S2|EP13: Healing in Relationships with a Therapist (with Chris Lam)
What makes people turn to therapy? How is talking to a therapist different from sharing your "problems" with a good friend or family member? In this episode, we discuss this and many other aspects of doing therapy!
Show notes:
- 00:01:34: How you can support the pod (rate + review!) and connect with me
- 00:02:24: Who is Chris Lam?
- 00:05:00: Chris’ analogy of “riding the waves” with how we navigate both “positive and negative” emotions
- 00:10:20: Chris’ path to becoming a therapist
- 00:17:45: How developing a relationship vs “fixing” his clients helped Chris connect with youth in therapy
- 00:20:02: Chris’ experience working with adults in therapy + common reasons why people do therapy
- 00:23:17: What are some benefits of counselling?
- 00:26:18: How talking to a therapist can be different from sharing your “problems” with friends or family
- 00:32:26: How gaining knowledge of trauma psychoeducation can help with shame + our healing process
- 00:33:35: Differences and similarities working with youth vs adults in therapy
- 00:37:14: Chris’ experience working with “hard-to-serve” youth in the justice system
- 00:39:49: Some ways Chris has worked toward being a more trauma-informed therapist and doing “the least harm” with clients
- 00:44:21: How Chris navigates therapy conversations about healing childhood trauma and issues with parents
- 00:49:55: How youth can/usually access therapy + legislation on youth and therapy (at least in Toronto)
- 00:53:00: What can be involved in finding the right match with a therapist
- 00:56:52: Some red flags that Janice would consider for herself in finding the right therapist
- 00:58:53: Doing virtual therapy: yay or nay?
- 01:02:32: How you can connect with Chris
Rate & review the podcast:
- Website: www.ridethewavescs.com
- Email: clam@ridethewavescs.com
- Phone: (647) 456-7751
Connect with Janice:
- Instagram: @janicehoimages | @janicehocounselling
Listen to all The Soul's Work Podcast episodes: www.thesoulsworkpodcast.com
-----
Janice is a therapist-in-training and not licensed to work with clients.
DISCLAIMER: The content in the podcast and on this webpage is not intended to constitute or be a substitute for working with a professional mental health or healing practitioner.
Intro
Hey y’all, welcome back to the Soul’s Work Podcast. I’m so excited to bring you my guest today, Chris Lam. He is the owner of and counsellor at Ride the Waves Counselling Service. And we are talking about doing therapy today.
But before I share his bio with you and jump into the conversation, hello, how y’all doing? I hope you’re all as well as can be, and taking care of yourselves. By the time this comes out, I will be in Italy, presumably eating a lot of food. If you missed my last episode, it was about this idea of life being short, and part of that was booking this trip to Italy, but also taking a more nuanced approach to what it means to live our life like it’s short, and therefore live authentically. Which is what this podcast is all about.
Another episode I want to point you to is my "Doing Therapy" episode in the trauma healing series of this season – that is episode 9. And I think it’s really good complement to this one, because I do talk about my various experiences working with different therapists, things to maybe consider if you’re thinking about doing therapy yourself. And this episode is really cool, because it’s kind of hearing from the other side, from the therapist or counselor themselves and what they might bring to that therapeutic relationship.
So just as a reminder, if you are loving the show, are finding it helpful to tune in and learn about things or just hear about another human’s experience that makes you feel a little bit less alone in life, and you want to support the show, please do leave a review and rating on Apple Podcasts, subscribe to the pod. It’s also on Spotify and all the things. Share on social. And that all really helps to build engagement and get others tuning in as well. And I thank you in advance for that.
You can follow me @janicehoimages on Instagram and @janicehocreative on Facebook, where I do always give updates as soon as a new episode drops. And I’m also @natureimmersed on Instagram, and you can always email me at janice.sj.ho@gmail.com to provide any feedback, suggestions, or inquiries about the podcast.
Okay, so as I mentioned, Chris Lam is the owner of and counsellor at Ride the Waves Counselling Service. He is a registered Social Worker and has been in the field of therapy for 15 years. The majority of his time as a community Social Worker has been providing individual therapy with youth involved with the justice system while his private practice primarily works with adults. He has experience working with clients around issues of trauma, anxiety, relationship difficulties, emotion management, and exploring future life paths. A key focus of Ride the Waves Counselling Service is to help people develop a better understanding of their emotions, to gain greater personal awareness, and to help people develop more skills to manage the ups and downs of life.
I love it. And how I know Chris is that we worked in the same non-profit organization, back when I was there in 2014, 2015, and this organization did serve folks who were going through the justice system or were at risk of coming into contact with the justice system, perhaps because of unemployment issues or addictions or housing instability, etc. And so, I met Chris when he was facilitating one of the programs there where he did work with these youth and really helped them to talk through some of their life challenges. And he’s no longer there now. He is doing his private practice, but of course it’s still all super important work. And he does share his contact info at the end of the episode, but just want to say at the top that you can check out his website www.ridethewavescs.com/ to learn more about him.
Okay, without further ado, here is my conversation with Chris Lam. I hope you enjoy.