To request an assessment for a place on one of these, please click here and complete our referral form.
The course aims to provide you with strategies to manage symptoms of low mood, stress and anxiety based on cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT).
CBT is based on the concept that your thoughts, feelings, physical sensations and actions are interconnected, and that how you respond to issues can sometimes trap you in a vicious cycle, despite your attempts to cope in the best way that you can imagine.
We can teach you various evidence-based skills to deal with low motivation, worry, negative thoughts, stress and anxiety and so on.
Course overview
The course will run over eight weekly sessions, for one hour.
Between each session, you're expected to go away and practice the techniques we have looked at. You'll be given any materials needed to help with this.
At the end of the course, you'll be offered a review to discuss improvements, and we can decide together whether you need further support.
Accessing the course
The course is curently held virtually online, but this may change in future.
To request an assessment for a place on this course, please complete the referral form at the top of this page.
For more information, contact Oldham Healthy Minds on 0161 716 2777.
The mindfulness for health course provides you with a wide range of mindfulness skills to ease the suffering associated with persistent pain, fatigue and long term health conditions (including stress and low mood that often accompanies such conditions).
The information below is about the course, but click here to read more about mindfulness in general or to try some guided practices.
Aims of the course
There are two key principles which underlie all aspects of mindfulness and run through this course:
This approach helps you to come to terms with you situation, not by changing your condition itself but by changing your relationship to it.
Mindfulness for health core components:
Confidentiality and safety
In order to create an atmosphere of trust and sharing within the group, confidentiality will be observed by both participants and instructors. If your instructor has a concern for your safety or well-being, including risk to yourself or another, he or she will need to contact your general practitioner, or other professional person.
Talking in front of others
There will be points in the group sessions where reflection of each practice will be encouraged, but speaking out is not a requirement. As people develop confidence and begin to feel comfortable in the group, they often wish to talk about their own experiences and to make comments and ask questions.
Practical arrangements
It is a good idea to wear comfortable clothes, and any items that will allow you to comfortably participate in the sessions, i.e. cushion, blanket, drinks etc. If there any adaptations or adjustments required for you to participate in the group, please inform us ahead of time.
This group aims to support mums and dads, with babies up to two years old, struggling with mild-moderate anxiety or depression.
This lasts 10 weeks, with an initial meet and greet, eight taught sessions and one telephone review:
Through out the sessions a health visitor will be present and on hand to help with any questions around your baby and support. Each session includes some time to go through bonding techniques to help parent and baby.
It’s a small informal, relaxed group and we strongly recommend interaction from parents (and baby).
Dialectical behaviour therapy (DBT) aims to help if you have difficulty managing your emotions.
You may struggle to manage your emotions for a range of reasons - genetics and life experiences often play a part. If your emotions aren't managed properly, they can create problems including self-harm, unstable relationships and impulsive actions.
DBT has been found to be particularly helpful for borderline personality disorder (BPD), otherwise known as emotionally unstable personality disorder (EUPD). There is growing evidence that it can also be helpful if you struggle to manage your feelings.
About the emotion skills group
This is a 24 week course, based on DBT, broken down into three modules. The first two weeks of each module will cover mindfulness.
The group aims to teach you skills to manage your emotions safely, so you can make healthy changes and improve your quality of life. It is not a therapy group and there will be no individual sessions.
How the group works:
Don’t worry if you missed the start of the course - new group members are welcome at the beginning of each module:
Who the group is for:
This is a skills group for adults who struggle to manage their emotions. This group may be helpful if:
This group may not be for you if you feel unable to keep yourself safe on a daily basis, or risk becoming unsafe quickly.
This group is also not open to people who require care co-ordination. We recommend you seek support from your GP or crisis services if you feel unable to keep yourself or others safe.
What is expected of you:
You will need to commit to the following for treatment to be effective:
If you become unwell and are at risk of harming yourself or another person, please inform the facilitators and access crisis services.
Many men and women seek help to deal with the emotional consequences of being abused as a child. Sharing feelings with those who have had similar experiences can make the process of recovery from such trauma easier.
We offer an 18-session therapeutic group programme to help you overcome the difficulties that can arise from being abused as a child.
Who the group is for
This group may be of benefit to you if you have experienced sexual and/or physical abuse in your childhood, which has an impact on how you view yourself and the world around you now.
You may be suffering with low mood, anxiety or have difficulties with forming trusting relationships. You may have developed ways of coping with what happened to you which have become unhelpful, such as self-harming or drinking too much.
Aims of the group
Our goal is to lessen the impact that the trauma has on your life now. We will be focussing very much on your ‘here and now’ difficulties and developing a wide range of coping strategies.
The therapy programme is based on cognitive therapy techniques, which have been proven helpful to those who suffer from emotional, behavioural and relationship problems. The programme also incorporates aspects of other therapeutic approaches.
Structure of the group
Sessions will be held regularly - weekly at first, moving to less frequently towards the end of the programme.
You will be given a workbook at the beginning of the treatment for you to work through at your own pace, supported by your attendance at the group.
All the meetings are confidential and you will be encouraged to share as much or as little about your experiences as is right for you. No one will be expected to speak before they are ready.
There are exercises in the workbook that will enhance your learning from the group; again you can do these at your own pace.
About the programme
The programme begins with a ‘preparation’ stage (sessions 1-7). This will help you to learn ways to look after yourself as well as ways to manage your mood and stress. These sessions will also help you to gain a greater understanding of your current difficulties and what keeps them going.
This is followed by work on issues common to people who have experienced abuse in childhood; such as understanding that you were not to blame, dealing with feelings of anger and sadness, improving your relationships and moving forward (sessions 8-16).
The final sessions prepare you to carry on with your recovery on your own (sessions 17 and 18).
Keeping safe during the group
Strong feelings are a part of any therapy and we ask that you can keep yourself safe while attending the group. If you feel that you are beginning to struggle to keep yourself safe we ask that you let one of the group facilitators know, so they can give details of other helpful services.
Accessing the group
The group is curently held virtually online, but this may change in future.
To request an assessment for a place, please complete the referral form at the top of this page.
A psychosexual difficulty is one related to sexual behaviour and functioning, which can affect many people.
These are often caused by regular things which bring about change or a loss of confidence, such as illness or surgery, childbirth, menopause or even losing your job.
While they are common, some people will struggle with these difficulties alone for long periods of time, worrying that they might be judged for them.
If the problems have persisted for more than six months, it might be a good idea to seek help from us.
We can offer support for common psychosexual difficulties such as:
In men:
In women:
Unfortunately, we are unable to offer treatment for:
We are also unable to offer treatment if there are significant difficulty with alcohol or substances, if there is domestic violence within the relationship, or if you have a psychiatric disorder that needs treatment as a priority.
About the treatment
We offer a psychological treatment which helps to restore normal sexual function, by talking through the problem to gain a better understanding of it. This includes what has triggered it, what influences it and what has caused the problem to continue.
A therapist will discuss how many sessions you will need at your first appointment, each session is completely confidential and lasts about 50 minutes. If any sensitive information needs to be shared with your GP, it will be discussed with you first.
You can attend the sessions alone, but if the problem affects your partner too, it might be better for you both to attend.
The therapist will work with you alone, or as a couple, to understand what steps you can take to improve the problem. They may also give you exercises and tasks to do with your partner in your own time, nothing sexual will ever happen during the therapy itself.
Both partners need to be open to making changes within therapy to help address the problem. If there is significant conflict within the relationship aside from psychosexual difficulties, it may be beneficial to work on these through couples counselling before starting this treatment.
You can discuss which treatment would be best with one of our therapists before you start.
Couple therapy for depression is a 20-session treatment for depression, for couples where there is also relationship distress.
This follows the UK's National Institute for Clinical Excellence (NICE) guidelines, for the treatment of depression and relationship distress in couples.
The aims of this are to:
Click here for more information
The Unified Protocol Transdiagnostic group
The Unified Protocol (UP) is a form of cognitive-behavioral therapy (CBT) for individuals diagnosed with anxiety disorders, depression and related disorders (which we refer to as emotional disorders). The UP is a trans-diagnostic treatment, which means that it can be applied to a range of different disorders and problems (e.g., panic attacks, social anxiety, obsessive thought/compulsions, depressed mood). The overarching goal of the UP is to help people build a healthier relationship to their emotions by learning new ways of responding to uncomfortable emotions in order to reduce symptoms across a range of problems. The UP has elements of mindfulness, cognitive therapy, and behavioral therapy and uses five core skills as building blocks for change:
Group Outline
It is a 12 session group that meets weekly, for 2 hours. It is a skills-based treatment programme; therefore practice between sessions is extremely important. The Centre for Anxiety and Related Disorders at Boston University developed this program and reported 70% of people who engaged experienced significant improvements. However the biggest predictor of success was the amount of effort an individual dedicated to the program.
Each session group members will be asked to complete between session tasks. Around up to half of each session will be spent on reviewing between-session work before moving onto new skills, so it is key that this has been completed.
There is some level of interaction expected from each group member when reviewing between session work.
It is a closed group, so members can only start at the beginning of the course. Accessing the course
To request an assessment to access this group please complete the referral form below.
