About Emma Stakelum
I am an ICP Accredited Psychotherapist with a Master's degree in Psychoanalytic Psychotherapy, providing face-to-face psychotherapy in Dublin and online therapy across Ireland and the world
People come to therapy for many different reasons. Some are struggling with anxiety, intrusive thoughts, low mood, or relationship difficulties. Others feel overwhelmed, stuck, or find themselves repeating patterns they don't fully understand. Whatever has brought you here, therapy offers a space to explore your experience with curiosity, honesty, and without judgement.
My work is informed by Freudian and Lacanian psychoanalytic theory, while remaining attentive to the unique circumstances and lived experience of each individual. I believe that lasting change comes not simply from learning to manage symptoms, but from developing a deeper understanding of the emotional patterns, relationships, and unconscious processes that shape how we experience ourselves and the world around us.
My Approach
Psychotherapy is about more than finding ways to cope. It is about understanding.
Symptoms such as anxiety, obsessive thoughts, relationship difficulties, depression, or a persistent feeling of being stuck rarely appear without reason. Rather than seeing these experiences as something to eliminate as quickly as possible, psychoanalytic psychotherapy asks what they might be communicating and how they have come to occupy such an important place in your life.
Our work together begins with your own experience. There is no script, no expectation that you should know what to say, and no pressure to have everything figured out. Through conversation, we gradually begin to make sense of recurring patterns, unconscious conflicts, and ways of relating that may no longer serve you.
The aim is not simply to reduce symptoms, but to develop a deeper understanding of yourself that allows for more lasting psychological change.
Clinical Experience
Alongside private practice, I have worked across a range of clinical settings, including university student counselling services, psychiatric hospitals, addiction services, and educational settings.
This experience has allowed me to work with adults presenting with anxiety, OCD and intrusive thoughts, depression, trauma, addiction, relationship difficulties, grief, and significant life transitions. Working across different settings has reinforced one central principle: every person's experience is unique, and therapy should reflect that.
Qualifications & Professional Memberships
I have a Master's degree in Psychoanalytic Psychotherapy and continue to develop my practice through regular supervision, advanced clinical training, seminars, and ongoing professional development.
I am an ICP Accredited Psychotherapist and a member of both the Irish Council for Psychotherapy (ICP) and the Association for Psychoanalysis and Psychotherapy in Ireland (APPI). These professional memberships reflect my commitment to ethical practice, and continuing professional development.
Whether you are considering therapy for the first time or returning after previous experience, my aim is to provide a thoughtful, confidential, and collaborative space in which you can speak freely and begin to understand yourself differently.
I also accept insurance for various health care providers.
What is Psychoanalysis ?
Psychoanalysis is a, form of talk therapy dedicated to uncovering the powerful, often hidden forces that shape our emotional lives, relationships, and suffering. Its core premise is that the root of our most persistent problems does not lie in our conscious thoughts, but in the unconscious mind.
Unlike therapies that focus on modifying surface behaviour or managing immediate symptoms, psychoanalysis aims for structural change. The method uses free association,inviting the client to speak about what that comes to mind without censorship, to bypass the individual's usual psychological defences.
The goal is to bring the unconscious into the light of consciousness. This process illuminates the deeply buried memories, conflicts, and desires often stemming from early life experiences, that fuel our current patterns of behaviour, repetitive struggles (known as the compulsion to repeat), and emotional pain. By giving voice and symbolic representation to these repressed forces, the individual gains the self knowledge necessary to break painful cycles and achieve genuine psychic freedom.
