Relationship counsellor Debbie Pynsent​ has shot down many male reputations

Life As We Know It 93: There are times when Debbie will talk about her own gentleman friends but curiously her own entanglements are of relatively short duration

Illustration by Mark Long

'The thing about Gary," Debbie earnestly proposes, "is that, deep down, he's actually a very caring person. I know there were those issues with – Maxine, was her name? – and then being let go by Legal & General can't have helped his self-esteem, but you've really brought him out of himself, Den, you really have, and getting him to commit like that, well, it's just fantastic, honestly it is."

The other women seated around the table at the Faversham Costa, where so many male reputations have, over the years, been shot down, ruined or otherwise disposed of, nod their heads. Undoubtedly, Denise has done an excellent job with the once feckless and seriously overweight Gary, who only last week joined a gymnasium and put down a deposit on a two-bedroom terraced house, but it is nice to have these judgements conceptualised in a way that, mysteriously, only Debbie seems able to bring off.

A plump-faced and somewhat shapeless girl in her mid-twenties, with a great deal of costume jewellery strewn around her person, Debbie is very interested in "relationships".Her favourite television programmes are of the kind in which sofa-bound celebrities discuss how they feel about each other, and she is a great one for books with titles such as Discovering Your Inner Self or Soulmates – and How to Find Them.

"Then I had Abby ring me up about her new partner, Justin," Debbie goes on. "And I had to say, 'Abs, he's a nice guy, he really is, but I've known him a long time – you remember when he used to go out with Shelley-Anne and they ran that dry-cleaners? – and I really wonder whether he's the one for you, seeing that he's never been able to manage his anger.'"

The women – Denise, Gaby and Jackie – nod again. They know all about anger management, along with coming home late and the danger of joint bank accounts. "Of course," Debbie continues, "part of the problem is that Abby's never got over Rob."

There are times, in the course of these fortnightly sit-downs, when Debbie will talk about her own gentleman friends – Martin from Dixons and Gordon who wrought such havoc with her heart during a trip to Centre Parcs – but curiously her own entanglements are of relatively short duration. In fact, there is a strong suspicion among the Costa cronies that she prefers talking about relationships to actually conducting them.