ABOUT
Meet Sarah – Your Guide to Post-Traumatic Growth and Resilience
Sarah is a compassionate therapist dedicated to supporting individuals on their journey toward post-traumatic growth and resilience. Her mission is to empower you to recover from trauma and reclaim your life.
About Sarah Brooks
Before becoming a counsellor, Sarah held various roles—from waitressing and bartending to working as an investigative analyst and managing a team of former law enforcement officers. It was during acting classes that she began her own healing journey. Acting requires vulnerability, and this process helped Sarah uncover how past trauma was affecting her present life.
Through mindful exploration of her emotions, thoughts, and behaviours, Sarah transitioned from experiencing post-traumatic stress disorder to achieving post-traumatic growth and resilience. This journey has been humbling, allowing her to confront feelings of shame, guilt, fear, grief, anger, and joy. Her own intense healing experience enables her to be fully present with you in your moments of pain and celebration.
With a solid foundation in psychology and specialized training in Somatic Experiencing™ and NARM™ therapy, Sarah focuses on helping clients navigate the complexities of their trauma. She believes that healing involves addressing the interconnectedness of the mind, body, and spirit. Her holistic approach recognizes that post-traumatic growth requires attention to emotional, physical, and spiritual well-being.
As Sarah healed, she discovered a passion of helping other people on their healing journey. Since 2009, she has been counselling individuals and couples and facilitated support groups. She also served as an instructor for a counsellor training program for ten years. Her continued education spans trauma, complex trauma, borderline personality disorder, narcissism, anxiety, depression, addiction, neurodiversity, oppression, sexuality, loss and grief, family systems theory, integrative medicine, occupational awareness, aging, supervision, and critical incident stress management.
Start Your Counselling Journey
If you’re ready to explore post-traumatic growth and resilience, I invite you to reach out. At Safe Harbour Counselling, I’m here to guide you on your path to healing and self-discovery. Together, we can work towards a brighter future.
Contact Sarah today to schedule your appointment and take the first step towards reclaiming your life.
Professional Designations & Trainings
Sarah holds a Master of Counselling and has completed extensive training in trauma-informed care. She is passionate about learning new trauma-informed techniques, neurobiology, privilege and oppression. See below for a list of professional counsellor trainings.
✓ EMDR – EMDRIA (EMDR International Association) Approved Training – Completion Spring 2025
✓ Regular supervision ongoing
✓ Registered Clinical Counsellor (RCC) with the BC Association of Clinical Counsellors (BCACC)
✓ Registered Counselling Supervisor (RCS) with the Association of Cooperative Counselling Therapists of Canada (ACCT)
✓ Master Therapeutic Counsellor (MTC) with ACCT
✓Somatic Experiencing™ Practitioner (SEP)
✓ NeuroAffective Relational Model (NARM™) Therapist; Master Level in progress
✓ Master of Counselling with City University of Seattle in Canada
✓ Integrative Medicine and Nutrition for PTSD and Complex Trauma CIMHP Certification
✓ Walking in the Footsteps of Our Ancestors: McLeod Lake Indian Band Cultural Awareness Training
✓ San’yas Indigenous Cultural Safety Training
✓ Women’s Economic Council: GEDI Principles & Inclusive Leadership
✓ People’s Institute for Survival and Beyond: Undoing Racism
✓ International Critical Incident Stress Foundation: Assisting Individuals in Crisis
✓ International Critical Incident Stress Foundation: Group Crisis Intervention
✓ Occupational Awareness Training with First Responder Health: Understanding Firefighter Culture
✓ Occupational Awareness Training with First Responder Health: Understanding Emergency Worker Trauma
✓ Diploma in Transpersonal Counselling Psychology
✓ 2005 Vancouver Rape Relief and Women’s Shelter 6 Month Training and Volunteer program
✓ Volunteer with Chrysalis Anti-Human Trafficking Apr 2021 to Oct 2022
✓ Instructor – 10 years – Practitioners Training Program for Clearmind International – Level 1 & Level 3 – in person and online
✓ Supervisor – Clearmind International Counselling Supervision
✓ 2019-2020 Facilitator – Women in Wonder workshop
✓ Level 1 AEDP (Accelerated Experiential Dynamic Psychotherapy) therapist
✓ Level 1-3 Supervisor Training with Kristy Higgins
Trainings In Progress
“Owning our story can be hard but not nearly as difficult as spending our lives running from it. Embracing our vulnerabilities is risky but not nearly as dangerous as giving up on love and belonging and joy—the experiences that make us the most vulnerable. Only when we are brave enough to explore the darkness will we discover the infinite power of our light.” – Brené Brown
If you are serious about wanting something different in your life, it starts with owning your story and re-writing the meaning you have attached to it.
The first step is often the hardest; let me walk with you.
Safe Harbour Counselling is located on the traditional, ancestral, and unceded territory of the Syilx Okanagan Nation, which comprises seven member communities: Okanagan Indian Band, Osoyoos Indian Band, Penticton Indian Band, Upper Nicola Band, Upper and Lower Similkameen Indian Bands, and Westbank First Nation, as well as the Colville Confederated Tribes in Northern Washington State. Sarah honours their deep connection to this land and pays her respects to their elders, past and present.
As a second-generation settler with ancestors from England and Ireland, Sarah recognizes that England was a colonial power that contributed to the foundation of Canada through the genocide of Indigenous peoples. Sarah is committed to continuously unlearning the colonial principles she has inherited. Sarah acknowledges her unearned privileges as a white settler, cisgender, heterosexual, non-disabled, neurotypical, financially stable, educated, and female individual.
Book a Free 15-min Consult to see your next step
Learn about Trauma and how Counselling helps