Who you see can make a huge difference in your experience because each of those professionals have very different training with regards to the focus of their training and the duration. In addition to that, there are numerous different ways of practicing psychology. For example, some therapists work from a perspective that strictly values looking towards the future or working from the present whereas others believe that the past can sometimes be relevant. Some therapists will focus on using tools that help you modify your thinking and behaviours, others might focus on working with your emotions, and yet others might be weaving in body responses. Some may also focus strictly on skills and finding solutions.

What can expect from therapy (with me):
 

• You will be treated as the expert on your own life and given the opportunity to voice what you want out of therapy and what's important for us to focus on. 

• We may focus on the past, present, and/or future depending on what is most important to you and relevant to your specific concerns. 

• We start each session by discussing what has come up for you between sessions and any concerns you want to address before moving on to working towards your goals. The exception to this is the intake session in which you will share with me what's going on in your life that brings you to therapy. We will also work on identifying goals in the intake as well and, if we have time, get to a concrete tool that you can start using immediately. Some days you may come in with concerns that have come up that are important and we may spend a whole session on those. Others, we may focus solely on your goals and strategies to get you where you want to go. 

• We may work from both a top-down and a bottom-up approach, but we will start with and only do what you are comfortable with. Top-down means working with tools that you can use immediately to alleviate or minimize any symptoms or distress you are having right now. Bottom-up means digging around for the root causes of the symptoms or distress so that we can prevent them from happening again in the future. 

• I will be honest about the concerns that I am trained in working with and will provide you with referral options if I am unable to address your concerns effectively. 

• I am passionate about learning.  If you are open to it, I will gladly share as much learning and resources as you are interested in that may give you insight into what's going on psychologically with you and plenty of evidence-based tools to cope with it. If learning is what you want, the part of me that will always be a teacher at heart has created several handouts that you will be able to take with you and reference. However, if having a good listener to validate and reflect on your experiences with you is more important than learning, I'm great at making space for that too - just let me know!

• Therapy sessions typically last 50-minutes (which is standard) and I make a point of using all of our valuable time to the best of my ability by planning for the session ahead so I am well prepared for the work we will do together. That being said, it's not uncommon for life to happen between sessions and my plan to go out the window due to new concerns that have come up, in which case we roll with the punches!

• I always try to make space for clients to share what has been working in therapy and what hasn't so that we can make any tweaks we need to and my clients can get the most out of their time with me. Feedback is always welcome!

• As a Registered Psychologist, I have a 3-year masters degree that was entirely dedicated to learning about counselling psychology, a 600 hour practicum at the YWCA in which I was supervised in my work by a team of Registered Psychologists, and a 1600 hour internship in which I was also supervised by a Registered Psychologist. I am also pursuing my Doctoral of Psychology at present which is adding depth to my knowledge as well. Prior to my masters, I achieved my Bachelor of Education in which I also took over 40 credits of undergraduate psychology courses. In order to register as a psychologist, I also had to pass the Examination for Professional Practice in Psychology, which all psychologists in North America have to pass in order to practice, and an oral ethical exam for the College of Alberta Psychologists. Further, as a psychologist it is my professional responsibility to regularly engage in ongoing professional development in order to best serve my clients with the most up-to-date strategies and information, which is a part of my job I enjoy immensely! 

Although that might give you somewhat of an idea of what you can expect from therapy, you still might not be sold that it's something you're interested in. In that case, checking out my writing on The Magic of Connection and Doing the Heavy Lifting might be helpful!