About Shelley
Shelley Hughes is a counsellor based in the United Kingdom who helps people manage stress, anxiety and relationship concerns. She works with those facing trauma, grief, low self-esteem and addiction. Shelley also supports people dealing with issues such as ADHD, bipolar and changes at work or home.
She uses a straightforward, supportive style so conversations feel clear and usable. Shelley draws on somatic approaches alongside evidence-based therapies to help clients connect mind and body.
Background and approach
She also uses Acceptance and Commitment Therapy, attachment-based ideas, client-centred listening and cognitive behavioural tools. In sessions she helps people notice what is happening in their body, name thoughts, and try small, practical steps between meetings. Her background includes five years of professional practice and registration as NCPS.
That experience informs a practical way of working that focuses on manageable change rather than heavy theory. Sessions are set up to be collaborative and paced around individual needs. People find the approach useful when coping with loss, trauma, relationship strain, or ongoing anxiety and mood issues.
Shelley often helps clients tackle day-to-day problems like sleep, eating, work stress and parenting challenges in plain language. She aims for steady progress through short, clear goals. To begin, clients complete a short matching questionnaire and choose a format.
Shelley offers video calls, phone sessions, live chat and text-based messaging so people can fit therapy into busy lives.
How Shelley blends approaches online
Somatic work helps people notice bodily signals that relate to stress and emotion. It involves simple body-based awareness and gentle movement to reduce tension and to bring attention into the present. This can be helpful for trauma, anxiety and chronic stress.Acceptance and Commitment Therapy, or ACT, focuses on identifying values and taking small actions that matter. It helps with anxiety, depression and life transitions by shifting attention from fighting difficult thoughts to building a meaningful life. Attachment-based ideas look at how early relationships shape current patterns and help people change unhelpful ways of relating to others.
Finding the right mix of methods is part of the work. Shelley will work together with each person to choose approaches that suit their needs, goals and comfort. That collaborative process shapes what happens in sessions and what is practised between meetings.
Online formats offer practical flexibility. Video calls let the therapist and client work face to face; phone sessions suit people who prefer not to be on camera. Live chat and text-based messaging allow short check-ins and ongoing contact between longer sessions. These options make it easier to fit therapy around family, work and other commitments, while keeping the focus on steady, usable progress.
Frequently asked questions
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Specialties and expertise
Top specialties
- Stress, Anxiety
- Relationship issues
- Trauma and abuse
Also works with
- Abandonment
- Addictions
- ADHD
- Anger management
- Antisocial personality
- Attachment issues
- Autism and Asperger Syndrome
- Avoidant personality
- Bipolar disorder
- Blended family issues
- Body image
- Cancer
- Career difficulties
- Caregiver issues and stress
- Chronic pain, illness, and disability
- Coaching
- Codependency
- Commitment issues
- Communication problems
- Compassion fatigue
- Control issues
- Coping with life changes
- Coping with natural or human-caused disaster
- 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
- Fertility issues
- First responder issues
- Forgiveness
- Grief
- Guilt and shame
- Hoarding
- Hospice and end-of-life counseling
- Impulsivity
- Infidelity
- Intellectual disability
- Intimacy-related issues
- Isolation / loneliness
- Jealousy
- LGBT
- Life purpose
- Money and financial issues
- Mood disorders
- Multicultural concerns
- Narcissism
- Obsessions, compulsions, and OCD
- Panic disorder and panic attacks
- Paranoia
- Parenting issues
- Personality disorders
- Phobias
- Polyamory / non-monogamous relationships
- Post-traumatic stress
- Postpartum depression
- Pregnancy and childbirth
- Prejudice and discrimination
- Process addiction (porn, exercise, gambling)
- Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD)
- Self esteem
- Self-harm
- Self-love
- Sex addiction
- Sexual assault and abuse
- Sexual dysfunction
- Sexuality
- Sleeping disorders
- Smoking / vaping cessation
- Social anxiety and phobia
- Veteran and Armed Forces Issues
- Women's issues
- Workplace issues
- Young adult issues
Therapeutic approaches
- Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT)
- Attachment-Based Therapy
- Client-Centered Therapy
- Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT)
- Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT)
- Emotionally-Focused Therapy (EFT)
- Existential Therapy
- Jungian Therapy
- Mindfulness Therapy
- Narrative Therapy
- Psychodynamic Therapy
- Solution-Focused Therapy
- Somatic Therapy
- Trauma-Focused Therapy
- Internal Family Systems
- Experience
- 5 years
- Licensed
- Languages
- English