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Psychotherapy for depression and low mood in Australia with a registered psychologist. Sessions online, weekday mornings AEST.
Depression can look very different from one person to the next. For some people, it is an overwhelming sense of sadness or despair. For others, it is quieter: waking up already tired, finding that ordinary tasks require more effort than they once did, or noticing a gradual loss of interest in things that used to matter.
Depression can also bring guilt or self-criticism. You may wonder why you can’t simply “snap out of it”, compare yourself to other people, or feel as though you have no good reason to be struggling. Some people continue to work, care for others, and appear to be coping from the outside, while others find that depression makes everyday life feel almost impossible. Whatever form it takes, depression can be exhausting to carry alone.
If you’re in immediate danger, call 000.
Lifeline: 13 11 14 (24/7)
Suicide Call Back Service: 1300 659 467 (24/7)
Alicia’s practice is not a crisis service and cannot respond to urgent matters outside session times.
Depression can affect thoughts, emotions, the body, and the way people relate to others. Because of this, it does not look the same for everyone. You might recognise some of the following:
For some people, this sense of disconnection sits at the heart of the experience. Sometimes the painful part of depression isn’t just the sadness itself, but the feeling of becoming disconnected from your life, your relationships, your sense of purpose, or your sense of who you are.
Depression can take many forms, and the descriptions below are intended as starting points for reflection and understanding rather than definitive descriptions of your experience. While diagnostic terms can be useful, Alicia is interested in understanding the experiences, relationships, and patterns that shape how depression shows up for each person.
A sustained period of low mood and/or loss of interest or pleasure, often accompanied by changes in sleep, appetite, energy, concentration, motivation and self-worth that persist for weeks or longer and begin to affect everyday life. For some people, it follows a significant loss or stressful life event; for others, it seems to emerge without an obvious explanation.
Therapy aims to understand depression in the context of your life as a whole. Rather than focusing solely on symptoms, it offers an opportunity to explore the emotional experiences, relationships, patterns, and personal history that may have shaped the depression and what continues to maintain it.
Some depression is less defined by intensity and more by how long it lasts. You may still be working, maintaining responsibilities, and appearing to cope, while noticing that things take more effort than they used to, enjoyment feels harder to access, or you no longer feel quite like yourself. Low mood that persists over time is worth understanding, even if it does not feel “serious enough” to seek help for.
Persistent depressive disorder involves a longer-lasting pattern of depressed mood and related symptoms, sometimes continuing for years. For some people, it becomes so familiar that it starts to feel like part of their personality or simply the way life is. Therapy can explore the experiences, relationships, patterns, and ways of relating to yourself that may be connected to this ongoing sense of disconnection, while making space to understand what has contributed to it and what may help things shift.
The transition into parenthood can bring profound changes, emotionally and practically. While many people expect this time to feel joyful, it can also involve exhaustion, uncertainty, loss of identity, and feelings that are difficult to talk about. Postpartum depression can involve persistent low mood, loss of interest or pleasure, anxiety, guilt, emotional numbness, or a sense of feeling disconnected from yourself or your new role.
For some people, these experiences are shaped not only by the demands of early parenthood, but also by previous experiences, relationships, expectations, and changes in how they understand themselves. Therapy can provide space to make sense of what you are experiencing, including the emotional impact of this transition and the patterns or pressures that may be contributing to your distress.
Some people experience periods of depression alongside periods of mania or hypomania, which could indicate that bipolar disorder is part of the picture. These periods may involve feeling unusually energised, needing much less sleep, having racing thoughts, feeling unusually confident or irritable, or behaving in ways that feel different from your usual self.
Where bipolar disorder is part of the picture, therapy can provide space to understand and manage the impact of these experiences, while exploring how they affect emotions, relationships, and sense of self, alongside appropriate medical care where needed.
Depression and anxiety often occur together, and each can influence the other. Living with ongoing anxiety can be exhausting, while depression can bring its own worries — about the future, relationships, responsibilities, or whether things will improve. When both are present, it can sometimes feel difficult to know where one ends and the other begins.
Avoidance can become part of this cycle. Anxiety may make situations feel overwhelming, and avoiding them can provide short-term relief. Over time, however, withdrawal can reduce opportunities for connection, confidence, and positive experiences, which may contribute to low mood. Therapy can support you to make sense of how anxiety and depression interact in your own life, while exploring the experiences, patterns, and circumstances that may be contributing to both. Over time, this deeper understanding can create space for new ways of responding to difficult thoughts, feelings, and experiences.
Read More About Anxiety Treatment
Grief is a natural response to loss, and it does not follow a predictable timeline. Feelings of sadness, disorientation, anger, numbness, or a loss of interest in everyday life can all be part of the grieving process.
At times, grief and depression can become intertwined. A significant loss can bring older experiences of loss to the surface, or awaken feelings that were difficult to process at the time — including anger, relief, guilt, or ambivalence. For some people, grief can also become connected with longstanding emotional difficulties or patterns that existed before the loss.
Therapy can provide space to honour and make sense of your loss, while also exploring whether other experiences have become intertwined with your grief. Alicia works with grief and loss as a core part of her practice.
Burnout and depression can look very similar from the inside. Both can involve exhaustion, reduced motivation, difficulty concentrating, withdrawal, and a sense of no longer feeling like yourself.
Burnout is often used to describe the effects of prolonged stress, particularly in relation to work, study, caregiving, or other ongoing demands. These experiences can affect many areas of life, not just the situation that contributed to them. Depression can also emerge in the context of prolonged stress or difficult circumstances, but may involve broader changes in mood, self-worth, and how you experience yourself and the world.
The two can overlap, and understanding what is happening in your particular circumstances is often more helpful than trying to draw a strict line between them. Therapy can provide space to explore the pressures you have been carrying, the experiences that have shaped your responses to stress, and what may help things shift.
Read more about stress and burnout.
Anhedonia refers to a reduced ability to experience pleasure, interest, or a sense of connection with things that would usually matter to you. It may feel like food is less enjoyable, music no longer moves you, or time with people you care about feels strangely distant. It can occur alongside sadness, but for some people the most difficult part is the sense of emotional flatness or disconnection.
When pleasure and interest feel diminished, it can be frustrating and difficult to understand, particularly when other aspects of depression begin to improve. Therapy can provide space to explore anhedonia in the context of your life — including what may have contributed to this sense of disconnection, what it means for you, and how you relate to your emotions more broadly.
Depression can gradually affect many areas of life. Things that once felt manageable may begin to require more effort: responding to messages, keeping up with responsibilities, engaging in relationships, or finding enjoyment in everyday activities. Sleep, motivation, concentration, and self-confidence can all be affected, while self-critical thoughts may become louder: I’m being lazy. I’m being difficult. Everyone else copes.
Much of this can remain invisible to the people around you, which can make depression feel isolating. Therapy provides a space to understand what you are experiencing, including the thoughts, emotions, and patterns that may be contributing to how depression affects your life.
Depression develops through a complex interaction of psychological, relational, biological and life experiences. Understanding these influences can help make sense of both what you are experiencing and why it may have emerged.
Psychodynamic therapy takes an approach that explores depression within the context of your individual circumstances. It considers the emotional experiences, relationships, and patterns that may have shaped how you relate to yourself and the world around you. Developing a deeper understanding of these influences can create new perspectives on your experience and open possibilities for change.
Depression root causes vary, and aren’t always obvious. Areas that might come into view over the course of therapy could include:
Alicia also considers the wider context in which depression develops. Relationships, life circumstances, class, sexuality, and broader social and cultural pressures all shape mental health. Depression is not simply an individual problem; it emerges within the context of a person’s life as a whole.
Many people wait far longer than they need to, usually because they’ve decided their depression isn’t severe enough to warrant help. You do not need to be in crisis, and you do not need a diagnosis, to benefit from therapy.
It may be worth speaking with a psychologist if:
If you’re having thoughts of harming yourself, please use the crisis contacts above. Support is available right now, and it’s worth reaching for.
Alicia Shevlin (she/her) is a registered psychologist and clinical psychology registrar, based in Melbourne and working with adults across Australia via telehealth. She holds a Master of Applied Psychology (Clinical Psychology) from Victoria University, where her training took an integrative approach spanning both cognitive behavioural and psychodynamic traditions. In her current practice, she works psychodynamically.
Alicia has worked in mental health since 2016, beginning in the domestic and family violence sector and going on to work across community, university and public health settings before entering private practice. Mood and anxiety disorders are among her core areas of practice. She works with adults aged 18 and over, and with people of all genders, sexual orientations and sex characteristics.
AHPRA registration: PSY0002275993
Member: Australian Psychological Society
Alicia has training in a range of evidence-based psychological approaches, including forms of cognitive behavioural therapy such as Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT). While different therapeutic approaches offer different ways of understanding and working with psychological difficulties, Alicia’s current practice focuses exclusively on psychodynamic therapy.
In psychodynamic therapy for depression, attention is given not only to symptoms, but also to the experiences, relationships, emotional patterns, and internal pressures that may be connected to how depression has developed and continues to affect your life.
In practice, this may involve putting words to experiences that have been difficult to articulate, noticing patterns as they emerge, understanding the emotional meaning of symptoms, and developing a different relationship with yourself. For many people experiencing depression, self-criticism can be particularly painful, and developing greater self-understanding and self-compassion can become an important part of the work.
Alicia’s manner is warm, thoughtful, and compassionate, while also gently supporting reflection on experiences that may at times feel difficult. She works in a non-directive way — thinking alongside you rather than providing instructions — and takes care to move at a pace that feels manageable. Psychodynamic therapy provides an opportunity for sustained exploration of your experiences, with the aim of developing greater understanding and creating possibilities for change.
People seek help for depression with different preferences and questions about treatment. Some people find antidepressant medication helpful, while others prefer to explore their difficulties through psychological therapy without medication. For others, medication alongside psychological therapy feels like an appropriate approach.
Psychological therapy is an evidence-based treatment for depression in its own right. Alicia’s work focuses on understanding depression within the context of your life — including your experiences, relationships, emotional patterns, and the circumstances that may be contributing to how you are feeling. This work can be valuable whether or not you are also using medication as part of your treatment plan.
Alicia is a psychologist and does not prescribe medication or provide medical advice about starting, stopping, reducing, or changing medication. Decisions about medication are made with your GP or psychiatrist, and any changes to prescribed medication should always be discussed with them.
Therapy can provide space to explore your experiences of depression, including any questions or uncertainties you may have about different forms of support. For some people, these conversations also connect with broader questions about how they understand their difficulties, what has shaped them, and what they hope might change.
Alicia works with individuals and does not provide couples therapy. Sessions are for therapeutic support and are not conducted for medico-legal purposes such as court reports. Third-party funding via WorkCover, TAC or DVA is not currently available.
Alicia is Melbourne-based and works entirely via telehealth, with sessions held over Zoom.
For depression specifically, that matters more than it might seem. When motivation is low, and energy is scarce, the practical demands of an appointment — getting dressed properly, travelling across the city, parking, sitting in a waiting room — can be the thing that stops it happening at all.
Online depression therapy removes those steps. Attending from your own home, from a chair you already know, takes considerably less out of you, and that difference often determines whether therapy continues past the first few weeks.
Consistency is a large part of what makes therapy work. Depression help via telehealth tends to be easier to sustain through the periods when getting anywhere feels impossible — which are, of course, exactly the periods when continuing matters most.
Practically, you’ll need a private space where you won’t be overheard, a stable internet connection, and a device with a camera. Headphones help.
Appointments are available on weekday mornings only, scheduled in Australian Eastern Standard Time (or AEDT during Victorian daylight saving), both before and after 9:00 am AEST.
Service area: Because of those session times, depression treatment with Alicia is typically most suitable for people in Victoria, New South Wales, Queensland, South Australia, the ACT and the Northern Territory.
Whether you’re looking for a depression therapist in Victoria, an online depression psychologist in Melbourne, or telehealth sessions from Sydney, Brisbane, Adelaide, Canberra, Hobart, Perth, or Darwin, therapy is available within those time zones.
No. Many people begin therapy without a formal diagnosis. People often come when they feel stuck, flat, exhausted or unlike themselves, or when something simply doesn’t feel right. Alicia can provide a diagnosis when it is clinically useful, but you do not need one in order to begin therapy.
Psychodynamic therapy explores the experiences, relationships, emotions, and patterns that shape depression — including aspects of yourself and your history that may influence how you feel and relate to the world without always being obvious. Rather than focusing only on managing symptoms, it aims to develop a deeper understanding of your experience and how change may become possible over time.
When depression has been present for a long time or keeps returning, it can begin to feel like a fixed part of life. Psychodynamic therapy explores the experiences, relationships, and patterns that may be connected to depression, creating space for deeper understanding that can facilitate meaningful change over time. For some people, particularly those who have tried approaches focused primarily on symptom management and feel that something remains unresolved, a more exploratory approach may potentially offer a more meaningful way of working.
CBT typically focuses on identifying and changing unhelpful thoughts and behaviours, often through structured exercises. Psychodynamic therapy explores the experiences, relationships, emotions, and patterns that may shape depression, including how these have developed over time. Alicia focuses exclusively on psychodynamic therapy. This approach may be particularly suited to people who want to explore their experience of depression in greater depth, including when difficulties feel longstanding or when they are seeking a deeper understanding of recurring patterns.
Alicia generally suggests beginning with weekly or fortnightly sessions, as this supports continuity and allows space for the therapeutic work to develop over time. As therapy progresses, session frequency can be reviewed and adjusted depending on your circumstances and needs. Some people choose to continue with regular sessions over the longer term, while others reduce frequency as things become more manageable.
Treatment duration can be difficult to predict, depending on your circumstances and what you hope to achieve. Alicia’s approach is generally suited to medium- to long-term work, providing space to explore longstanding difficulties in greater depth. The pace and duration of therapy are discussed throughout treatment. Under a Mental Health Treatment Plan, Medicare rebates are available for up to 10 individual sessions per calendar year, and therapy can continue beyond that at the private billing rate if you choose.
No. You can book directly with Alicia without a referral or a Mental Health Treatment Plan. A referral from your GP or psychiatrist is only required if you want to claim a Medicare rebate. Without one, sessions are privately billed. See current session fees.
Yes. Alicia works entirely via telehealth over Zoom with adults across Australia. Because appointments are weekday mornings in AEST, sessions are typically most suitable for people in Victoria, New South Wales, Queensland, South Australia, the ACT and the Northern Territory.
Alicia provides psychodynamic therapy because she believes this approach offers a meaningful way of exploring the deeper patterns underlying psychological difficulties. It may be particularly suited to people who are interested in understanding why certain patterns continue, even when they already have insight into them.
Yes, with a valid Mental Health Treatment Plan and referral from your GP or psychiatrist — depression is one of the most common reasons a plan is prepared. The session fee under the Medicare Better Access Program is $210, with a rebate of $101.55 per session paid into your nominated bank account by Services Australia, for up to 10 sessions per calendar year.
Rebates are subject to eligibility requirements. Enquiries are also welcome from clients accessing therapy through the Victorian Financial Assistance Scheme (FAS, formerly VOCAT), and from self-managed and plan-managed NDIS participants.
Yes, psychologists are qualified to diagnose depression, and Alicia is trained to do so.
Depression can make many things feel more difficult, including reaching out for support. Taking the first step can feel daunting, particularly when you are already feeling low or overwhelmed.
The free 15-minute phone call is a simple way to begin: a brief conversation, no obligation, and time afterwards to consider whether therapy feels like the right next step.
The information below outlines what therapy involves, how telehealth sessions work, and practical details regarding fees and Medicare rebates.
Learn about how a range of mental health issues can be treated with psychodynamic therapy.
Access therapy without leaving home. Learn what to expect from beginning telehealth therapy.
Medicare rebates available for eligible patients. A referral from your GP or psychiatrist is required.