Yvonne McKenna

Contact

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Counselling Services

Counselling and play therapy

Many families today are struggling and feel there is nowhere to turn. Parents have conflicts with their children, couples have martial and relationship difficulties, and families are struggling as a result. Some children suffer as well with emotional and behavioural difficulties. I offer several types of counselling services to meet families’ needs.

Play Therapy – Therapeutic play methods help children access feelings, thoughts and problem-solving strategies. Using materials such as puppets, art materials, a sand tray and figures, I help children ‘play through' some of the issues that they are dealing with. Some examples of reasons children come for play therapy are:

• Grief and Loss
• Dealing with separation and divorce
• Anxiety and depression
• Nightmares and sleep problems
• Trauma
• Abuse
• Delayed development
• Social exclusion and bullying
• Behaviour problems
• Academic, social and cultural issues
• Adjustment difficulties

Couples counselling – Sometimes marriages go through difficult times and counselling can help to resolve conflicts, talk about past hurts and experiences, and develop new strategies for communication and learning to love again. I offer couples counselling based on a solution-focused model.

Individual counselling – Socrates once said “the unexamined life is not worth living”. It may be time for you to examine your life and determine what you can do to make it more fulfilling. I use humanistic and solution-focused counselling, and cognitive behavioural strategies to help you examine past and current issues that are keeping you from living your best life.

Family counselling – Families sometimes need more than coaching to get them through struggles. Counselling as a family can address difficulties that separate family members and help develop communication and cooperation.

Parent Coaching

Toilet teaching. Getting your child to sleep. Discipline versus punishment. Positive self-esteem. These and other parenting challenges can make your life difficult, but there are tried-and-true strategies that can help you navigate different ages and stages of your child's early years. I can meet with you to help come up with solutions tailored to your family's needs.

Infant massage

Using nurturing touch with your infant can help promote relaxation, interaction, relief and a secure relationship. The services I offer include individual instruction for one family (one or two parents and infant or twins) and group instruction with up to 6 parent-infant pairs. Five sessions of 90 minutes each provides lots of practice of the strokes approved by the International Association Infant Massage. We also focus on reading your infant's cues for interacting and common parenting concerns.

Consulting and Workshops

If you are a member of an agency or group looking for a speaker, I offer various talks on topics related to infant mental health, parenting and early intervention. Here are some workshops I have given recently:

• Attachment Difficulties in Early Childhood: Opportunities and Red Flags During a Well Baby Exam (45th Annual Post Graduate Review in Family Medicine)
• Depression and Our Families (Reach Positive Behaviour Support Program)
• Play Therapy (Vancouver Art Therapy Institute, Reach Child and Youth Development Society)
• Laying a Foundation for Positive Self Esteem (Ladner Family Place)
• Toilet Teaching: The Basics (Delta Association for Child Development)