SUPPORT
Caring, Committed Counselling for Toxic Stress and Trauma including Complex Trauma.
Counselling Areas
I provide Edmonton-based counselling support for adults focused on toxic stress and trauma with a special focus on complex trauma (virtually in Alberta).
This means I work with:
- Toxic stress and various stress related conditions such as burnout, compassion fatigue, moral distress, and all of the contributing aspects such as self-care, belief systems, and coping skills.
- Typical effects of trauma such as symptoms related to intrusion, arousal and reactivity, avoidance, numbing and dissociation.
- Additional effects of complex trauma such as issues with emotional and nervous system dysregulation, shame, self-concept and abandonment of self, learned helplessness and poor efficacy, trauma responses, insecure attachment styles including trauma bonding and relationship issues, addictions as a means of managing internal distress, and somatic distress and related physical illnesses.
I facilitate recognition, regulation, resources, recovery, resilience, and relationships (with self and others).
Carole Marriott
It can be an awkward thing to write about oneself, but I know for me, it is much easier to share with, learn from and be supported by someone when I know more about them. In fact, it’s a prerequisite.
So, here’s five things about me:
- I have a mix of education (business, social work, health promotion, coaching, adult education, lifestyle medicine, mindfulness, nutrition, counselling and psychotherapy, trauma recovery) and varied experience (social worker, therapist, manager, executive, and consultant in multiple government and not for profit health and mental health settings). The consistent focus of my career has been on transformation: understanding it, learning about it, and supporting individuals, organizations, and systems. Even after decades of change-making efforts, it still lights me up.
2. Many would say, we can only support others to go where we have been. So, in that vein, even though it was some time ago, know that I’ve been through several dark nights, including as I moved through years of my own complex trauma recovery. I did my best to be broken open, stripped bare and reintegrated into a bigger, better version of myself.
4. For as long as I can remember, I’ve seen things in the big picture, so I naturally reflect on how things are interrelated, often trying to understand where the roots to any issue are and where energy is best spent to shift something. This perspective helps me make change in my own life and support others to do the same.
3. I spent the COVID 19 pandemic working in a large multi-site continuing care organization supporting the hardworking frontline staff, managers, and executives in coping with and recovering from the unrelenting stress, moral distress and hundreds of deaths.
Like many others, the pandemic experiences led to a reconsideration of many things, and deeper recognition of the prevalence of toxic stress and trauma recovery.
5. I love being a mom/stepmom and witnessing and supporting another person’s becoming. (And everything I am invited to humbly learn in the process!) These days, our feisty dog, Millie, is also teaching me some things. I also enjoy hanging out in sacred space, spending time with family and friends, staying fit (mostly), enjoying nature in the ravine trails or getting messy in the dirt, spontaneous dance parties, being thrift rich, and adding stamps to the Canadian collection my mom passed down to me.
Training, Theories and Therapies
To help you better understand some of what’s backing my ability, here’s a list of relevant education and training.
Education, Registrations, Certifications.
- Undergraduate degree in Social Work with five years counselling experience. Registered as a social worker (RSW) with the Alberta College of Social Workers.
- Graduate degree in Science– Health Promotion specializing in mental health. (Health Promotion recognizes the complexity of health (including mental health) and “disease” and sees them as resulting from the interplay of multiple layers and factors. It is the process of empowering people to increase control over and improve their health using individual, social and environmental interventions).
- Certificate Solution Focused Coaching (ESFC).
- Certificate Adult Education.
- Graduate Certificate in Spiritually Informed Psychotherapy.
- Certified Trauma Recovery Counsellor. Registered trauma recovery counsellor (CTRC).
- About 450 hours of training specific to trauma and complex trauma recovery.
Counselling Theories, Therapies and Specialized Training. There are hundreds of different approaches to supporting therapeutic change. Each of them has a particular way of understanding and addressing an issue. Here are some of the ones I work from.
Internal Family Systems for Complex Trauma. An approach that regards trauma as resulting in internal fragmentation. It seeks to heal the wounded parts and restore wholeness by changing the dynamics between the parts and the core SELF, which is the calm, confident, curious, compassionate, clear, courageous, creative, connected person at the core of each individual.
Advanced Trauma Treatment for Complex Trauma. In depth exploration of the impacts of complex trauma and the most effective and evidence-based strategies for recovery including with dissociation and fragmentation of self.
Emotional Freedom Techniques. A bilateral tapping protocol and set of various processes used to shift emotional distress and stuckness related to unhelpful patterns, core beliefs, and unprocessed trauma.
It can be especially helpful, because there are processes for processing trauma that do not require verbally telling the story.
Cognitive Processing Therapy for Trauma. A type of CBT enhanced specifically for trauma. It explores the interplay between thoughts including core beliefs, feelings and behaviors by recognizing and shifting stuck points. In addition, it invites a review and redefining of safety, trust, power and control, esteem, and intimacy which are often impacted by trauma.
Coherence Focused Therapy. Brings awareness to ignored core areas of meaning, feeling, and emotional learning and uses internal capabilities to retrieve and transform subconscious, symptom-requiring emotional schemas, which were learned adaptively in response to the trauma(s).
Somatic Therapy for Trauma. An approach that recognizes the holding of trauma in the soma (body and bodily sensations) and uses methods to process and release the holding.
Soul Based Complex Trauma Recovery. An approach that recognizes the impact of complex trauma on the SELF and facilitates intervention that draws on healing practices around the world to restore internal fragmentation and address the other impacts of trauma.
Other Relevant Training.
- Clinical Applications of Polyvagal Theory. This is a theory by Dr. Stephen Porges that expanded our view of how the nervous system works, defined “safety”, better differentiated the survival defense states beyond “fight or flight” and outlined the critical role and importance of regulating the Vagus nerve. The training also explored the impact of trauma on the nervous system and the best Polyvagal Informed strategies to support recovery.
- Fallout and Recovery from Narcissistic and Antagonistic Abuse.
- Mindfulness. Mindfulness essentially means to be in the present moment, noticing and attending on purpose, without judgement. It is a valuable state and skill to cultivate. When practiced consistently it is linked to improved self-awareness, regulation, empathy, and response flexibility. It also supports resilience, helps to reduce the conditioned fear response and assists recovery from stress related conditions and trauma.
- Solution Focused Counselling. A short-term, goal-oriented, and collaborative approach to therapy that helps clients achieve change by focusing on solutions rather than problems.
- Cognitive Behavior Therapy. An approach that works on the interplay between thoughts, including core beliefs, feelings and behaviors by recognizing and shifting problematic areas that are having a negative impact.
- Lifestyle Medicine. Lifestyle Medicine is an area of healthcare aimed at working with the whole person through lifestyle interventions in six evidence-based areas including: nutrition, physical activity, restorative sleep, stress management, avoidance of risky substances and positive social connections. These areas has been shown to have global impacts on an individual’s health and mental health.