I didn't always know I wanted to be a psychologist. What I knew was that I was someone who pushed hard, planned obsessively, and held everything together, or tried to. I didn't recognize it as anxiety at the time. I just thought I needed more structure, more control, more output. It wasn't until I started understanding the somatic side of stress, the chronically tight traps, the locked shoulders that no amount of physio could fix, that I began to connect what was happening in my body to what was happening in my mind.

That realization changed me. Not overnight, and not easily. But it shifted something fundamental about how I relate to myself, and eventually, to everyone around me.

Psychology gave me a way to reframe what I'd always called ambition. I started to understand that drive doesn't have to be a solo pursuit. That the most meaningful version of achievement is one built around connection, your relationships, your presence, your influence on the people closest to you. For me, that meant learning to hold space for the people I love without frustration or the need to fix everything. Learning to be vulnerable. Learning to lean on people without feeling like that made me less.

As a Filipino-Canadian man, that wasn't a straightforward path. The cultural scripts around masculinity, stoicism, and family obligation don't leave a lot of room for that kind of softness. But I've come to believe, and I've seen it in the men I work with, that self-compassion isn't weakness. That being kind, present, and emotionally honest makes you a better leader, a better partner, a better person. Embracing that has been the most important work I've done.

It's also why I do this professionally. Because I've lived the gap between who you perform yourself to be and who you actually are underneath that performance. And I know what it takes to close it.

I work primarily with adults and adolescents in Calgary and virtually across Alberta and Quebec. My clients tend to be people who are self-aware, motivated, and genuinely stuck — not because they haven't tried, but because what they've tried hasn't been enough.

That includes:

→ People carrying complex trauma who need more than talk therapy

→ Men navigating identity, pressure, and the parts of themselves they were taught not to show

→ High performers and driven individuals hitting a wall they can't outwork

→ Second-generation Canadians managing the space between family expectation and personal identity

→ Adolescents building the emotional foundation they'll carry into adulthood

→ People of colour looking for a therapist who doesn't need everything explained

If you've been in therapy before and left feeling like something was still missing — that's often who finds their way here.

I don't believe in one-size-fits-all therapy. Every person who sits across from me brings a different history, a different nervous system, and a different set of needs. My job is to meet that with precision, not a formula. My work is primarily informed by: Janina Fischer’s Conceptualization and Interventions around Complex Trauma, EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing) for processing trauma at the level where it lives, not just talking about it, IFS (Internal Family Systems) for understanding the different parts of yourself that show up in conflict, self-sabotage, or emotional shutdown ACT (Acceptance and Commitment Therapy) for building psychological flexibility and living in alignment with your values rather than your fears Attachment-based approaches for understanding how your early relationships shape your current ones CPT (Cognitive Processing Therapy) for restructuring the beliefs trauma leaves behind. What this means in practice: sessions are structured, not passive. You'll leave with insight and with something to work with. Progress is tracked. The work has direction. And I'll challenge you respectfully, directly, and only in service of what you're actually here for.