Settling In: Seasonal Light Shifts and Your Environment
This November, we’re returning to the body.
As the light changes, so do we. You might feel it already — that tug to go to bed earlier, the extra effort it takes to wake up, or a desire to stay cozy and close to home. These are not flaws in your motivation. They’re physiological cues from your nervous system.
The Unseen Work That Shapes Our Relationships
You know the feeling, remembering your partner’s dental appointment, your child’s shifting moods, your roommate’s dietary preferences, and the mental list of things no one else seems to track. And still wondering, “Why am I so tired?”
That’s invisible labour. And it’s exhausting.
What Are You Carrying That Wasn’t Yours?
This week’s Tend to it Tuesday opened up a conversation many people feel in their bones, even if they don’t always have the words for it:
How am I still shaped by the emotional roles I inherited, even decades later?
As a therapist, I often sit with clients in that quiet, painful realization:
“I was the kid who had to stay calm so everyone else could fall apart.”
“I didn’t get to be angry, so now I don’t know how to express it.”
“I still feel like I’m failing if I’m not helping someone else.”
And sometimes:
“I became the parent I swore I wouldn’t be.”
Inherited Patterns, Invisible Roles
We inherit more than eye colour or traditions from our families.
We inherit unspoken rules, emotional roles, and nervous system cues.
The “fixer,” the “quiet one,” the “strong one,” the “troublemaker.”
Sometimes those roles were assigned without words.
Sometimes they were survival strategies.
Staying Flexible While Staying Connected
There’s a subtle, but powerful shift that happens in therapy rooms when people realize:
“I don’t have to do all the work alone — but I do have to do my part differently.”
As a therapist, I often witness this in family or couples work. There’s a moment when someone softens — not because they’ve been convinced or coerced — but because their body stops bracing. A breath releases. The shoulders drop. The eyes come forward again.
Self-Work While in Relationship
When we talk about self-work, it can sound like something done alone, in your own head, on your own time.
But in couples and family therapy, self-work is often relational. It happens with the other person in the room. They become a mirror, a trigger, a teacher, and a co-regulator.
This week, we explore how relational self-awareness: the ability to notice, name, and shift your patterns while staying in connection, is often the most transformative work of all.
From the Therapist’s Chair: Unpacking the Systems We Live In
As therapists, we’re trained to notice roles in our clients: the helper, the fixer, the avoider, the explainer.
But these roles don’t disappear when we become clinicians. In fact, many of us were drawn to this work because of the roles we learned to play early on.
How Relationships Shape Us and We Shape Them.
This week, we’re exploring family systems theory and attachment science to better understand the emotional patterns we carry into adulthood. Often, what feels like “just the way I am” is actually “how I learned to be” in relationship to others.
From the Therapist’s Chair: What Couples & Family Therapy Can (and Can’t) Do
Not all family therapy looks the same. And no one arrives at the process without a story, sometimes many stories. Some come in already clear on what hurts. Others arrive hoping I can somehow fix someone else in the room.
But here’s the thing I always try to hold:
Therapy is a process, not a magic wand. It’s a space to explore, witness, and sometimes renegotiate the patterns we carry in our relationships.
What Therapy Can (and Can’t) Do for Families & Couples
If you’ve ever wondered:
“Would family therapy help, or just make it worse?”
“Is couples therapy only for people on the brink?”
“Can therapy actually help our dynamic?”
You’re not alone. These are common and valid questions.
Let’s start this month by grounding ourselves in what couples and family therapy can (and can’t) actually do.