Life’s challenges can feel overwhelming — especially during times of transition, or when we find ourselves feeling stuck. Sometimes you know something needs to change, but you’re not sure where to start.
I offer a warm, collaborative, non-judgmental counselling space where we can explore your experiences within the context of your history and community — to better understand yourself and those around you, and to move toward meaningful, lasting change. My approach is trauma-informed, relational, and holistic. I view symptoms not as signs that something is wrong with you, but as adaptive responses that developed for important reasons. We approach patterns together with curiosity and compassion, so you feel genuinely seen, supported, and accepted.
What I Bring to This Work
I hold a Master of Social Work (MSW) with advanced postgraduate training in addiction and counselling/psychotherapy from the University of Southern California. My clinical experience spans hospital social work, community mental health, addictions treatment, and outpatient individual and group psychotherapy — supporting individuals, couples, and families through complex mental health concerns, medical challenges, and significant life transitions.
Before becoming a therapist, I worked internationally in the film industry and later stepped away to raise my children. I am also a late in life ADHD diagnosed woman who has researched how the hormonal shifts that come with “the change” can often render masking impossible. Sometimes something has got to change. These experiences have given me a deep appreciation for the complexities of identity, shifting roles, burnout, and the many transitions we navigate throughout life. I discovered yoga and meditation at university during a difficult period, and that practice of learning to regulate my nervous system changed my life. It remains at the root of my interest in somatic healing for the body holds what the mind often struggles to access, and learning to listen to it can open us to a deeper self-awareness and growth.
Seeking support can be one of the hardest and most courageous steps we take, and I would be honoured to walk alongside you.
I have a special interest, personal experience and expertise in the following areas:
Anxiety, Depression & Burnout
Anxiety and depression are among the most common reasons people seek therapy — and also among the most misunderstood. Anxiety isn’t just worry; it can show up as physical tension, restlessness, or a relentless inner critic. Depression isn’t simply sadness; it can feel like numbness, disconnection, or a loss of interest and meaning in your life.
Burnout and compassion fatigue often sit at the intersection of both. Often developing gradually through chronic overextension, we limp along until the reserves that once kept us going are depleted. In our work together, we’ll look beneath the symptoms to understand what’s driving them, and create the conditions for something different.
Life Transitions & Identity
Transitions — even welcome ones — can be destabilizing. Starting or ending a relationship, changing careers, losing a loved one, retiring, or simply reaching a point where the life you’ve built no longer fits the person you’ve become: these moments ask us to renegotiate who we are.
Leaving home for the first time can be more disorienting than anyone anticipates. The quarterlife years bring their own particular pressures: identity, direction, belonging, and the gap between who you thought you’d be and who you’re becoming can feel confusing and overwhelming.
Midlife and later-life transitions deserve equal attention. The years between 40 and 60 often bring a quiet but significant reckoning with time, with choices made and unmade, with shifting roles and changing bodies, and with questions of what comes next. These aren’t signs that something has gone wrong; they’re often signs that something important is asking to be heard.
Partnering, Parenting & Caregiving
Parenting is one of the most profound and demanding roles a person can take on, and often one of the least supported. Caregiving asks us to give continuously while rarely making space for our own experience. Growing a family also changes the landscape of a partnership in ways that can catch people off guard. The stress, the exhaustion, and shifting power dynamics can surface complex feelings and conflict that feel hard to navigate alongside everything else.
Many parents and caregivers I work with are carrying not just the practical demands of the role, but also unexplored emotional weight. Feelings of fear, frustration, boredom, guilt or grief around how identity shifts or how their own history surfaces in caring for others can begin to feel heavy. Counselling can offer a rare space to tend to yourself, or to your partnership, and to explore ways of restoring peace and balance.
Relationships & Family Dynamics
Our earliest relationships, or attachments, shape the templates we carry into every connection we make. When those models include experiences of loss, inconsistency, or rupture, closeness can feel complicated — even when we want it deeply. Humans are literally wired for connection. I counsel individuals navigating conflict, communication difficulties, painful ruptures, or the legacy of their family of origin.
Whether you’re in a relationship that’s struggling or trying to understand why connection keeps feeling difficult, therapy can help you develop insight and move toward the relationships you’re hoping for.
Addiction & Chronic Health Concerns
Substance use and addictive behaviours are always connected to something else — trauma, pain, anxiety, or an attempt to manage an internal experience that feels otherwise unmanageable. I approach this work without judgment, within a harm reduction and recovery-oriented framework that meets you where you are.
I have a particular interest in the relationship between addictive behaviours and physical chronic conditions. For too long, mental health support, medical conditions and addiction treatment have been siloed. I am a firm believer in the power of truly integrated health care, and in our work together, we hold mind and body as one.
Recognize your patterns. Reconnect with yourself. Create meaningful change.
If you’d like to explore working together, I offer a free 15-minute consultation to help us get to know each other and see if it feels like the right fit.Research has confirmed that the relationship between a client and counsellor is the most important factor in reaching a positive outcome.
Limited sliding-scale options may be available if cost is a concern — please feel welcome to reach out if you’d like to discuss.
You can contact me at s.r.naramore.psychotherapy@gmail.com. Or book online through my booking link.
I offer a limited number of Accessibly Priced Individual Sessions (in person or virtual): $95 for a 50-minute session or $143 for a 75-minute session.
You can view my Informed Consent Form here.