Background: Michelle is a PACFA registered Clinical Counsellor with more than 20 years of diverse experience across the helping professions. She offers online counselling as well as in-person sessions in Marrickville and Erskineville in Sydney’s Inner West. Drawing on both professional and lived experience, Michelle works from a person-centred, trauma-informed and neuro-affirming perspective.
Specialty: Michelle specialises in supporting people experiencing depression, anxiety and stress; neurodivergence; grief and loss; food, body and self-image concerns; parenting and caring responsibilities; cultural identity; and past addiction. She also has experience in attachment, child and adolescent development, and works with people from diverse backgrounds, including LGBTQIA+ and trans and gender-diverse clients; people with chronic illness or disability; larger-bodied clients; culturally and linguistically diverse communities; and Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander clients.
Approach: Michelle brings a broad toolkit built over more than 20 years of practice, and shapes each session around what’s useful for you at the time, rather than following one method throughout. She will regularly check in with you to ask what’s working and what needs adjustment, so that counselling is as useful as possible for you.
Perspective: Michelle has supported people through a broad range of difficult experiences. She listens closely to what matters to you, and brings more than 20 years of experience across the helping professions to sessions that can hold complex or difficult experiences.
She pays attention to the wider circumstances, social and personal, that shape someone’s wellbeing, not just what’s happening inside their head. Michelle focuses on what’s already working for you, and helps you find a way forward that actually fits your life and what you want from it.
More About Michelle
Michelle Ormsby is a PACFA registered Clinical Counsellor with more than 20 years of experience across the helping professions. She offers online counselling and in-person sessions in Marrickville and Erskineville in Sydney’s Inner West, supporting people through anxiety, depression, neurodivergence, grief and loss, parenting, body image concerns and other life challenges.
She has particular experience in attachment and child and adolescent development, and works with people managing caring responsibilities, cultural identity and past addiction. Michelle also works with LGBTQIA+ and trans and gender-diverse people, people living with chronic illness or disability, larger-bodied people, culturally and linguistically diverse communities, and First Nations clients.
Michelle draws on Narrative Therapy, Solution-Focused Therapy, Acceptance and Commitment Therapy, Cognitive Behavioural Therapy, creative therapies, family and systems approaches, trauma-informed practice and mindfulness, choosing what fits each person rather than applying one method to everyone.
Working with Michelle means finding an approach shaped around you, not a fixed method used the same way for every client.
Booking With Michelle:
Availability: Wednesdays, Thursdays and Fridays with some availability on Thursday evenings.
Timezone: Sydney, NSW (AEST)
Where: Online and in-person counselling in Marrickville and Erskineville, Sydney NSW.
Offers couples counselling? No
Offers counselling to under 18’s? No
Cost: $70-$160 – check our sliding scale here
Specialties:
How to Book
- Think about your goals for counselling, and which counsellor might be a good match
- Send an email to the counsellor you’d like to work with requesting an appointment
- In the rare event you don’t hear from your counsellor within 24 hours, please contact us
Not sure who might be the right fit for you? Contact us and we’re happy to make a recommendation
Intake Process
- Initial appointments are $70 for individuals, or $80 for couples
- Due to our counsellor’s busy schedules, they cannot do intakes over the phone
- Your intake session will include discussing what supports you need, your goals for counselling, and to decide whether your counsellor is a good match for you
- If you decide that the fit isn’t right, you can ask to be referred to someone else – no offence will be taken!
Important Notice
There are some people that our counsellors can’t work with – not because we don’t want to, but because we want you to have the best possible care.
If you currently experience domestic violence, are having a mental health crisis, are experiencing severe substance dependency issues, or other acute crises, we can’t provide you with the level of support you deserve. However, we will use your initial appointment to connect you with places that specialise in these issues, so you can get the best possible care.
