About Bernadette
Bernadette Welham is an AASW social worker with five years of professional experience in Australia. She focuses on practical support for people facing stress, anxiety, depression and parenting concerns. She also helps people who are dealing with trauma, relationship strain and addiction-related issues.
Bernadette believes clients know their own story and brings a respectful, strengths-based stance to each meeting. Her approach is straightforward and conversational. She uses client-centred methods so conversations follow what matters most to the person in front of her.
Background and approach
She also draws on cognitive behavioural ideas to help people notice unhelpful thinking and try new ways of responding. Bernadette offers Emotionally-Focused Therapy ideas when relationships or attachment patterns are central to the problem. She blends mindfulness practices to help with grounding, sleep and managing sudden anxiety.
Sessions are paced to suit the person, with practical tools to try between meetings. She has worked across a range of common and complex concerns including grief, intimacy issues, body image, burnout and ADHD-related struggles. She also supports people working through adoption and foster care questions, chronic illness, caregiver stress and career uncertainty.
People who prefer a calm, collaborative and non-judgemental style tend to find her approach helpful. Bernadette encourages small steps and realistic goals, and she acknowledges the courage it takes to start therapy.
Approach and online care that fits your life
Bernadette uses client-centred therapy to make sessions focus on what matters most to the person. This approach means conversations are guided by the client's priorities and pace, and the therapist follows the client's lead to build trust and clarity.She also uses Cognitive Behavioural Therapy, which helps people notice patterns in their thoughts and behaviours and try practical experiments to change them. CBT is often useful for anxiety, sleep problems and managing low mood. Emotionally-Focused Therapy ideas are used when attachment and relationship patterns are central, helping people name emotions and create new, more helpful ways of relating.
Finding the right approach is part of the work. Bernadette will talk with each person about what feels helpful and adapt methods to match goals and preferences. This is a collaborative process where the therapist and client choose what to try together.
Online therapy offers flexibility and different ways to connect. Video calls let people use visual cues for deeper conversation, phone sessions can fit into a short break and use less bandwidth, and live chat or text-based messaging can suit quick check-ins or times when typing feels easier. These options help people access care from work, home or while travelling and fit therapy around a busy life.
Questions people ask
What kinds of issues does Bernadette help with?
How does she work with clients in session?
What is her professional background?
What credentials does she hold and where is she based?
Can I work with her in other languages or from overseas?
What session formats are available?
How much do sessions cost?
How do I begin a therapy process?
What this therapist works with
Most often
- Stress, Anxiety
- Family conflicts
- Trauma and abuse
Also listed
- Abandonment
- Addictions
- ADHD
- Adoption and foster care
- Aging and geriatric issues
- Anger management
- Antisocial personality
- Attachment issues
- Autism and Asperger Syndrome
- Avoidant personality
- BDSM, kink, and alternative sex culture
- Bipolar disorder
- Blended family issues
- Body image
- Cancer
- Career difficulties
- Caregiver issues and stress
- Chronic pain, illness, and disability
- Coaching
- Codependency
- Commitment issues
- Communication problems
- Compassion fatigue
- Control issues
- Coping with life changes
- Coping with natural or human-caused disaster
- Dependent personality
- Depression
- Disruptive Mood Dysregulation Disorder (DMDD)
- Dissociation
- Divorce and separation
- Domestic violence
- Drug and alcohol addiction
- Eating and food-related issues
- Eating disorders
- Emptiness
- Family problems
- Fatherhood issues
- Fertility issues
- First responder issues
- Forgiveness
- Gender dysphoria
- Grief
- Guilt and shame
- Hoarding
- Impulsivity
- Infidelity
- Intellectual disability
- Intimacy-related issues
- Isolation / loneliness
- Jealousy
- LGBT
- Men's issues
- Midlife crisis
- Money and financial issues
- Mood disorders
- Multicultural concerns
- Narcissism
- Obsessions, compulsions, and OCD
- Panic disorder and panic attacks
- Paranoia
- Parenting issues
- Personality disorders
- Phobias
- Polyamory / non-monogamous relationships
- Post-traumatic stress
- Postpartum depression
- Pregnancy and childbirth
- Prejudice and discrimination
- Process addiction (porn, exercise, gambling)
- Relationship issues
- Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD)
- Self esteem
- Self-harm
- Self-love
- Sex addiction
- Sexual assault and abuse
- Sexual dysfunction
- Sexuality
- Sleeping disorders
- Smoking / vaping cessation
- Social anxiety and phobia
- Traumatic brain injury
- Visually impaired
- Women's issues
- Workplace issues
- Young adult issues
Therapeutic approaches
- Experience
- 5 years
- Licensed
- Languages
- English
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