Hello and welcome

Experiencing distress is part of being human, but some struggles can feel too difficult to manage alone.

When challenges interfere with your ability to be yourself, function well or enjoy life, and turning to family or friends is not enough, professional support is recommended.

Professional counselling provides a confidential, respectful, and reflective environment to explore your difficulties and make sense of your experience. The insight and understanding gained through this process can help you:

  • Feel more motivated, confident, and at ease

  • Build and sustain healthier relationships

  • Think more clearly and make informed decisions

  • Release your potential

  • Strengthen emotional intelligence

  • Deepen empathy and self-reflection

Here’s a little about me and how I work.

I’m a practising relational psychodynamic therapist and counsellor based in St Albans, Hertfordshire, with a deep interest in psychoanalytic thinking.

Psychodynamic therapy is a collaborative and active form of therapy without being directive. Using a psychodynamic approach, we explore earlier experiences alongside the present, helping to uncover patterns and develop a deeper understanding of ourselves and how we relate to others. I’m particularly attentive to language, meaning, and each person’s unique perspective.

I’ve always been curious about the ways we relate to others and to ourselves. What shapes the choices we make, and the stories we tell about who we are? What unconscious or subconscious processes guide our thoughts, feelings, and behaviours, often without our awareness? Psychodynamic therapy can help illuminate these hidden parts of ourselves, bringing insight and understanding to what often lies outside of consciousness.

Before training as a therapist, I spent many years working in the creative arts. This continues to inform how I work, particularly around identity, performance pressure and anxiety, depression, and finding one’s place in competitive environments.

Alongside private practice, I work in a residential rehab setting, supporting people navigating anxiety, addictive processes, relationship difficulties, and questions of identity and belonging, including queer and cultural identities. I aim to understand each person within their own context and offer an open-minded, reflective space where insight and change can emerge.

I work with adults from a wide range of backgrounds, welcoming and affirming diversity in race, dis/ability, migration, neurodiversity, religion or spirituality, class, gender, and sexuality.

Everyone is welcome here.

Qualification & Experience

  • MA in Psychodynamic Counselling and Psychotherapy (Level 7) – Goldsmiths, University of London

    I trained in Psychodynamic Psychotherapy and Counselling at Goldsmiths College and regularly engage in continuing professional development (CPD) to stay up to date with issues relevant to my clients.

  • Tutor - Certificate in Psychodynamic Counselling

    I am a tutor for classes of up to 14 students. We explore the fundamentals of psychodynamic theory, skills, and process over a 10-week period.

  • I’m a registered member of the British Association for Counselling and Psychotherapy (BACP) and follow their Code of Ethics.

Gemma Rees - relational psychodynamic psychotherapist offering therapy in-person in St Albans and online across UK and overseas
Logo of BACB with text indicating accreditation and registered member number 406085 with the initials MBACP.

For more information about BACP’s Code of Ethics, please visit here.

INSURANCE I am fully insured by Markel International Insurance Company Limited

PERSONAL DATA PROTECTION All clients' personal information is handled in compliance with GDPR regulations. I will share my policy notice explaining how your data is used and protected when we finalise our contract for working together.