issues
- Phobias
- Post-traumatic stress
- Prejudice and discrimination
- Process addiction (porn, exercise, gambling)
- Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD)
- Self esteem
- Self-harm
- Self-love
- Sexual assault and abuse
- Sexual dysfunction
- Sexuality
- Sleeping disorders
- Social anxiety and phobia
- Trauma and abuse
- Trichotillomania
- Women's issues
- Workplace issues
Training and background
| Registers | BACP, NCPS |
|---|---|
| Years in practice | 16 |
| Languages | English |
| Session format | Online: video, phone, live chat or messaging |
| Country | United Kingdom |
Memberships and registers are shown as supplied; they are not licences, and this directory does not verify them.
Online support options
How Paula’s approaches translate to online therapy
Attachment‑based work focuses on how past relationships shape current trust and closeness. Online sessions can help people notice patterns in how they relate to others and practise different ways of connecting. Client‑centred counselling puts the person’s experience at the heart of the work, offering acceptance and active listening so people can find their own answers and feel heard. Cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT) looks at thoughts and behaviours that keep problems going and uses practical exercises to change those patterns. It can be useful for anxiety, low mood and sleep or eating difficulties.Choosing the right approach is part of the process. Paula will discuss options and will work collaboratively to shape a plan that fits the person's goals and preferences. That might mean starting with person‑centred listening, adding CBT tools, or exploring relational patterns over time.
Online formats offer practical benefits. Video calls allow face‑to‑face conversation across distance. Phone sessions suit shorter check‑ins or times when a video call is not possible. Live chat and text messaging let people share thoughts between appointments or use therapy without being on camera. These options provide flexibility for different schedules, quieter surroundings or varying bandwidth so therapy can fit into everyday life.
Start online instead of waiting
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Common questions
What concerns does Paula help with?
What is her therapeutic style like?
How many years has she been working in this field?
What credentials and region are relevant?
Are sessions available in other languages or internationally?
How can I communicate with her online?
How does payment and cost work?
What are the first steps to begin therapy?
A practical next step
Write down two things you would want to be different in six months. That is the most useful thing to bring to a first session, whoever it is with. If you would rather start now than keep reading, online sessions are the quickest route.
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