I offer a compassionate, non-judgmental space where you can feel heard, understood, and supported. My goal is to help you reconnect with yourself and find the strength to navigate life’s challenges with calm & confidence.
My name is Ella, and I began Moon Rise Counselling Therapy to make meaningful connections and support people to cultivate more peace, awareness, and trust in their lives.
Welcome to Moon Rise, I’m glad you are here.
I believe that every person holds within them the wisdom and resilience to heal and grow. I also believe that we are not meant to walk this path alone.
Our thoughts, emotions, and physiological responses are designed to present us with valuable insight about our needs. But these channels can get blurred, blocked, or become so overwhelming they feel impossible to decipher.
My role as a counsellor is to cultivate a safe and compassionate relationship with my clients where we can begin to deepen this self-awareness, and explore the parts inside asking to be acknowledged.
Philosophy of practice
My counselling style is informed by:
Humanistic Therapy
Emotion-focused Therapy
Mindfulness-based Therapy
Somatic Therapy
Internal Family Systems Therapy
Strengths Based Therapy
Attachment Therapy
Relational-cultural Therapy
Training
Canadian Perinatal Mental Health Certificate (CPMH-C)
Circle of Security Parenting Program | Registered Facilitator
Core Emotion Focused Family Therapy (EFFT)
Cognitive Behavioural Therapy — Anxiety & Depression
Somatic Trauma Therapy Certificate Course *
Comprehensive Internal Family Systems Course *
*In progress
Education
Masters degree, Counselling Psychology | Yorkville University
Bachelor of Arts degree, Anthropology & Psychology | McGill University
Professional member of the British Columbia Association for Clinical Counsellors (BCACC).
More about Ella.
I live in Courtenay, BC, way up high on a mountain with my husband, Noah, and my Australian Shepherd, Eilidh (Ay-lee).
When I am not seeing clients, I enjoy being in the sunshine for walks and runs, swimming in the ocean and rivers, skiing when its cold enough, and giving mountain biking my best efforts.
I also love to create things with my hands, whether it’s watercolours, book-binding or knitting projects, writing letters to loved ones, or writing in general. On the rainy days, you’ll find me cozy on the couch with my fifth cup of tea for the day and a book in my hands!
I have a special passion for the realm of perinatal mental health, reproductive mental health, and birth education.
The seeds of this interest began to sprout while I was living in Australia studying at the University of Adelaide in 2016.
Concepts like matrescence, continuity of care, and perinatal mood disorders were all unfamiliar topics to me at the time. They have been slow to be embraced by our contemporary fertility and birth culture. Even as I write this “matrescence” is still red underlined despite being written about in the New York Times and The New Yorker.
Put simply, matrescence can be seen as a fundemental life shift much like adolescence. The internal and external changes in both of these phases, especially psychological and neurochemical, turn our worlds upside down. As with any major life transition it can bring pleasant thoughts and emotions, and it can also bring troubling, uncomfortable ones. You do not have to walk this path without support.
Through the lens of my courses in psychology, public health, and cultural anthropology, I began to explore the existential phases of conception, pregnancy, birth, and postpartum. Embarking on these interconnected journeys leads to profound identity shifts and transformation for individuals, partnerships, and family constellations.
Through my studies as well as personal experience, my commitment to this area of counselling psychology and women’s health continues to grow.
I believe wholeheartedly in seeking support for both the mind and the body during this powerful time of life.
Are you curious about working with me?