PAYMENT & INSURANCE

Most extended benefits now cover a portion or all of the costs of counselling up to a certain dollar amount.  However, it is important for you to check that my designation as a Registered Clinical Counsellor (RCC) is included within your insurance.  This means that I will invoice you directly at the time of your counselling session and that you will need to submit the receipts to your insurance provider to be reimbursed.  I am currently accepting credit cards and e-transfers for payment.

IN PERSON?

I do most of my counselling sessions in person at my Kitsilano office.  When we book your first in-person counselling session, I will send you an email with my office address and directions to get there.  I do virtual counselling for  clients who live outside the Lower Mainland, or for clients who have a long commute or find it difficult to make it in person.  Where we're working in a group (couples or families), it is really worth it to try to work in person if it is manageable.

HOW LONG WILL IT TAKE?

The average out there is 5-6 sessions per one specific issue.  However, that can vary quite a bit from person-to-person depending on what you’d like to work on.  In a similar way that people differ from each other in the way that they use physiotherapy or massage therapy, diferent people have different approaches to psychotherapy.  Some people use these services in discrete instances to deal with specific issues that come up while others use it as a form of maintenance that is woven into their regular self-care.  Psychological issues that have been building up over many years sometimes become more complex and can benefit from longer-term treatment.

HOW OFTEN DO I GO?

On average I would say once every two weeks.  However, I see clients on a monthly or weekly basis quite often too.  Typically, I find it better to start off with the first few sessions in closer proximity to gain a bit of traction and then often get farther apart as you see improvements and feel less of a need to come in.  You can increase or decrease your frequency of therapy as needed.

WHAT DAYS AND TIMES?

My clinic hours are Mondays, Wednesdays and Thursdays (and some Tuesdays) from 9:30-5:30. 

HOW DO WE START?

During our first session, I do a detailed intake where I ask questions that help me to get important background information that is very helpful as we start working together.  In this session, I am asking most of the questions.  In the next sessions, I ask you to choose how we begin and what we talk about, and we work together.  I will check in with you regularly about whether you feel that the work we are doing relates to the concerns that brought you to therapy in the first place, or if our work has evolved, whether its direction is working for you..

HOW LONG DOES EACH THERAPY SESSION LAST?

Therapy sessions are booked for one hour.  However, this is a "theraputic hour," meaning that it will be 50 minutes of talk therapy while the final 10 minutes is reserved for scheduling additional appointments, payment, and writing notes.  Couples sometimes choose to do an 80 minute session.