PROFESSIONAL PROFILE
Experienced Therapy with Depth, Skill, and Integrity
Turning Trauma into Resilience
I am a Clinical Counsellor and Psychotherapist with over 30 years of international experience, working with individuals, couples, and groups across complex psychological presentations. I maintain a private practice in country Victoria, Australia, and work online with clients worldwide. I am a Clinical Member of the Australian Counselling Association at Level 4, a senior registration category within Australia’s largest professional body for counsellors and psychotherapists.
My work is grounded in depth psychology, evidence-based clinical practice, and a lifelong inquiry into human behaviour, suffering, and transformation. I specialise in trauma and its many expressions, including complex trauma, attachment injury, dissociation, anxiety, chronic stress states, grief, addiction, identity disruption, and the long-term psychological and somatic effects of adversity. I also work extensively in narcissistic abuse recovery, Cluster B and Dark Triad dynamics, trauma bonds, existential crisis, life transitions, and relational breakdown.
What distinguishes my work is not only the breadth of modalities I draw upon, but the level at which I work. Therapy is not limited to symptom reduction. It extends into the deeper structures beneath suffering, including unconscious patterning, attachment dynamics, defensive adaptations, embodied memory, and the narratives through which a person has come to understand themselves.
CLINICAL PHILOSOPHY
Evidence-Based. Existential. Embodied.
My approach is integrative, trauma-informed, and grounded in both science and depth psychology. I work across cognitive, emotional, somatic, and symbolic domains, supporting clients to move beyond survival-based adaptations toward integration, agency, and psychological freedom.
This involves working with both top-down and bottom-up processes. Therapy may include cognitive clarity, behavioural change, emotional regulation, narrative repair, body-based awareness, symbolic exploration, and the integration of unconscious material.
At its core, my work is concerned with authorship. Many individuals live from roles shaped by trauma, expectation, or survival. Therapy becomes a process of re-encoding experience, re-narrating identity, and reclaiming the capacity to choose how one lives, responds, and defines oneself.
I do not see people as problems to be fixed. I see them as complex systems shaped by experience, capable of insight, adaptation, and profound transformation.
AREAS OF FOCUS
My clinical work includes trauma and complex trauma, narcissistic and psychopathic abuse recovery, trauma bonds and attachment injuries, anxiety and chronic stress, grief and bereavement, death and palliative issues, divorce and separation, addictions, identity disruption, existential crisis, family system dynamics, couples therapy, and the development of resilience, confidence, and post-traumatic growth.
I also work with individuals who feel they have lost direction, lost themselves, or reached a point where previous coping strategies are no longer sufficient. This includes rebuilding identity after relational trauma, strengthening internal structure, developing boundaries, understanding repeated patterns, and creating a life grounded in clarity, meaning, and self-trust.
MY APPROACH IN PRACTICE
My work is both structured and adaptive. I bring clarity, direction, and measurable outcomes while remaining responsive to the individual in front of me.
I use inquiry as a central tool. Not only what has happened, but how it is experienced, how it is interpreted, and how it continues to shape identity and behaviour.
Where resistance is present, I work through multiple pathways. Cognitive approaches, somatic processes, symbolic work, hypnotherapy, and EMDR allow access to different layers of the psyche. Change may occur through insight, emotional processing, or unconscious re-patterning.
I am solution-focused, but not superficially so. The aim is not only to feel better, but to create sustainable, observable change in how a person thinks, feels, behaves, and lives.
PROFESSIONAL FORMATION AND INFLUENCE
My early life shaped the foundation of my work. I grew up across different countries, immersed in nature, oceans, forests, and wide landscapes. This environment cultivated observation, reflection, and a deep sensitivity to both the outer and inner worlds.
I was also influenced profoundly by my mother, an occupational therapist trained in psychiatric settings in England and later working in senior roles in Canada. She was also a journalist, artist, and deeply creative thinker. Through shared lived experiences of trauma, we developed a symbolic and metaphorical language as a way of maintaining psychological freedom and selfhood in complex circumstances.
This early exposure to both trauma and creativity shaped my orientation toward meaning, resilience, and the capacity for transformation.
My academic and clinical training further deepened this path. During my studies, I developed a strong interest in the question of why individuals exposed to similar circumstances have vastly different outcomes. This inquiry led me beyond purely linear models of psychology and toward a more integrative understanding of environment, behaviour, intergenerational patterns, and what is now understood as epigenetic influence.
I later transferred my studies to the International Institute of Integral Human Sciences, where I trained within a multidisciplinary environment that included psychotherapy, neuroscience, consciousness studies, and integrative healing approaches. I was exposed to leading thinkers and practitioners whose work contributed to the foundations of many contemporary therapeutic modalities.
EDUCATION AND TRAINING
Diploma of Social Counselling, Montreal
Bachelor of Therapeutic Counselling
Master of Therapeutic Counselling
Thesis in spiritual psychotherapy and bereavement counselling
Clinical and Medical Hypnosis training with Maurice Kershaw
Master Practitioner in Neuro-Linguistic Programming
Extensive ongoing professional development across trauma therapy, EMDR, somatic approaches, and depth psychology
Over 8,000 hours of supervised practicum across diverse clinical settings, including youth protection, psychiatric services, addiction rehabilitation, homelessness outreach, Holocaust survivor support, schizophrenia treatment, and community-based interventions
MODALITIES AND METHODS
My work integrates a wide range of therapeutic approaches, including EMDR, clinical hypnosis, cognitive behavioural therapy, acceptance and commitment therapy, dialectical behaviour therapy, neuro-linguistic programming, narrative therapy, parts work, somatic approaches, psychodrama, Jungian psychology, existential therapy, logotherapy, and symbolic and ritual-based interventions.
These are not applied as isolated techniques, but integrated according to the individual, the clinical need, and the depth of work required.
ORIGINAL WORK AND CONTRIBUTION
I am the creator of the TR6 Trauma Model and Assessment, a structured framework for understanding the progression of trauma across psychological and somatic stages. This work has been accepted for peer-reviewed publication in the Australian Counselling Research Journal and will be further developed through forthcoming publications and practitioner training.
I have also developed the TraumaCode therapeutic card system and continue to produce written and educational material at the intersection of trauma, resilience, and psychological transformation.
PUBLICATIONS AND DEVELOPING WORK
You Are as Sick as Your Secrets: Trauma Understands Trauma
TR6 Trauma Model and Assessment
TraumaCode Cards and Therapeutic Deck
Forthcoming peer-reviewed journal article
Forthcoming book and practitioner training programs
SUPERVISION AND PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT
In addition to clinical practice, I provide supervision, mentoring, and training for therapists and helping professionals. This includes support in trauma-informed practice, clinical identity, case conceptualisation, and the development of sustainable and meaningful professional work.
WHY THIS WORK MATTERS
My commitment to this work is both professional and deeply personal. I have lived experience of trauma and understand its complexity not only intellectually, but experientially. This has shaped my approach and deepened my commitment to helping others move beyond survival toward integration and wholeness.
I believe that therapy, when done well, has the capacity to change not only an individual life, but the trajectory of families and future generations.
A PERSONAL NOTE
I have maintained a long-standing practice built on trust, depth, and word of mouth. I do not take lightly the responsibility of the work I do.
At its best, therapy is a process of being seen clearly, understood deeply, and supported skilfully. From that place, people begin to rebuild trust in themselves, reclaim their voice, and live with greater clarity, strength, and authenticity.
Thank you for taking the time to understand my work.
Book a Session
Sessions are available online worldwide via Zoom, with limited in-person availability in Victoria, Australia.
To request a session, click below:
DEIRDRE ROLFE
Clinical Counsellor and Psychotherapist
ACA Level 4 Registered Practitioner
Evidence-Based. Existential. Embodied.