Laurie Bedard is the founder and director of LJB and Associates Counseling Services. She is a certified Canadian counselor with the Canadian Counseling and Psychotherapy Association. She founded her private practice in 2009 after graduating with her Master of Arts in Counseling and Psychology from Goddard College in Plainfield, Vermont. Before that, Ms. Bedard graduated from McGill University in Montreal, Quebec with a Bachelor of Education in 1994.
Ms. Bedard has been a teacher for 25 years. “Teaching isn’t something you do, it’s something you are” she told us. When she began her career as a clinical counselor in 2009, she practiced part-time until just recently. It wasn’t until she was a professor of psychology at Heritage College in Gatineau, Quebec that she realized she could incorporate both her love of teaching and her love of psychology.
“I realized I could offer what other private practices were offering, as well as psychoeducational workshops offered to the general public, businesses or institutions looking to educate themselves or their employees on matters of mental health”. Ms. Bedard says she loves the idea of helping others manage their mental health and that having the opportunity to educate loved ones, employers, administrators or teachers of those struggling with mental health is both an honor and a privilege.
Ms. Bedard herself struggled with anxiety and depression from childhood until she finally “put all of the pieces together” in 2011. She described the stigma attached to mental illness as another obstacle those trying to manage their mental health issues have to overcome. “Having experienced discrimination in the workplace due to mental health challenges, it has become my mission to not only serve those who require support during very difficult and painful times, but also to educate those in positions of power about the realities of mental illness and how to make their place of work a safe space for all of their employees, including those dealing with what is often an invisible illness.”
Laurie Bedard, Clinical Mental Health Counselor & Teacher
Can you share a little bit about the journey that got you to where you are today?
I have a very vivid memory of being 9 or 10, listening to my older brother talk about some psychology courses he was interested in taking in college. He was describing them to my parents and I just remember being enthralled by the concepts he was talking about. At that age, anything and everything seemed possible, so I decided I was going to be a teacher, a hairdresser a professional soccer player and something to do with psychology. I played college soccer but never made it to the big leagues, and unfortunately for my children, I discovered too late that hairdressing wasn’t my forte! Teaching and psychology have always been intertwined though.
It's fascinating because I believe that what you put into the universe, if it aligns with your natural talents and passion, has a way of creating its own unique path for you. Of course, the other side of the coin is that if you continually put out and believe self-defeating messages, you can sabotage your own dreams, goals and intentions. I’m fairly certain that I have done that a couple of times along the way! Between the ages 9 or 10 until now, I have had a wild ride. When I started studying psychology at McGill University, I was still dealing with some of my self-defeating beliefs and ended up switching to the education program. When I graduated and began my career in teaching I had a love of imparting knowledge, but even when I was working as a teacher, there always seemed to be something missing. Also, working with students and families that had little access to financial, educational, social, and health resources, I came to realize that I wasn’t equipped to be teaching reading and writing to students who were focused solely on survival. That’s when I decided to go back to school to earn a master’s degree in psychology and counseling. At the time I wanted to both follow through with a long-held goal and to better equip me to teach.
Did the graduate degree help you become a better teacher?
When I returned to teaching, I believe that it did. However, before I returned to teaching, I was working in a drug and alcohol rehabilitation center as an intern and a new world opened up to me. As I led group therapy sessions, I began realizing that most of my clients had unmet needs from their childhood, and many times they turned to drugs and alcohol to cope, particularly when it came to trauma, abuse or dysfunctional family dynamics. Many of our clients also had undiagnosed learning disabilities that were never addressed, and as an adaptive coping mechanism, they managed their academic and social challenges and the anxiety that came with it through drugs or alcohol.
I could see the connection between my clients and some of my students. At that time, I was still focused on returning to the classroom, but I also had a strong desire to grow my practice in an effort to prevent what I saw as a failure in the educational system to meet the unmet needs of its students. It was also very frustrating to be in the position of a teacher, having the ability to help my students as a counselor, but having to stick to the role of teacher. Whether I was teaching or counseling I was always thinking about the thing I wasn’t doing. I felt pulled in two different directions.
Were there any a-ha moments or catalysts that inspired you to finally step away from teaching to pursue counseling full-time?
The death of my father in 2019, coupled with a toxic workplace environment was a huge catalyst for me. It hit me when he passed away that I only had one life, and if I didn’t take some risks I would probably end up with some regrets.
l agonized about whether or not I should leave teaching and my pension for something that wasn’t as secure as my teaching career. I made pros and cons lists and I consulted with trusted family and friends. Ultimately it was an untenable situation with the administration at work that finally pushed me over the edge. It was a major decision to finally step away from my career, but I eventually took a job at St-Justine Hospital in Montreal delivering a drug and alcohol prevention program designed for teenagers, to facilitators of the program across the world. I still wasn’t ready to go all in on my private practice, but I felt I was a step closer to being able to do both of the things I loved.
You would think I had learned my lesson, but eventually I was led back to a teaching position at Heritage College as a professor of psychology. I was still hustling, working full-time teaching and part-time at my practice and feeling drained from trying to continue to do both. That’s when I finally decided to take a chance on my private practice and go all in. At the time in 2021 I had already had 4 counselors working for the practice so I began offering psychoeducational workshops along with my other services. I know! Why didn’t I think of that sooner right?
What sort of material do you cover in your psychoeducational workshops?
It really does vary, and this aspect of the practice is relatively new, but there is a lot of demand for understanding anxiety, depression and substance abuse and how they impact the person, the family, the workplace and the community. There is a thirst for knowledge and for finding better ways of supporting loved ones and employees. I think there has been a steep learning curve with the pandemic. Loved ones, employers and society at large were forced to reckon with the mental health and substance abuse crisis. The same old, same old, was not going to suffice anymore.
I’m up to the task of putting together a workshop or webinar on most topics in mental health and psychology, whether it be anxiety, self-care and wellness, communication or whatever the client is looking for. This is where my experience as a teacher comes in. Even if I am not an expert on the topic, I know how to do the research and deliver an informative and engaging learning experience.
Are there any topics that interest you more than others?
That depends on the day you ask me! Right now, I’m taking courses on trauma and the changing landscape in terms of treatment options. We have come a long way with our definition and understanding of trauma. The book, The Body Keeps the Score by Bessel van der Kolk has also lit a fire under me. There has been interested and research in this area for many years, but the idea that talks therapy alone may not be the best option therapeutically has really caught on and is one that I have begun to realize in my own practice.
Talk therapy alone may not be the best option for someone struggling with trauma? How so?
Well, for instance, many of my clients could easily grasp the concepts of what they were experiencing and we could talk about the memories and the manifestation of the trauma or traumas quite easily. Some of my clients, even those who were counselors seemed to struggle with putting what they knew into practice, much as I did when I first began trying to figure out how to transform my trauma into something I could live with.
When I was relying on talk therapy with my clients, there seemed to be a disconnect between what they knew and what they could access emotionally. What I have learned is that when trauma occurs, we sometimes have to separate ourselves from our emotions because it is the only way we can go on. We carry on with life, family, school and friends but, the feelings of shame, terror, fear or sadness remain in our body. This is why somatic and other therapies that work on releasing the trauma from the body, have shown a lot of promise.
Ironically, it wasn’t until I started doing some inner child work in my own therapy sessions, that I learned to reconnect with my deep-seated feelings and work on releasing them instead of having them appear as unresolvable anxiety and depression. I had often wondered why inner child work was so effective with me and with so many of my clients, and the research has helped me bridge some of the gap between what I had experienced anecdotally and how I could explain it scientifically.
Sounds fascinating, can you explain how the science explains the positive results of your inner child work?
Sure! There are areas of the brain that influence our strengths and weaknesses, how we reason, how we process emotions etc. Essentially, we develop emotionally and socially in the right hemisphere and cognitively in the left hemisphere. If a child experiences abuse or dysfunction or any other trauma, developmentally, they are not prepared to make sense of it. They just aren’t equipped. As an adaptive way to go on and live and survive everyday life they often have to disown, shut down or dissociate from their strong emotions which are developing in the right hemisphere. So, while they may continue to grow and evolve cognitively, they must leave their deep pain, shame, fear or sadness stored in the right hemisphere and house it in their body.
This is an amazing feat, and it serves a very important purpose because as mentioned, it allows them to survive and go on in the face of great difficulty. Often though, neuro circuits working outside of our conscious thoughts will determine if something or someone is dangerous or life threatening – this is called neuroception, and it’s different than perception, which involves conscious thought. This is why people will report feeling anxiety, panic or depression but not understanding why. They have tried talking themselves out of their feelings without success. If you have disconnected from the area responsible for emotions in the right hemisphere, being able to soothe your fears or regulate your emotions with your cognitive prowess may prove to be very difficult.
When we do inner-child work, we go back for the lost version of ourselves, the parts we left behind. Our younger self or our feeling part of the brain that has held our intense feelings so that we may carry on. We reconnect to the part of our brain that has carried the pain. The little child or the right hemisphere. We learn to apply what we know to how we feel. We integrate the two so that they may work together to solve problems and manage feelings. Of course, the process is much more complicated, but that’s the nutshell version.
The same concept can be applied to an adult who experiences trauma. They often will compartmentalize and distance themselves from the feeling part of the brain in order to carry on with life. Experiencing anxiety and hypervigilance after trauma is common and normal, and some people in the months following trauma can work through the event and come out the other side mentally well and healthy, but many people shut down and distance themselves from the feelings that the trauma elicited and this can lead to post-traumatic stress that gets trapped in the body.
Who has inspired you professionally and personally?
There have been many people through the years who have inspired me. In particular, in elementary and high school, there were teachers who held a safe space for me and made me feel accepted when I didn’t accept myself. Often times that was much more important to me than their teaching methods. When I was teaching, I tried to always remember the value in acceptance and that it sometimes trumps the lesson plan of the day.
There are many psychologists and theorists whose work has informed the way I practice counseling.
Abraham Maslow, Carl Rogers and Charlotte Buhler who were known as humanists inspired how I thought about practicing counseling. Judith Hermann who wrote Trauma and Recovery was also very influential and I still refer to her work to help guide me when working with clients who have suffered from sexual abuse, domestic violence and other forms of trauma. Perhaps one of the biggest influences on me, because her worked has resonated with me both professionally and personally is psychologist Tara Brach, whose articles, books, and podcasts have opened me up to the practice of mindfulness and meditation.
Personally, my greatest mentor and inspiration has been my father. He was a thinker ahead of his time. He was hard-working, loving, a devoted family man and he had a great sense of humor! He gave me most of the tools I have used in life through good times and bad. I am who I am largely because of him.
You have had a long career in both teaching and counseling. Have you accomplished all of your goals?
I have been really fortunate to have been able to work in two fields that I am passionate about, however, believe it or not I feel as though I’m just getting started! I am currently collaborating with some amazing women to create and deliver a mental health healing retreat to be held in Mexico. We hope to be able to run it by the beginning of 2024. I also have a love of writing and have a couple of projects that I am working on.
Would the mental health healing retreat be similar to a wellness retreat?
In some ways, in the sense that the retreat will be holistic and include alternative therapies, but that is where the similarities end. Perhaps It would help to think of it more along the lines of a rehabilitation retreat, not very different from a drug and alcohol rehabilitation center. It will be designed to help people struggling with mental health issues such as anxiety or depression. We will offer one on one therapy, group therapy, psychoeducational workshops and as mentioned some alternative therapies. We will also introduce skills training such as mindfulness meditation and relapse prevention among others to help our clients return home with a management plan that they can put in place to continue the momentum they will gain at the retreat.
In closing, who would benefit from your services and how should those wanting to know more or book a session contact you?
Those who are looking for online one on one or group therapy for a variety of mental health issues including; anxiety, depression, trauma, symptoms manifesting from childhood sexual abuse or sexual assault and live in Canada can book an appointment here.
For those interested in booking a 1, 2, or 3-hour workshop covering a variety of mental health topics can write to me here for more information.
Those who would like more information and/or to secure a spot at our first mental health healing retreat in Mexico can sign up for more information here.
Follow LJB and Associates Counseling Services and Laurie on Facebook, LinkedIn, Instagram, Youtube, and visit her website for more info!
