🧭 Counselling or Coaching? Making Sense of Support After Cancer

If you or someone close to you has been through cancer, you’ll know the emotional journey doesn’t end when treatment does. That’s often when the questions start: Who am I now? What next? How do I live again?  

Maybe you are a fellow professional who supports people with cancer and has questions about whether counselling or coaching is best for your patient? 

At this point, many people consider talking to someone but aren't sure who that someone should be. Should you see a counsellor? Try coaching? What’s the difference?

Let’s explore this and clear up to support you or someone close to you get the right help, first time.

🧠 Counselling: Understanding, Healing, Holding, Coping.

Counselling is typically about looking back to understand the present.

A counsellor helps you explore past experiences, painful emotions, and patterns that may be holding you back in your present life experience. It’s a safe, non-judgmental space where you can bring sadness, grief, anger, confusion and be heard, held, and supported.

Counsellors are trained to work with trauma, bereavement, anxiety, and depression, stress, relationship dynamics, body image, self-perception amongst others. Their approach is therapeutic, grounded in psychological theory and ethical frameworks.

As Lorna Earl, Macmillan Counselling Lead for East Sussex says:

“Counselling offers people the opportunity to explore and express the physical and emotional impact of cancer in a safe space. It helps people process their experience and find a way through.”

🌱 Coaching: Forward Focused, Empowering, Practical

Coaching is more future focused. It’s about where you are now and where you want to go. A coach partners with you to rebuild confidence, explore identity, set goals, and reconnect with life on your terms.

If counselling is about healing wounds, coaching is about rediscovering strength and designing your next chapter.

As a coach, I often work with people who say:

• “I survived… but I don’t feel like me anymore.”

• “Everyone thinks I’m fine, but I feel lost.”

• “I want to make the most of this second chance, but I don’t know how.”

We work together to rebuild trust in yourself, reconnect to what matters, and take gentle, purposeful steps forward.

✨ Similar but Different

Coaching hasn’t been around as long as counselling has in cancer therapies but they make great partners in supporting people to get through and past their experiences.

There are some similarities and some differences, summarised below

Counselling	Coaching
Past and present focused	Future focused
Healing emotional wounds	Unlocking potential and goals
Client led although therapist may have therapeutic tools and techniques to support you within the process	Client led, coach partners with you
Regulated profession	Unregulated (but many coaches are trained and accredited)

That said, there’s a lot of shared ground. Both provide:

• A confidential, supportive relationship

• Space to explore challenges

• Active listening and powerful questions

• A focus on your wellbeing

  
  

💬 So Which One Do You Need?

If you’re feeling, stuck in grief, anxious, or struggling to cope day to day, counselling may be the most helpful first step.

If you’re feeling ready to make changes, rebuild identity, or want support to move forward out of the overwhelm and confusion,  coaching could be what helps you thrive after cancer.

Sometimes, you might need both, at different times or at the same time!. That’s okay. Support is never one-size-fits-all.

💚 You Deserve Support That Feels Right

Cancer changes everything, but it doesn’t define you.

Whether you choose counselling, coaching, or both, know that help is out there. You don’t have to navigate this alone. There’s life beyond treatment and it can be meaningful, joyful, and yours to shape.

📣 Ready to Take a Step Forward?

If you’re curious about how coaching could support you after cancer, I invite you to book a free 30-minute call with me. There’s no pressure, no hard sell — just space to explore what you need and whether coaching feels like the right next step.

I am working in partnership with Sussex Cancer Fund to provide FREE coaching for people in Sussex who have finished active treatment. I also work with self-funding clients outside of Sussex.

👉 Book a free call with me here 

Lorna Earl says about the local support . “Having a local life coach available for patients who need it is a great bonus. I have been able to refer people to Sue for coaching who are ready to move forward but are feeling stuck in issues around work, dreams they want to make a reality since cancer or in some cases, being able to get on with things they shelved during treatment and now want to revisit through the lens of post-treatment life.  These steps go a long way to help people adjust to this new phase in their life and support their wellbeing”.

Or if you feel that counselling is the right thing for you at the moment, Macmillan offer counselling and there is some great advice and links here : 

For Cancer specific counselling in Sussex contact:

East Sussex    Phone 0800 131 5543   Email esht.macmillancounselling.edgh@nhs.net  

West Sussex   Phone 01273 468770    Email horizoncentre@macmillan.org.uk

General information https://www.macmillan.org.uk/cancer-information-and-support/treatment/coping-with-treatment/talking-therapies

I’d love to hear from you:What kind of support helped you most after cancer or while caring for someone?Have you tried both counselling and coaching? How did they differ for you?

Let’s keep the conversation open and compassionate.

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