This started because too many veterans were getting handed to the wrong clinician.

I kept seeing the same pattern. A veteran gets approved by VAC, gets a name off a list, books in, and within three sessions decides it isn't for them. The problem usually wasn't the veteran and often wasn't even the clinician — it was that nobody had asked the right questions first about what was actually driving the thing, and what kind of work would move it.

I also watched people give up at the paperwork. Approved for treatment and still stuck, because the process is opaque and nobody wants to make one more phone call to explain themselves again.

So I built a practice with the front door I wished existed: one clinician who understands the culture and the system, who does the assessment personally, and who tells you plainly what he thinks and where you should go — even when that's somewhere other than here.

The first conversation is with me, free, and it works in one direction first: I'm listening for what's actually going on. What changed and when. What the sleep is doing. What the drinking is doing. What's happening at home. What you've already tried and why it didn't hold. Whether what's in front of me is operational stress, grief, moral injury, an anger problem sitting on top of something older, or a release that took the identity with it.

Then I tell you what I think. Not a diagnosis pitch — a plain formulation: here's what I believe is driving this, here's the work I think it needs, here's roughly how long that tends to take, and here's how we'll know if it's working.

And you vet me back. Ask what you want. How I work, what I actually know about the Forces or the RCMP, what happens if you don't like a session. If the answers don't sit right, that's useful information and you've lost nothing but a short call.

Out of that conversation comes a recommendation, not a booking funnel. Individual trauma work with me. A group, when being in a room with people who don't need it explained is worth more than another one-to-one hour. Family sessions, when the thing that's breaking is at home. A referral out, when someone else is genuinely the better fit — a psychiatrist for medication, an addictions program, or a clinician with a specialism I don't have.

As the practice grows and other clinicians join, that doesn't change. I stay the first conversation, and I match you to the person I think is right for what you told me. Nobody here gets assigned by whoever has the earliest opening.

Dunn Kaufman, RP, CRPO #12096. Over ten years in practice with trauma, anxiety, depression, addiction, anger, grief and relationships that have stopped working.

I came to this sideways. Before therapy I spent years in the corporate world as a marketing manager — targets, optics, and holding a straight face while things came apart behind it. That taught me what performing competence costs a person, and it's why plain talk matters more to me than clinical distance.

I'm a husband and a father of seven. I know what it looks like when someone comes home running on empty and the whole house quietly adjusts around it. That's the part veterans mention last and feel worst about, and it's often where the work starts paying off first.

I haven't served, and I won't pretend the experience is mine. What I've done is put in the years to understand military and RCMP structure, the release process and how VAC actually works — and I ask when something needs explaining instead of nodding along.

Direct, plain-spoken, and organised around what you actually want to change. A clear formulation, a plan you agreed to, and honest feedback about whether it's moving.

Clinically that means Cognitive Behavioural Therapy, Emotionally Focused Therapy and Internal Family Systems, plus trauma-focused and EMDR-informed processing and DBT skills — chosen for the problem in front of us, not a house style. Clients tend to describe it the same way: empathetic, but results-driven.

Veterans of the Canadian Armed Forces and the RCMP approved for psychotherapy through Veterans Affairs Canada. Coverage is verified with your K number before you start, so cost is settled before the first session.

If you haven't been approved yet, that's not the end of the conversation. Tell us where you are in the process and we'll walk you through getting approved.

No questionnaire marathon before anyone talks to you like a person. No pressure to narrate the worst day of your life to prove you belong. No open-ended therapy with no sense of whether anything is changing.

If we're not the right fit, I'll tell you and point you somewhere better.

Sessions are private. Nothing is reported to your unit, your detachment, your CO or an employer. Records are kept securely under CRPO standards and PHIPA, and information is only shared with your written consent or in the narrow circumstances the law requires.

Coverage administration with VAC and Medavie Blue Cross is limited to the information required for billing.