Laura Batten
Counselling Services
About Me
Kia ora, I'm Laura!
I'm a registered counsellor based in Wellington City, originally from Canada and proud to have called Aotearoa home for nearly a decade.
What draws me to counselling is that I've always been drawn to people. To their stories, their complexity, and their resilience. I know what it's like to navigate life's harder seasons, to carry more than your share, and to wonder whether what you're feeling is "normal." That curiosity is what brought me to this work, and it's what keeps me here.
My clinical experience includes working at the New Zealand Prostitutes' Collective, where I had the privilege of supporting people in a community that is too often underserved, and at Kowhai Therapeutic Services, where I worked across both counselling and workplace wellbeing. I now work from a private office in Wellington City, seeing clients in person and online across Aotearoa.
Outside of the counselling room, you'll find me in the garden or baking something with questionable success. I think there's something grounding about working with your hands, and I bring that same grounded, unhurried energy into my work with clients.
Professionally, I hold a Bachelor of Counselling and Addictions Practice and am a provisional member of the New Zealand Association of Counsellors (NZAC). I work with adults navigating anxiety, overwhelm, life transitions, and the patterns inherited from family of origin, with a particular passion for supporting women who over-function.
My Philosophy
I believe that no one should have to sit alone with their thoughts, their feelings, or the questions that keep them up at night.
My role isn't to hand you answers or tell you how to live; it's to work alongside you while we work to find your own. I think people are far more capable of insight and change than they're often given credit for, and sometimes all it takes is the right space, the right pace, and someone who genuinely wants to understand.
Counselling with me is collaborative, unhurried, and grounded in the belief that you are the expert on your own life. I'm just here to help you hear yourself a little more clearly.