Find An Eating Disorder Therapist in West Point Grey, BC.

I work with children and youth experiencing eating disorders. I also work with adults who suffer from disordered thinking related to eating and body image. Counselling with me includes building relationships, exploring past feelings and addressing present life stressors. My main goal is to work alongside you as we process together to help you heal and live the life you deserve.

Many forms or disordered eating are related to emotional eating. Somewhere along the line you have learned to soothe stress and overwhelm using food. Whether you're a binger or grazer, you are most likely familiar with feeling either in deprivation mode (you're dieting or restricting) or failure mode. Failure mode, feeling helpless and powerless in your attempts to control your eating behaviour can lead to bulimia, food addiction and binge eating. As an addictions counsellor I have specialized in Eating Disorders. Using a blend of cognitive behavioural therapy and somatic psychotherapy, I will help you change your eating patterns, stop disordered eating and develop a relapse prevention plan.

Eating Disorders can impact someone as negatively as any type of serious addiction. However, unlike addiction treatment plans, food must continue to play a role in your life. My basic goal is to stop further development of any eating problem you may have, and assist you in returning to a healthy lifestyle. The most successful focus is on harm reduction as an overall principle in addressing eating disorders, with the end goal of moving towards complete recovery. I also typically want to establish effective coping skills to reduce the possibility of relapse and sustain the progress you make in therapy.

Our approach to helping clients who are dealing with an eating disorder and require treatment and counselling is to work both with the family and with the individual dealing with this stressor. We work collaboratively with the client and use Dialectical behavioural therapy (DBT) and Cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT) to help manage the eating disorder. We come from a strength-based and collaborative approach.

I use the Internal Family Systems approach to eating disorders, which views disordered eating as the result of inner conflict among different "parts" of the self. Often, a "Critic" part drives restrictive behaviors, while "Exiled" parts carry painful emotions or past trauma that the eating disorder tries to suppress. I'll help you identify and understand these parts, fostering compassion and healing. The goal is to unburden the parts, heal the underlying trauma, and restore balance so that you can develop healthier coping strategies and a more loving relationship with food and body.

Eating disorders are often related to trauma, and they are often also related to not feeling in control due to ongoing traumatic events and stress. This is because trauma is not always caused by a major single incident but can instead be can caused by smaller but daily or regularly-experienced trauma such as what might occur within family dynamics or bullying at school. Because they are commonly rooted in trauma and because they can be hard to treat with just talk therapy, EMDR Therapy is an option which can effectively address these devastating conditions and the suffering attached. If you would like further information about this, I encourage you to contact me.

At Yaletown Counselling, we approach eating disorders with compassion, curiosity, and a deep respect for each person's relationship with food, body, and self. We understand that disordered eating is rarely just about food. It is often connected to deeper experiences around control, identity, emotion, and worth. Our trauma-informed counsellors work collaboratively with clients to explore the underlying factors driving these patterns, build a more attuned relationship with themselves, and move toward healing at a pace that feels safe and sustainable.

It is my hope that individual therapy will benefit clients who may currently be participating in community-based support groups and group therapy, giving them the opportunity to explore in more depth the underlying issues related to their challenges with food. Clients will benefit from exploring relationship issues with significant people in their lives. They will learn to identify inner and situational triggers that may have resulted in harmful patterns and choices in the past. They will benefit from identifying negative and debilitating thought patterns, and will develop self-affirming beliefs to move them to greater confidence and self-acceptance.

Eating disorders are often an expression of emotional distress and an unclear or negative sense of self. We explore the emotions and family patterns and relationships that might be contributing. Then we move from emotional understanding to action - we explore what is within the client's control and what is outside of their control - from there we determine in a concrete way the nature of the next steps.

When it comes to working with clients who are experiencing disordered eating, the first thing to understand is that rarely is it about food itself, and it can affect anyone from all genders, ages, classes, and abilities. I personally understand the amount of stress and anxiety that can arise around eating and body image and want to work with you to pinpoint what is triggering for you about eating. My goal is to help you create and maintain a healthy relationship with food, not a fearful one. By using open, supportive, and non-judgemental dialogue, we can break down the shame and stigma of eating disorders together.

You are struggling with binged eating. You wish to let go of your long-standing patterns of unhealthy eating habits. You know what to do, but have been unable to get the motivation to make the changes. Quyn can help you! EMDR helps you manage cravings of unhealthy foods by reducing their associated rewards in your brain. It also resolves certain traumas related to your associations with food and eating. Hypnotherapy helps you let go of certain beliefs in your unconscious mind about food, eating, and especially about yourself. You regain motivation and create new habits and patterns. As you enhance your self-worth, eating healthy becomes natural for you! You begin to have a healthy connection

I am able to help clients dealing with anexoria, bulimia or binge eating. By helping clients look at how and why they use food for control, reward, stress management or to deal with other emotions they can begin to change their maladative relationship with food. With some in office techniques and some out of office homework clients can have radical change in their lives. Enjoying food is one of life pleasures.

Eating disorders are complicated and complex. Having lived with an experience of a distorted body image, I have an understanding of some of the challenges of an eating disorder. To get the outcome clients want, I utilize the approaches of EMDR, Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT) and Neurofeedback (NFB). EMDR takes the charge out of rooted disturbances, allowing an individual to overcome challenging behaviours without needing to reason. With CBT, I am able to offer support while challenging distorted thoughts and dysfunctional behaviours. NFB trains the brain to self regulate, allowing optimal performance, effecting the thoughts, emotions and actions that keep an eating disorder alive.