Relational Trauma Counselling
Do you react in ways that don’t feel like you since you left? You may be starting to wonder if you’ll ever trust yourself, or anyone else, the way you used to.
Relational trauma as an adult isn’t always one clean event. It usually happens over a longer period of time, whether it’s months or years in an abusive relationship or at a toxic workplace. targeted over months or years in a relationship or workplace. The overwhelm isn’t necessarily the incident but the constant betrayal, broken promises and attacks. Sometimes, it’s connect with layers of different relational wounding: a sexual assault followed by a toxic relationship, or being invalidated or dismissed by people you considered friends. The layered harm slowly disrupted your capacity to integrated it and your trust.
I offer online relational trauma counselling, working with adults internationally, integrating EMDR, IFS-informed parts work, and somatic approaches — adapted to what happened to you and your pace.
Who I work with – And how I show up
Adults who feel disconnected from who they were before it happened: a domestic violence relationship, an abusive partnership, workplace bullying or harassment, a sexual assault followed by a toxic relationship, or being blamed by people who should have helped.
You might feel like a different version of yourself: more anxious, more reactive, less able to trust your own judgment. That’s not a character flaw. It’s a part of you that had to stay on guard.
This is what relational trauma counselling looks like in practice: somatic work to regulate your nervous system, parts work to understand what got activated and repair relational wounding, EMDR to help what’s stuck in your body move, and a relationship that models trustworthy connection, since that’s exactly what was violated. I bring over 30 years of my own lived experience of trauma recovery, alongside my professional expertise
A note on the word “relational trauma”: I’m using it specifically for harm that happened in adulthood, after you already had a stable sense of who you were. If what you’re carrying started in childhood, or has shaped you for as long as you can remember, you may be better served by Complex Trauma Counselling or Childhood Trauma Coaching for Adults, since recovery might look different in these cases.
What becomes possible with relational trauma counselling
Feeling like yourself again
Reconnect with your adult self, and build a healthy relationship with the parts that took over.
Trust that’s not all or nothing
Rebuild your capacity to trust yourself and discern what’s safe enough vs. danger, instead of mistrusting everybody.
Boundaries you can hold
Manage fawn, fight, or flight while staying connected to yourself, and respond how you want instead of reacting in ways you don’t like.
Emotions that make sense
You learn to read what your body is telling you rather than being confused or overwhelmed by it.
More joy and hope
As you process what happened, traumatic experiences slowly lose their charge. You have more room for things to feel lighter again.
Relational trauma counselling heals what’s within your control your emotions, your body, your mind, and your relationship with yourself. It can’t heal what’s someone else’s. Some of my clients are co-parenting with a toxic ex-partner, or targeted by systemic harm.
If you can’t fully step away from the relationship, because of co-parenting, legal proceedings, a separation that’s still unfolding, or systemic harm, we also work on strategies to help you navigate what’s ahead, so contact you can’t avoid doesn’t undo the ground you’ve gained.
If these possibilities resonate with you, we can start small. Your next step is a free consultation to see whether my approach feels right for you.
Meet Natalie
I’m a trauma counsellor and complex trauma coach with 15+ years supporting adults healing from relational trauma. My approach, the Integrative Trauma Recovery Model™, integrates EMDR, IFS-informed parts work, and somatic approaches, adapted to what you’ve been through and your pace. It also integrates anti-oppressive practices.
I offer relational trauma counselling online to adults in Western Canada. If you live outside this area and want to work with me, please feel free to reach out to explore options. I work with people from diverse backgrounds. Income-based variable pricing available.
My integrative approach for healing relational trauma
Relational trauma counselling rooted in the Integrative Trauma Recovery Model™
Relational trauma isn’t one-size-fits-all and the approach I use reflects that. The Integrative Trauma Recovery Model™ brings together evidence-based modalities including [EMDR], IFS-informed parts work, somatic approaches, and boundary work, adapting them to what happened to you and your pace.
Rather than following a fixed protocol, we build the process together. Many people feel like they’ve changed, and notice behaviours in themselves they don’t like. Emotions they had to wall off for years can suddenly flood back. That doesn’t mean there’s something wrong with you. Those were adaptive skills that helped you survive. In our work together, all of these parts are welcome, even the ones you dislike.
Here’s what commonly happens with my clients, step by step. We first build enough stabilization that looking at what happened doesn’t overwhelm you, using grounding tools and somatic practices. We use parts work to explore the parts that hold anger, feel anxious and unsafe or that shut down when you see your ex. We look at your trauma responses and find practices to work with them.
When you feel ready and stable enough, we process the betrayal and the pain with EMDR. Throughout, we explore what sore spots within you the abuser used to control you or what parts of you may forced you to override and neglect your boundaries. That’s for prevention. Once, you recognize them and can care for them, it may help you to assert yourself and leave a similar situation in the future earlier.
Our therapeutic relationship matters to me. It’s the container that supports your healing, and it lets you unlearn what relational trauma may have taught you about relationships. If parts of you don’t trust me, that makes sense. I don’t need them to change; I want to understand what they have to say. And if we have a conflict, yes, this can happen in therapeutic relationships, as in any other, I stay present, hear your position, and respect it. I repair if I made a mistake.
I’ll acknowledge abusive and toxic dynamics directly, so you have clarity and can recognize that pattern in future relationships, and I offer psychoeducation on what healthier can look like. Many of my clients tell me it helps to have these dynamics named clearly. It brings a kind of clarity that’s hard to reach on one’s own. Together, we untangle what was theirs to carry and what’s actually yours, since that line is often hard to see when you’re the one who lived it.
Over time, clients often notice they trust their own judgment more, set boundaries that hold, feel less reactive in relationships, or find that specific memories have lost their charge. Healing here means recovering agency and rebuilding trust in yourself — not necessarily trust in everyone.
If you’d like to understand more about how this model works and whether it might be the right fit for you, read: Trauma Counselling: How I Practice and What You Can Expect.
It’s your time to heal: Let’s begin
If this resonates, your next step is simple: a free consultation to see whether this approach feels right for you. We’ll map out gentle first steps together. No need to dive straight into the most painful memories. Book through Jane App or message me at nat@brighthorizontherapies.com.
Your relational trauma counselling questions answered
If you’re curious to learn more about trauma recovery at your own pace, you’re welcome to explore my Trauma Recovery FAQs.