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Towards A Life More Lived

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Individual Therapy

Psychotherapy can be helpful in exploring your current difficulties and understanding the unconscious dynamics behind them. It can help you in identifying unhelpful patterns in relationships and seeing how these issues are often rooted in the past. Whether you're facing anxiety, depression or relationship challenges, therapy offers space for insight, healing, and reconnection with yourself.

Supervision

I offer psychodynamic/psychoanalytic supervision to qualified psychotherapists as well as trainees, who work with individuals or in group settings. I supervise both, individual and teams. Typically, sessions revolve around clinical work but also technique, therapists’ well-being and some theoretical concepts.

Reflective Practice Groups

Reflective Practice is a form of organisational consultancy that offers a supportive and structured space for professionals who wish to build a reflective capacity within a team and also who wish to explore the emotional impact of their work on their well-being.

Parents & Family Consultations

These are generally brief therapeutic interventions that address unhelpful behavioural patterns and destructive ways of relating. Sessions may involve the whole family of various constellations of members. Common areas of difficulties include conflict, breakdowns, illness, separation or divorce.

Workshops & Seminars for Clinicians

At Mensana we offer a range of educational and clinical programmes for mental health professionals. I currently lead workshops in Clinical Assessment and Mindfulness Practice tailored to therapeutic settings.

Support Groups

I am involved with facilitating support and psychoeducational groups for women, families, parents and also for patients diagnosed with Bipolar Disorder.

Begin here

Step 1

Reaching Out

Please contact me by email. I aim to respond within 24 hours.

Step 2

Initial Consultation

An in-depth assessment will be scheduled in order to develop a deeper understanding of your difficulties and to agree upon a treatment plan.

Step 3

Ongoing Therapy

This could be either short or long-term work depending on your individual needs and flexibility. Sessions typically range from one to three per week.

About Me

I am an experienced psychoanalytic psychotherapist and clinical supervisor.
I trained at the Tavistock & Portman NHS Foundation Trust
and the Society of Analytic Psychology in London.
Alongside my private practice,
I am the co-director of the
United in Crisis Association.

Katarzyna Akhtar

Bio

I work with adults and young people and provide therapy on a long-term basis as well as brief therapeutic interventions. I specialise in the treatment of a range of clinical issues, including anxiety and depression, trauma, personality difficulties and other complex presentations.

I run supervision & reflective practice groups, seminars and workshops in the field of mental health and wellbeing. I am a co-founder and co-director of the United in Crisis Association, a non-profit organisation based in Lisbon, which provides free of charge mental health support for refugees and asylum seekers.

I have over twenty years of experience of working therapeutically with individuals and groups in a variety of mental health settings, including the South London and Maudsley NHS Foundation Trust as well as the private sector in the UK, UAE, Poland and Portugal.

My original background is in teaching but for many years, prior to becoming a psychotherapist, I was deeply involved in the work within therapeutic communities. This included work with traumatised refugees, victims of violence and this is where I became interested in trauma, severe psychopathology and group work.

Whilst living in the UAE, I wrote and coordinated a psycho-educational programme to teach and promote the practice of mindfulness to build reflective awareness and conscious growth. I used my deep understanding of the destructive impact of stress, which could result in addictive and obsessive behaviours and increased anxiety.

In collaboration with other mental health clinicians, I founded ‘Wellness PitStop’ – a mental health and well-being consultancy service. We offered individual consultations and delivered workshops to organisations where we provided psychological guidance and education in order to reduce workplace stress and promote work/life balance.

For the past two years, I have been consulting and supervising clinicians at the Mensana Mental Health Clinic.

As well as being committed to in-depth clinical work, I am also interested in group dynamics and unconscious social and political violence, and I have conducted research in this field.

Professional Registrations

I am an accredited member and abide by the code of ethics of the
British Psychoanalytical Council & Tavistock Society of Psychotherapists.

BPC 24132 TSP 33067

Support Material

Additional readings and resources that complement our therapeutic work.

Explore Articles

Exploring The Unknown Requires Tolerating Uncertainty

Areas of Speciality

  • Depression and anxiety
  • Problems with relationships and intimacy
  • Intergenerational trauma
  • Multicultural and diversity issues
  • Major life transitions (marriage, parenthood, divorce, emigration etc.)
  • Somatic expressing of emotional distress
Therapeutic Illustration

Approach

  • Psychodynamic Psychotherapy
  • Transference-Focused Psychotherapy (TFP) for Personality Disorders
  • Psychoanalytic Supervision with a Jungian Orientation
  • Mentalisation Based Therapy (MBT)
Notebook Illustration

Psychodynamic
Assessment Workshop

with Katarzyna Akhtar

This comprehensive two-day interactive workshop is designed for counsellors, psychotherapists and psychologists who wish to develop or deepen their knowledge and technique of a psychodynamic assessment. Through engaging exercises, case studies and self-reflection, the participants will refine their skills and knowledge in conducting an in-depth interview.

Workshop content:

  • An Overview of Psychoanalytic Assessment
  • The Aims of Assessment: Why, What and How we Assess?
  • History Taking versus History Making
  • DSM – Friend or Foe?
  • Clinical Case Presentation: Making Sense of the Symptoms
  • Unconscious Communication in the Assessment Process
  • Concluding Assessment: Constructing a Psychodynamic Formulation & Treatment Recommendation
  • Psychodynamic Considerations in Risk Assessment & Management

June 19th & June 26th, 2025
17:30 – 20:30 GMT
In person at the Mensana Clinic

Informacyjna ulotka (Ukraina)

Location

Both of my consulting rooms are easily accessible by public transport and there is ample parking available nearby.

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Rua São Rafael
2750-082 Cascais

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Mensana Mental Health Clinic
Rua Dom João V, 2A, 4
1250-090 Lisboa

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Contact Katarzyna Akhtar

For all enquiries, please write directly to:

contact@katarzynaakhtarpsychotherapy.com

I offer therapy in both English and Polish

In your message, please include your full name and phone number.
You are welcome to add a short note about your enquiry (optional).

Frequency and Length of Therapy

Sessions may take place once, twice, or three times a week, depending on your personal needs.

Fees

Fees are assessed individually based on the type and duration of therapy.

Locations

Rua São Rafael 570
2750-082 Cascais

Mensana – Mental Health Clinic
Rua Dom João V, 2ª, 4
1250-090 Lisboa