While our lives get painfully confusing,
Our minds need to stay clear.
Welcome!
I want to meet you in your lived reality—not with platitudes, but with genuine understanding and competence.
My practice is grounded in Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT). While some criticize CBT for its alleged coldness and disinterest in deeper concerns, rest assured: CBT can address both immediate symptoms and the deeper sources of your distress.
I believe that therapeutic expertise is only effective when delivered through a warm, human connection. When you arrive, I invite you to pour a cup of tea or coffee, grab a blanket, and settle into a comfy couch.
My role is to provide the clinical skills you need to change within the warmth and stability you need to heal.
Joanna
What to Expect in Therapy
Our first meeting is used to gather as much information as possible about your history, problems and strengths, as well as things that are important to you. You are likely going to be given some tests or monitoring sheets to complete before the next appointment. This is necessary for us to better understand the mechanisms that maintain your difficulties and to create a working model of what is happening in your life.
Obviously, each person is different, with different life philosophies and aspirations. Yet many of us get stuck in self-reinforcing cycles of triggers, thoughts, emotions, actions and outcomes that all add up to create our lived reality.
Therapy is about ensuring that your mind works for you and not against you.
My Background
I am a regulated health professional registered with the Ontario College of Social Workers and Social Service Workers and a member of Ontario Association for Social Workers (MSW, RSW).
I have been working as a clinical social worker since 1996 in a variety of settings, including emergency department/crisis intervention, inpatient psychiatry, community outreach and hospital affiliated mental health clinics. The bulk of my professional life was spent at Trillium Health Centre in Mississauga. I have a bachelor degree in psychology from the University of Western Ontario, and a master’s degree in social work from the University of Toronto.
I pursued specialization in cognitive behaviour therapy and became accredited by the Academy of Cognitive and Behavioural Therapies and the Canadian Association for Cognitive and Behavioural Therapies (CACBT-ACTCC). You can learn a lot about CBT and confirm my credentials by accessing the websites of these two organizations.
I chose CBT because it is honest, effective and extensively researched. All of its techniques can be easily explained. Because different therapies often rely on incompatible core principles, the therapeutic process can become quite confusing when interventions are drawn across a spectrum of modalities. CBT allows us to navigate complex issues using a large set of specialized tools that all work together harmoniously, ensuring you receive clear, cohesive treatment without the unnecessary confusion.
Concepts and Clichés
Concepts and Clichés is a blog dedicated to exploring the real-world application of cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT). Here, you’ll find accessible explanations of CBT principles, common misconceptions (“clichés”), and how these concepts can be used to manage painful symptoms and deal with life’s challenges.
