About Naomi Ball
OCD & Self-Esteem Therapist in Toronto
Where it all Started
I grew up in a family where worry was just part of the air we breathed. We didn't call it anxiety, we just called it caring about health and safety. It took me a long time to realize that what I was experiencing from a young age was actually social anxiety, and that it was quietly shaping my self-esteem the whole time. On the outside, I looked confident. I had friends, I did well in school, I achieved. But underneath, the process of achieving left me anxious and overwhelmed, and for a long time I thought the problem was just me.
It wasn't until university that I started to understand I wasn't alone, that this was a common experience, and that there were real ways to work through it. That realization changed the direction of my life. When I found the Counselling Psychology program at OISE, something clicked in a way nothing had before. I'd found work that fit who I actually am: quieter, more focused, deeply relational.
Finding my Way Into This Work
What drew me to self-esteem and anxiety work specifically was my own experience of being high-functioning on the outside while struggling underneath, the exact thing I see in so many of my clients now. And OCD has always fascinated me. There's something remarkable and heartbreaking about how the very things you care about most, being a good person, not hurting the people you love, can get turned around by your brain into a source of suffering. I also grew up sensing there was undiagnosed OCD somewhere in my family history, and a fair amount of intergenerational anxiety that likely shaped more than one of us. I came to OCD work with some existing expertise in impulse control and body-focused repetitive behaviours, and I wanted to bring more structure back into my practice to complement the long-term relational work I already do.
I officially started seeing private clients in 2016, just one evening a week, in a small rented space. I built from there slowly and intentionally, part-time hours, then a mix of my own caseload and group practice work, until I moved to seeing my own clients full-time in 2022. What almost ten years of this work has taught me is that change rarely happens all at once. People contemplate it, prepare for it, sit with wanting it for a while, until the conditions are finally right and it happens. My job is to help build those conditions, and to be steady company while people do the hardest parts themselves.
More About Naomi
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In plain language: I draw a lot on CBT to understand the patterns of thought that keep people stuck, but I don't think CBT alone is enough to heal old relational wounds, so I also bring in EFT (Emotionally Focused Therapy) and psychodynamic approaches, along with self-compassion and mindfulness-based practices, to help you build a kinder relationship with yourself. For OCD, I use ERP (Exposure and Response Prevention), the most evidence-based approach we have for treating it well.
Some of the thinkers who've shaped how I practice: Tara Brach and Jack Kornfield's work on mindfulness and radical acceptance, Irvin Yalom's writing on what makes therapy meaningful, and Kristin Neff's research on self-compassion. I've been lucky enough to train directly with two of them. Their ideas, along with the both/and thinking central to dialectical approaches - multiple truths existing at once, acceptance alongside suffering - show up in how I think about this work every day.
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Earlier in my career, I worked with an incredibly diverse group of young adults, and that experience still shapes how I show up with clients today. I try never to assume I know where someone is coming from. I want every client, regardless of background, identity, or life experience, to feel like this is a genuinely safe space to be fully themselves. Some of the relationships I built with students years ago are still ones I think about today, people who came from very different backgrounds than my own, and who trusted me enough to find me again, years later, in private practice.
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Outside the therapy room, travel is where I feel most alive. I love art, photography, architecture, design, anything that puts me in the middle of something beautiful. A few years ago I took my two teenagers to Japan for a month, and watching the cherry blossoms bloom nearly undid me (my kids did not share the enthusiasm, but that's teenagers for you). When I'm not travelling, you'll find me on walks, at Pilates or lifting weights, playing mah jong with friends, thrifting, or out at a comedy show. I'm also, if I'm honest, someone who still second-guesses herself more than people probably assume. I think that's part of what makes me good at this work, I understand the gap between how capable you look and how uncertain you can feel inside.
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I'm a Registered Psychotherapist (RP) and a member of the International OCD Foundation (IOCDF). I completed advanced OCD treatment training in February 2026, and I consult monthly with a clinical psychologist who specializes in OCD to make sure my approach to every case is sound.
Let’s see if We’re a Good fit
If you've read this far, here's what I most want you to know: I take this work seriously, and I don't take myself too seriously. I'd love the chance to get to know you and see if we're a good fit. Book a free 30-minute video consultation, and let's start there.