About Ranka
Ranka Smith is a counsellor with 26 years of experience working in the United Kingdom. She supports people who are feeling overwhelmed by stress, anxiety, low self-esteem or depression. She also works with those facing relationship strain, grief, addiction concerns and difficulties with intimacy.
Her approach is practical and person-focused. She creates an open space where thoughts and feelings can be spoken about without judgement. She pays attention to how the body and emotions connect, bringing in somatic awareness alongside talking work.
Background and approach
Ranka uses a mix of approaches to match each person’s needs. This includes attachment-based ideas to look at patterns from early relationships and client-centred work that places the person’s experience at the core. Cognitive behavioural techniques are offered to help change unhelpful thoughts and behaviours.
She has long experience supporting people through life changes and complex emotional challenges. Areas she addresses include compassion fatigue, bipolar mood concerns, eating and sleep difficulties, and coping with ageing or end-of-life matters. Immigration and family of origin issues are also within her focus.
Sessions can be carried out in English, Bosnian, Croatian or Serbian. Ranka works with people who need help navigating anxiety, trauma, substance-related problems and relationship patterns, and she adapts her methods to each person’s goals and pace.
How somatic and relational approaches work online
Ranka blends somatic awareness with attachment-based and client-centred work to help people notice how the body and emotions interact. Somatic-based work pays attention to bodily sensations and simple grounding techniques to reduce overwhelm and support regulation. Attachment-based ideas look at relationship patterns formed early in life to understand current struggles and improve emotional connection.Client-centred therapy places the person’s experience at the heart of sessions, so the counsellor follows each person’s pace and priorities. Finding the right mix of methods is part of the process and is decided together. She will discuss goals, try different ways of working and adapt the approach to what feels most helpful and realistic for the individual.
Online therapy makes this collaborative work accessible through flexible formats. Video calls allow face-to-face interaction and eye contact; phone sessions remove the need for video while keeping live conversation; live chat and text messaging give a way to work in shorter or more frequent exchanges. These options help people fit therapy around work, family and travel, while still doing meaningful emotional and somatic work with a registered professional.
Frequently asked questions
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Specialties and expertise
Top specialties
- Stress, Anxiety
- Relationship issues
- Self esteem
Also works with
- Abandonment
- Addictions
- ADHD
- Aging and geriatric issues
- Anger management
- Attachment issues
- Avoidant personality
- Bipolar disorder
- Body image
- Codependency
- Communication problems
- Compassion fatigue
- Coping with life changes
- Dependent personality
- Depression
- Dissociation
- Drug and alcohol addiction
- Eating and food-related issues
- Eating disorders
- Emptiness
- Family conflicts
- Family of origin issues
- Grief
- Hospice and end-of-life counseling
- Immigration issues
- Impulsivity
- Infidelity
- Intimacy-related issues
- Isolation / loneliness
- LGBT
- Mood disorders
- Obsessions, compulsions, and OCD
- Panic disorder and panic attacks
- Parenting issues
- Personality disorders
- Phobias
- Post-traumatic stress
- Postpartum depression
- Prejudice and discrimination
- Process addiction (porn, exercise, gambling)
- Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD)
- Self-harm
- Self-love
- Sex addiction
- Sleeping disorders
- Social anxiety and phobia
- Trauma and abuse
- Women's issues
- Workplace issues
Therapeutic approaches
- Experience
- 26 years
- Licensed
- Languages
- English, Bosnian, Croatian, Serbian