Rola Shbib — Registered Social Worker in London, ON

Much of my work has been with people on the hardest day of their life — on crisis lines, in suicide prevention, and in community mental health and addiction services. That work taught me something simple and lasting: what helps most is a steady, non-judgmental presence. Someone who can sit with what's happening without flinching, and help you find your footing again. That's the presence I bring to every session.

My practice is trauma-informed, person-centred, and recovery-oriented. In plain language, that means we move at your pace, we build on the strengths that have carried you this far, and you stay the expert on your own life. Together we make a plan that fits you — not a template.

Grief holds a special place in my work. Before social work, I completed an honours degree in thanatology — the study of death, dying, and bereavement — and I'm comfortable sitting with loss in all its forms: the death of someone you love, anticipatory grief, and the quieter losses of health, identity, home, or a future you had planned on.

I also know what it means to build a life between cultures and languages. I offer counselling in Arabic and English, and I bring lived experience with newcomer communities to my work — because being understood in your own language, and your own context, changes what therapy can do.

"You don't have to be in crisis to deserve support — and if you are, you don't have to face it alone."