These are the clinical methods Karen lists. The descriptions are Maker Therapy's, not
Karen's - a general explanation of what each method is, so the list means something before
you have spoken to anybody. They are not a claim about how Karen runs a session.
- Acceptance and Commitment TherapyACT
- Rather than trying to argue a painful thought away, ACT works on loosening its grip and getting on with what matters to you anyway. Sessions spend real time naming your values, then building action around them while difficult feelings are still present.
- Attachment-Based Therapy
- Reads present-day relationship difficulty through the lens of how safety and closeness were learned early on. The therapeutic relationship itself is treated as part of the work, because it is where the pattern tends to show up first.
- Client-Centred TherapyPerson-centred · Rogerian
- The therapist does not steer toward a technique or a diagnosis. They offer sustained, non-judgemental attention and reflect back what they hear, on the premise that people find their own direction when they are genuinely listened to. Often what people mean by “someone who just gets it”.
- Cognitive Behavioural TherapyCBT
- Structured, present-focused work on the loop between what you think, how you feel and what you then do. Usually means noticing a thought pattern in the room, testing it against evidence, and practising something different between sessions. Among the most heavily researched talking therapies for depression and anxiety.
- Dialectical Behaviour TherapyDBT
- A structured skills-led adaptation of CBT built around holding two things at once: accepting yourself as you are and working to change. Teaches concrete skills for distress tolerance, emotion regulation and relationships. Developed for people whose feelings arrive at overwhelming intensity, and strongest-evidenced there.
- Emotionally Focused TherapyEFT
- Built for couples and rooted in attachment: the recurring argument is treated as a cycle two people are stuck in rather than as one person's fault. Sessions work to interrupt the cycle and get to what each person is actually asking for underneath it.
- Mindfulness-Based TherapyMBCT
- Trains attention on what is happening right now - body, breath, the thought as it arrives - so distress can be observed rather than automatically acted on. Strongest evidence is in preventing depression from recurring, and it is usually taught as a practice you keep doing outside the session.
- Narrative Therapy
- Treats the story you tell about your life as something that can be examined and retold rather than as the plain facts. Separates the person from the problem - “the anxiety” rather than “your anxiety” - to make room for the parts the current story leaves out.
- Psychodynamic Therapy
- Works on the assumption that current patterns - in relationships, at work, in how you treat yourself - have a history, and that seeing the history loosens the pattern. Less structured than CBT, usually longer, and more interested in what comes up unbidden than in a weekly agenda.
- Solution-Focused Brief TherapySFBT
- Starts from where you want to end up rather than from how you got here. Sessions look for the times the problem is already smaller and work out what is different about those, so the number of sessions tends to be short and the work concrete.
- Trauma-Focused TherapyTF-CBT · trauma-informed
- CBT adapted for people whose difficulty is rooted in a frightening or overwhelming event. Pacing is the point: safety and stabilisation come first, the memory itself is approached gradually and only when you are ready, and the aim is that recalling it stops hijacking the present.
- Internal Family SystemsIFS
- Treats the mind as made up of parts - the critic, the one who withdraws, the one that keeps everything running - each of which is trying to protect you. The work is getting to know them rather than overruling them.