Our Team

Sally Woods – Senior Counsellor

Sally has over 20 years’ experience working as a social worker and therapist both in Western Australia and the United Kingdom to help facilitate positive behaviour change with clients who have complex mental health problems. She trained in the trauma specialised treatment of EMDR in 2016 and has recently advanced from practitioner level to become an EMDRAA Accredited EMDR Consultant 2022-2027. She is passionate about providing this evidenced based trauma treatment approach as an alternative to talking therapy.

Sally takes a systemic perspective to understand a client’s bio-psycho-social context of their issues and works collaboratively to establish the most effective and least intrusive course of treatment.

Sally has worked for a variety of organisations including voluntary agencies, private residential settings, Edith Cowan University, the WA Drug and Alcohol Office and the UK National Health Service. She currently divides her time working at Phoenix and The Pax Centre.

Baljit Carroll – Senior Counsellor

Baljit has worked in the counselling field for over 28 years mainly in the not-for-profit sector. Baljit has worked with individuals, couples, and families experiencing a wide range of issues across the life cycle, including mental health challenges, relationship conflict, alcohol and other drugs, and issues of identity. Baljit is an experienced group facilitator and clinical supervisor and is passionate about helping people to have the best life possible despite past negative, painful, and unhelpful experiences. Baljit has a Masters in Social Science (Counselling) and is a dedicated yoga teacher and utilises a wide range of approaches in counselling to assist clients towards achieving their goals. Baljit has most recently, also worked as a Beyond Blue counsellor for Medicare providing telephone counselling support.   

Qualifications:  

Masters in Social Science (Counselling).

Susan Laird – Senior Counsellor

Susan has over 14 years’ experience working as a counsellor. She has worked predominantly in the not-for-profit setting and in private practice. Susan’s work has included but is not limited to, sexual abuse, family and domestic violence, grief and loss, managing anxiety, depression, couples counselling and trauma. Susan has worked across the lifespan and has extensive experience with working with victim- survivors of child sexual abuse.

In Susan’s role as a counsellor, she practices “trauma-informed care”. This is a victim-survivor-oriented approach and is underpinned by principles of safety, empowerment, choice, collaboration, and understanding of culture. It places the victim-survivor as the expert on their own life.

Susan has a passion for victim-survivors to be heard, to be believed, and to be told what happened is not their fault.

Susan has previously worked with Break the Silence, as a telehealth counsellor with 1800RESPECT and she currently divides her time working at Phoenix and the Salvation Army.

Qualifications:  

Susan studied counselling at Strathclyde University in Glasgow Scotland before going on to train as an EMDR therapist. Susan is a registered member of ACA and EMDRAA.