It can be tricky to find a psychotherapist who’s the right fit for you. Especially if you are limited by the number of available therapists in your area.

If you are searching for therapeutic help in your town or city, there’s a good chance that even if you spot one that meets your requirements, he or she won’t have time for you immediately. It’s likely you’ll have to wait two to three weeks or even longer to get your first session. That’s a lot of time when you are dealing with a heavy burden. Online you have much more choice and there’s a much bigger chance someone will be available to attend to you right away.

Here are some of the benefits of online therapy:

  • You won’t need to leave the comfort of your own home. It can be daunting to go to an unfamiliar place and open up to someone you’ve never met before
  • If you are particularly keen on keeping the fact that you reached out to find professional help totally private, there’s no way someone could find out. Nobody will bump into you on the way to or from your therapist’s office. There’s zero chance of meeting other clients your therapist is seeing.
  • Some people freeze, especially initially, in the physical presence of a mental health professional they have never met more. Online therapy may feel safer for people who are not used to the process of psychotherapy. The level of intimacy can be scary. Online the threshold to open up may be significantly lower
  • It’s much easier to terminate a session if you feel you can’t handle more for that day
  • You don’t need to face traffic to get there, so you won’t start your session in a stressful mood. You certainly won’t have to look for a parking spot. And you’ll save some money on transportation of course
  • You won’t need to stress over what to wear as you are in the comfort of your own home
  • Any items you wish to show your therapist are on hand. Suppose you want to show your therapist some of your paintings, meaningful objects, anything that is of importance to you, it will be readily available, you won’t have to drag anything to an office on the other side of town
  • Disabilities, certain illnesses, fatigue, injuries, etc can no longer prevent a person from seeing a therapist
  • Is your baby asleep in the other room? Normally you wouldn’t be able to leave the house. Thanks to online therapy you can still have a therapy session and you won’t need to find a babysitter. Online therapy gives people more freedom
  • Online you will have a much broader choice of therapists. If you’re not limited to your area it doesn’t matter whether your therapist is in Canada, Australia, the US, or any other country for that matter, as long as he or she speaks your language
  • You’re no longer limited to regular working hours. Suffering from insomnia? Online you can find a mental health professional in a completely different time zone! Online therapy makes therapy possible at every moment of the day or night!
  • All you need is a laptop and an internet connection

Jeffrey Kottler, a psychotherapist who’s written numerous books on the process of therapy, writes in his fifth edition of On Being a Therapist, on pages 249-250: ‘clients can save commuting time and expense and also access more qualified professionals from anywhere in the world. Many clients also report anecdotally that they are often willing to share things online or via video or audio conferences that they likely wouldn’t be able to do in person.’

It be a challenge to go open your laptop and go looking for a therapist online. At first it might seem like searching for a needle in a hay stack.

Luckily there’s the promising initiative of Better Help.

This organisation combines the profiles of a vast number of certified mental health professionals. Their system allows you to find a good match in a very short period of time.

You can check them out via this link:  https://www.betterhelp.com/start/