This 8-day certificate course is facilitated by Cabby Laffy, Duane Yon, and Polly McAfee. The course is designed for qualified counsellors, psychotherapists or psychologists who would like to become more skilled in working therapeutically with psychosexual issues.
This 8-day certificate course, facilitated by Cabby Laffy and Polly McAfee, is designed for qualified counsellors, psychotherapists or psychologists who would like to become more skilled in working therapeutically with psychosexual issues. Through theoretical teaching and experiential work – including group discussion, case vignettes, and skills practice – you will gain conceptual insights, practical tools and more confidence to work with clients’ sexual concerns. These concerns may range from lack of sexual interest to pain during penetration, to difficulty asserting boundaries or communicating preferences, to recovery from sexual trauma, and the psychosexual impact of shame. The course also gives an overview of sexual anatomy for the purposes of enhancing pleasure. It looks at ways to help clients keep desire alive in long term relationships.
Our approach celebrates Gender, Sex and Relationship Diversity (GSRD), avoiding assumptions of normativity. We include the impact of societal and cultural beliefs on our sexual lives – along with the importance of social identity and positionality for sexual expression. The trainers advocate working with both/all partners where possible when treating psychosexual issues, and the course will include reference to working with individually and with couples/relationships.
This course has a sex-positive philosophy, in which sex has a valid place within therapeutic work. Overall, this training provides a practical toolkit of working with psychosexual material in therapy, backed up by current theory. It provides a platform if you lack confidence or specialist knowledge about working in the therapy room with sexual expression and sexual problems – especially when sexual issues are indicators that the conditions for good sex aren’t in place or something has gone off track with sex in a relationship.
This training provides deeper understanding and a practical toolkit for working with sexual issues in therapy. This equips you with more confidence and competence around psychosexual issues.
It is designed to give participants a CPD certificate as evidence of having taken additional specialised training in psychosexual therapy for couples and other types of relationship – to equip therapists with relevant knowledge and models when addressing sex in their therapy work.
The course is designed for therapists to begin this training without any prior experience of working with psychosexual topics. However, those practitioners who already work with couples or relationship issues may find this training to be useful as an additional layer of learning, by adding further dimensions to this work.
This course rests on the existing scope of practice for which the participant is already qualified, such as psychotherapy or coaching, or client groups such as young people.
This training is offered as a CPD programme (Continuous Professional Development) accredited by COSRT as thematic training. If you are interested in membership of COSRT, please check the COSRT website for details of their membership requirements to see where you stand.
The syllabus includes:
This course has a bio-psycho-social underpinning – where the body’s physiology and the client’s psychological process are considered within the sociological context.
The structure of the course includes:
There are two options for taking this course.
The first is by attendance only, where learning is absorbed by participation during the course days. For this option, there is no assessment other than attendance and participation. This route leads to the Certificate in Psychosexual Therapy awarded by The Grove.
The other option leads to the COSRT Level 5 accredited certification. This involves undertaking a written assignment of up to 2,500 words, with a quiz on course content. The Certificate is awarded by The Grove, with an additional narrative and logo indicating that the assessments for the COSRT Level 5 certification have been achieved. Students can choose this option at any time during the lifetime of the course.
A fee of £150 to cover administration and assignment marking is payable for the COSRT Level 5 certification. This is an optional extra.
An upgrade to COSRT Level 5 certification is possible for those who completed a prior intake, or who wish to take the written assignments after their course has completed, by payment of the additional fee of £150.
But please note that the COSRT Level 5 certification is available only for people who have taken the full 8-day training with The Grove. This is because the assignments rely on material taught specifically on The Grove’s course and the COSRT course accreditation is awarded to The Grove on that basis.
We also recommend that any practitioner who provides couple/relationship therapy seeks supervision from a suitably qualified professional, to support this important area of work.
The award of the Certificate in Psychosexual Therapy will be issued upon completion of the course, provided that a minimum 80% attendance has been met and the course fee has been paid in full. If these criteria are not met, a CPD attendance letter will be provided – or the student can submit a written reflective piece covering the content that has been missed, which will be marked before the full Certificate award is issued.
A digital certificate is provided as a matter of routine. Paper certificates despatched by Royal Mail are available upon request. Replacement certificates are available on request.
We also recommend that practitioner undertaking sex therapy seeks supervision from a suitably-qualified professional, to support this important area of work.
This intake takes place in person, held in the training venue at NCVO, London N1, taught by Cabby Laffy and Duane Yon and Polly McAfee.
Friday and Saturday dates in Spring 2024:
8 & 9 March
12 & 13 April
10 & 11 May
21 & 22 June
Times each day:
10am – 4:30pm
This intake is currently underway, and is now closed for applications. If you are interested in taking this course in-person, please see the Spring 2025 intake for available dates.
This intake takes place online by Zoom, taught by Cabby Laffy and Polly McAfee.
Friday and Saturday dates in Autumn 2024:
13 & 14 September
18 & 19 October
15 & 16 November
13 & 14 December
Times each day:
10am – 4:30pm
This intake takes place in person, held in the training venue at NCVO, London N1, taught by Cabby Laffy and Duane Yon and Polly McAfee.
Friday and Saturday dates in Spring 2025:
28 & 29 March
25 & 26 April
16 & 17 May
20 & 21 June
Times each day:
10am – 4:30pm
This intake takes place online by Zoom, taught by Cabby Laffy and Polly McAfee.
Friday and Saturday dates in Autumn 2025:
19 & 20 September
17 & 18 October
14 & 15 November
12 & 13 December
Times each day:
10am – 4:30pm
Certification by The Grove including verification of 50 CPD hours:
£2,000 + VAT = £2,400 payable in full or by instalments.
Everyone who completes the course satisfactorily will receive this certification.
COSRT Level 5 certification:
There is an additional fee of £125 + VAT = £150 to cover marking and administration of the assignments required for the COSRT Level 5 award. This is an optional extra. An updated certificate will be issued when satisfactory marking of the assignments has been completed, as detailed in the course handbook.
After paying the deposit of £480 including VAT, the remainder of the fee can be paid by instalments as indicated on the invoice usually reaching the full total by 6 weeks before the final weekend of the training.
The course fee includes all training materials and the CPD certificate.
Some reduced-fee places may be awarded depending on student circumstances, subject to availability. The course fee can also be invoiced fully or partially to an employer or funding organisation. Please contact us for details.
This information is applicable for courses attended in person.
Tea and coffee and water are served during each day of the course.
A light sandwich lunch is served each day. This includes fillings with meat, fish, vegetarian and vegan options. Please let us know if you have particular dietary requirements such as gluten-free.
Alternatively, there are many cafes and restaurants near the venue such as at Kings Cross station or in York Way, where different lunch options can be purchased if preferred.
Please note that only food and drink served by the venue may be consumed on the premises.
I really enjoyed the experiential nature of the course. It made me reflect on my own values around sex and intimacy.
Student
Enrol for the Spring 2024 intake
Training with us empowers a positive difference in the lives of the people you support.
Read all about it here
Training with us empowers a positive difference in the lives of the people you support.
Read all about it here
Cabby Laffy has been a facilitator of training and workshops since 1991.
Duane Yon is a psychosexual and intercultural therapist and supervisor.
Polly McAfee is is a graduate of the Diploma in Integrative Psychosexual Therapy.
Applicants are expected to be qualified and experienced professionals in a mental health or helping profession, who are established in their practice. This will be covered in the application form. All applicants are expected to:
The Grove’s courses have been successfully recognised as CPD for members of the following membership bodies: BACP, UKCP, COSRT, NCIP, NCPS, AHPP, ACC, BPS, among others. Organisations such as universities, schools and colleges, several NHS trusts, Relate, MIND, and Place2B have also supported some of their therapists in taking training with The Grove. This is a mark of unofficial validation of our courses as worthy of being listed on the CPD logs by members these organisations and therapists.
We are proud of the multi-disciplinary nature of our courses, where learners from a variety of mental health backgrounds and other related fields are welcome, subject to fulfilling our application criteria.
The Grove Practice is accredited by NCIP (National Council for Integrative Psychotherapists) as a CPD training centre. As such, all The Grove’s courses are awarded NCIP accreditation for CPD (Continuous Professional Development).
This accreditation provides reassurance regarding high standards of teaching and course content.
The Grove’s Certificate in Psychosexual Therapy has been awarded Thematic Training Accreditation by COSRT at Level 5. This accreditation is a mark of endorsement by a leading professional body in the UK, mapping in equivalence to the RQF levels regulated by OfQual – although The Grove’s courses are not Ofqual-regulated. Participants who successfully complete this course can use this training certificate as evidence of CPD hours required for ongoing membership of COSRT.
Please note that the course is accredited (not the learner). This course on its own does not infer membership or accreditation by COSRT. Please refer to COSRT’s criteria for membership and practitioner accreditation. This course in itself is unlikely to fulfil COSRT’s requirements for full membership as a psychosexual therapist. Each participant’s background and qualifications may differ. So the recommendation by The Grove is to check the COSRT membership requirements to see how you stand.
This course is taught at academic Level 5 equivalence. This is a post-qualification training which requires overt theoretical evaluation, self-reflection, and interpretation of how to apply the models in mental health settings such as clinical practice or multi-disciplinary teams in organisations. The Grove is setting its own courses at a training level in line with industry-wide language for evaluating the academic level of the course.