What are tax deductible expenses for self employed pyschotherapists and counsellors? 2022.
Covid 19 Precautions for therapy: Fogging
I use a fogging machine in our self catering property. The use and disinfectant is explained in this very short video http://welshgatehouse.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/WGH-Dec-Inc-BkNow-WGH.mp4 This one cost me over £300, partly because there were not many in the country at the time!
However, or a therapy room a something such as this will suffice: Electric Paint Spray Gun with 800 ml Paint Holder for applying paint, lacquers, stains, varnish and fine finishes.
https://smile.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B074XVF1TT/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o07_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1 I also bought one of these and it cost under £30 and plugs into the mains.
The disinfectant I use requires about dilution of 15 ml of disinfectant per litre of water https://www.covipro.co.uk/product/disinfectant-5ltr/?gclid=Cj0KCQjw1qL6BRCmARIsADV9JtYZnI7IwPtchGuVUbvFL0x5Ds_m1MScU3aSbPaAYu4dkqGYfWb2mxsaAp0YEALw_wcB and costs about £80 including delivery for 5 litres of disinfectant.
The spray is damp, but I spray it up into the air and allow it to land on all the surfaces. Covid 19 is destroyed within 5 minutes.
I have allergies to a variety of things and cannot use many cleaning products because I have a reaction to them – but I do not react to this disinfectant. However, it would be wise for the therapist to have a safety sheet, or the label available, to show clients who are concerned.
Organisations you may wish to join?
- Association for the Treatment of Sexual Abusers which has a good community for therapists https://www.atsa.com/
- NOTA: Supporting Professionals To Prevent Sexual Abuse https://www.nota.co.uk/
- StopSO_UK: The Specialist Treatment Organisation for Perpetrators and Survivors of Sexual Offences – which has a support group for therpasits and professionals. www.stopso.org.uk
- The Therapist network connected to B4UAct B4UACTTHERAPISTMM@groups.io
NSPCC E-safety training to help you keep children and young people safe online
Do you know your Fortnite from your Snapchat? Do you know the role online technologies play in children and young people’s lives and the risks they might face? The online world brings many positives and possibilities, but it’s also full of risks – and it’s constantly changing. Developed by the NSPCC in association with NCA-CEOP, the child protection unit of the National Crime Agency, this elearning course will help you to understand what children and young people do online, why they take risks and how to respond to these risks so you can feel confident in protecting the children you work with. Click here £35
Working With Erotic Charge
Alison Priestman has created a new video for therapists, exploring how to work with erotic charge. She has been running workshops and webinars on this theme for the past 10 years. If you’ve been struggling with this issue or would just like to know more – here’s the link https://youtu.be/Ej_xjHz5Sl8
Working Online Including Working with Clients From Abroad
There is a BACP document for therapists about working online (see page 11 for thoughts about working with clients from abroad) https://www.bacp.co.uk/events-and-resources/ethics-and-standards/good-practice-in-action/gpia047-working-online-fs
Click here to download the BACP Factsheet on Working Online
Re insurance for working with clients from abroad – not all insurance companies cover working with clients from abroad. Oxygen Professional Risks insurance told Juliet Grayson, “You are covered to do online work as long as it falls under the activities we insure you for. As per your insurance schedule the policy also covers you to work on a worldwide basis but this excludes USA/CANADA jurisdictions and also countries under sanctions would have to be referred to us.”
Good article. “Beyond the “Ick Factor”: Counselling Non‑offending Persons with Pedophilia Jill S. Levenson, Melissa D. Grady, John W. Morin. it is about counselling non-offending persons with paedophilia. It provides a good overview of the literature around non-offending paedophiles/minor attracted persons. It also provides a number of helpful strategies for engaging and working with individuals who disclose a sexual interest for children. Written for USA – so – to find british law about reporting go here, and when they talk about a clinical social worker we would mean a counsellor or psychotherapist.
Click here for the article
Risk Assements Should Never be Done by the Client’s Therapist
Clients should have independent report and risk assessment – their therapist cannot do it because of the relationship – following the Anthony Rice Ruling. Best idea is to recommend a suitably qualified colleague. StopSO can advise
Can child abuse involve another child (this website has lots of articles and resources on it too)
https://www.stopitnow.org/faq/can-child-sexual-abuse-also-involve-a-child-abusing-another-child
Book: Online Child Sexual Abuse
Grooming, Policing and Child Protection in a Multi-Media World
By Elena Martellozzo
Online Child Sexual Abuse: Grooming, Policing and Child Protection in a Multi-Media World addresses the complex, multi-faceted and, at times, counter-intuitive relationships between online grooming behaviours, risk assessment, police practices, and the actual danger of subsequent abuse in the physical world. Online child sexual abuse has become a high profile and important issue in public life. When children are victims, there is clearly intense public and political interest and concern. Sex offenders are society’s most reviled deviants and the object of seemingly undifferentiated public fear and loathing. This may be evidenced in ongoing efforts to advance legislation, develop police tactics and to educate children and their carers to engage with multi-media and the internet safely. Understanding how sex offenders use the internet and how the police and the government are responding to their behaviour is central to the development of preventative measures. Based on extensive ethnographic research conducted with the police and a specialist paedophile unit, here Elena Marellozzo presents an informed analysis of online child sexual abuse: of the patterns and characteristics of online grooming, and of the challenges and techniques that characterize its policing. Connecting theory, research and practice in the field of policing, social policy, victimology and criminology, this book adds significantly to our understanding and knowledge of the problem of online child sexual abuse, the way in which victims are targeted and how this phenomenon is, and might be, policed.
Working With Clients Who Violate Boundaries
Working with potential or actual perpetrator clients who themselves are children
https://stopso.org.uk/working-with-stopso-clients-who-are-children/
Free Psychotherapy Books to Download
Download Free eBooks in Psychotherapy, Psychiatry and Psychoanalysis
https://www.freepsychotherapybooks.org/
Offering Therapy to People Who Have Been Adopted
There are laws in the UK governing work that therapists can do with people who have been adopted. Oct 2020 I was informed that there was a change to The Children’s Act relating to adoption support – BACP members can find a Qs and A’s article here (you’ll need to log in) https://www.bacp.co.uk/bacp-
Conversion Therapy: Memorandum of Understanding
The Memorandum of Understanding on Conversion Therapy 2017, link below. They have done a good job, working hard not be oppressive to both LGBT people and to therapists working with the diversity of sexual issues and to include the practice of people working with cases of sexual attraction to children, so that they are not impeded or mistakenly trapped in over simplistic wording.
Click here to read this
Should I report a client who has an sexual attraction to children?
Reporting Child Abuse Juliet’s thoughts
Therapists Letter for Clients: about the Referral, Attendance & Engagement for Courts
Sometimes therapists who work with sexual offenders are sometimes asked by solicitors to write a report about the work that has been done. Here are some notes & guidelines that I have pulled together about how to write a factual letter for such a situation.
https://sexuallyinappropriatebehaviour.org/letter-for-courts/
If you are asked to release notes by the police
Do not let the police re write your summary without you signing it.
Get support from your supervisor.
Talk to Bacp (or your governing body) and your insurers.
Consider adding this to the top of every page of any notes you are asked to release
Important information regarding these counselling notes. These notes are for therapeutic purposes only and as such should be used cautiously. They are not verbatim notes or a log of what the client said or did not say. All notes are my own and are not designed to be used by the courts or for any purposes other than to assist me in my role as a counsellor. All notes on this form are my own understanding or interpretation only and have not been agreed by the client.
Risk Assessment Guidance for Counsellors
An article – for counsellors – about
Client Masturbation During Counselling
The Case That Saved Sex On The Internet
Note from Juliet. I have put this on here for info. I wonder if they realised the unintended consequences of allowing that freedom of speech.
In 1997 the US Supreme Court ruled against censoring sex on the internet. It overturned a law, signed the previous year which had been designed to protect children from sexual content on the internet. Claire Bowes has been speaking to an American Civil Liberties Union lawyer who fought the case for freedom of speech.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/w3csvtvl
Suicide: Managing Perpetrators of Child Sexual Exploitation and Internet Images Of Children: Understanding Risk of Suicide
people arrested for viewing Internet Images of Children (IIOC) are over 200 times more likely to take their own lives than members of the general population.
This report is a summary of the research conducted as part of the work of the Suicide Prevention Group from 2015 to 2017. The report outlines a systematic review of the known published literature on risk factors of suicide in CSE and IIOC offenders and qualitative research conducted across three groups (law enforcement officers, Lucy Faithfull Foundation ‘Stop it Now!’1 helpline operators and post-conviction IIOC offenders in the UK). The findings of this report have been utilised as a framework to refine the original operational guidance of the suicide prevention and risk management of perpetrators of Online CSE and IIOC (NPCC, 2017). Final Research Report
Managing the risk of suicide for persons under investigation for online child sexual abuse and exploitation: Operational Advice (College of Policing)
http://library.college.police.uk/docs/appref/Suicide-Risk-Operational-Advice-Final.pdf
Lots of resources and worksheets around child sexual abuse and trauma
Including feelings about being abused, lettr to the perpetrator, etc https://depts.washington.edu/hcsats/PDF/Temp%20TF-%20CBT/pages/traumafocused_cbt.html#info_sheets
What I learned about male desire in a sex doll factory
Know Your Law Quiz (about sexual offending):
by Juliet Grayson, published in The Psychotherapist, Issue 60, Summer 2015 p13. This accompanies the article above.
Click here to read: Know Your Law Quiz
Click here to read: The Answers to Quiz
The law about reporting sexual abuse and sexual offences, as it applies to psychotherapists and counsellors.
Law in the UK About Reporting Child Abuse by Juliet Grayson
Guidelines on the management of disclosure of historic child sexual abuse by a victim
GDPR for Therapists
https://www.bacp.co.uk/about-us/contact-us/gdpr/
Guidance and resources for therapists about how to handle information about people’s healthcare
https://ico.org.uk/for-organisations/in-your-sector/
Working Online for Therapists
https://www.bacp.co.uk/media/2162/bacp-working-online-supplementary-guidance-gpia047.pdf
Getting a DBS Check
Apply for a BASIC DBS check directly to through the government website
https://www.gov.uk/request-copy-criminal-record
N.B. Self-employed people can’t apply for ENHANCED DBS check themselves and need to use a third party. This is from the government website: If you’re self-employed, an organisation you’re working with can get a standard, enhanced or enhanced with barred lists check for you, where the role is eligible. Individuals needing an enhanced DBS have to use an umbrella organisation – click here to access the government info on this
Government Recommended Organisations that will help you https://www.gov.uk/guidance/responsible-organisations
These organisations will do it for you and you pay for that service
https://www.sonographersmedical.com/dbs-crb-checks/
https://dbs-ub-directory.homeoffice.gov.uk/org-page.php?id=636
https://crbdirect.org.uk/
MAYFLOWER have been used by a few people
One therapist is doing it via www.counsellorscollective.co.uk/
FOR THOSE WHO NEED THIS INFO: Relevant Rehabilitation periods
https://crbdirect.org.uk/faqs/
Working with clients: dissociation in an online environment: Videos
Trauma-focused therapists often report feeling puzzled, frustrated, or downright overwhelmed in working with dissociation and the ways it presents. This frustration can feel exponentially greater in the sudden transition that most therapists are making to telehealth. In this special webinar prepared for the COVID-19 crisis, dissociation expert Dr. Jamie Marich and her colleague Amy Wagner share their personal and professional insights with other trauma therapists and trauma-informed human services providers. At the heart of Dr. Jamie’s teaching is the idea that dissociation is not to be feared, rather, embraced as a normal part of the human experience and a vital skill in working with unhealed trauma. In this webinar, Jamie and Amy seek to assist you in diffusing your fears and hesitation about addressing dissociation in the online environment. Practical skills that can be used in online therapy and consultation are shown, and an open question-and-answer period will allow you a chance to voice your concerns as Jamie and Amy offer potential solutions. https://www.instituteforcreativemindfulness.com/working-with-dissociation-in-an-online-environment.html
Reoffending Rates for People who Have Committed Sexual Offences are Very Low
This is a quote from an email sent to Juliet Grayson by Karl Hanson who has spent a lifetime researching this. He said: “Out of 100 individuals released from a sexual offence conviction in the UK, between 2 and 3 will be reconvicted for another sexual offence within 2 years, and 97 to 98 will not. If the follow-up period is extended to 4 years, an additional 2 to 3 individuals will be reconvicted, bringing the 4 year sexual reconviction rate to 5.5%. In other words, if 100 individuals with a sexual offence conviction are followed for 4 years, 5 or 6 of these will be reconvicted for a sexual offence and 94 to 95 will not. These figures are from the attached article (p. 454).These figures are similar to rates found in other countries during the past 10 – 15 years” This is validated by the2010 An examination of the Risk Matrix Study. Juliet notes more about reoffending rates here Reoffending Rates for Sex Offenders
Reassessing Risk: Release from the Sex Offender Label
In relation to risk over time, Karl Hanson reported his findings from an extensive literature review of studies looking at a total of 543,204 sex offenders. This showed that for every five years that a sex offender remains offence-free in the community, the likelihood of them re-offending is cut by half. Hanson believes this is due to the following factors: effective psychological interventions that reduce risk, the effects of physical ageing such as a decline in testosterone levels, increasing rewards from living a prosocial life, success at work, rewarding leisure activities, decent friends, caring intimate partner, and learning to become interdependent (rather than being isolated as many are when younger). So if risk is 20% when you leave prison, if you make it for 5 years you are 10% risk, and if you make it for 10 year you are a 5% risk. Karl Hanson: Reassessing Risk 2017 Reasessing risk hanson2017_Release from sex offender label