Alexandra is a BC Register Clinical Counsellor with a Bachelor’s degree in Counselling with Distinction, a Masters Degree, and more than twenty years of experience. Alexandra provides therapy to all clients including children, adolescents, individuals, adults, couples and families.

Her specialties in counselling include:

Couples counselling, Depression and anxiety, Confidence and self-esteem, Grief, Child/teen therapy, Parenting/family issues, Attachment issues, Life and work stress, and life transitions.

She uses cognitive behavioural therapy, solution-focused therapy, Gottman couples therapy and Hakomi Somatic therapy, art therapy, play therapy, and EMDR for children.

She believes that play therapy is a powerful modality to address childhood trauma, behavioural challenges, attachment issues and other challenges. Children can have trouble expressing their feelings through talk therapy; however, with a story or a paintbrush, they can access emotions, articulate fears and work out challenges.

Along these lines, she uses art therapy as an effective, creative approach for people of all ages to explore their challenges and understand better their barriers through creating a visual image. She uses art therapy in individual counselling sessions as a tool for self-exploration, communication, and healing.

Alexandra is a BC Register Clinical Counsellor with a Bachelor’s degree in Counselling with Disti... Read More

Much like plodding through snow-laden terrain in winter, forging forward with therapy can be arduous and foreboding. With commitment and repetition, however, a path emerges, and our journey becomes easier and more familiar with time. Whether we are mired in depression, frenetic with anxiety, battling the legacy of a past trauma, or slogging through the monotony of a tired relationship, therapy can provide us with the tools and insights we need to reorient ourselves to the present and create an informed design for the future.

As a Canadian Certified Counsellor with a Masters of Arts in Counselling Psychology, I only practise evidence-based treatments that have a track-record of efficacy. Some of these include: Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT), Strengths-Based Trauma Therapy, and elements of Gottman Method Therapy (Levels 1 and 2) for couples. Shortly, I will be augmenting my skill set through further trauma training in Life Integration (LI) and couples training with the Gottman Institute.

While these modalities provide the structure “or bones” of therapy, my personal approach is informed by a reverence for the following: 1. Irvin Yalom’s existential givens of death, meaning, isolation, and freedom, which denote the parameters of the human condition, 2. Carl Rogers’s client-centred approach, which views individuals through a lens of curiosity and unconditional positive regard, and 3. the biopsychosocial approach, which I use as a heuristic for understanding the facets of life that contribute to mental wellbeing.

In terms of delivery, I find figurative language, particularly the use of metaphor and analogy, effective for creating rich, memorable dialogue, and useful for expediting salient experiences and insights. Kintsugi, for example, is the Japanese art form of mending ceramic vessels with gold. While it is a stunning form of art, it is also a valuable metaphor for how adverse experiences (our own cracks and fissures) are part of what make us unique and resilient. In this way, I believe psychotherapy to be a form of Kintsugi for the psyche.

On the topic of adversity, it is my mission to understand, and be present for, the plight that has brought you to therapy. As someone who has been on both sides of the table- as a client, a couple, and a therapist, I respect the courage it takes to instigate change and show vulnerability to someone you’ve never met. It is my hope that we can work together to help you create clarity and connection within your relationship, reframe the legacy of trauma, mitigate depression and anxiety, and help you design an informed path forward. Until then, I invite you to contemplate this quote by Winston Churchill, 1940:

“If you’re going through hell, keep going.”

Much like plodding through snow-laden terrain in winter, forging forward with therapy can be ardu... Read More