Counselling Service for You

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Counselling Service for You

Counselling and Psychotherapy - Face to Face [Gymea, NSW] or Online & Phone
Call 1300 373 150 NOW! Counselling is a confidential process.

Counselling Service for You is located in Gymea NSW, just 5 minute walk from the Gymea Station on the T4 Train Line. Gaye Cameron is a highly qualified, registered and experienced social worker and counsellor. Providing care and support for many people in Australia and Overseas, Gaye has been counselling for over 10 years and has over 33+ years other life experiences, providing person centred professional support for clients in Sutherland Shire and beyond.

Registered with:
NSW SIRA iCare Workers Compensation Provider - injured workers
NSW Victims Services - victims of crime

NDIS Support Provider - participants with Capacity Building' Packages for Counselling Support.

Accredited Social Worker and Registered Counsellor/Psychotherapist

Reach out NOW - Call or Text: 0457541348 or website - www.counsellingforyou.com.au

08/12/2025

The cost-of-living crisis is no longer just about dollars — it’s about mental health.

Across Australia, rising rents, mortgage stress, escalating grocery prices and utility bills are placing unprecedented pressure on individuals and families 💸🏠. What is increasingly visible in counselling rooms, workplaces and communities is the emotional toll this financial strain is taking — heightened anxiety, depression, relationship breakdown, substance use, and a deep sense of hopelessness.

Financial stress and mental health are inseparable. When people are worried about keeping a roof over their heads or feeding their families, psychological safety disappears. Chronic stress keeps nervous systems in survival mode, making it harder to sleep, think clearly, parent effectively or maintain employment. For many, this is no longer a short-term challenge — it’s becoming a sustained state of distress 🧠⚠️.

What is most concerning is that those under the greatest financial pressure are often the least able to access mental health support. Rising out-of-pocket costs mean counselling becomes a luxury rather than a lifeline. People delay care, withdraw, and deteriorate — not because they don’t want help, but because they simply cannot afford it.

So we must ask the uncomfortable question: where is the meaningful government response?
Where are the structural solutions that address housing insecurity, income stress, and access to affordable mental health care? Band-aid policies and short-term funding announcements are not enough. This is a systemic crisis requiring long-term, coordinated action.

Mental health does not exist in a vacuum. If we are serious about wellbeing, we must address the social and economic conditions driving distress — not just treat the symptoms.

💬 I invite conversation:
How are you seeing cost-of-living pressures affect mental health in your work, family, or community? What do you believe governments must do now?

SocialDeterminants HousingCrisis Wellbeing PolicyReform CommunityCare

08/12/2025

Keep the Doors Open. Keep Hope Alive.

As a Director of this Charity, Every day, Link Foundation AOD provides vital alcohol and other drug support to individuals and families who are doing it tough. Our service is often the difference between someone falling through the cracks or finding stability, dignity, and a path forward.

Right now, we need community support to keep our doors open and continue delivering free, accessible support to people in need. Your donation helps ensure ongoing counselling, outreach, and recovery-focused services for some of the most vulnerable members of our community.

✅ All donations over $2 are tax deductible
✅ Every contribution, large or small, makes a real and immediate impact

Please consider giving today and sharing this message with others who may be able to help.

👉 Donate here:
https://linkfoundationaod.org.au/donate/ -form

Together, we can ensure no one is turned away when they reach out for help 🤍

07/12/2025

Advocating with Clients: Mental Health as a Shared Journey

Mental health support is most powerful when it is grounded in partnership. Advocacy is not something we do to or for clients—it is something we do with them. At its core, mental health advocacy is about walking alongside people as they find their voice, reclaim agency, and navigate systems that are often complex, overwhelming, or unintentionally silencing.

When we advocate with clients, we honour their lived experience as expertise. We listen deeply, validate their story, and support their right to make informed choices about their own lives. This approach recognises that healing is not just individual—it is relational and systemic. True wellbeing emerges when people feel seen, heard, and respected within the spaces they occupy.

Advocacy may look like supporting someone to speak up in a medical appointment, helping them understand their rights, or standing beside them as they challenge unfair processes. Sometimes it is quiet and steady; other times it is courageous and bold. Always, it is human.

In a world where many struggle to be heard, advocating with clients restores dignity and hope. It reminds us that mental health care is not only about treatment, but about justice, empowerment, and connection.

💬 I’d love to hear your thoughts. What does advocating with clients mean to you? Where have you seen it make the greatest difference?

01/12/2025

❤️When Courage Finds Its Voice in the Therapy Room

Today I witnessed something profound.
A mature-aged woman sat across from me and, for the first time in her life, allowed herself to speak openly about the horrors she survived in childhood. Decades of silence, confusion, shame, and self-protection slowly gave way to tears, language, and truth.

It was not an “unloading.”
It was an act of bravery.
It was grief meeting compassion.
It was the beginning of healing.

As she named what had been unspeakable, I watched her posture shift — ever so slightly — from guarded and braced, to grounded and present. In that moment, the therapy space became more than a room. It became a safe container for emotional release, integration, and self-reclamation.

For anyone who has endured trauma in childhood, you will know how it echoes:
in trust, in relationships, in the body, in the nervous system, in self-worth. And yet, you might also know how hard it is to speak about it — especially when you’ve spent a lifetime minimising your pain or tending to others before yourself.

Therapy doesn’t erase the past.
It helps you feel what you were never allowed to feel.
It helps you understand what was never explained.
It helps you stop carrying what never belonged to you.

And most importantly — it shows you that you were never the shame, only the survivor.

If you’re holding memories that hurt to look at, if the child you once were still needs someone to hear her story, or if you simply feel “not okay” and you can’t name why… you’re welcome.

Pull up a chair.
Let’s talk through what you’ve carried alone for too long.
There is no age limit on healing, no expiry date on courage, and no story too heavy to be met with empathy.

If this resonates, and you’re ready to begin, I invite you to connect and make a time.
Your history matters.
Your voice matters.
And you deserve a space where both can be held gently.
Our Link - https://www.counsellingforyou.com.au

28/11/2025

Make some time to connect with nature this weekend……

28/11/2025

Sometimes what people living with trauma or domestic violence need most isn’t advice or another strategy — it’s someone who can hold space safely, listen without judgement, and gently help them reconnect with their sense of self.

In my counselling work, I walk alongside individuals who have carried the weight of fear, confusion, shame, and survival for far too long. Together, we explore the patterns, protective responses, emotions, and stories that trauma creates — not to re-live them, but to understand them in a way that restores clarity, safety, and personal power.

We don’t rush the process. We move at your pace.
The aim isn’t just coping — it’s helping you reclaim your voice, rebuild trust in your own instincts, and move towards a life that feels steadier, calmer, and more aligned with who you truly are.

If you’re navigating the impacts of trauma, leaving or recovering from an abusive relationship, or simply sensing that something isn’t right even if you can’t quite name it, you don’t have to carry it alone. Together, we can make sense of what feels overwhelming and support you in taking your next step with care and confidence.

🔍 Ready when you are. Visit the website in the Bio, learn more and reach out for support.

24/11/2025

🏆WINNER - NSW EDUCATION International Student of the Year 👏👏👏👏👏👏

23/11/2025

“There were bruises in my tears.”

A client said this to me recently — and it captures something so many survivors live with every day:
Pain that isn’t always visible.
Abuse that doesn’t always leave marks on skin.
Trauma carried quietly, in nervous systems and hearts.

Domestic abuse isn’t just physical.
It’s emotional erosion, psychological control, fear, isolation, manipulation, and the slow loss of self.

If any part of this resonates, please know this:

You don’t need proof to seek support.
You don’t need visible bruises.
You don’t need permission to ask for help.

Anyone — absolutely anyone — can reach out.

Your safety matters.
Your story matters.
Your tears are enough.

If you need support, you are not alone.
Help is available. ❤️‍🩹

16/11/2025

🧠🏮Knowledge is a lantern carried into a storm.

It doesn’t calm the winds or stop the rain, but it cuts through just enough darkness for the next step to appear. With every question we dare to ask, the flame grows brighter—revealing paths that once felt impossible, guiding us forward long before certainty arrives.

💡Now your thoughts - in practice how has knowledge lit your pathway! 👇

16/11/2025

Using ACT to Transform Anxiety: From Struggle to Strength 💡🧠

Anxiety is one of the most common presentations in counselling and mental health. Yet many clients still feel shame about “not coping,” believing their distress reflects weakness rather than a natural human response.

Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) offers a compassionate, practical framework that changes the narrative. Instead of trying to eliminate anxiety—a battle few win—ACT builds psychological flexibility, reconnects people with their values, and supports movement toward a meaningful life guided by choice, not fear.

1. Accepting, Not Resisting 🤝

In ACT, anxiety isn’t the enemy; the struggle against it heightens suffering. Acceptance helps clients recognise what they can control—and gently release what they can’t.

2. Cognitive Defusion 🪶

Anxious thoughts often sound like hard truths. Defusion techniques—labelling thoughts as “stories,” repeating them slowly, or visualising them on a screen—help clients unhook and reduce their power.

3. Mindfulness and the Present Moment 🌿

Grounding, sensory awareness, and breathwork interrupt spirals and bring clients back to the here-and-now, where clarity and agency can be found.

4. Values as the Compass 🎯

Identifying what truly matters—family, purpose, compassion—gives clients a stable direction. With values guiding the way, they can take steps forward even with anxiety by their side.

5. Committed Action 🚶‍♂️➡️

ACT reframes progress from “I’ll act when anxiety is gone” to “I’ll act because my life matters.” Small, meaningful actions rebuild momentum, confidence, and hope.

⸻

Why ACT Works 🌱

ACT normalises the human experience. It helps clients stop fighting themselves, builds emotional flexibility, and aligns seamlessly with trauma-aware, strengths-based practice.

[Disclaimer - I am not dismissing CBT]

Your Turn 💬

How have you seen ACT support people living with anxiety?
What strategies resonate most in your work—or in your own life?
Share your insights below. 👇

15/11/2025

🤔 When Will Government Admit That Our Mental Health “System” Is Actually a Crisis Factory?

As a Mental Health Social Worker, I have clients who have been in crisis, taken to their local hospital, merely to be told they would have to wait for a bed they are full. Just not good enough.

Every week, frontline workers watch people in acute distress turned away because there are no beds. No step-up services. No follow-up. No safety net. And we’re expected to call this “care.”

Let’s be honest: this isn’t a resource issue—it’s a priority issue.

Governments continue to fund inquiries, strategies, and glossy press releases while the very people those reports claim to protect are sleeping in cars, lining up at emergency departments, or relapsing because early intervention doesn’t actually exist outside of talking points.

We don’t need another taskforce.
We need capacity.
We need crisis beds.
We need human lives treated as more than budget line items.

Mental health workers, families, and consumers have been sounding the alarm for years. The silence from leadership is no longer ignorance—it’s negligence.

If a single child waited 48 hours for treatment after a physical injury, there would be national outrage. But if they’re suicidal? “Sorry, we’re full.”

How much longer are we willing to pretend this is acceptable? Your thoughts? Your experiences…..

11/11/2025

🌿 The Beating Heart of the Frontline 🌿

It’s not all about degrees.
It’s about heart, skill, and humanity. 💛

Across Australia, thousands of vocationally trained Counsellors, Mental Health Workers & Community Service professionals are the quiet heroes of our frontline — holding space, saving lives, and standing beside those in crisis.

They aren’t “less qualified.” They’re differently qualified.
They don’t just talk about trauma — they sit in it.
They don’t just follow policy — they live compassion.

From shelters to hospitals, homes to streets — they’re the ones who show up when it matters most. 🕊️

It’s time we recognise and respect the people who keep Australia’s wellbeing system alive.

✨ Let’s start valuing what truly heals: connection, competence, and courage.

💭 Tag a frontline worker who inspires you!

⸻

Address

334 President Avenue
Sydney, NSW
2227

Opening Hours

8am - 5pm

Telephone

+61457541348

Website

http://counsellingforyou.com.au/

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