Hi, I'm Ruth.

I’m a social worker, meditation teacher and women’s wellness guide. I’ve spent more than 15 years sitting with people in some of the harder parts of being human.

And somewhere along the way, my own life gave me plenty of opportunities to learn what it feels like to be the person sitting on the other side.

I know what it’s like to overthink, second-guess yourself and look outside yourself for the right answer. To keep going because that’s what you do. And to eventually realize that some of the things you’ve been carrying might not actually belong to you.

A lot of what I do now grew out of both sides of that experience: what I’ve learned through my work, and what I’ve had to learn by living it.

I know the difference it makes to have someone with you

I’ve been through hard things in my own life. Some I moved through with people beside me. Some I mostly carried on my own.

I know the difference.

Not because having support makes the hard thing disappear. It doesn’t. But there is something different about having someone who can stay with you in it, without rushing you through it, trying to fix it or telling you what you should do.

That has shaped the way I work.

I don’t believe my job is to have the answers to your life. I want to help create enough space for you to slow things down, understand what’s happening underneath them and hear yourself a little more clearly.

Sometimes that means talking. Sometimes it means noticing what’s happening in your body, working with your breath, questioning a belief you’ve carried for years or sitting with something you would usually move past.

I can bring my experience, ask questions, offer another perspective and stay with you when things are uncomfortable.

But your life is still yours. And I want the choices you make in it to belong to you.

More than 15 years of doing this work

I’m a Registered Social Worker in Ontario with a Master of Social Work and more than 15 years of experience working with people through difficult, complicated and deeply human things.

My background includes child protection, psychotherapy and private practice, and over the years I’ve continued to learn beyond my formal training particularly in meditation, breathwork and nervous-system regulation.

Today, those pieces come together in the way I work. Sometimes that work is psychotherapy. Sometimes it happens through a workshop, a retreat, a meditation or another Grounding with Ruth experience.

The setting might change, but much of what I’m interested in stays the same: what happens when you have enough space to notice what’s going on, understand some of what’s underneath it and make choices that feel more like your own.

MSW · Registered Social Worker (Ontario) · Meditation Teacher

Outside of this work, I’m still just Ruth

I live in Ontario with my husband, Keith, our dog Huron and our cats Salem and Poplar. I spend a lot of time with dogs, but at heart I am a very serious cat person.

I’m an introvert who loves deep conversations and smaller rooms. I love being outside, I read constantly, my favourite drink is a London Fog, and there are very few things I won’t consider if they smell or taste like lavender.

My own life is still a work in progress. I still catch myself overthinking, looking outside myself for an answer or getting caught up in what I think I’m supposed to do.

The difference is that I’ve spent years learning how to recognize those patterns, understand what’s happening underneath them and find my way back to myself. That experience lives alongside my professional training and the many years I’ve spent doing this work with other people.

I don’t need to have a perfectly figured-out life to know how to help someone make more room in theirs.