Psychotherapy
Move beyond survival mode
Expert therapy rooted in somatic experiencing and parts work — helping you integrate and reclaim your capacity for choice, safety, and connection.
The people I work alongside — therapists, high achievers, helping professionals, creatives, and athletes — often have this in common:
They work incredibly hard
They appear like they have it all together
Yet, inside, they are depleted, self-critical, and exhausted
If that’s you, too, you may give in relationships while longing for care, tenderness, and to be truly seen. You might want boundaries, but struggle with conflict and feel disoriented when your requests are met with dismissal or blame.
Maybe you carry the grief of not being able to move your body as freely as you once did, are navigating bi-cultural family dynamics, or are holding the tension of life’s big decisions, like career shifts, relocation, or wondering whether you want a child.
You’ve likely tried a lot of ways to get unstuck on your own. I want you to know that you haven’t failed. The approach just wasn’t what you needed. Healing was never meant to happen alone, and there’s no quick-fix solution.
My Specializations
Support for therapists, high achievers, helping professionals, creatives, and athletes
Attachment Trauma and Relational Skills
We can explore how relational experiences, ancestry, and social conditioning shape boundaries, caregiving roles, family estrangement, and self-abandonment. This work will help you embody your needs, set relational boundaries with less guilt, and take centred accountability in conflicts, so connection can feel safer and more nourishing.
This work is for clients of all sexual orientations, gender identities, and relationship structures, including queer and polyamorous relationships.
Anxiety and Perfectionism
Notice patterns of anxiety, perfectionism, or caregiving overdrive that can feel automatic — and the guilt or shame that arises when you try to slow down. You’re invited to explore how these patterns are shaped not only by personal history, but also by cultural pressures, scarcity, and messages about moralized worth — cultivating more softness and permission without losing your drive, your values, or your commitment to what matters most.
Trauma Processing
Tend to trauma while recognizing the layered impact of interpersonal harm, systemic violence, and chronic threat. We can work on strengthening confidence, emotional resilience, attunement to your needs, and the ability to reclaim pleasure and vitality. This is done without bypassing the realities and intergenerational traumas that shaped how you learned to survive. This work is intended for those who feel ready to engage with difficult internal experiences and can maintain a sense of safety and grounding outside of sessions.
Burnout
I offer a supportive container for therapists, values-driven professionals, nonprofit leaders, and advocates exhausted from caring deeply within systems that extract and demand endless resilience (all while navigating racism, sexism, queerphobia, ableism, and systemic pressures). I help you cultivate centered accountability, relational boundaries, and embodied self-care, while reducing the physical and mental effects of stress: tension, pain, restlessness, low energy, and brain fog.
Sport Injuries and Re-orienting to Movement
I support athletes and movement-oriented individuals navigating the emotional, psychological, and nervous system impacts of injury. We’ll tend to the grief of lost abilities, disrupted goals, or changes in identity, while rebuilding trust in your body and exploring identity beyond performance. This work invites questioning of grind culture, ableism, and productivity myths, creating space for a safer, more authentic and sustainable relationship with movement.
Life Transitions and Grief
I offer support for adults navigating life transitions. Maybe you’re questioning whether you want to start a family, navigate loss, consider a career shift, or process a breakup or divorce. We can attend to the embodied experience of grief while supporting you to re-orient to new ways of living. This work is a slow and tender process, allowing you to feel into your experiences with support. Over time, we move gradually toward integration, helping you honour your body, your emotions, and the parts of yourself that carry these experiences.
“Alex is a warm and skilled therapist and supervisor with deep knowledge of somatics, physiology, and trauma. She is deeply principled, empathetic, and able to hold individual as well as collective dynamics. I very much appreciated our time as colleagues.”
-Emma Wolley
Registered Social Worker, RSW, MSW, SEP
Session Fees & Scheduling
Sessions are held weekly or bi-weekly on a long-term relational basis.
I offer sessions on a structured schedule, rather than short-term or single-session bookings.
All sessions take place virtually via the JaneApp.
Brief Consultation (20 mins): FREE
$165 per 50 minutes
A limited number of sliding scale rates are available for new and existing clients experiencing financial barriers (e.g., unable to cover basic living expenses, job loss, limited savings, students, individuals supported by ODSP).
My approach is rooted in embodied transformation
The soma—your living body—is a whole organism. It carries your thinking, your internal stances, and billions of years of evolutionary wisdom.
The goal of embodied psychotherapy isn’t to return the body to a “perfectly regulated” state or to control or dominate your emotions. We work on honouring the body’s responses to struggle, emotional pain, and injustice.
I USE A 3 PHASE MODEL OF EMBODIED PSYCHOTHERAPY
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In this phase, we explore how parts of the self have adapted to stress, trauma, or attachment wounds, sometimes remaining “stuck” in fight, flight, or freeze responses as a way of fitting in or keeping you safe. You’ll be invited to practice mindfulness and experiential somatic exercises that build internal stability and a felt sense of safety.
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This phase supports reconnection with exiled or shadowed parts of the psyche. Through a process called titration — feeling a little at a time — you’ll be invited to gently explore the embodied survival energies carried by your inner parts, allowing these experiences to be safely felt, understood, and expressed without overwhelm, expanding your innate capacity for self-regulation.
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This phase brings awareness into purposeful action by integrating somatic and parts-based insights into your daily life. Together, we identify personalized strategies that help you stay connected to your internal wisdom and support ongoing embodied transformation beyond sessions.
The roots of embodied psychotherapy
WHAT INFLUENCES MY WORK
Somatics draw on Indigenous traditions and diverse cultural lineages worldwide. Central to a somatically oriented psychotherapy is the intention to reconnect mind and body — a connection often fractured by trauma, prolonged stress and systemic oppression, and the ongoing impacts of colonization.
Embodied psychotherapy prepares the body for life’s struggles by slowing down, expanding into your growth edges, and taking actions aligned with personal and collective healing. This creates space for discernment, conscious choice, and resilience.
I draw from evidence-based approaches, including:
Somatic Experiencing (SE), a body-oriented method for resolving trauma developed by Peter Levine, Ph.D.
Trauma-Informed Stabilization Treatment (parts work), is an approach for individuals who have experienced prolonged or early-life trauma (CPTSD). It integrates techniques from Sensorimotor Psychotherapy and Internal Family Systems (IFS), as developed by Janina Fisher, Ph.D.
Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT), an approach that fosters psychological resilience and supports value-based action, developed by Stephen Hayes, Ph.D.
My approach is also guided by the teachings of Staci Haines, Resmaa Menakem, and Kai Cheng Thom, whose insights enrich the work by integrating a depth psychology, and liberatory framework to healing.
If you feel done with pushing through, let’s connect
Reach out via the button below. I’ll invite you to join my waitlist or to book a free 30-minute consultation if openings are available.
Frequently Asked Questions
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At this time, I am only registered to provide services to Ontario residents.
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I have a Master of Social Work and I am a Registered Social Worker (registration No. 827744) with the Ontario College of Social Workers and Social Service Workers (OCSWSSW). I adhere to the standards of practice, ethical codes, and guidelines set by the OCSWSSW. To learn more about these standards, you can visit www.ocswssw.org or contact them directly at 416-972-9882.
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Through therapy, you may develop skills and resilience that support you in addressing challenges and navigating barriers more effectively. Many clients also experience relief from trauma symptoms and build healthier relationships with themselves and others.
It’s important to note that the outcome of therapy is not guaranteed. Success depends on factors such as your relationship with your therapist, your current environment, your readiness for change, and your willingness to engage openly and honestly in the process.
Working with me is not appropriate for you if you are dealing with acute trauma related symptoms or need immediate crisis stabilization. My approach may not align with those seeking direct advice, solutions-focused brief therapy, or symptom-focused interventions.
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Starting therapy is an important decision. It is natural to have many questions and even feel nervous starting this new journey. During our 30 minute consultation call I will go over some logistics (e.g., fees, availability, consent, client rights and responsibilities) and invite you to share about your hopes and goals for therapy. Please note that when I am accepting new clients I am prioritizing individuals who are prepared for in depth mindful and somatic processing.
You are also welcome to ask me questions to help you assess therapeutic fit. Some common questions you may consider asking include;
How long have you been practising?
How many clients have you had with similar circumstances to my own? When was the last time you worked with someone similar to me?
What are your strengths and limitations as a therapist?
What is your general philosophy and approach to helping? Are you more directive or more guiding?
How often do you seek consultation?
How do you set up counseling goals? What is success for you?
What is a typical session like? How long are the sessions?
How do I prepare for my first session?
What are your times of availability?
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My practice uses Jane App practice management software to safely store all client personal health information, book appointments, and hold secure telehealth video sessions. Jane App is congruent with the Personal Health and Information Protection Act of Ontario (PHIPA) and the Personal Information Protection and Electronic Documents Act (PIPEDA) of the Federal Government of Canada. All personal information obtained, used and disclosed in therapy sessions is done so with your consent. Specific safeguards are in place including double locked cabinets and 2 password authentication on computers to protect your personal information. You may request a copy of your records at any time.
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My services are covered by the Medical Expense Tax Credit and may be eligible for coverage through the Non-Insured Health Benefits Program. My services can also be claimed under most health insurance plans that recognize Masters of Social Work and/or Registered Social Workers. Receipts will be provided following each session for your records and for health insurance and/or income tax purposes.
Note: I do not bill insurance directly.
I have a Master of Social Work and I am a Registered Social Worker (registration No. 827744).
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Your appointment time is reserved just for you on a weekly or bi-wekly basis. A late cancellation or missed visit leaves a vacancy in my schedule that could be filled by another client needing timely service. As such, a minimum of 24 hours notice is required for any cancellations or changes to your appointment. Missed or cancelled appointments without at least 24 hours’ notice will be billed at 100% of the original appointment rate.
Cancellation fees will only be waived on compassionate grounds, such as in the event of a medical emergency, death in the family, or in the event of an accident or natural disaster.
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No, at this time all psychotherapy offerings are virtual.
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Evidence-based research studies generally show an association between weekly psychotherapy sessions and positive outcomes for clients. This appears to be especially important in the first stage of therapy, when you’re building rapport with your therapist and beginning to get to the roots of things. I work with clients on a weekly or bi-weekly only. In our work together we will check in regularly to assess progress and satisfaction with the support being provided.
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While members of the Ontario College of Social Workers and Social Service Workers (OCSWSSW) are permitted to practice the Controlled Act of Psychotherapy, not all social workers have received clinical training to provide psychotherapy. Many focus on other areas of practice, such as case management, advocacy, or community work.
The College strongly recommends that registrants have extensive clinical experience — typically 2,000–3,000 hours of supervised practice — and significant experience in their area of practice before providing psychotherapy independently. While the College provides guidance in the Practice Guideline for Performing the Controlled Act of Psychotherapy, registrants are not required to confirm that they have met these recommendations or are ready for private practice. This gap can place clients at risk. When choosing a therapist, it’s important to ask about their training, qualifications, and experience — don’t be shy.
I am deeply committed to integrity, ethics, and transparency in clinical practice. I believe social workers have an ethical obligation to clearly communicate their clinical training, including supervised hours, scope of practice, and direct practice experience. My training and experience exceed the expectations of the OCSWSSW. For more information on my credentials, post-graduate professional development, and supervised clinical experience, please see my Education page.