Avah Henn is Hebrew and translates to love, grace and unmerited favour. This is my aim, that through coming to Avah Henn for counselling you will experience unconditional positive regard, love, grace and unmerited favour. I feel that this quote from Carl Rogers, sums up what I would like to achieve during the counselling process: “When a person realizes he has been deeply heard, his eyes moisten. I think in some real sense he is weeping for joy. It is as though he were saying, “Thank God, somebody heard me. Someone knows what it’s like to be me”
– Carl R. Rogers
My name is Danica Freimond (pictured on the right with my husband, Sean). I am a registered social worker with a passion to leave people better than I found them. I work from the person-centred approach and place a high value on your innate ability to change and grow. Just because we cannot see a mental health problem, doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist. Mental health should carry the exact same weight as a broken leg; you wouldn’t walk around on a broken leg, don’t walk around with untreated mental health problems; reach out for help! “The curious paradox is that when I accept myself just as I am, then I can change” – C. R. Rogers
Through the person-centred approach, I facilitate a process where you feel heard, understood and accepted. This process enables you to reconnect with yourself and find a unique to move forward. Overall, I have a keen interest in individual counselling, mental health, life skills, relationship counselling, trauma resolution, and post-traumatic growth.
I work from the person-centred approach. This means that during our counselling process, I trust in your innate ability (known as the actualising tendency) to find fulfilment in your personal potential. I place a high value on you as a person in all aspects of your humanity. Through the person-centred approach, I facilitate a process where you feel heard, understood, and accepted. This process enables you to reconnect with yourself and find your own way to move forward.
When deciding on seeking counselling, I often encourage clients to ask themselves the following questions:
*What do you expect from counselling?
*Why are you here?
*What do you want?
*What do you hope to leave with?
*How is what you are currently doing working for you?
*What aspects of yourself or your life situation would you most like to change?
Counselling helps couples take time out of their busy lives and come together to really focus on themselves. I act as a sort of mediator between you and help to facilitate healthy and effective communication. It is particularly helpful where couples are set on improving their relationships but are not sure how to go about doing so. Another part of the process involves identifying behavioral patterns between the two of you and identify those which lead to conflict. Trough the counselling process we can work on modifying them. Throughout it is important that we focus on effective communication.
Below are just a few of the major benefits that can come out of couples counselling:
*Improved communication
*Deeper connection and renewed intimacy
*Re-negotiating commitments and making decisions.
Another important benefit of the couples counselling process is that it helps you to establish realistic pictures of your partner, helping you to become more aware of each other’s desires and motivations. It is also a fantastic accountability tool; here homework can also play a valuable role.
Trauma counselling is a form of therapy that can help you deal with the emotional response caused by a traumatic event. “Over 50% of people experience at least one trauma in their lives. Trauma can include a wide range of situations, ranging from serious injury, sexual violence, and life-threatening events, to chronic abuse and neglect, being bullied, and homelessness,” says Kelly Workman, PsyD, a psychologist at Columbia University Medical Center who specializes in treating trauma.
People are not passive recipients of trauma. You take steps to prevent trauma. When you can’t stop the trauma, you try to modify the trauma itself or its effects of it on your life. These steps are used to preserve what you hold precious in life and are founded upon these values. People try to protect what they give value to. Your response to trauma is based on what you give value to in life. In the context of trauma these responses and the values they signify, are usually demeaned or seen as unimportant (White 2006:28).
I usually start the trauma counselling process with a debriefing conversation. Ideally, the debriefing process should be done 48-72 hours after the event (but can also be done long after a trauma and still be as effective). Debriefing in my practice can be seen as a structured conversation called defusing. From a narrative perspective, our first goal is to externalise the trauma so that it becomes an event separate from the person. Secondly, we want to explore the trauma in the landscape of identity so as to strengthen the sense of an agentive self. Thirdly, we want to normalise intense and confusing emotions that result from exposure to trauma.
Further Applied Metapsychology techniques are outlined below
What it Traumatic Incident Reduction or TIR?
TIR is a rapid (compared to traditional therapy) method of effectively reducing traumatic stress from emotionally and/or physically painful events in the past. It involves re-experiencing past traumas in a completely safe environment, free of distractions, judgments, or interpretations. Any severe and shocking event can be addressed, including accidents, injuries, childhood traumas, violent crime, or any sort of loss. In addition, unwanted persistent feelings, emotions, sensations, attitudes and pains can be addressed, even if you have no immediate memory of traumatic incidents connected to that feeling. If you are interested in TIR, book a session with me where we discuss the method and then we book a follow up appointment during which the technique is used.
What is Life Stress Reduction or LSR?
Quality of life is all about you being able to use your full abilities, being freed from painful events of the past and confusing situations in the present. Life Stress Reduction takes up the issues of most interest and importance to you, addressing each issue with a variety of specific person-centred techniques until you feel that issue is resolved. Using lighter Life Stress Reduction techniques can aid you in building up ego strength, enabling you to eventually go through the worst of any trauma and/or stress issues you feel you want to address. The many techniques in Life Stress Reduction besides TIR are also good for people who don’t have many traumas in their lives. If you feel you have other issues or areas of life that you would like to improve, and/or if you simply want to grow beyond where you currently are. If you are interested in LSR, book a session with me where we discuss the method and then we book a follow-up appointment during which the techniques are used.
