Stress, PTSD and Anxiety Therapists in Metchosin, BC.

My office is a safe space to express any thoughts and feelings about your life in complete confidence. Sharing painful experiences under the Witness of an empathic human being has incredible healing power. Within this therapeutic relationship, we can use mindfullness practices, progressive muscle-relaxation, and Cognitive Therapy to transform your experience of stress into the present, balanced, and relaxed way of living that you have not had in a very, very long time.

I help people work through and overcome painful experiences of stress and anxiety. I approach my clients with kindness and understanding and let them know that they will not be judged by me. By creating an open and trusting relationship, they will not feel humiliated or shamed. Together we will examine the depth of their problem and how it affects them mentally, emotionally, behaviorally and socially. We will explore the triggers underlying their anxiety and learn new skills to reduce their reactions. Clients learn to change faulty beliefs, to relax, to feel more secure and free, and to attain a calmness that they did not experience before.

I am honoured that you are interested in my services and I would like to tell you a little bit about myself. I have been described as slightly non-conventional in the counselling world, which suits me perfectly, and also tends to suit youth who are trying to stand up to the force of the problems in their life. I am very comfortable working with this population, and I feel fortunate that I can connect with teens the way I do, conventionally or in a way that makes sense to them.

You are not alone. Whether you are anxious in social situations, suffering from PTSD, OCD, or panic disorders, or experiencing a generalized and on-going anxiety, you are not the only one! And you don't have to face it by yourself. At your own pace we will work at alleviating the physical symptoms like nausea, dizziness, chest pain, muscle tension, trembling and sweating. We will manage the manifestations of your anxiety, like isolation, irrational fears, or heart racing panic attacks. Discover helpful anxiety and stress, and why it is essential to our survival. Find peace in our carefully created therapeutic relationship, and recreate it in all parts of your life.

Anxiety is a very common experience for many people and can manifest within a person's life in many different ways. I provide opportunities for people to learn about anxiety, develop an awareness about their thoughts, emotions and beliefs that fuel anxiety and offer clinically proven strategies for overcoming anxiety. I work together with individuals to develop a counselling program that entails understanding where a person's anxiety may have originated, developing an awareness into the situations and relationships that trigger their anxiety and employing coping methods to help manage anxiety in daily life.

Anxiety and panic are often driven by negative experiences or traumas that are stored in the brain and can trigger overwhelming emotional responses. EMDR helps to desensitize and reprocess these memories, reducing the intensity of the emotional response and decreasing symptoms of anxiety and panic. Through the use of bilateral stimulation, such as eye movements or tapping, EMDR can help the brain reprocess the negative experiences, leading to increased emotional regulation and a greater sense of calm and well-being.

Everyone feels anxiety at some point in their lives but when it starts to interfere with your life, counseling can help. Although anxiety can feel debilitating, it is treatable. People with anxiety don’t always share the same symptoms, they vary from person to person. Therapy will help you to reclaim your life and function in a chronically stressful world.

I work holistically with anxiety and life stressors/transitions, believing in a three pronged approach that includes diet/nutrition, physical exercise and dealing with chronic stress and trauma. Addressing all 3 of these areas as well as learning various strategies and tools to deal with stress and anxiety directly can help alleviate your symptoms relatively quickly. In addition, we will take a personalized look at what isn't working in your life and what is fueling your response. Healing looks different for everyone, and I will work with you to sort out your unique situation, and help bring you back in to alignment with your authentic self.

Anxiety and Stress have become a ubiquitous part of our modern world. For many of us, they are an all too pervasive daily experience and sap the life out of our vital energies. Our work on anxiety and stress will include practical skills and tools to work with and deal with the anxiety and stress. It may involve changing ways of thinking that create more anxiety than necessary in certain situations. We will work toward finding ways of being that allow for more freedom, more ease and more enjoyment in being alive.

It’s impossible to be human without a little anxiety and stress. The problem arises when anxiety sticks around even when we’re not under threat. I believe it’s important to understand anxiety and stress in the context of your personal, family and cultural history, as well as any external stressors you may be experiencing. Secondly, anxiety and stress live in the body—locating them and applying practical tools like mindfulness, muscle relaxation and breathing techniques to help calm the nervous system can also be very helpful. It all depends on where you’re at and what you need. Ready to feel calmer and sturdier in the face of life’s challenges? Let’s get started.

Anxiety and stress can be the first signs that something is off that we need to respond to in our lives. They can snowball until they have power over us: their impulses conflicting with our greater needs. They can also be signs of deeper issues that are unique to each of our lives. Our personalities, senses of self, life histories, and individual understandings of the world all play a role; as do our nervous systems and embodied patterns of how we generate and resolve anxious feelings. Together we’ll collaborate to get every part of you on your team, aligned with the direction you want to take as as a whole.

Stress in the right amount, at the right time, and in the right manner helps us grow. The problem with most modern stress is that it violates all three conditions and never comes one issue at a time! Together, we will identify what your stressors are, how you perceive them, what sense of control you feel you have, what symptoms define them, and what resources you can muster to deal with them. You are not powerless - it just feels that way at times.

Our culture is permeated with stress and anxiety, and we develop habitual ways of reacting to situations that actually reinforce our stress and anxiety. Although stress reactions can be helpful in avoiding danger, in a day to day way these reactions can actually interfere with our ability to cope. In therapy, you will learn new ways to calm and self-regulate, to change habitual and negative beliefs, and to react differently in stressful situations. By using simple mindfulness techniques that calm the nervous system, you can actually minimize your stress or anxious reaction. The result is a more positive life experience which will lead to more satisfaction.

Dr. Sloat feels we live in a world that overstimulates us, and thus stress and anxiety are sometimes unavoidable, especially for the sensitive among us. She takes a triple approach to treatment in that it is, 1) aimed at teaching strategies and tools for dealing with anxiety and stress as we experience them, 2) geared toward challenging thoughts and beliefs that are anxiety and/or stress producing in themselves, and 3) facilitates management of one's lifestyle such that it becomes balanced.

When you worry you suffer in advance for outcomes which have not yet happened and, in fact, rarely do happen. It is bad enough to suffer the bad things that really do happen without suffering needlessly. We will seek to strengthen faith and trust that the world is mainly safe for you. Stress is the result of overloading our coping competencies. We will talk about riding through anxiety attacks and techniques to reduce uncomfortable hyper vigilance. We will look back into your history to find the roots of anxiety and stress. We may use trauma relief strategies such as EMDR or Traumatic Incident reduction (TIR). Counseling for anxiety and stress should make you happier and more relaxed.

Chronic stress and anxiety when untreated can make just 'regular human function' feel like an unsurmountable task. Anxiety tends to be a downstream symptom of other psychological dynamics and experiences, so understanding how we got here can help us process their impact and develop tools to increase resiliency, improve insight, and manage feelings and emotions.

We live in a fast paced 24/7 world dealing with social media, technology and lots of things to worry about in the media. No wonder we are all a little anxious these days. I will help you change your relationship with your thoughts so they have less power and control over you. When we give in and avoid things due to anxiety we end up feeling pretty isolated. I will teach you tools and strategies to get through your stress and anxiety.

Some amount of anxiety and stress is a normal and necessary reaction to life events and situations. Yet, too much or too little can create obstacles to living your life fully and peacefully. I can help you to learn and practice skills needed to manage anxiety and to improve interactions with people in your life. We can also work together to reduce, and in some cases, take the "charge" out of the intensity of the triggers that cause unhelpful anxious reactions. Different therapies we can use include to talk therapy, CBT (Cognitive Behavioural Therapy) and/or EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing).

Anxiety and stress are different for everyone. What is exciting to one may be too much for another. They can show up as bodily symptoms (panic, breathlessness, jitters, poor sleep). Others notice changes in their thoughts and attention– you might have racing thoughts, fears, and a hard time focusing. Too much stress makes us fearful, then we cope by avoiding some parts of our lives. Or we cope by doing a lot of things that don’t help so much (like worrying). We can get overwhelmed, or over-plan to try to manage. Counselling can help you identify what is going on, where it comes from – and explore what can be done about it, including different ways to calm your nervous system

Anxiety is a challenging condition that is characterized by excessive worry, muscle aches/soreness, difficulty sleeping, fatigue, restlessness, and difficulty concentrating. While depressed thinking is usually focused on the past, anxious thinking is usually focused on the future. Anxiety and depression often occur together. I use a combination of therapies to help you to change your relationship to anxiety, including cognitive therapy, somatic therapy, mindfulness, self-focused therapies, and narrative therapy.

Anxiety and stress seem to be ever-present in our world today. Feeling anxious and stressed can often feel inevitable but we do have choices and we can behave differently when confronted with anxiety and stress provoking situations. With over 10 years experience developing resilience promoting programs and services, I will help you gain increased control over your reaction and have you feeling more confident and in charge of yourself. Resilience is a quality and a skill that can be learned.

Dealing with anxiety and stress can feel overwhelming. Day-to-day tasks can be overwhelming. In our sessions, we'll employ evidence-based techniques such as Cognitive Behavioral Therapy to help you identify triggers and thought patterns, giving you practical tools to manage your anxiety. The road to a calmer mind may have its ups and downs, but please know that you're not alone on this journey. With consistent effort and support, you can regain a sense of control and peace in your life.

Feelings of anxiety can become so intense that it becomes overwhelming. Often individuals struggling with anxiety express constant intruding thoughts that focus on fears of events of the future. Anxiety can create physical feelings of distress like a tight chest that makes it difficult to breath, an upset or tight feeling in the stomach, and general fatigue from constantly trying to control their thoughts and actions. Some people have battled anxiety for so long that they begin to believe it is just who they are and accept the restrictions it causes in their life. Through counselling we will work to break the cycle of anxiety controlling your inner world. Bringing a sense of relief, control and freedom that has been absent for so long.

Stress is a fact of life. Work, school, finances, relationships, raising children, concerns about the future, and countless other issues can be overwhelming. We simply cannot handle long-term, chronic stress without health consequences. Anxiety goes hand-in-glove with stress. Stress can lead to feelings of anxiety, and anxiety often heightens stress levels. This feedback loop can feel crazy-making, overwhelming, and get in the way of everything. In my practice, I help people to better understand stress and anxiety, and learn ways to deepen their ability to cope, and move toward enjoying increased peace of mind and sense of stability. Contact me for a free 30-minute consultation to discuss how we can work together toward getting you feeling like you are more in control of your life.

I believe anxiety is a response to aspects of life that a person deems fearful, unsafe, or uncertain. It is possible to reduce or eliminate a person's anxiety in counselling, and in doing so, you will feel lighter, more secure, and grounded in your daily living. Similarly, high stress levels can perpetuate a person's sense of anxiety. I believe stress can be managed and significantly decreased through counselling.