Virtual Therapy · Serving Hamilton, Ontario
Online Therapist & Counsellor for Hamilton, Ontario
Finding a therapist in Hamilton often means a waitlist measured in months, or a drive up and down the Mountain in rush hour. Virtual sessions remove both. Trauma therapy and EMDR, marriage counselling, grief and addictions support — with Ontario-registered clinicians, evenings and weekends, in English or Arabic.
Free 15 minute consultation · No referral needed · Seven days a week
A counsellor for Hamilton — without the crosstown drive
TEO Counselling is a fully virtual practice, so there is no office in Hamilton to get to — no Main Street traffic, no hunting for parking near a clinic, no choosing a therapist by which end of the city they sit in. Sessions happen by video through the Jane platform, with Zoom or Google Meet as a backup, from wherever you have a door that closes.
That matters in a city that runs on shifts. Hospital rotations, steel and manufacturing schedules, a GO commute to Toronto that eats the start and end of every weekday — a mid-afternoon appointment across town was never realistic for most working Hamiltonians. Appointments here run seven days a week from noon to 9pm Pacific, which is 3pm to midnight in Hamilton, so an after-work or late-evening session is an ordinary booking rather than a favour.
Both clinicians who see Hamilton clients are registered with Ontario regulators: Mohamad Shabib, MACP, CCC, a Registered Psychotherapist (Qualifying) with the CRPO, and Rola Shbib, BSW (Hons), RSW, with the OCSWSSW. Both offer sessions in English and Arabic.
Counselling services for Hamilton
Trauma Therapy & EMDR — with Mohamad
Mohamad is EMDRIA-trained in EMDR at the advanced level and trained in Internal Family Systems (Levels 1–2) and CBT for Trauma (Levels 1–2) — ways of working with trauma, PTSD, panic, and anxious overthinking that don’t require you to narrate every detail before you’re ready. You set the pace.
Marriage & Couples Counselling
Marriage counselling in Hamilton usually means finding one clinic both of you can reach at the same daytime hour. Evening and weekend video sessions remove that barrier — each partner can even join from a different location. Mohamad, trained in Gottman Method Levels 1 & 2, works on conflict cycles, trust repair, and the slow drift into running a household instead of a relationship.
Grief, Crisis & Addictions — with Rola
Rola’s path into counselling ran through crisis lines and suicide-prevention work, and her honours degree in thanatology gives her rare depth with death, dying, and bereavement. If you’re carrying a loss, supporting someone through a crisis, or rethinking your relationship with alcohol or other substances, she works gently and at your pace.
Anger That Keeps Costing You
Anger management in Hamilton is often searched for after a hard conversation at work or at home. Counselling here looks underneath the outbursts — the stress load, the old injuries, the feeling of not being heard — rather than only handing you breathing techniques. Practical tools are part of it; they are not the whole of it.
Serving Hamilton, the Mountain, and the communities around them
Video sessions reach every corner of the city — lower city and Mountain alike.
Downtown Hamilton · Westdale · Dundas · Ancaster · Stoney Creek · Waterdown · Binbrook · the Mountain · Grimsby · Caledonia · Brantford — and everywhere else in the province through our Ontario therapy page
Common questions about counselling in Hamilton
How do I find a therapist in Hamilton, Ontario?
You can book directly with TEO Counselling — no referral needed. Start with a free 15 minute video consultation, and we’ll help you decide whether Mohamad, a Registered Psychotherapist (Qualifying) with the CRPO, or Rola, a Registered Social Worker with the OCSWSSW, is the better fit. Most new clients have their first full session within days rather than months.
Is there an EMDR therapist who serves Hamilton?
Yes. Mohamad Shabib, MACP, CCC, a Registered Psychotherapist (Qualifying) with the CRPO, is EMDRIA-trained in EMDR at the advanced level and works with Hamilton clients by video, with evening and weekend appointments available.
How much does therapy cost in Hamilton?
Individual sessions are $150 per 60-minute session and couples sessions are $175 per 60-minute session, with a sliding scale available if cost is a barrier. Your initial 15 minute consultation is free. You receive a receipt after every session — many extended health plans cover services from a Registered Psychotherapist, a Canadian Certified Counsellor, or a Registered Social Worker, so check what your plan lists.
Do you offer marriage counselling in Hamilton?
Yes. Mohamad has completed Gottman Method Levels 1 and 2 training and works with couples across Hamilton by video. Couples sessions are $175 per 60-minute session, with evening and weekend times — and each partner can join the call from a different location.
Do you offer grief counselling in Hamilton?
Yes. Rola Shbib, BSW (Hons), RSW, holds an honours degree in thanatology — the study of dying, death, and bereavement — and came to counselling through crisis intervention and suicide-prevention work. She supports Hamilton clients through grief and loss by video, in English or Arabic.
Can I have my sessions in Arabic?
Yes. Both Mohamad and Rola offer sessions in Arabic as well as English — a meaningful option for Hamilton’s Arabic-speaking community.
Looking for an EMDR therapist in Hamilton?
For clients in Hamilton, EMDR at TEO Counselling is provided by Mohamad Shabib, MACP, CCC — a Registered Psychotherapist (Qualifying) with the CRPO whose EMDR training is at the advanced level through EMDRIA. That is a description of training completed, not a certification, and we don’t present it as more than that.
In session, EMDR means holding attention on a distressing memory while following a repeated cue — traditionally eye movements, which translate directly to a video screen. The working model is that doing so changes how the memory is stored, so it stops intruding on the present with its original intensity. The mechanism is still debated among researchers, and nobody can tell you in advance exactly how you will respond; what a first appointment can do is establish whether the approach makes sense for what you’re carrying.
Online EMDR follows the same phases as it would in any consulting room: history and preparation first, processing only once you have grounding strategies that work for you. If you’ve been putting this off because every EMDR practice near you had a waitlist, a video appointment within days is the practical alternative.
Evening appointments, on Hamilton time
Sessions run seven days a week from noon to 9pm Pacific — in Hamilton, that is 3pm to midnight. A 9pm or 10pm start after the kids are down, or after an afternoon shift ends, is a normal slot here rather than an exception.
An individual session is 60 minutes at $150. A couples session is $175. Before either, there is a free 15 minute video consultation — no referral, no charge, no obligation to continue.
Cancellations need 24 hours’ notice. Inside that window, and for a session nobody attends, the full fee is charged.
Who does what, and what the registrations mean
Mohamad Shabib, MACP, CCC, is a Registered Psychotherapist (Qualifying) with the CRPO — Ontario’s psychotherapy regulator — and a Canadian Certified Counsellor with the CCPA. He works with clients in all six provinces the practice serves: British Columbia, Ontario, Alberta, Saskatchewan, Manitoba, and Newfoundland and Labrador. His training spans advanced EMDR through EMDRIA, Internal Family Systems Levels 1 and 2, Gottman Method Levels 1 and 2, CBT for Trauma Levels 1 and 2, and DBT, alongside a graduate diploma in addiction treatment and prevention and concurrent trauma-and-addictions work at Edgewood.
Rola Shbib, BSW (Hons), RSW, is a Registered Social Worker with the Ontario College of Social Workers and Social Service Workers, based in London, Ontario. Her background is crisis intervention, suicide prevention (ASIST), addictions and mental health, and grief — her honours degree is in thanatology.
Alison Shaji, MA, RCC, the practice’s third clinician, works with clients in British Columbia only, so she is not offered to Hamilton clients.
Those are levels of training completed, not certifications, and we do not describe them as anything more. If a particular approach matters to you, ask at the consultation who holds the training for it.
Paying for counselling in Hamilton
OHIP does not pay for private psychotherapy or counselling — no provincial plan does — so every session here is paid privately. After each one you receive an insurance-ready receipt showing the clinician’s name and registration.
Where your plan is one TEO can bill directly — Pacific Blue Cross, CVAP, and plans on the TELUS eClaims network among them — you pay only the portion it does not cover. Otherwise you pay per session and your extended health plan reimburses you afterwards if it covers the service.
Read your plan’s wording before you rely on it. If it lists Registered Psychotherapist, ask specifically whether the Qualifying category is included; if it lists Registered Social Worker, ask which registrations it counts. The plan’s wording — not ours — is what decides a claim.
A few reduced-fee spots are held for people for whom the fee is the barrier. Asking about one at the free consultation is a normal question and changes nothing about how you are treated.
The limits, stated plainly
Because everything happens over video, some kinds of help sit outside what this practice can give. Nobody can sit beside you in a waiting room or accompany you to a Hamilton hospital. If that is the support you need right now, say so at the consultation and you will be pointed toward local services that provide it.
Counsellors and psychotherapists do not diagnose, screen, or assess conditions, and prescriptions come from a physician or nurse practitioner. Sessions here can run alongside that care, not instead of it.
What you say stays between you and your clinician, with four exceptions explained before the first session: a serious risk that you will harm yourself, a serious risk that you will harm another person, a suspicion that a child is being abused or neglected, and a subpoena or court order for the records.
Video also asks something practical of you — a private space and an internet connection that holds. If neither is easy to arrange at home, raise it at the consultation rather than after the first session.
Hamilton mental health resources
- · COAST Hamilton (24/7 crisis outreach and support): 905-972-8338
- · Barrett Centre for Crisis Support (24/7): 905-529-7878
- · 9-8-8 Suicide Crisis Helpline: call or text 9-8-8 (24/7)
- · ConnexOntario (mental health & addictions navigation): 1-866-531-2600
- · Kids Help Phone: 1-800-668-6868
If you are in immediate danger, please call 911.
Talk to a therapist who works on Hamilton’s schedule
Book a free 15 minute video consultation — no referral, no waitlist, no pressure. If it doesn’t feel like the right fit, we’ll point you toward options that might be.
Book a Free ConsultationPrefer to speak by phone? Call (519) 760-5211