Counselling Services in Burnaby and Across BC
Support That Goes Beyond the Surface
Whether you are navigating an immediate issue or working through patterns that have impacted you for many years, I offer psychotherapy that will help you to understand yourself more deeply in order to get to the root of your concerns.
Our work together will often involve exploring family history, social and cultural influences, and traumatic experiences, but will also build upon the inner resources, strengths, and gifts you already have.
I also bring in creative and experiential techniques such as mindfulness, breathwork, art, writing, and nature-based practices to support healing that goes beyond words alone.
Areas of practice
-
Anxiety is one of the most common reasons people seek counselling, and is often the most misunderstood. It is not simply worry or nervousness. At its core, anxiety is a nervous system response, a signal that some part of you does not feel safe. It can show up as racing thoughts, physical tension, avoidance, perfectionism, difficulty making decisions, or a persistent sense that something is wrong even when life looks fine on the outside.
When the nervous system has been exposed to prolonged stress, trauma, overwhelm, or emotional pain, it can begin to remain in a heightened state of protection—even when danger is no longer present.
Working from a mind–body approach allows us to address chronic fight, flight, freeze, or shutdown responses, while Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT) provides a framework to explore the thoughts and beliefs that feed anxious patterns, helping your system learn that it is safe to settle.
-
Living with chronic pain, illness, fatigue, or burnout is exhausting in ways that go far beyond the physical. It can affect your sense of identity, your relationships, your ability to work, and your hopes for the future. You may also feel burdened by unrealistic expectations of healing held by your self, those close to you, and society in general, making it a struggle to set important boundaries around what you can and can't do.
It often brings with it painful feelings of grief, fear, shame, discouragement and deep despair which if not dealt with can lead to pushing too hard through signals of pain and fatigue, or becoming hypervigilant to both internal and external threats. When the brain and body begin to perceive danger everywhere, even safe situations can trigger further symptoms.
A mind-body approach using Pain Reprocessing Therapy (PRT) helps the brain gradually relearn safety. Through increasing awareness of nervous system patterns, reducing fear around symptoms and sensations, and developing new experiences of calm and regulation, the brain can begin to shift out of chronic protection mode so that symptoms can begin to ease.
As a person with lived experience of chronic pain, fibromyalgia, and ME/CFS, who has seen profound improvements through these approaches, I am passionate about offering this treatment to others.
-
If you have always felt things more deeply than those around you, found yourself overwhelmed by noise, busy environments, or interpersonal dynamics, or have grown up hearing that you are "too sensitive”, you may have Sensory Processing Sensitivity. This is not a flaw or a diagnosis. It is a genetic temperament trait shared by approximately 20% of the population, and it comes with genuine gifts alongside its challenges.
Highly sensitive people are often described as being deeply empathetic, conscientious, and very observant of subtle details. They also tend to be more vulnerable to stress, overstimulation, and the long-term effects of difficult early experiences. Many HSP clients come to counselling carrying years of self-doubt and a quiet sense of being misunderstood or not quite fitting in. They often wonder whether they are too much, too emotional, or simply too hard to help.
As a highly sensitive person myself, I understand the complexity of this trait firsthand. I offer a gentle, attuned approach that does not minimize or pathologize your sensitivity, but instead helps you understand it, work with it, and ultimately see it as the asset it truly is.
-
Depression is not simply sadness. It can feel like a heaviness that has no clear source, a loss of meaning or interest in things that once mattered, a sense of disconnection from yourself and others, or a quiet but persistent belief that things will not get better. Grief, whether it follows a loss, a life transition, or the slow erosion of something you hoped for, can bring its own kind of darkness that is often underestimated by those around you.
Internal Family Systems (IFS) therapy can be particularly helpful in treating depression and grief because it recognizes that we all develop different parts of ourselves in response to life experiences, relationships, and emotional challenges. Rather than seeing depression as something wrong with you, IFS understands that specific parts of you may feel hopeless, lost, numb, or highly self-critical in an attempt to protect more vulnerable emotional wounds underneath.
Rather than judging or trying to eliminate these feelings, IFS helps us approach them with curiosity and compassion, creating space to understand what they may be protecting. As deeper wounds are acknowledged and healed, many people experience greater self-compassion, hope, and engagement with life.
-
Addiction is an attempt to cope. Whether it shows up as substance use, disordered eating, workaholism, overuse of social media or gaming, these compulsive behaviours begin as a way to manage pain, and often provide relief even if it is only temporary. They all in their own way serve to numb and distract from intense emotions such as shame, guilt, anger, and emptiness.
People struggling with addiction often carry deep internal conflicts, painful emotional experiences, and self-defeating beliefs that developed over time—frequently in response to stress, trauma, attachment wounds, or unmet emotional needs.
Working from psychodynamic, attachment, and IFS perspectives, addictive behaviours are often understood not simply as “bad habits,” but as attempts to escape distress, regulate emotions, and to establish some control. Recovery in my view, is not about eliminating the behaviour through willpower alone. It is about approaching yourself and your history with curiosity and compassion, understanding what the behaviour has been doing for you, and gradually building new ways to meet those needs.
-
Relationship struggles and low self-worth are deeply interconnected. When we do not feel fundamentally worthy or secure within ourselves, it shapes how we show up with others, how we communicate, what we tolerate, and how we respond to conflict or closeness. Over time, painful relational patterns can reinforce the very beliefs about ourselves we most want to move beyond.
These patterns may also contribute to concerns such as people-pleasing, fear of rejection or abandonment, difficulty trusting others, relationship conflict or avoidance, perfectionism, low self-esteem, emotional dependency, loneliness, or challenges with boundaries and intimacy.
Drawing on attachment theory and IFS, we look at where these patterns began and how they have been trying to protect you, so that you can develop new ways of relating to yourself and others that feel more authentic, secure, and connected.
“There is only one Journey. Going inside Yourself”
-Rainer Maria Rilke
How much does it cost?
Fees are set in accordance with the BCACC recommended fee schedule for experienced Registered Clinical Counsellors. Fees as of January 1/2026:
50-minute in-person session = $155.00
50-minute phone/online session = $155.00
BC Medical Services Plan does not currently cover fees for Counselling and Psychotherapy. Many extended health care plans or employee assistance plans provide some coverage for services offered by a Registered Clinical Counsellor, and receipts will be provided following each session.
I feel passionately that counselling services should be accessible to everyone, and because of this, I have reserved a few sliding scale spots that are available on a first-come, first-served basis for those facing current financial difficulty.
To avoid being charged for a missed session, 24 hours’ notice of cancellation is required.
Service FAQs
-
No referral or diagnosis is needed. You can reach out directly to book a consultation and we will take it from there.
-
Absolutely. Many clients come in with overlapping challenges, such as anxiety and chronic pain, or depression and relationship difficulties. My integrative approach means we can hold the full picture of what you are experiencing rather than addressing things in isolation.
-
You do not need to know. Part of my role is to understand what you are dealing with and draw on the approaches that are most likely to help. We figure that out together over the first few sessions.
-
It is a meaningful focus of my work. As an HSP myself, I have a particular understanding of and commitment to supporting sensitive individuals, though I work with a wide range of clients and concerns.
-
PRT was developed for chronic pain and fatigue, but the principles behind it, which involve calming an overactivated nervous system, are relevant to anxiety, burnout, and stress-related conditions as well.
-
That is more common than you might think, and it does not mean therapy cannot work for you. It may mean the approach or the fit was not quite right. I am happy to talk through what has and has not worked in the past during our consultation.
Ready to Take the First Step?
Finding the right therapist is one of the most important parts of the process, and it is okay to take your time with it. I offer a free 15-minute consultation so we can connect, you can ask any questions you have, and we can get a sense of whether working together feels like a good fit. There is no pressure and no commitment. Just a conversation.