Most of my clients don't come in saying "I have trauma." They come in saying they're irritable, or shut down, or exhausted by their own reactions. They've usually spent years managing it: thinking it through, explaining it away, telling themselves it wasn't that bad, or that it was a long time ago, so it shouldn't still matter.
Here's the thing. You can't think your way out of something your body is still bracing for. You can explain it, understand it, analyze it from every angle, yet still flinch at the same things, still go quiet in the same moments, still feel it land in your chest like it's happening now. That's not a flaw in your thinking. It means the thinking was never going to be enough.
I know it sounds unbearable, but feeling it, with someone who knows how to go there with you, is often easier than the years you've spent managing around it. The managing is what's exhausting you.
Victoria Brassard Counselling offers trauma-informed, attachment-based therapy in Kingston, in-person downtown and virtually across Ontario.
Trauma therapy might be for you if this sounds familiar…
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Your past doesn't feel past
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Getting flooded by memories or feelings that seem to come out of nowhere
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Avoiding certain people, places, or conversations without fully knowing why
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Feeling like you're overreacting, but not being able to stop yourself
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You've gotten very good at managing
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Staying composed on the outside while something else is happening underneath
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Explaining things away before anyone can ask how you're really doing
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Bracing for the worst, even in moments that are actually safe
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Your body is very reactive
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Tension, fatigue, or a racing heart with no clear medical cause*
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Trouble feeling fully present, even in good moments
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A watchfulness that never quite switches off
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You're not broken. You adapted to survive something, and that adaptation made sense at the time. It's just not asking anything useful of you anymore. As a trauma-informed therapist in Kingston, I help clients stop managing what happened and start actually moving through it.
*If not better explained by a medical concern
What working together looks like
Trauma therapy isn't about reliving the worst thing that ever happened to you on repeat. Here's how we build your path forward.
In your first session, we talk about what you're carrying and how it's showing up in your life right now — not to relive it, but to finally look at it directly.
Over the next few sessions, we trace how your past shaped the ways you protect yourself today, at a pace your nervous system can actually tolerate.
As therapy continues, you start catching the old patterns while they're happening, instead of only understanding them afterward. That's where things actually start to change.
With consistent support, trauma therapy helps you feel like you again — present, steady, and no longer at the mercy of something that already ended.
A safe, inclusive space for healing in Downtown Kingston.
My approach combines Emotionally Focused Therapy, narrative therapy, and parts work, all grounded in a humanistic, trauma-informed lens. As a queer and neurodivergent practitioner, I am deeply committed to making sure this is a room where you never have to manage yourself to be understood.
In-person office | 20 Montreal Street #2, Kingston, ON
Virtual care available across Ontario
Covered by most Registered Psychotherapist insurance benefits
Ready to take the next step?
You don't need the whole story figured out before you reach out. You just need to stop carrying it alone. Start with a free 15-minute consultation.