Samia El Osta - Profile

I’m a High-Intensity Cognitive Behavioural Therapist (CBT) with more than 12 years of experience promoting clients’ social, emotional, and psychological wellbeing. My relationship with clients is based in collaboration, insightful self-exploration, data-driven interventions, shared laughter, and kindness. I consistently receive excellent feedback from clients about my practice. With me, you’re welcome just as you are. I value the topics, thoughts, and personal experiences you want to discuss and nothing is considered shameful, taboo, or off-limits. I abide by the British Association for Behavioural and Cognitive Psychotherapies (BABCP) standards of conduct, performance, and ethics and take my duty to you, and all my clients, as both a privilege and a trusted responsibility.

Alongside my private practice, I am a Lecturer in the School of Psychology at the University of Surrey where I teach student Psychological Wellbeing Practitioners to effectively use CBT within the NHS. I’m always excited to teach students about CBT and its power to alleviate depression and anxiety.

I specialise in treating all anxiety disorders, depression, and perinatal mental health for individuals ages 17yrs+.

My experience is both far reaching and far ranging. I specialize in treating depression, anxiety disorders, and perinatal mental health. I’m particularly interested in the perinatal mental health of women and have extensive experience supporting women one-to-one and in groups with post-partum depression and anxiety. I’m highly skilled in working with multiculturalism and diversity, I’m anti-racist, and I value the intersectionality of people’s life experiences and circumstances.

In the UK, I’ve worked as a CBT Therapist for NHS Talking Therapies and as a Criminal Justice Social Worker supporting clients who want to change their life trajectory for the better. In the United States, I worked as a clinical Social Worker offering therapy to youth and teens in school settings, and I helped lead a personal and professional development program for underserved young adults. In the Middle East, I assisted in researching the experiences of Iraqi refugees with war and conflict injuries, and subsequently built on that experience in the United States by offering therapy to refugees from Iraq in schools and the non-profit sector.

Testimonials

“Working with Samia was literally a game changer for me. My anxiety was crippling my day to day life and living. Now that is not the case. My anxiety is under control. I control it rather than it disabling me. The tools, techniques, safe space, thought reimagining has been excellent. Now I am ready to work on the other deeper issues that I was unable to get to due to the anxiety ruling my life.” – CS

“When I came to Samia I was depressed, anxious and had PTSD. I also felt helpless, worthless and had low self-esteem and confidence. Samia helped me to address all of these and because of that I will always be eternally grateful. Samia is amazing at her job…she not only got me over the most traumatic experience of my life thus far but has also equipped me to better manage my behaviors and feelings in the future, to be more present in today than worry about the future and have much more gratitude for everything good in my life…I couldn’t recommend Samia highly enough, I have had CBT therapy before, but this was just levels above.” – James C.

“I’m so much more open to talking about difficult things now and I couldn’t imagine starting this journey with anyone better! I’ve learnt so much about myself. When I first came to Samia, I felt quite miserable and lost, and there was a lot weighing me down. Now, I feel a lot stronger and have more faith in myself, and I can also see the strength in being vulnerable and open. I am slowly starting to love myself more – although there is still a long way to go! I genuinely feel like I have grown so much and have benefitted immeasurably from Samia’s help.” – Teenage client