Eleni Opperwall

Eleni Opperwall Compassion and clarity on your journey.

Perinatal mental health, postpartum depression and anxiety, EMDR, parent-child attachment, parent support during infancy and early years.

01/17/2026

PEOPLE. IT'S THAT TIME OF YEAR... FLORA'S WALK IS BACK!! 🩵💚

HELP RAISE FUNDS TO SUPPORT PARENTS RIGHT HERE IN YOUR COMMUNITY!! LET'S DO IT HAMMERTOWN 🔨

LINK IS IN MY BIO!!!

01/17/2026

People. We know what time of year it is... It's BACK Y'ALL.

FLORA'S WALK! Time to band together again in support of the parents of our community and raise some funds for free perinatal services RIGHT IN YOUR VERY NEIGHBORHOOD!! 🩵💚

LET'S DO IT, HAMMERTOWN 🔨

LINK IS IN MY BIO!!!

(🙏 many thanks to my 12 year old for recording this absurd video🙏 he got a very fancy hot chocolate out of the deal)

2025 is on its way out!! ❄️☃️🌨️🥶 Time to sign up for the next round of my Perinatal Supervision Group! Join the absolut...
12/12/2025

2025 is on its way out!! ❄️☃️🌨️🥶 Time to sign up for the next round of my Perinatal Supervision Group!

Join the absolute loveliest perinatal therapists for rich and reflective group explorations of our work with clients! We will be meeting 4Th Tuesdays from 12-1:30pm 💖 More info in the link in my bio or feel free to DM! 🙂 Hope to see you there!!

This beloved poem has been on my fridge for years. Next to all their macaroni art, crayon portraits, tantrum response pl...
06/04/2025

This beloved poem has been on my fridge for years. Next to all their macaroni art, crayon portraits, tantrum response plans, and spelling tests, I also placed this brief yet profound reminder that my kids are their own people.  

We get a lot of strange messages as parents -- stranger ones now than ever before.  We are invited to feel as though we need to "make something" of our kids, or mold them into someone.  Someone successful and utterly perfect. (Or even just someone who will survive in our increasingly frightening world.)

But they already are someone.   They have been since the day they were born.  

I often say that we are told as parents to be potters.  It's impressed upon us that we need to mold our inert clay into the right shape for the world.  If our pot is lop-sided then we were bad potters.  But there's a more true and (I think) compassionate way to see things.

We are actually gardeners.  We don't change one plant into another.  But we ensure each plant has its specific needs cared for, and we respect what kind of plant it is.  We get to know our plants.  We give them enough water. We guard them against pests and the brutal chaos of squirrels.  We make sure that when the season is right, they are pruned, and when the season is right again, they get fertilizer.  We watch each leaf and petal open on its own time.  We let it show us the specific beauty and qualities it has.  

Gibran calls us "bows" but the message is the same:  we aren't here to forcefully push our children out of their childhood.  Our job is to bend.  And as we bend, they fly. 

Sending love to all the gardeners and bows out there 🌷🌷🏹🏹

Folks who know me know that Flora's Walk is an event that holds a very special place in my heart. I often reminisce abo...
05/23/2025

Folks who know me know that Flora's Walk is an event that holds a very special place in my heart. I often reminisce about our first Flora's Walk, a few months after Flora's death, when we were just a few folks in the park trying to join our small powers together in the face of something very, very big. 2025 was the first year that I wasn't a Walk Leader for -- I passed the baton to Stephanie .nesting , Lara and Allie with full confidence that they would do a phenomenal job, and they did not disappoint 💖 (Even when the weather decidedly did not cooperate!)

Flora's Walk is a lot of things to a lot of people. It's a chance to talk openly about perinatal mental health. It's a fundraiser for free perinatal therapy and other services. It's a chance to meet others who have experienced the struggle first-hand. But for me, it also will always be a sign of hope.

Hope that even the deepest despair can be met with love and care.

Hope that compassion and light can be born of immense sorrow and darkness.

Hope that if we add our all our deep sorrows together, perhaps their sum is joy. 🩵💚

So pleased to receive my fancy Canadian Certificate in Birth and Reproductive Trauma the other day!! 💖Thank you for send...
05/14/2025

So pleased to receive my fancy Canadian Certificate in Birth and Reproductive Trauma the other day!! 💖

Thank you for sending, .m.vandenberg ! Can't wait to do more thought-provoking, clinically rigorous and FUN trainings with in the future! ☺️

What a week, folks... This past Thursday I had the incredible pleasure of seeing deliver a talk entitled “Trauma, Illne...
05/05/2025

What a week, folks... This past Thursday I had the incredible pleasure of seeing deliver a talk entitled “Trauma, Illness & Healing in a Toxic Culture” with my dear friend at Roy Thomson Hall.  I tried to explain my feelings to my husband by telling him that seeing Dr. Mate speak live is basically the trauma therapist’s equivalent of seeing Led Zeppelin.  It’s hard for me to think of a trauma practitioner who has had a deeper impact on my views on trauma and attachment.  I remember reading “When The Body Says No” as a newly minted MSW back in the day and walking away with two major take-aways:  

The human being is one holistic and undivided bio-psycho-social entity.  Anything that hurts us will affect our body AND mind, which also means that the healing process will involve body AND mind in some way.  

Much of what we conceive of as “healthy functioning” in an unhealthy society is anything but. Rather than seeing illness as an individual affair, healing professionals must also zoom out to see the enormous web of relationships, intergenerational stories, societal pressures, and cultural sicknesses in which each human being finds themselves. 

Both of these ideas were foundational for my practice and have shaped me professionally and personally.  I was so grateful for the chance to see Dr. Mate in person at least once in my life.  He was supremely knowledgeable but also just really freaking funny, and most importantly (to me), a fantastic storyteller. 💖

Actual footage of the majesty of spring! It's the perfect season to book a Walk and Talk session and hit the trail with...
03/27/2025

Actual footage of the majesty of spring! It's the perfect season to book a Walk and Talk session and hit the trail with me! 🚶🚶🚶

Walk and Talk sessions are an evidence-based form of therapy that helps folks connect with their bodies and their minds out in nature. We can meet on a nearby trail and spend our time together outside, taking in the beauty of the Chedoke Radial trail or other local trails.

If you're interested, please do DM me! Happy Spring 🪻

*Image from the very funny book “Men To Avoid In Art and In Life” by Nicole Tersigni*Today I was contemplating a well-lo...
03/20/2025

*Image from the very funny book “Men To Avoid In Art and In Life” by Nicole Tersigni*

Today I was contemplating a well-loved quote (often attributed to the inventor Nikola Tesla):  “When you understand that every opinion is a vision full of personal history, you will begin to understand that every judgment is a confession.” 

It made me think about all the unsolicited advice and opinions we hear as parents.  

"If you keep picking that baby up, you’ll spoil them!"
"Did you know that they won’t start sleeping through the night until they start eating solid food?"
"NEVER use a (Jolly Jumper, Bumbo seat, insert baby product of your choice here)!  It permanently messes up their gross motor development!"

It can be frustrating to the max to be bombarded with all kinds of advice and opinions you never asked for.  It feel like an invitation to start defending ourselves, arguing, debating, convincing OR judging ourselves as bad parents and not good enough.   

But what if we simply saw it as a statement about THEM and not US?  What would it be like to think, “Oh, Auntie So’n’so is saying that she had a bad experience with that in the past, and it has nothing to do with my parenting in the present”? 

It might impact how those unsolicited opinions land with us.  We might experience less shame and anger after we hear them.  We might stop taking other peoples’ opinions as our marching orders, or our cue to start a debate or start criticising ourselves.  Maybe we simply say the same things to Advice-Givers that we always say: “Thanks for sharing your advice!  We are doing what works for us.”  But maybe we say it with a bit less frustration and a bit more healthy detachment than before.

How does this shift in mindset change things for you?  What are your favorite ways to respond to unsolicited advice and opinions? 💡💡💡

Hey there people, just a reminder that my fundraising page for Flora's Walk is NOW LIVE and EAGERLY AWAITING donations! ...
03/01/2025

Hey there people, just a reminder that my fundraising page for Flora's Walk is NOW LIVE and EAGERLY AWAITING donations! 🎉🎉

Don't know what Flora's Walk is? Well...It's just the nation's largest fundraiser for perinatal mental health, that's all!

Each year, Flora's Walk raises both awareness and funding for parents who are experiencing perinatal mental health struggles. 70% of all funding raised this year by Team Hamilton will go towards providing low-cost and no-cost perinatal mental health services for parents right here in the Hammer!!! 🔨 And the remaining 30% will go towards Life With a Baby's peer support programs and Flora's family!

Given how common perinatal mental health issues are, we ALL have either experienced them ourselves OR love someone who has ❤️ Think about how powerful it could be to rally around those in our community who might be going through this and need our support to access care...

Visit the link in my bio to learn more and please do consider giving to this worthy cause!

Folks: This book has changed so many lives. Today I'm recommending "Recovering from Emotionally Immature Parents" by t...
02/27/2025

Folks: This book has changed so many lives. Today I'm recommending "Recovering from Emotionally Immature Parents" by the amazingly wise Lindsay C. Gibson.

For adult children of emotionally immature parents, there can be a fog of confusion hovering over the dysfunction in their relationship with their parent. Dr. Gibson ✨magically dispels this fog ✨ with her incisive insights into the dynamics at play between an emotionally immature parent and their child. Beyond that, she invites the reader into an authentic curiosity about their own inner world, and she helps the reader to reconnect with a sense of free will and autonomy within all their important relationships.

If you are wondering about unhealthy dynamics in your relationship with a parent or family member, I cannot recommend this book highly enough! AAAAAND guess what? It's a series!! So do check out Dr. Gibson's other work as well!

And hey! Want to hear a fantastic interview with Lindsay C. Gibson? who hosts the Baggage Reclaim podcast just did a lovely one a few months ago! Check out podcast episode #283 to hear more! ❤️

DID YOU KNOW... What percentage of new parents experience intrusive thoughts? Those vivid, obsessive thoughts about awfu...
02/20/2025

DID YOU KNOW... 

What percentage of new parents experience intrusive thoughts? Those vivid, obsessive thoughts about awful things happening to our baby, ourselves or our family members? 

Most research indicates that around 90% of parents have them!  🤯🤯 Is your mind utterly blown?  Mine was!

Intrusive thoughts make people feel so ashamed and out of control.  But they appear to be a typical part of the postpartum experience.  Karen Kleiman and Amy Wenzel's fantastic book "Dropping the Baby and Other Scary Thoughts" is a great read if you are working on your intrusive thoughts and would like to understand how to respond to them in a healthy way.  

Check it out!! (but as always, go to your local indie bookstore! 📕📗📘❤️💚🩵)

Address

409 Charlton Avenue West
Hamilton, ON
L8P2E6

Opening Hours

Monday 9:30am - 5:30pm
Tuesday 9:30am - 5:30pm
Wednesday 9:30am - 5:30pm
Thursday 9:30am - 5:30pm
Friday 9:30am - 5:30pm

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