Virtual Therapy · Serving Richmond, BC
Virtual Trauma Therapist & Couples Counselling for Richmond, BC
Specialist-level virtual therapy for Richmond residents. EMDR, IFS, and Gottman Method. Multilingual therapists available. No waitlists — no bridge or tunnel commute required.
Therapy in English, Arabic, Hindi & Malayalam · Seven days a week
Therapy for Richmond — no bridge commute required
Richmond residents accessing specialist therapy in Vancouver face one consistent obstacle: getting there. Whether it's the Oak Street Bridge, the Massey Tunnel, or Canada Line delays — commuting for regular therapy sessions adds up in time, money, and stress.
TEO Counselling's virtual model means Richmond clients access the same specialist-level trauma therapy and couples counselling as Vancouver clients — without leaving Richmond. Sessions happen over video, with evening and weekend availability.
Therapy in English, Arabic, Hindi, and Malayalam means Richmond's diverse communities can access care in their language.
Therapy services for Richmond
Trauma & PTSD Therapy
Advanced EMDR and IFS trauma therapy. Arabic and multilingual sessions available. No waitlist — specialist care accessible to Richmond residents without the commute.
Learn about trauma therapy →Couples & Relationship Counselling
Gottman Method couples therapy in English, Hindi, and Malayalam. Culturally sensitive — Alison brings genuine understanding of the dynamics in South Asian relationships and diverse families.
Learn about couples counselling →Serving all of Richmond
Steveston · Ironwood · Broadmoor · City Centre · Brighouse · Seafair · Hamilton · Shellmont · Garden City · and all of Richmond, BC — and everywhere else in the province through our British Columbia therapy page
Who you would be working with from a Richmond address
You choose who you work with at the consultation rather than being handed to whoever is free. Mohamad Shabib, MACP, CCC, is a Registered Psychotherapist (Qualifying) with the CRPO. His training includes Advanced EMDR through an EMDRIA-approved programme, Internal Family Systems Levels 1 and 2, Gottman Method Levels 1 and 2, CBT for Trauma Levels 1 and 2, DBT, and Indigenous Focused Oriented Therapy, alongside a graduate diploma in addiction treatment and prevention and work with concurrent trauma and addiction at Edgewood. He works in English and Arabic.
Alison Shaji is a Registered Clinical Counsellor with the BCACC and works with clients in British Columbia. Her training includes EMDR, Gottman Method Levels 1 and 2, CBT, DBT, Emotion Focused Family Therapy, and psychoanalytic, inner-child and shadow work. She works in English, Hindi and Malayalam. That is not a decorative line on a profile. Therapy in a second language costs you something every hour, because part of you is busy translating, and the words that carry the most weight are usually the ones from childhood, in the language childhood happened in.
Two pieces of straightness while we are here. Richmond has large Chinese communities and we do not have a clinician who works in Mandarin or Cantonese; if that is what you need, the free consultation is the place to establish at no cost that we are not the right practice for you. And Gottman Levels 1 and 2 and IFS Levels 1 and 2 are training levels, not certifications. Nobody here is a certified Gottman or IFS therapist, and we will not describe it that way.
What sessions cost, and what your insurance will and will not do
An individual session is $150 for 60 minutes. A couples session is $175. The first consultation is free, runs 15 minutes, and needs no referral from anyone. A small number of reduced-fee spots are held, so if the fee is the obstacle, raise it on the consultation call rather than quietly deciding this is out of reach.
MSP does not pay for this, and that is not a TEO quirk. No provincial health plan in Canada covers counselling in private practice. What people use instead is an extended health plan through their own job or a partner's. After every session you receive an insurance-ready receipt showing the clinician's name, designation, registration number, the date and the amount paid. TEO can direct-bill Pacific Blue Cross, CVAP and plans on the TELUS eClaims network when you see Mohamad or Alison, so your plan's share is settled at the time. Where yours is not one of them you pay at the session and submit the receipt yourself, which means reimbursement arrives on your insurer's timeline rather than ours.
Before you book, phone the number on your benefits card and ask one narrow question: which counselling designations does this plan reimburse? BC plans commonly list Registered Clinical Counsellor, some also list Registered Psychotherapist, and some list neither. Tell us the answer and we will say plainly whether one of us is a designation your plan names. One piece of housekeeping alongside it: cancellations need 24 hours' notice, and inside that window, including no-shows, the session is charged in full, because the hour was held for you and cannot be refilled at short notice. Ask specifically whether the Qualifying category of Registered Psychotherapist is included, because the plan's wording is what decides it.
Booking around YVR shifts and the drive back over the bridge
Sessions run noon to 9pm Pacific, seven days a week, and Richmond sits in that timezone, so there is no arithmetic to do. Seven o'clock on the booking page is seven o'clock on Westminster Highway. Clients in our other provinces have to convert; you do not.
The window suits shift patterns better than it suits nine-to-five. Come off an overnight at the airport at seven in the morning, sleep until eleven, and a noon session is the first thing you are properly awake for. Finish a day shift, cross the bridge, get home by five, and a 7pm or 8pm slot sits comfortably after dinner. Weekends run the same hours, so Saturday and Sunday afternoons are ordinary appointment times rather than favours.
The limit, said out loud rather than buried in a footer: nothing begins before noon Pacific and nothing begins after 9pm. If you work six to two and are asleep by half past eight, your workable band is roughly 3pm to 7pm, since a session that starts at seven ends at ten to eight. If your roster rotates, a fortnightly session you actually attend is worth more than a weekly one you keep moving. For couples, both partners need to be in a province where the clinician is able to work, so if one of you is in Richmond and the other is in Ontario on a contract, say so when you book, because it changes who you are matched with.
What the first three or four appointments actually involve
The free consultation is not a session. It is 15 minutes to say what is going on, hear how someone would approach it, and ask about fee and scheduling. Nobody opens trauma work on that call. The first full session is history and direction: what is happening now, what has already been tried, what you want to be different, and what you would rather not go near yet. Counsellors do not diagnose. Nothing in these sessions produces a diagnostic label, and if you need one for a workplace form or a medication question, that belongs with your family doctor.
If EMDR is the direction, sessions two and three are preparation rather than reprocessing. EMDR is an eight-phase protocol and the memory work is phase four. What comes before it is history-taking and resourcing: a calm-place exercise, grounding you can use in a room full of people without anyone noticing, and a check that you can bring your own arousal down inside the session and not only later at home. Going straight at the memory is how people end an hour more activated than they started it. The preparation phases exist precisely to stop that.
Over video, the bilateral stimulation is a dot moving across your screen or tapping you do yourself, alternating left and right, rather than a clinician's hand moving in front of your eyes. Two practical things make a real difference from a Richmond flat: headphones, and twenty clear minutes afterwards. Do not book the session flush against a meeting.
If Internal Family Systems is the direction, what changes early is the question being asked. Instead of why do I keep doing this, it becomes which part of me does this, what does that part think would happen if it stopped, and how old does it feel. For couples, the first joint sessions map one recurring argument in sequence: who opens it, what raises the volume, how it ends, and what a repair attempt looks like when it lands and when it gets missed.
Common questions
Can I have sessions in Hindi or Malayalam?
Yes. Alison Shaji works in English, Hindi and Malayalam, and she is a Registered Clinical Counsellor with the BCACC working with clients in British Columbia, so a Richmond address is straightforward. Mohamad Shabib works in English and Arabic. Say which language you want on the free consultation call and we will match accordingly. We do not currently have a clinician working in Mandarin or Cantonese.
Will MSP or my work benefits pay for this?
MSP will not. No provincial health plan in Canada covers counselling in private practice. An extended health plan through your job or a partner's often covers part of it. TEO can direct-bill Pacific Blue Cross, CVAP and plans on the TELUS eClaims network when you see Mohamad or Alison. Otherwise you receive an insurance-ready receipt after every session, pay at the time, and claim it back yourself. Ring your insurer first and ask which designations they reimburse; BC plans commonly list Registered Clinical Counsellor.
My shifts at YVR change every week. How does booking work?
Appointments run noon to 9pm Pacific, seven days a week including weekends, and Richmond is on Pacific time, so the times on the booking page need no converting. You can book week to week around a rotating roster rather than committing to one fixed slot. Cancellations need 24 hours' notice; anything later, and no-shows, are charged in full, so move the time as soon as your roster comes out.
Is what I say confidential? Richmond is a small community.
Sessions are confidential, with four limits your clinician will name in the first session: a risk of serious harm to you or to someone else, a child in need of protection, a court order or subpoena, and a regulator's reporting duties. Outside those, what you say stays between you and your clinician. If you are worried about being recognised in a waiting room, there is no waiting room to be recognised in.
Do I need a referral or a diagnosis before I book?
No referral from a doctor or anyone else is needed for either clinician. You book the free 15-minute consultation directly. You also do not need a diagnosis, and you will not be given one here, because counsellors do not diagnose. If you already have one, bring it, as it is useful context for how sessions are planned. If you want one, that is a conversation for your family doctor.
Richmond & BC mental health resources
Therapy is not a crisis service. These are free and staffed around the clock:
- · 9-8-8 Suicide Crisis Helpline: call or text 9-8-8 (24/7)
- · BC Crisis Line: 1-800-784-2433 (24/7)
- · Kids Help Phone: 1-800-668-6868, or text CONNECT to 686868
If you are in immediate danger, please call 911.
Start with a free consultation
No referral, no waitlist, no commute. Book a free call and we'll figure out together if we're the right fit.
Book Free ConsultationOr call: (519) 760-5211