Excel Psychology
Mary Kedwell
Psychologist and Board Approved Supervisor
If you have ever felt like something is getting in the way of the life you want to be living, or like the people and systems around you have shaped you in ways you are still trying to understand, Mary’s approach might resonate with you.
Mary has been working as a psychologist for more than 25 years. Her career has taken her through Child and Youth Mental Health services and 14 years as a school psychologist in a P-12 setting, working with young people and the adults around them across some of the most formative years of their lives. That experience gave her a deep appreciation for something that is easy to overlook: we do not exist in isolation. Our families, schools, workplaces, and the wider world we move through all play a significant role in how we experience ourselves and our lives.
This understanding shapes everything about the way Mary works. She takes a warm, systemic approach to therapy, one that looks at the whole picture rather than the presenting problem alone, and she works with young people from age 16 and adults throughout the lifespan. For couples and families, the work focuses on building a shared understanding that supports both people in the relationship.
Whatever brings someone to therapy, Mary’s focus is on understanding how the nervous system responds to experience, and on helping clients build a different relationship with the thoughts, feelings, and reactions that are getting in the way. Drawing on Acceptance and Commitment Therapy, among other approaches, she gently invites clients to move towards what is difficult rather than away from it. Research consistently shows that building this capacity, even in small steps, is what creates genuine and lasting change.
It can take courage to begin. Mary’s role is to make that courage feel possible, and to walk alongside you as you find your way forward.
Early in the process, Mary takes time to walk clients through the frameworks that guide her practice, so that you can decide together whether her approach feels like the right fit before ongoing work begins.