People often expect counselling to feel clinical. I try to make it feel more like exhaling — a place to stop performing "okay." Twenty-four years in this industry, the last six as a counsellor, have taught me that healing isn't a straight line, and it was never meant to be a lonely one either.

My path here

This work didn't start for me in a classroom — it started in lived experience. Addiction touched my own life long before it became my career, and that gave me something no textbook could: a working knowledge of what recovery actually costs, and what genuinely helps.

Twenty-four years in the recovery industry later, six of them spent counselling formally, I sit with residents and private clients the same way — without judgement, without an agenda, and without pretending the road is short. Sobriety, rebuilt relationships, a real return to ordinary life: that's the destination. Getting there looks different for everyone who walks it.

"I'm not here to fix you. I'm here to walk next to you until the path is one you can manage on your own."

What sessions look like

Expect warmth over clinical distance, and your pace over mine. Some sessions do visible work — naming a pattern, holding a boundary you've never held before. Others are quieter: sitting with what's hard until it loosens its grip. Both matter equally.

Because recovery rarely affects just one person, I welcome family into the process wherever it's useful. The people walking alongside you deserve support too — you don't carry this, or hold them up, entirely on your own.

Trauma, relationship strain, recovery — whatever brought you to this page, you don't have to carry it by yourself.

Caryn, counsellor at Lighthouse Sanctuary
At a glance
  • On-site counselling for Lighthouse Sanctuary residents
  • Private one-on-one outpatient sessions
  • Couples and family sessions
  • In person in Johannesburg, or online anywhere in South Africa
  • R550 per private session