Nancy Reeves, PHDc, MSW BSW, RSW
If you’re looking for counselling in Waterloo, you deserve a therapist who understands both what hurts and what healing can look like
If you’re searching for counselling in Waterloo, you’re probably not looking for generic advice. You want a therapist who can understand trauma, anxiety, grief, identity strain, family conflict, or racism-related stress—and you want to feel safe enough to bring your full story into the room. Nancy Eleanor Reeves, PhDc, MSW, BSW, RSW offers that kind of psychotherapy in Waterloo with uncommon depth. As a Registered Social Worker, psychotherapist, educator, and human rights advocate with more than sixteen years of experience, Nancy brings clinical skill, cultural humility, and steady compassion to every session. After living as a refugee for ten years before immigrating to Canada, she understands that distress is often tied to loss, survival, identity, family, culture, and safety. That is why Nancy’s therapy is designed to help you feel seen, heard, and understood from the beginning.Nancy Eleanor Reeves, PhDc, MSW, BSW, RSW offers broad, compassionate psychotherapy—and brings rare depth when trauma, oppression, and faith are part of your story
Nancy Eleanor Reeves, PhDc, MSW, BSW, RSW provides comprehensive counselling and therapy for anxiety, depression, grief, life transitions, family stress, PTSD, and identity-related challenges. That broad foundation matters, because you should never have to wonder whether the therapist you choose can handle the full picture of what you are carrying. What makes Nancy especially distinctive is the way she combines broad psychotherapy practice with trauma-informed, anti-racist, anti-oppressive, Indigenous-informed, and spiritually integrative care. She does not reduce you to a diagnosis or rush past the context of your life. Instead, she helps you understand how your experiences, relationships, culture, community, and nervous system interact—so therapy becomes more accurate, more respectful, and more useful.From your first session, you can expect therapy that feels warm, structured, and genuinely built around what healing means for you
When you come in for counselling, Nancy starts by listening carefully to what has brought you here, what feels overwhelming, and what feeling better would actually mean in your daily life. Instead of forcing you into a fixed formula, she builds care around your goals, your pace, and your story. Nancy’s sessions are warm and conversational, but they are also purposeful. She draws from evidence-based approaches such as Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT), Solution-Focused Therapy, Dialectical Behaviour Therapy, Narrative Therapy, and spiritually informed psychotherapy when those approaches fit your needs. If you need practical tools, she helps you find them. If you need space to process deeper pain, she makes room for that too. Because she works within the coordinated model at CARESPACE Uptown Waterloo, your therapy can also connect naturally with broader wellness support when another discipline would strengthen your progress.Years of clinical work, teaching, advocacy, and advanced training mean Nancy sees both the pain beneath the surface and the strengths you may not even realize you still have
Nancy’s credentials are substantial, but what makes them meaningful is how directly they shape your experience in session. She holds bachelor’s and master’s degrees in social work, with specialization in gerontology, social service administration, policy analysis, and program development and evaluation. She is also completing a PhD in Social Work Education focused on the long-term impact of trauma and war-related displacement, which gives her a deep understanding of how trauma affects the mind, body, spirit, and relationships over time. Her professional training includes Trauma-Informed Practice, Cognitive Behavioural Therapy, Dialectical Behaviour Therapy, and Brief Therapy. Beyond formal training, Nancy has provided psychotherapy and counselling in community health, private practice, family services, violence prevention, refugee support, and post-conflict settings. She has supported youth and families affected by gun violence, survivors of domestic and sexual violence, refugees fleeing persecution, Indigenous youth and families, and people navigating reintegration after involvement with the justice system. She has also taught for years at colleges and universities and served in senior equity and anti-racism leadership, including an interim executive role in equity, diversity, inclusion, and anti-racism at a leading Canadian university. That combination means she understands both personal suffering and the larger systems that can intensify it.If trauma, racism, displacement, or spiritual questions are shaping your life, this is where Nancy’s therapy goes far beyond ordinary support
While Nancy works with the full range of concerns that can bring you to therapy, you will find especially deep expertise when your healing is connected to trauma and identity. If trauma has left you feeling hypervigilant, shut down, disconnected, exhausted, or stuck in patterns that seem impossible to explain, Nancy helps you understand those responses as survival strategies—not personal failures. Her trauma-informed psychotherapy is shaped by years of work with war-affected families, refugees, survivors of violence, and those living with PTSD, anxiety, depression, grief, and complex trauma. She uses CBT when you need practical ways to challenge thoughts and behaviours that keep you trapped, and she uses Solution-Focused Therapy when you need momentum, strengths, and clear next steps that help you move forward. The goal is not to push you faster than your system can handle. The goal is to help you build safety, self-understanding, and real change that lasts beyond the therapy room.Nancy also brings exceptional depth to anti-racist, Indigenous-informed, and spiritually integrated psychotherapy. If racism, migration, culture, faith, or community are central to your experience, you should not have to spend your session explaining why those parts of your story matter. Nancy’s approach makes room for systemic stress, intergenerational trauma, belonging, identity, prayer, meditation, ancestral wisdom, and Indigenous ways of knowing when those are important to you. Her work is deeply informed by social justice, cultural safety, and intersectionality, so you are met with respect rather than minimization. This can be especially meaningful if you are Black, Indigenous, racialized, new to Canada, or carrying the emotional impact of oppression across generations. At the same time, her care remains practical and grounded. You are not just talking about pain; you are building insight, coping skills, self-trust, and a stronger path forward.
