A counselling space for Helpers
Throughline Counselling provides in-person counselling in Bendigo and online therapy in Australia for helping professionals and others navigating burnout, trauma & Complex PTSD, grief, anxiety, depression, and life changes.
Welcome
"Work-life balance is rarely just about boundaries or self-care".
Hi, I'm Frederikke Jensen, She/Her, a narrative therapist and Master's qualified counsellor based in Bendigo. Some of the people I work with have already tried setting boundaries, taking leave, or prioritising self-care, yet still feel overwhelmed, emotionally exhausted, or disconnected from their work and relationships.
Therapy for helping professionals experiencing burnout, overwhelm and emotional exhaustion
Based in Bendigo, I provide in-person counselling for people across Bendigo and surrounding areas of Central Victoria, as well as online therapy throughout Australia.
My consulting room in Kangaroo Flat, just south-west of Bendigo, is a quiet, thoughtfully arranged space that provides a frame for therapeutic conversations to unfold. Pending availability, I may offer an appointment outside normal business hours.
Counselling can help when supporting others begins to take a toll
Burnout, vicarious trauma and psychosocial hazards are inherent occupational risks in helping professions. Like everyone else, volunteers, therapists, teachers, social workers, nurses, managers and team leaders also experience grief, loss, trauma, anxiety and depression.
Therapy offers time to think, reflect and make sense of experiences that are often difficult to hold alone, regardless of training and vocation. Even if you understand mental health problems, you might need another mind and a therapeutic space to help you feel your way through difficult emotional experiences—this goes for helpers too—we are no exception to needing therapy.
A reflective therapeutic approach to mental well-being beyond techniques and symptoms
For some people, monthly or bi-weekly, predominantly technique-based therapy may not reach the interpersonal, systemic and relational aspects of psychological difficulties. I have written more about why weekly therapy can be beneficial in ‘How often should you go to therapy’.
Symptoms such as not sleeping, feeling anxious, or feeling irritable or distant from others tell us something is wrong—but symptoms do not tell the full story.
If taking time off work, self-help, or technique-based therapy hasn't brought lasting change, exploratory talk therapy—including narrative therapy—offers an opportunity to better understand yourself and your relationships. Rather than focusing on symptom reduction alone, exploratory talk therapy invites curiosity about the patterns and experiences that give rise to distress.
Therapeutic modality and background
Coming from a psychology undergraduate degree, I trained in narrative therapy as it aligns with my understanding of people’s difficulties as originating from their relationships, history, culture, experiences of oppression, trauma and grief.
Narrative therapy is about making meaning of experiences, approaching problems with curiosity rather than judgement. In my experience, self-judgement often accompanies burnout, trauma and overwhelm. Rather than treating self-judgment as the enemy, therapy invites us to understand what it might be trying to tell us.
Whilst narrative therapy is my primary modality, my approach is also influenced by contemporary psychodynamic thinking and relational practice. This shapes how I understand the therapeutic relationship and the influence of earlier life experiences in the present.
Alongside Throughline Counselling, I work in a leadership role within a human services organisation. This ongoing work continues to inform my understanding of helping professionals, workplace wellbeing and the emotional demands of working with people and systemic pressures on leaders and workers alike.
If you'd like to know more about my background, you can read more about me here.
What guides my therapeutic work
Through both my clinical work and my own experience, I have come to believe that tending to our own wounds, by being held in mind by another person, is vital to longevity in a helping role.
Trauma therapy is guided by sensitivity to pace and safety. Shame and other painful experiences are approached with compassion and curiosity.
Over time, therapy can help us feel more connected—to ourselves, to other people, to our work and to the wider world.
Therapy is committed work undertaken in collaboration between therapist and client.
If this resonates, get in touch to explore how counselling might support you or read more about my approach on the therapy page.
Throughline Journal
Finding throughlines of resilience, hope, and understanding in the midst of change
Next steps