4 Reasons Why You Should Consider Doing Group Therapy

1. It's Cheaper. Though your mental health is precious, and worth investing in, for most people cost is a factor. Individual therapy with a psychotherapist or clinical psychologist in New Zealand can easily cost between $90 - $150 per hour long session. A session of group therapy is likely to cost significantly less, and will probably be 1.5 - 2 hours long, so you're getting more for your money. It's simple math, when multiple group members are contributing to the cost of the therapist who facilitates, everyone pays less.
   
   
2. It's Effective. Though outcome research varies depending on the study or what mental health issues are being treated, group is often as effective as individual therapy. This does vary, but with some issues group may be more effective than individual. An example is for people with depression, for whom group can be very valuable to break the depressive isolation that is helping maintain the disorder.
   
   
3. It Reduces Stigma. In various roles I've been in the position of talking a client into considering group, either because I think it's what will help them best, or because it's what the service was able to offer. Often, I think, the barrier has been shame. Bad enough to tell one person, the therapist, what's going wrong for me. Why on earth would I want to consider telling a whole room full of people? As much as it can be anxiety provoking at first, a good group does help reduce the stigma. Participants have the experience of feeling normal in a group of people with shared challenges. A group that develops genuine pride in itself can be incredibly healing. 
   
   
4. Learn from, and get support from your fellow participants. Time and time again group therapists here from their groups that the most important therapeutic moments were when group members shared insights or support with each other.
   
   At Lucid Psychotherapy and Counselling we run a DBT skills group and will develop and run other groups as the need arises. Tell us what sort of group you would like us to run in the future!