COUNSELLING & Psychotherapy

Supervision for Psychologists and COUNSELLORS / Psychotherapists

Welcome to my website. My name is Elaine Smith. I am a trained clinical psychologist, psychotherapist, and supervisor, working in Lucan, West Dublin, and close to the North Kildare border. I have spent many years working as a senior clinical psychologist and supervisor within HSE mental health services and child development teams.

Since 2001 I have worked with people of different ages, backgrounds, and presentations within the research psychology, clinical psychology, and counselling / psychotherapy fields. During this time, I have met with a vast range of personal difficulties and circumstances through which people wished, or needed, to navigate. This means that I will meet you with the benefit of this wide and deep experience.

My practice is fundamentally rooted in my humanistic and integrative values as well as my psychodynamic appreciations.

By “humanistic” I refer to my unwavering commitment to meet you as a person and to respect the lived experience that you have had. I believe we have all done our best to get by in the world and preserve our minds and our identities; sometimes this means we have developed ways of coping or beliefs that others may find unusual. Whilst I appreciate these may also be causing us problems and may require some assistance in the here and now, I also appreciate that they arose for a reason and that they require utmost respect.  

By “integrative” I refer to my goal to meet you in the best way that I can in any given moment and to do so in a way which strives towards awareness of, and connection to, the different parts of the self. I do not subscribe to the idea that the way in which this is done should be the same for everybody all of the time, as we are unique, organic, and changing individuals.

By “psychodynamic” I mean two things: firstly, that I am interested in the ways in which early life experiences, or particular developmental understandings of early life experiences, may have shaped the way we are now; secondly, that I believe the unconscious plays an important role in how we behave or feel. Of course, there are difficulties and experiences for which this may not always be a relevant or useful lens, and we shall be mindful of that.

Across my work I also have a keen interest in the workings of the human mind, of the wider evolutionary, adaptive, and systemic forces that have come to shape us as individuals and as a species, and of meeting the self, and the other, from a place of compassion.

Whilst I have a strong background in public service clinical work and professional committee working, my core interest lies in working closely with people. I particularly value private practice for the privacy and confidentiality it affords us as well the way in which external pressures are limited, allowing you to stay for as long as you need, even if this spans years.