The length of your treatment will very much depend on your unique circumstances and needs and the type of therapy you choose.

Cognitive behavioural therapy is designed to be short-term and will often last six to 20 sessions. Psychodynamic, psychoanalytic, and existential therapies tend to be longer term, and many last for many months or even years. Research shows that psychodynamic therapies longer than 18 months are very effective for symptoms such as depression.

Keep in mind that once you start sessions, new issues and angles can arise that you then want to explore. It is of course possible to also see improvement faster than you expected.