Conditions Treated | Dr Derek Mitchell, Clinical Psychologist Aberdeen

Areas of practice

Conditions I work with

Each page below explains the condition, describes what tends to keep it going, and sets out how it is generally approached — a starting point for understanding what might be relevant to you before getting in touch.

Browse by condition

Find what you’re looking for

Many difficulties overlap or don’t fit neatly into a single category. If you’re unsure where you fit, the initial consultation is the right place to start — getting clarity on what is going on is often part of the work itself.

Work Stress & Burnout

Particularly relevant for professionals and those in demanding or high-responsibility roles. Burnout is not simply the result of working too hard — the specific pattern matters, and understanding it is where any useful approach has to begin.

Read more about burnout

Relationship & Personal Life

Recurring patterns in relationships, difficulty with boundaries, emotional regulation, and a sense that the same problems keep presenting themselves in different forms. Individual therapy to understand where these patterns come from and how they might change.

Read more about relationships

Anxiety Disorders

Covering generalised anxiety (GAD), social anxiety, panic disorder, and specific phobias. Different anxiety presentations have different maintaining patterns — identifying the right one shapes the entire approach.

Read more about anxiety

OCD

Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder takes many forms beyond the familiar stereotypes — intrusive thoughts, checking, contamination fears, and presentations that are less well known, including intrusive thoughts on themes that feel deeply shameful or taboo: harm, sexuality, or blasphemy. The content of these thoughts does not reflect character, values, or intent, and this is worth saying plainly. Exposure and Response Prevention (ERP) is the most effective approach available.

Read more about OCD

Post-Traumatic Stress (PTSD)

Including both single-incident trauma and more complex presentations involving prolonged or repeated experience. Trauma-focused psychological therapy can produce meaningful change — though the right approach depends considerably on the nature and history of the trauma.

Read more about PTSD

Panic Disorder

Panic attacks are frightening and can feel dangerous — they are not. What tends to develop alongside them is an anticipatory pattern: monitoring the body, avoiding situations, and gradually narrowing life to reduce the risk of another attack. This pattern is very well understood and responds well to psychological therapy.

Read more about panic

Life Transitions, Loss & Adjustment

Bereavement, career change, relationship breakdown, health diagnosis, retirement, parenthood. Major change — even change that is chosen or welcome — can destabilise a sense of identity and direction in ways that are harder to navigate alone than people expect.

Read more about life transitions

Depression

Depression affects mood, thinking, energy, motivation, and behaviour — often in ways that make the prospect of change feel implausible. That scepticism is itself part of the condition, and it does not mean change is not possible. Psychological therapy for depression is well developed, and for many people careful, well-targeted work produces meaningful and lasting improvement.

Read more about depression

The approach is always shaped by the individual

The condition pages describe general patterns and typical approaches, but therapy is never one-size-fits-all. A thorough initial assessment produces a formulation — a detailed, shared understanding of what is driving your specific difficulties and what is likely to be most useful. In practice this means the work is oriented around your particular history and maintaining patterns, rather than a standard protocol for the diagnostic category. That distinction tends to matter.

Not sure where you fit?

Many people arrive with something that doesn’t map onto a single category — or simply a sense that things aren’t right, without being able to say exactly why. That is a perfectly reasonable place to start. Part of what an initial consultation does is make sense of exactly that.

The right place to start is a conversation.

An initial consultation is an opportunity to talk through what is bringing you here, get a clearer sense of what is going on, and consider together whether this is the right fit.

Get in touch