A confidential space for you, beyond the work.
Compassionate virtual counselling for first responders and public safety professionals across British Columbia and Ontario, including police officers, firefighters, paramedics, emergency dispatchers, and correctional professionals.
You Don't Have to Carry Everything Alone
You may be used to showing up for others, making difficult decisions, and managing demanding situations. Having a space to focus on your own experiences can feel unfamiliar.
Counselling offers an opportunity to explore what you’ve been carrying, whether it’s connected to your work, relationships, health, or life beyond the job.
There’s no expectation to share more than you’re comfortable with, and no pressure to have the right words. We can begin wherever you are.
What We Can Work Through Together
Trauma & Operational Stress
Making Space for Difficult Experiences
Critical incidents and repeated exposure to distressing situations can affect you in different ways. Counselling offers space to process these experiences, explore their impact, and consider what support might help.
Cumulative Stress & Burnout
When the Demands Add Up
Frontline pressures can build over time, sometimes affecting your energy, wellbeing, and sense of self. Counselling offers space to recognize these patterns, explore your needs, and find ways to manage ongoing demands.
Compassion Fatigue
Caring for Yourself, Too
Supporting others through crisis and suffering can take an emotional toll. Counselling offers space to explore exhaustion, emotional distancing, and the challenges of caring for others while making room for your own needs and wellbeing.
Shift Work & Sleep Strain
Finding Balance Beyond the Shift
Irregular schedules, disrupted sleep, and shift-work demands can affect your health, relationships, and daily life. Counselling offers space to explore these challenges and develop practical approaches to rest, routines, and wellbeing.
Moral Injury
When Experiences Challenge Your Values
Some experiences can leave you questioning decisions, circumstances, or what feels right. Counselling offers a nonjudgmental space to explore difficult emotions, moral conflicts, and questions of meaning, identity, and personal values.
Relationships & Family Life
Making Room for Life Beyond Work
The demands of first responder work can affect communication, connection, and family relationships. Counselling offers space to explore these challenges, better understand relationship patterns, and consider ways to support the connections that matter to you.
Why work with Erica?
Professional Care. An Understanding of the Work.
As a registered clinical counsellor, Erica brings a warm, collaborative, and trauma-informed approach to counselling, supported by additional education through Warrior Health focused on the experiences, culture, and mental health needs of first responders and public safety professionals.
Her background as a sports chiropractor and kinesiologist also informs her understanding of the connection between physical wellbeing, stress, and emotional health.
While her training offers insight into the demands of frontline work, Erica recognizes that every person’s experience is different. Here, you won’t be defined by your profession or expected to explain away what you’re feeling.
Your experiences matter, both in and beyond the uniform.
Care That Respects Your Experience
Trauma-informed care
A thoughtful approach that respects your experiences, boundaries, and pace.
First Responder Awareness
Care informed by additional education in public safety mental health.
Confidential Virtual Sessions
Private, secure counselling from a suitable location in BC or Ontario.
Respect for Your Schedule
Appointment planning that considers the realities of shift work, within available hours.
Whole-Person Perspective
Attention to the connection between emotional, physical, and relational wellbeing.
Collaborative Support
Counselling shaped around your individual needs, goals, and feedback.
Getting Started Is Simple
01. Let’s Start With a Conversation
Book a complimentary 15-minute consultation to ask questions, share what you’re looking for, and explore whether counselling feels like a good fit.
02. Begin Wherever You Are
Our first sessions focus on understanding your experiences, concerns, and what you hope to gain from counselling. There’s no pressure to share everything at once.
03. Move Forward at Your Own Pace
Together, we’ll explore approaches that suit your needs and goals, with opportunities to check in, share feedback, and adjust our work along the way.
Accessible, Transparent Counselling
Individual counselling
50 min · 80 min
$170 · $225
Couples counselling
50 min · 80 min
$200 · $265
Family counselling
50 min · 80 min
$230 · $305
Group therapy
Ranging from $89 to $110 per session, depending on the group.
$89 · $110
Sliding-scale fees and lower-cost options may be available. We believe that financial circumstances shouldn’t prevent you from exploring counselling. You’re welcome to ask about fees and discuss what might be accessible for you.
Extended health benefits may cover some or all clinical counselling costs, depending on your insurance plan. Receipts are provided for reimbursement.
Curious About Group Therapy With Fellow First Responders?
Sometimes, connecting with others who understand the demands of frontline work can offer a different kind of support.
Our six-week group counselling programs provide a welcoming space for shared experiences, reflection, and practical conversations about stress, relationships, and life beyond the job.
Groups are professionally facilitated, with sliding-scale options available.
First Responder Therapy FAQs
Will I have to explain first responder culture?
Erica brings additional education in first responder and public safety mental health, while recognizing that every role, workplace, and individual experience is different. You won’t be starting from zero, but your experience will never be assumed.
Are counselling sessions confidential?
Yes. Your privacy is an important part of the therapeutic relationship. Sessions are confidential, subject to applicable legal and ethical exceptions, which will be explained before counselling begins.
If you have concerns about workplace privacy, you’re welcome to ask about record-keeping, insurance claims, and information-sharing before beginning.
Do I need to have PTSD or be in crisis?
Not at all. You may be navigating operational stress, burnout, relationship challenges, difficult experiences, or simply wanting space to focus on your wellbeing. You don’t need a diagnosis or crisis to seek support.
Can my partner or family join a session?
Depending on your circumstances and therapeutic goals, couples or family counselling may be considered as a separate service. To maintain appropriate professional boundaries, Erica does not provide individual counselling to multiple members of the same family system or automatically combine individual and couples work.
Referrals can be provided when separate support is more appropriate.
Is counselling covered by insurance?
Do you provide workplace assessments or fitness-for-duty evaluations?
No. Rising Minds provides counselling and psychotherapy, not independent fitness-for-duty assessments, occupational evaluations, or workplace investigations. Any requests for information from employers or third parties are addressed in accordance with applicable consent, privacy, and professional requirements.
Rising Minds is not an emergency or crisis-response service. If you are in immediate danger or require urgent mental-health support, please call 911, go to your nearest emergency department, or call or text 9-8-8 in Canada.
Trauma-Informed and Culturally Responsive Care
Our approach is grounded in trauma-informed, culturally responsive care, offering a welcoming space where you can feel respected, supported, and valued for who you are — both in and beyond your work.
Here, There's Room for You, Too
You spend so much of your time responding to the needs of others. Here, there’s space to focus on your own.
Whether you’re navigating challenges at work, changes at home, or simply looking for someone to talk to, you’re welcome here.