The perinatal period is the stretch from before pregnancy through your child's first years, and it asks more of your body, your mind, and your sense of self than most people talk about.
Anxiety, depression, intrusive thoughts, rage, grief for the version you had pictured. You do not have to sort it into the right category before reaching out. That is part of what we do together.
Some of this might sound familiar.
Not a checklist to pass or fail. Just the shapes this tends to take, in case it helps to see them named.
You are pregnant and the worry, sadness, or numbness is louder than the joy you expected to feel.
You are postpartum, and what you thought would be hard is harder than that, and in different ways than you expected.
You are still carrying a birth that did not go the way you needed it to.
You came to parenthood through infertility, loss, or assisted reproductive technology, and the journey is still part of how you carry today.
You are struggling to bond with your baby, or struggling to let your partner near them, or struggling with the fierce edge of both.
The intrusive thoughts, the rage, the exhaustion, the foreignness in your own body, the sense that this is not what you signed up for, any one of these, or all of them at once.
You want to talk to someone who already knows this territory and will not be shocked.
If you see yourself in even one of these, you are in the right place.
What this might feel like
In their own words. Some of what parents say, before they have a name for it.
I do not know what is wrong with me. I just know I am not okay, and I do not know who to tell.
Everyone keeps asking how the baby is. No one is asking how I am.
I thought I would feel like a mother by now. I do not feel like anything.
How I work with perinatal mental health
The work is shaped by my PMH-C certification through Postpartum Support International, the international standard for perinatal mental health training. That training is not an add-on to my practice; it is the centre of it. The perinatal period has its own clinical territory, its own risks, and its own things that get missed when a therapist is not trained for it. I know what to look for and what to do with what I find.
The methods are the same trauma-informed, evidence-based modalities I use across my practice, adapted to the perinatal context. Internal Family Systems for the parts of you that come up reminding you of who you were, who you are, and who you are becoming. Cognitive Behavioural Therapy for the thoughts that have become heavy. Polyvagal-informed work for a nervous system that is doing too much. Attachment-aware perspective for the bond with your baby, the bond with your partner, and the bond with yourself. For clients whose journey here includes infertility, loss, or assisted reproductive technologies, my recent training through Wilfrid Laurier University in counselling for infertility, reproductive loss, and ART means I can hold those threads of your story too.
You will not be diagnosed by me. You will not be rushed into the right label. We will work at the pace your nervous system can hold, and we will check in often about what is shifting and what you need next.
Practical details
Sessions and format
50-minute sessions, virtual across Ontario or in person Tuesdays in St. Agatha.
Virtual sessions across Ontario or in person in the Kitchener-Waterloo area. We can talk through which format fits your life on the consult call.
Fees and insurance
A receipt is provided for insurance reimbursement under Social Work Services, and many extended plans cover sessions. You confirm your coverage with your insurer.
For full details on session fees and payment, visit the Fees & Insurance page.
Every new client starts with a free 15-minute phone consultation. Once we have spoken, we will book a time that works for both of us. There is no obligation to continue.
Starting does not have to be complicated.
Book a free consult
A free 15-minute phone call. We talk about what is going on and whether we are the right fit. No obligation to continue.
Find your footing
Once we have spoken, we will book a time that works for both of us. The first sessions are slower and reflective; we get clear on what you are carrying.
Do the work, together
We work at the pace your nervous system can hold, and check in often about what is shifting and what you need next.
Frequently asked questions
No. Most clients who come to me through this page do not arrive with a diagnosis, and many never need one. We start with what is actually happening in your body and your week, and the picture clarifies as we go. If a formal diagnosis becomes useful at some point, we can talk about how to get one. It is not a prerequisite for the work, and it is not what makes the work effective.
It is not too early. Prenatal mental health is part of perinatal mental health, and the work we do during pregnancy often makes the postpartum period easier. Many of the patterns that intensify after birth, the worry, the identity shifts, the fears about what kind of parent you will be, are already present in the third trimester. Naming them now is one of the gentler ways to soften them later.
Yes. The perinatal period includes the road to becoming a parent, not only the parenting itself. Infertility, miscarriage, stillbirth, the long uncertainty of treatment, and the ambiguous losses that come with all of it are part of the territory I have specific training in through Wilfrid Laurier University. You do not have to be pregnant or postpartum for this to be the right place to begin.
Related areas
The perinatal road branches in many directions. The pages below cover the most common turn-offs.
Ready to talk?
Every new client starts with a free 15-minute phone call. We talk about what is going on, what you are hoping for, and whether we are the right fit. No paperwork. No pressure.