My Intern Therapist Journey at Changing Tides Counselling

My name is Michelle Kelly, and I have been an intern therapist at Changing Tides Counselling in Guelph, Ontario, since May 2023. Over the past eight months, I have developed my competency through training, blogs, observations, and supervision. Additionally, I have built therapeutic relationships with various clients, producing comfort and assurance in my role. I want to acknowledge the clients I had the pleasure of meeting throughout this experience. Thank you for welcoming me into your journey and sharing your story with me. I am incredibly grateful for the opportunity. One of the many highlights of my internship was attending Yoga Fest in May, where I met community partners and engaged in mindfulness exercises with many attendees. It was the perfect start to kick off my internship and taught me about other health and wellness community partnerships.

This experience would not have been possible without the immeasurable support my supervisor, Nichole Caswell, provided. She has been a genuine and insightful supervisor and immediately gave me a sense of belonging through her compassionate and welcoming demeanour. As an intern therapist, imposter syndrome was prevalent as I navigated new uncertainties. Nichole raised my confidence, encouraged me to step outside my comfort zone, and demonstrated the value of learning from challenges to build my skills and abilities.

I also sincerely thank my incredible team of therapists at Changing Tides Counselling. Rachel Keenan, Rachel Millar, Reva Timbers, Christina Zahra Keating, and Shannon Silva welcomed me and provided help and acceptance along the way. The compassionate atmosphere they provided fostered the foundation for me to develop into the therapist I am today. I want to personally acknowledge my fellow intern therapist, Madeleine Satov, who walked along this journey and achieved significant milestones with me to start our careers in the best way possible. The team overall fostered common humanity and a genuine feeling of “we are all in the same boat,” which strengthened my confidence to share insight to help other team members. My goal is to continue to be a resource for new and intern therapists to help them feel a sense of pride and fulfilment.

While my internship is coming to a close, I have the pleasure of announcing that my journey at Changing Tides Counselling will continue in January 2024. I look forward to staying with this team and engaging in future training and networking events to promote a career based on continuous learning and improvement. I pride myself in taking a learner’s perspective with clients as it allows me to raise pride and passion in their unique journeys. I am eager to see what this next year has to offer following this rewarding experience as an intern therapist.