Dhwani Joshi

Dhwani’s therapeutic style, informed by a mind-body approach, aims to deepen emotional experiences to facilitate therapeutic change. Her therapy is always individualized and she draws from a range of evidence-based treatments such as Emotion Focused Therapy (EFT), Dialectical Behaviour Therapy (DBT), Cognitive Behaviour Therapy (CBT), Internal Family Systems (IFS), and Somatic Experiencing (SE). In her work with couples, Dhwani integrates emotion- and attachment-focused therapies with the Gottman Method, harnessing the evidence-based strategies rooted in decades of research to strengthen communication, manage conflict, and deepen emotional connection. She is deeply attuned to the underlying emotional wounds that may surface in relational dynamics, skillfully guiding couples to unveil and heal these wounds to foster deeper intimacy and resilience.

A guiding belief in Dhwani’s practice is that unprocessed emotional injuries not only impact our minds but also reside in our physical body. She therefore incorporates somatic experiencing, particularly for individuals who have faced trauma and significant childhood distress. Somatic experiencing is a gentle way of inviting you to become more aware of your body. It helps you notice when your body is activated and when your body is calm. This allows you to see the patterns that you normally use to manage the stress in your life and how your body is physically responding to these patterns.

While Dhwani firmly believes in an individual’s innate capacity for self-healing, she felt moved by witnessing her clients undergo profound healing in the context of their relationships, including intimate relationships. She recognized that although conflicts can be an unwelcome presence in relationships, they can also offer opportunities for healing and deeper intimacy. This inspired her to expand her practice to couples with a goal of helping them co-create a renewed sense of what it means to nurture a relationship. Dhwani is highly attuned and integrates her trauma-focused lens to get underneath the spoken words during sessions, and helps couples understand the deeper wounds that become activated in the relational dynamic. By integrating exploration of underlying emotions and attachment patterns as well as addressing practical skills for communication, conflict management, and emotional connection through the Gottman Method, Dhwani offers couples concrete tools to navigate challenges and strengthen their bond, helping them to build a foundation of trust, intimacy, and resilience. Ultimately, Dhwani believes that couples owe it to their relationship to give it their best fighting chance!

Beyond couples therapy, Dhwani also provides parent-focused coaching to help navigate the complexities of parenthood. She has extensive experience supporting parents of teens who struggle with mood disorders, body image issues, disordered eating, ADHD, OCD, as well as post-traumatic stress. She believes in creating a safe and supportive space for parents, helping them navigate the unique challenges they may face.
 
Dhwani has had the pleasure of working with teenagers and parents in an inpatient hospital program. Her role involved both individual, parenting and group therapies. Her role navigated work with the child, the couple relationship and parent coaching to help overcome significant obstacles and create a unified system to fortify individuals and the family system.

In all of her work, Dhwani draws from her extensive experience working with a wide range of interdisciplinary teams in hospital settings. She was previously employed at Oakville Trafalgar Memorial Hospital where she provided treatment to adults as well as adolescents and their families in a variety of programs such as a concurrent disorders program, day treatment program, and an eating disorders program. At present, she is employed on a part-time basis at Credit Valley hospital in their addictions day treatment program providing individual and group-based treatment. Her treatment approach is focused on providing evidence-based treatments such as motivational interviewing, harm-reduction strategies as well as cognitive behaviour and dialectical behaviour therapy approaches.

Dhwani has a deep sense of optimism in the resiliency of the human spirit and our capacity for growth. She aspires to develop a strong therapeutic alliance from which you can explore important experiences that have brought you to therapy. Dhwani believes that distress is often interconnected and rooted in old emotional wounds that have now reached into your present experiences. With a keen sense of awareness into your unique needs, she strives to help you illuminate hurdles, uncover your potential to navigate them, and co-create new meanings for your life moving forward. Ultimately, Dhwani firmly believes that people heal in the presence of a strong therapeutic connection.

Dhwani strongly believes in maintaining the highest standards in clinical care. She has participated in many professional development workshops and continues to optimize her learning through new trainings, independent research as well as consultations with peers.

Dhwani is a member in good standing with the Ontario College of Registered Social Workers and Social Service Workers.

Online therapy available