MEET JILL

Jill Koehler, MA, RCC-ACS

Master of Counselling Psychology
Registered Clinical Counsellor + Supervisor

Maisie the Poodle, HOP

Happy Office Poodle
Hypo-allergenic & Non-shedding

About me…

I am a Registered Clinical Counsellor, Focusing-Oriented Therapist + Approved Clinical Supervisor. I work with people location-independently online/phone or in-person in Squamish. I graduated from my Master’s of Counselling Program in 2010 and have been working in various roles as a counsellor since then. Before this my professional life had all sorts of twists and turns: teaching fashion design in the Philippines, web design, executive assistant in tech and engineering, and running a small business designing and selling fleece clothing to list some of them.

In addition to my training as a psychotherapist, I also completed a 200-hour yoga training with Ashtanga Yoga Victoria. I practice yoga regularly and am an advocate for the transformative journey of yoga and other contemplative practices. For 10 years I was a volunteer with Squamish Search and Rescue and helped with providing mental health education and support.

Maisie is a goofy, small standard poodle who loves getting out on the trails in Squamish. While shy at first, she is friendly and loves to give the odd puppy kiss. Maisie is non-shedding and hypo-allergenic. Woof!

What is counselling?

So what’s counselling anyway? Is it years of lying on a couch? Is it the hope of a few sessions to resolve long-standing problems? Counselling can seem like a bit of a mystery. We’d all like a quick fix to our problems, but real change and transformation is a journey and counselling can be a helpful part of that.

I believe that within each of us is all the wisdom we need, but past and present experiences can get in the way of connecting with our own self-knowledge. With this disconnect we generally feel stuck and confused. Counselling is about increasing awareness of our thoughts, feelings, body sensations and response patterns both towards ourselves and others. As we begin to approach these parts of ourselves in a new way, with gentle curiosity, things naturally start to shift and move forward in a fresh way.

Training & Specializations

Integrative Body Psychotherapy

Integrative Body Psychotherapy (IBP) is a holistic approach developed by Los Angeles therapists Drs. Jack Lee Rosenberg and Beverly Kitaen Morse starting in the 1970s. It integrates the body, mind, and emotions in the healing process, addressing the physical-energetic, psychological-emotional, and existential-spiritual nature of being human. IBP helps individuals connect with their inner core of wisdom to achieve a calm and fulfilling sense of self, mental clarity, and overall well-being.

The underlying theory of IBP suggests that psychological issues often stem from unresolved early life traumas stored in the body, manifesting as tension, pain, and emotional reactivity. These can lead to mental health issues like anxiety and depression. IBP uses a combination of techniques from body-oriented psychotherapy, psychodynamic therapy, and cognitive-behavioral therapy to help individuals release these stored traumas and patterns of tension, fostering a healthy and balanced integration of bodily sensations, emotions, and thoughts.

Focusing-Oriented Therapy

Focusing-Oriented Therapy is a body-centered approach. In other words, it helps you connect with your felt sense or body sensations related to an issue. With this approach you can share a lot or a little about your experience, and you have control over the pacing and depth of our work together.

Often, especially with issues that feel particularly stuck, we have thought about and talked through the problem over and over again with little or no change. In such cases a focusing-oriented approach can provide a new way of exploring the problem, and in turn allow you to discover fresh perspectives and gain a sense of direction for moving things forward.

Research at the University of Chicago, since replicated in more than 50 studies, showed that the way that clients pay attention to their own experiential process, even in the first session, is predictive of success or failure in therapy. Focusing is a way to bring that successful client process into any kind of psychotherapy.

Integrative Psychotherapy

Integrative Psychotherapy, developed by by Richard Erskine and colleagues, values the inherent worth of each individual and seeks to unify various aspects of a person’s functioning—affective, behavioral, cognitive, physiological, and spiritual. It aims to integrate unresolved aspects of the self into a cohesive personality, reducing reliance on defense mechanisms, and enhancing flexibility in life. This approach brings together multiple therapeutic perspectives, including psychodynamic, cognitive, and behavioral, within a dynamic systems framework. The goal is to promote wholeness and optimal functioning in various life dimensions, with an emphasis on both client and therapist growth, ethical practice, and ongoing learning.

Coherence Therapy

Coherence therapy is focused on guiding clients to get in touch with hidden, core areas of meaning and feeling that are generating the presenting symptom or problem. Coherence Therapy makes use of native capacities for swiftly retrieving and then transforming the client’s unconscious, symptom-requiring emotional schemas, which were formed adaptively earlier in life.

A wide range of symptoms can be dispelled along with their associated, less visible emotional wounds, attachment patterns and troubled “parts”. The process is experiential and the therapist’s empathic attunement is a crucial ingredient. The focused methodology requires far fewer sessions than conventional in-depth psychotherapies. Quoted from: http://www.coherencetherapy.org/

Focusing-Oriented Dreamwork

Developed by Dr. Leslie Ellis, Focusing-Oriented dreamwork is a process of working through dreams and nightmares through a somatic or body-oriented lens. Through this process clients are invited to deeply experience their dreams and discover for themselves what they dream may be asking or telling them. This is not a process of interpreting dreams or nightmares but using these experiences as doorways to bring curiosity and gain clarity on what might be wanting attention in a client’s life.

Research in nightmares has shown that addressing nightmares can be correlated with a decrease in PTSD symptoms.

EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing)

EMDR = Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing.

Video 1: https://youtu.be/hKrfH43srg8
Video 2: https://youtu.be/Pkfln-ZtWeY

EMDR’s focus is on the brain’s ability to constantly learn, taking past experiences and updating them with the present situation.
- This is referred to as “The Adaptive Information Processing Hypothesis.”
- Adaptive learning is constantly updating memory network systems (reconsolidation).
EMDR’s focus is the person’s inability to update experiences.
EMDR therapy uses a set of procedures to organize these negative and positive networks and then uses bilateral stimulation, i.e., eye movements, alternative tapping, etc. as the catalyst to effectively integrate the past experiences with the present adaptive learning. Much like eating, we digest food, keeping the nutrients necessary of health, letting go of the waste, we keep what is necessary for adaptive learning. And let go of unnecessary information (from EMDR Consulting Website).

Nonviolent Communication

Nonviolent Communication (NVC) is the integration of 4 things:

Consciousness: a set of principles that support living a life of compassion, collaboration, courage, and authenticity
Language: understanding how words contribute to connection or distance
Communication: knowing how to ask for what we want, how to hear others even in disagreement, and how to move toward solutions that work for all
Means of influence: sharing “power with others” rather than using “power over others”

NVC is a communication skill-set that can be used to improve both personal and professional communication and conflict-resolution. NVC was developed by Marshall Rosenberg.

Polyvagal Theory

Polyvagal theory in therapy helps clients regulate their nervous system and promote healing. Therapists create a safe environment, teach regulation techniques, and encourage awareness of bodily sensations. Co-regulation and attunement support clients in shifting from dysregulation to regulation. Gradual exposure to triggers and integration empower clients to manage stress independently.

For more information: https://polyvagal-institute.mn.co/

Prepare-Enrich Couples Counselling

PREPARE/ENRICH is the leading relationship inventory and skill-building program for couples.

Over the last 30 years, the PREPARE/ENRICH relationship assessment has empowered and energized more than 3 million couples. It is built on a solid research foundation and provides a powerful platform for in-depth conversation about the topics and issues you might not even think to ask but that are essential conversations needed to build a solid relationship foundation to build on. PREPARE/ENRICH is custom tailored to a couple’s relationship and provides couple exercises to build their relationship skills.

Bader-Pearson Couples Model

This couples model helps us to understand the normal and natural stages and struggles that growing couples encounter. The model provides a structure for therapy through identifying the developmental task, developmental stalemate, diagnosis and specific treatment interventions for each stage of development. This model creates a structure through which partners can better understand each other’s vision, learn to change the way highly charged issues are discussed, manage emotional reactivity, and gain a deeper understanding of each other’s behaviour.

Gottman’s Couples Counselling Model

The Gottman Method is a highly structured and goal-oriented form of couples therapy that is designed to help couples maintain healthy, lasting relationships.

Psilocybin-Assisted Psychotherapy

Is Psilocybin-Assisted Therapy Right for You?

Psilocybin therapy isn’t suitable for everyone. Individuals with a history of bipolar disorder, psychotic disorders, or personality disorders should consult their physician or psychiatrist before considering this approach. While there’s growing excitement around the potential of psilocybin and other psychedelics, it’s crucial to approach them with caution and maintain realistic expectations. These substances do not offer short cuts or quick fixes.

Psilocybin is most effective when used as part of ongoing psychotherapy, with thorough preparation and integration. In considering this approach, people who are most likely to benefit include individuals:

Who have already been actively exploring their own self-awareness and healing.
Who are comfortable and can tolerate sustained internal focus with themselves.
Who have a supportive social network.
Who have are generally able to emotionally and psychologically self-regulate.

Other ways to access non-ordinary or altered states of consciousness:

Mind-body practices such as meditation, breathwork, ecstatic dance and cold plunging. Non-ordinary states disrupt our usual way of seeing things and may lead to insights and experiences ranging from the somatically strange to the mystically ineffable.

Special Access Program

Currently psilocybin can only be legally accessed through participation in research and through Canada’s Special Access Program (SAP), which provides access to psychedelic treatments for conditions like end-of-life distress, treatment-resistant depression, and PTSD. Note that only MDs and Nurse Practitioners can prescribe these medications under SAP.

The Process

1. Preparation: There are at least 3 preparatory counselling sessions to ensure you are fully prepared for the experience, helping to build a solid foundation for your journey. These preparation sessions don’t guarantee continuing on to a psilocybin session but are an opportunity to share more about the process, learn about an individual’s history and hopes, engage in some somatic processes and build trust and explore if proceeding to a psilocybin session is the best approach.

2. Psilocybin Session: The actual psilocybin session typically lasts about 6 hours, with costs ranging from $1300 to $1800, depending on the rates of the assistant who will also be present. These sessions provide guided support to ensure a safe container for your experience.

3. Integration: Following your psilocybin session, 3 or more integration sessions. Integration sessions offer a supportive, safe environment to further explore the experiences of the non-ordinary state and to learn ways of anchoring this new learning and where appropriate look at practical steps to implement those insights as positive change.

Coverage:

While the psilocybin session itself is not covered by benefits, the preparatory and integration sessions may be depending on your extended benefits.

Interested in learning more?

If you’re curious about whether psilocybin might be a fit for you, you are welcome to book an initial, free 15 minute consult: https://communicatingwell.janeapp.com/

Certification:
I am a registered and certified clinical counsellor and supervisor through the following governing body: B.C. Association of Clinical Counsellors. Membership requires a minimum of a Master’s Degree in counselling, as well as clinical experience, and there are strict guidelines for professional behaviour.