Naomi Ball Services
OCD, Anxiety & Self-Esteem Therapy in Toronto
I work with a wide range of concerns. Some clients come to me seeking treatment for a specific issue or concern - and even more come carrying a few layers: anxiety tangled up with self-esteem, a life transition stirring up old family patterns, grief sitting alongside identity questions. Below is a detailed look at the concerns I treat and how I approach each one. Click on whatever feels relevant, and know that we don't have to fit your experience into a tidy category before we start working together.
OCD Therapy in Toronto
OCD is often misunderstood and people may not recognize it at first. OCD is more than being neat, organized or particular. If you're noticing patterns, compulsions, or intrusive thoughts that take up time and mental energy and away from your life, you're in the right place.
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OCD involves unwanted, intrusive thoughts (obsessions) that create significant distress, followed by behaviours or mental rituals (compulsions) aimed at relieving that distress or preventing something bad from happening. It often targets the things a person cares about most - being a good person, keeping loved ones safe, being conscientious. Fears of doing something wrong in a much valued domain of life is part of what makes OCD so distressing. The reality is that OCD sufferers are the last people who would engage in the feared behaviours. But the fear of doing so creates real distress. Often people experiencing obsessions and compulsions have never talked about it with anyone before, often assuming what they're experiencing is just "bad anxiety." People struggling with OCD deserve care, support and skilled treatment.
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I treat OCD using Exposure and Response Prevention - a structured, evidence-based approach built specifically for it (more on that in the Approaches section below). Treatment typically begins with understanding the severity and shape of what you're experiencing, then moves into understanding the cycle of OCD and how it sustains itself. Once we understand together how OCD is impacting you, we’ll build a plan together that's unique to you. It will involve exposure to the things that are feared. And while that can understandably feel daunting, research has shown us that it works.
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Psychotherapy for OCD can be helpful for anyone noticing that what they've been calling "anxiety" involves intrusive thoughts (“What if I did something terrible?”), obsessive thoughts or behavioural rituals.
OCD treatment is important for people who've tried therapy before but found it focused on general anxiety rather than diving into and challenging the obsessions or rituals.
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You'll notice you can sit with discomfort without needing to complete a ritual to feel okay again. The grip of the thought loosens over time, and the rituals take up less and less space in your day.
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OCD treatment is structured and goal-oriented, different from most of my other therapy work, because that's what actually works for OCD.
Anxiety Therapy in Toronto
Anxiety can feel like constant overwhelm, racing thoughts, or a persistent sense that you're not doing enough, fast enough, well enough. It shows up differently depending on your context, but it almost always involves a mind working overtime to protect you from something that may not actually be a threat.
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Anxiety is a pattern of excessive worry, overthinking, or physical tension that interferes with daily life, often tied to a sense of impending danger that isn't actually there.
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Anxiety thrives on uncertainty, asking us “what if?” and then assuming the worst case scenario will happen. Anxiety’s MO is also to have us avoid those feared scenarios so that we “stay safe”.
If you are frequently distressed and asking yourself “what ifs” about social situations, feared situations (e.g. flying, having blood taken), your health, or your relationships, we begin by understanding the unique fears and where they originate.
We then work on changing our relationship to distressing thoughts as well as using our own behavioural experiments and evidence to teach ourselves that we can cope, even when we are scared.
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Teens navigating social relationships and fears, students navigating academic pressure, new parents, people navigating a career change, professionals managing high-stakes career. Anyone whose mind won't stop racing long enough to feel at ease is a good candidate for therapy.
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You notice the anxious thought arise but it doesn't automatically take over. You have language and tools to challenge it, reframe it, or simply let it pass.
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I draw on CBT to understand your patterns of thought alongside self-compassion and mindfulness-based approaches, to help you build a different relationship with anxious thinking.
Self-Esteem Therapy in Toronto
Our relationship with ourselves is based on our current reality as well as old and ingrained beliefs about ourselves, others and the world around us. Sometimes we have carried narratives about who we are and what we are capable of that no longer serve us or need to be updated in healthier ways or to reflect who we’ve become. Building a strong self concept and learning to relate to ourselves kindly takes patience, care and willingness. It is worth it.
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Self-esteem therapy is the ongoing work of understanding who you’ve been, what you care about, and who you want to continue to be or become. It involves us deeply understanding together the strengths and values you cherish, and acknowledging some of the challenges you face. Ultimately, we work on understanding if you are carrying limiting beliefs and then practice relating to yourself with increased kindness, care and compassion.
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We work together to deeply understand your beliefs about yourself and whether you deal with an inner critic (so many of us do). We then explore your actual strengths directly, helping you own things about yourself that may be hard to see clearly right now. A lot of this work is about learning, slowly and consistently, to treat yourself the way you'd treat a friend.
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Anyone who would like to build a stronger sense of self and focus on supporting themselves with kindness. This can often include people who look capable and accomplished from the outside but carry real self-doubt underneath, with an inner critic runnings the show more than they'd like.
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Instead of berating yourself after a mistake, you're able to say, "This is human, and it's okay."
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This is slow, steady work. We're not aiming for instant confidence; we're building a kinder internal relationship over time.
Identity Therapy in Toronto
Identity work looks different depending on where you are in life, but it's almost always tied to becoming a different version of yourself, whether that's by choice or circumstance.
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Identity therapy explores who you are, who you're becoming, and how that intersects with family, culture, gender, relationships, or career. For younger clients, this often means figuring out who you want to become outside your family of origin, or working through gender identity or sexual orientation. For clients further along, it's often tied to major life-stage shifts.
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We take the time to understand what's actually shifting and why it feels destabilizing, whether that's a new career, a serious relationship, becoming a parent, or stepping back from a role you'd built your identity around.
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Anyone moving through a significant shift in how they see themselves, especially when that shift feels destabilizing rather than exciting.
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You feel more solid in who you are, even amid change, rather than scrambling to hold onto an old version of yourself.
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In my experience, the more a history of self-esteem struggles is present, the harder these transitions tend to be, which is part of why identity and self-esteem work are so often connected - and important.
Family Conflict Therapy in Toronto
I offer therapy for individuals struggling within their family context versus family therapy. We process your experience of the family dynamic with a focus on where you have agency to try for change, where things or people are unlikely to change and how you can come to terms with whatever the outcome may be.
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This involves working through the impact of family relationships past and present on how you think, feel, and relate to others. Common threads include old hurts from a parent who wasn't emotionally available, navigating a family member's mental health or substance use struggles, or friction between your family of origin and a partner's.
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This is individual processing work, not family therapy. It's a space reflect upon your own unique experience of family dynamics. We will work together to to process your experiences. Many times this involves some grief work and acknowledgement of old hurts. I have found Emotion Focused Therapy (EFT) to be a powerful approach to experientially expressing, shifting or releasing “unfinished business”.
If I determine that family therapy would be most helpful, I will provide a referral.
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Anyone carrying old hurts from a parent who wasn't emotionally available, navigating a family member's struggles, or managing current friction within a family.
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You can name the pattern without getting pulled back into it every time, and you have more clarity on what you can and can't change in these relationships.
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This work is about your own relationship to the dynamic, not about changing the family members themselves.
Relationship Issues Therapy in Toronto
I work with individuals (I do not provide couples therapy) who are experiencing challenges within their closest relationships. When couples are struggling, I will almost always suggest couples therapy and provide referrals to skilled professionals. Unfortunately, at times couples therapy is not an option, and so I am here to support the individual who needs support and a space to consider where they have agency to shift the dynamic or set healthy boundaries.
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This involves working through relationship patterns, communication, and boundaries and focusing on your own role, patterns, and agency within a relationship.
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If you're looking for support specifically around your relationship as a couple, I'll point you toward a trusted colleague who specializes in that work. If your partner isn't willing or able to join that process, I'm glad to support you individually in the meantime. For clients already working with me, relationship concerns come up naturally as part of our broader work, and we look at communication patterns, boundary-setting and understanding where you have agency to make change.
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Clients who are wanting to understand their own patterns in relationships and build healthier communication and boundaries.
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You notice healthier communication and boundary-setting becoming more natural and you feel more satisfied and at ease in your relationship.
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Relationships take work and looking at what you bring to a dynamic is a healthy process. It’s also important for those struggling in a relationship dynamic to receive support and consider what can or needs to change.
Life Transitions Therapy in Toronto
Transitions take many shapes, and what they have in common is the way they destabilize things you thought were settled.
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Therapy for life transitions involves support through major life changes - finishing school, moving cities, further education, marriage, career shifts or loss, breakups, or adjusting to the death of a loved one. Transitions can feel disorienting even when they're positive or chosen and they can feel overwhelming when they’re not.
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My approach is supportive and holistic. When your life is changing dramatically, having a consistent space with someone who already knows and understands you can make a real difference in how you move through it. We often practice coping skills and figure out together what you need to weather the transition.
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Anyone navigating a significant life shift, whether chosen or unexpected.
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The transition starts to feel navigable rather than overwhelming, even while it's still unfolding.
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This work often overlaps with identity and self-esteem work, since big transitions tend to surface old patterns.
Grief Therapy in Toronto
Grief may about losing a family member, a partner, a friend, a pet or a version of your life you wanted to have. Grief may be public and understandable to others or private and “disenfranchised” (miscarriage, abortion, death of an affair partner). There is no right or wrong way to move through grief, and each grief journey is unique and deserves attention. A person who is grieving needs and deserves space in therapy to process their unique experience, have their grief witnessed, and feel supported as they move through their days navigating the loss.
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Grief therapy involves processing loss in all its forms, a person, an experience you never had, a future you'd imagined, or a part of your identity.
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I help you process your experience in the acute phase of grief and we make space for your pain, your anger, your resentment to those not going through it, your overwhelming adjustment. As we go, I will help you plan concretely for what's ahead (attending a funeral, navigating a difficult anniversary, knowing what to say to people) while also normalizing that grief doesn't follow a tidy, linear path. I don't subscribe to the idea of fixed "stages" of grief. That framework, however well-intentioned, can leave people feeling like they're grieving wrong. There is no right or wrong way. It’s just important that you have support as you go through it.
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Anyone grieving the loss of a person, a relationship, an experience (infertility, miscarriage, the parent you needed but didn't have), or a professional identity.
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You find ways to keep living your life alongside the grief.
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Social support, support groups, friends, and others with shared experience often complement this work well.
Trauma Therapy in Toronto
If you're dealing with acute or destabilizing trauma (accident, sexual assault, abuse, mass trauma or natural disaster), I'll likely refer you to a trusted colleague who is a Trauma therapist and/or trained in EMDR. It is important that the first stage of trauma is treated carefully and effectively.
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Trauma therapy works through the lasting impact of difficult or harmful past experiences on how you function today. This can include developmental or complex trauma, often rooted in childhood experiences, or more acute, singular traumatic events.
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I have real depth working with developmental and complex trauma, built through years of supporting clients navigating therapy for the first time. My approach centers on safety, trust, and nervous-system regulation (more on the thinkers who inform this work in the Approaches section below). For acute or more destabilizing trauma, I'll be honest if a referral to a trauma specialist makes more sense for you.
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Clients with longer-term, complex trauma histories looking for steady, relational support, not clients in acute crisis or needing intensive trauma-specific treatment.
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You feel more regulated and less reactive, with a growing sense of safety in your own body and life.
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Therapy to process and learn to cope with trauma is essential.
BFRB Therapy (Hair Pulling & Skin Picking) in Toronto
BFRBs are OCD spectrum disorders that include compulsive hair pulling or skin picking. They are not considered self harm, but rather a habit loop that can create challenges and require treatment.
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BFRBs (Body Focused Repetitive Behaviours) are considered OCD spectrum disorders, and include compulsive hair pulling, skin picking, nail biting or cheek biting. Most people engage in these behaviours sometimes but can stop when they want. People who struggle with BFRBs find the behaviours extremely difficult to control, and the brain has created a reward pathway over time that reinforces engaging in the behaviour. BRFSs are classified as OCD-related disorders.
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I'm trained in two evidence-based approaches for treating BFRBs (detailed in the Approaches section below). I am not currently accepting new BFRB clients, though I continue supporting long-term clients I've worked with in this area in an ongoing capacity.
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This information is for anyone wondering whether what they're experiencing (compulsive hair pulling, skin picking, nail biting or similar behaviours) might benefit from treatment. I'm not currently accepting new BFRB clients, but understanding what you're dealing with can still be a useful first step, and I'm glad to point you toward a specialist who can help.
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Increased awareness of triggers and patterns, even when the behaviour itself remains difficult to fully resolve.
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These behaviours difficult to treat but change is possible with strong motivation and active engagement in treatment.
Therapeutic Approaches
I draw on a range of evidence-based approaches, blending them based on what's actually useful for you rather than applying one framework to everyone. The exception is OCD, which requires a specific, structured protocol in order to be treated effectively.
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Understanding the patterns of thought that keep you stuck and learning to relate to those thoughts differently. Using behavioural strategies and interventions to manage or improve mood.
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Healing old relational hurts and working through unprocessed emotional pain as well as working on the relationship with self.
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The structured, evidence-based approach used specifically for OCD treatment. A typical course runs 12 to 20 sessions: we begin with assessment, move into education about how the OCD cycle functions, then build a plan for exposures specific to your thoughts and rituals. We also learn mindfulness and cognitive defusion skills (from ACT) to help you remove power from distressing thoughts.
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A focus on values alignment and skills like cognitive defusion - learning to relate differently to thoughts rather than thoughts wreaking havoc and running the show.
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Building a kinder, steadier relationship with yourself.
Learning to live in the present moment, accepting what comes, rather than suffering or wishing for something else.
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Drawing on the work of thinkers like Janina Fisher, Diane Poole Heller and Peter Levine for complex and developmental trauma, with a focus on safety and nervous-system regulation.
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Used specifically for treating BFRBs, focused on building awareness of triggers and patterns, meeting the sensory needs of the body, modifying the environment to support habit change and attending to affect.
Not Sure Where to Start?
You don't need to have the right words or the perfect category to describe what you're going through. Most people don't when they first reach out. If something above resonated, let’s talk. Book a complimentary 20-30 minute video consultation, and we'll figure out the rest together.