Stress, PTSD and Anxiety Therapists in Kitchener, ON.

Stress and anxiety when present within healthy limits can stimulate, motivate, challenge, warn and activate our bodies to react accordingly to the situation. When it's too much, too intense and for too long, stress and anxiety lead to poor functioning, impairment and exhaustion resulting in stress and anxiety overload, contributing heavily to triggering anxiety disorders. In my therapy, I use therapeutic approaches and techniques that help reduce stress and anxiety and enhance the quality of your life and build your emotional resilience. You develop skills to minimize distress and maximize efficacy in many areas of your living and live life in a happier and healthier manner

For many of us, our stream of life is interrupted by events that are so stressful and scary that they create lasting change. This can be a single incident such as an assault or accident. Or, it could be recurring incidents that take place in the course of our work. It could also be trauma in our earliest years from our caregivers or in our first relationships. If you feel that something from your past is impacting your current life, trauma and stress focused therapy may be a good fit for you.

Dealing with anxiety is difficult as it is the body's natural response to a perceived threat and that response, is unique to each individual and can often present itself as a sense of discomfort, emotional reactions, physical sensations, and unhelpful behavioural patterns. Your anxiety can be triggered through situational or environmental events and can often feel chronic. Schedule a free consultation to me to see if I am the right fit to help you manage your anxiety.

I hope to help you explore what a more preferred relationship with anxiety and stress could look like. In today’s hectic and often overwhelming environments, managing anxiety and stress can be one of the most important and difficult experience to manage. In our work together, you can expect me to ask about the impacts of both on your life, and gently explore what it could mean to live a little differently. Using evidence-based and individualized strategies, I help clients to find ways to manage and thrive. Book a free consultation to explore if we are a good fit.

Experiencing feelings of stress and anxiety can be overwhelming. Re-occurring thoughts, feelings of pressure, or worry because of work challenges, relationships, or experiencing a change or loss can sometimes be difficult to manage and process. Additionally, sometimes it is unclear what might be causing feelings of anxiety and overwhelm. In my work with you, I seek to help you understand the story of stress and anxiety in your life, its origins, the ways it impacts you and what kind of relationship you might want with it moving forward to be able to better manage it. Schedule a free consultation with me to see if we are a good fit.

In my experience, the combination of schema therapy and cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT) is an effective approach to dealing with anxiety. This method digs deeper than CBT alone and brings forth insights that guide us to specific stress and anxiety management priorities tailored to your needs. This is an amplified form of CBT that will open a new door to your recovery.

It is hard to understand anxiety unless you have experienced it. Anxiety is a lot like an unwanted guest at a party, only this guest often ruins everything and seemingly never wants to leave. People who live with anxiety are often misunderstood, minimized or dismissed as irrational by those who do not understand what it is like to feel anxious. Additionally, many people living with anxiety often blame themselves for their anxious thinking, which can often make things worse. I help men to better cope with their anxiety by working together to find and practice the tools and techniques that work for them so they can successfully deal with those unwanted/and poorly timed anxious moments.

Anxiety and stress have become quite common in today's world, thus, you are not alone. If you are experiencing either of these, and are finding it difficult to cope and manage, Growth Counselling Services can help. Together, we will work toward better understanding your anxiety, it's potential roots, and learning how to establish an alternate relationship with it. I believe in my clients' inner strengths and abilities to face the struggle that coincides with both. If you are tired of being defined by your anxiety, or are simply ready to make a change that allows you to regain control of your life, call Growth Counselling Services today, and let's get started.

I believe we all have moments in our lives when we experience stress and anxiety. Every single one of us could benefit from tools taken from mindfulness exercises as I do in my personal life. I tend to address these issues from a teaching and practicing approach with clients. Its one thing to suggest and explain something, but there has been greater success when we try it out together in session. I have used role play exercises from time to time when the client feels it would be beneficial to decrease the intensity of their anxiety. I love when my clients confidence starts to build because they have implemented what we have practiced in session and learned that it works!

Anxiety can come in many forms, such as: panic and anxiety attacks; extreme fear; worrying thoughts from which one rarely gets a break; sleeplessness either due to going over and over how one behaved during the day, and judging oneself, or, from dreading what the following day might bring; fear and avoidance of one's own intense emotions; fear of rejection of others, leading to intense social anxiety or avoidance of close relationships; performance anxiety, such as worries about exams, job interviews, or performance appraisals at one's place of work. I like to get a sense of the frequency, intensity, and duration of somebody's anxiety, and then to help them to reduce all 3.

Psychodynamic support for anxiety and stress involves exploring past experiences and unconscious processes that may be influencing your current struggles. By examining how early relationships and life events have shaped your patterns of thinking and behaving, we can gain insight into the root causes of your anxiety and stress. Through this deeper understanding, we aim to help you develop healthier coping mechanisms and build resilience to manage these overwhelming feelings. The therapeutic process may involve delving into unresolved conflicts, addressing defense mechanisms, and fostering self-awareness to promote lasting emotional healing and growth.

Anxiety has many sources and can mean many different things. It is always experienced physiologically in the same way, no matter the source or meaning. Anxiety arises when we move into unknown territory. This is normal. It arises when something of value to us is threatened. We can think of this as "sacred" anxiety. Or we can become anxious about being anxious, worried about things over which we have no control. This is neurotic anxiety. I work with people to first understand the source and meaning of their anxiety. Then work to help them learn to calm the anxiety down in order to take appropriate action in dealing with its source.

Stress can take a toll on your mental health and trigger anxiety. In people who have an anxiety disorder, stress can make it more challenging to manage the symptoms of anxiety. Increases in this hormone are related to anxiety. Anxiety and stress can be overwhelming and sometimes entirely disabling. They interfere with our lives and prevent us from living our best version of selves. In our therapy sessions, we work together to explore the stressors and anxiety that have been impacting you and your ability to lead a healthy stress-free life. We identify options on how to manage your anxiety better using mindfulness and CBT techniques and help you build your own tools box.

It's critical to understand that, even if you suffer from panic attacks, compulsive thoughts, ongoing worry, or a phobia, you don't have to live in fear and anxiety. In many cases, therapy is the most effective strategy to handle anxiety-related problems. Therapy gives you the skills and teaches you how to use them to overcome anxiety. If stress is not managed, it can become chronic stress and ultimately lead to burnout. While burnout leaves people feeling completely exhausted and unmotivated to keep going, stress often results in people feeling overwhelmed. Therapy provides coping mechanisms for stress symptoms, which may help to avoid burnout.

Anxiety and stress are predominant in the world we live in; there is a lot to think about! But it does not need to be a source of anxiety or stress and you can learn to manage the impact the news, economy, environment etc. has on you. Likewise, if your worries are more general or anxiety has been around for years, we can work on managing how you think about things and how to calm your body so you can feel better!