About Kinga Robinson, RCC
Registered Clinical Counsellor, and one of the few Level 3 certified IFS therapists in the Okanagan.
“You will meet me in running shoes. High heels look lovely and they pull my attention straight off the person in front of me, so they stay in the closet. It is a small thing, but it is a fair introduction to how I work.
I became a counsellor because I am endlessly interested in people, and because I think most of what makes life hard, and most of what makes it good, lives inside our relationships. The relationship with ourselves and with others.”
How I got here
I came to Kelowna from Romania when I was seven. My cultural roots are Hungarian. I still speak the language, still cook the food, still pass both on to my own two children.
My work started a long way from a quiet counselling office. I spent over a decade in the addiction field: outreach on the street, treatment centres, second stage housing, the slow patient work of aftercare. That is where I learned to sit with people in the hardest chapters of their lives without flinching, and without rushing them toward a fix on my timeline.
Couples work drew me in next, and when Internal Family Systems arrived, individual work opened up alongside it. IFS is where all of it finally came together, and it is now the centre of how I practise.
What it is like to work with me
I keep the room comfortable on purpose. There is tea, there are fidget toys, and you are welcome to sit however you actually sit. I usually have my feet tucked up under me.
My intent is to stay curious about whatever you bring, rather than to judge it. Every part of you is welcome here, including the parts you are not proud of and the parts that seem to argue with each other. If your mind works a little differently from the textbook, you will not be tidied up or corrected.
You will be met.
You do not need to have yourself sorted before you come. That is rather the whole point.
Who I work with
I work with adults and couples across the Okanagan: individuals wanting to understand themselves more clearly, couples caught in the same cycle, and parents wanting to build connection at home. People come to me while navigating grief and loss, life transitions, stress, addiction and recovery, questions of trust and communication, and the experience of building a life between cultures.
For the people who hold everyone else
I have spent more than twenty years working alongside nurses, doctors, social workers, child and youth workers, and other therapists, including years connected to child protection and the healthcare system. I know that world from the inside. I know how sometimes work can follow you home, and about being the steady one for everybody else.
If you spend your days caring for other people, this can be the hour that is just for you. My services is covered by many extended health plans (Pacific Blue Cross and Sunlife), so it is often more within reach than people expect.
And if you are a therapist yourself, looking for consultation rather than counselling, that is something I offer too. Contact me for more.
If you are building a life between cultures
If you grew up translating between two worlds, or you are raising children in a culture that is not the one you were raised in, or you are watching immigrant parents age while you stand with a foot in each place, you will not have to start by explaining what that is like. I have lived it, and I am still living it. I also know that directness lands differently depending on where you were raised, and I can meet you on either side of that.
Training and credentials
MA, and Registered Clinical Counsellor (RCC #14858) with the BC Association of Clinical Counsellors
Certified to Level 3 in Internal Family Systems, the model's most advanced level of training, and uncommon in the Okanagan
Trained in Intimacy from the Inside Out (IFIO) for couples, alongside Emotion Focused Therapy, the Gottman Method, and Emotion Focused Family Therapy for parenting
Qualified to provide clinical consultation to other counsellors
Nearly ten years in private practice, on top of a decade in the wider field
If this sounds like your kind of person…
I will always be straight with you about whether I am the right fit, because getting you to the right person matters more to me than filling my calendar. The way to find out is a short, low pressure conversation.