Where Community Becomes the Medicine
What We Offer
Upcoming Events
Free COmmunity Events
Somatic Peer Support Group: Bi-Weekly on Wednesdays
Trauma Informed Care Circles: Bi-Weekly on Wednesdays
FOUNDATION OF CARE SERIES MONTHLY WORKSHOP
Upcoming Workshop Theme: What Trauma Teaches Us About Survival (and What It Doesn’t Teach Us About Safety)
Peer Support Certification Training
Saturday, January 24 - Sunday, January 25 (via Zoom)
Learn trauma-responsive, body-first approaches to Mental Health First Aid that strengthen safety, care, and community support.
Community Voices
This space held me when the world wouldn’t.
Fuel the Movement
@TEAO_CANADA

Educational Awareness: We love this #resource ♥️
Reposted from @getsoundrx
Research shows that tribal music can increase immune markers, natural killer cells, oxytocin, endorphins, and lower cortisol.
And when tribes sang together, their hearts and brains synced together creating coherence — meaning they literally became one.
Every civilization had tribal music to connect and heal them…so what happened to it that we barely have any today?

We LOVE This! ♥️♥️♥️
Repost from @violadavis
“I hope you make it”. Amen! ❤️❤️
🎥@maxinem_x
We Love This 🫶🏾🫶🏾🫶🏾 (for those that need to hear this #collectivehealing #collective #support)
Repost from @imterencelester
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Words for those who need them 🙏🏾

We Looooove This! ♥️♥️♥️
Repost from @hunter_prosper
Every stranger has a story, let’s start listening <3
#Leadership #MentalHealth #Community #Sociallmpact #Traumahealing
We love this at TEAO Canada as a healing centred initiative throughout communities. ♥️♥️♥️
Repost from @our.moral.imperative
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What our most vulnerable and most marginalized, oppressed, and disinvested students need.
What our public school system will never want nor be able to provide.
.
.
.
Healing-centered spaces aren’t about staying positive - they’re about telling the truth.
At Vocal Justice, healing means naming the harm young people face, validating their anger, and building community so they don’t carry it alone.
A healing-centered classroom doesn’t avoid hard topics - it trusts youth to confront injustice, protect their rights, and turn pain into collective power.
Thank you to Dr. Shawn Ginwright, who developed the healing-centered framework we implement throughout the Vocal Justice curriculum.
🙏🏽👉🏽 @vocal_justice
#Leadership #MentalHealth #Community #Sociallmpact
#TraumalnformedCare
We didn’t build an organization - we built a movement.
Not from bureaucracy.
Not from legacy wealth.
Not from political comfort.
But from lived experience, community trust, and a refusal to wait for permission.
Two weeks ago, TEAO (Trauma & Embodiment Association of Ontario) held its first public Annual General Meeting, and it felt like a landmark moment in a story that began with Nicole Brown Faulknor a lone ranger, working against the grain, fighting to create something that didn’t exist in Canada: a trauma-responsive collective born from community, not compliance.
Because trauma healing deserves more than documentation.
It deserves embodiment, relationship, and humanity.
#Leadership #MentalHealth #Community #Sociallmpact
#TraumalnformedCare

Unlearning. Educational Awareness Post ♥️♥️
Video credit: @cultivatingboldspaces (via T/T)
The mythologization of Black women within systems of care—through narratives of inherent strength, endurance, and emotional self-sufficiency—has directly shaped how distress is perceived, treated, and often minimized in clinical, social service, and institutional settings. These stereotypes contribute to delayed care, misdiagnosis, compassion fatigue toward Black women’s suffering, and the normalization of overexposure to adversity.
In trauma-responsive practice like the offerings through TEAO trainings & certifications, unlearning these projections is essential to restoring full humanity, supporting accurate assessment, and ensuring that care is grounded in safety, relational attunement, and equitable clinical response rather than myth-based expectation.
#TraumaResponsiveSystems
#UnlearningInPractice
#HumanizingCare
Sponsorship Offering: As shared by our CEO & Founder of TEAO Canada, Nicole @wounds2wings she’s learned that healing is not an individual act — it’s a collective investment in our shared humanity And she shares this from lived experience: https://www.teaocanada.com/about-nicole-1 (read about Nicole’s story on website our teaocanada.com)
She states today, that she will forever credit the community for giving her a normal childhood. “This region raised me and supported me. I don’t remember Christmas without an abundance of donations and food. A monthly cheque from the Region that supported my mother with groceries and rent. I don’t remember a summer without a camp program sponsored by the region.”
“Community care saved my life — long before I had language for trauma, embodiment, or systemic barriers.”
This holiday season, you can do more than give a gift.
🎁 You can sponsor a woman’s healing journey.
Through TEAO Canada’s Costa Rica Healing Retreat (Jan 3–10, 2026), we are creating a restorative and trauma-responsive space for women navigating burnout, grief, systemic barriers, and the weight of carrying so much for so long.
A space where nervous systems can soften.
Where breath returns.
Where women remember themselves again.
Sponsorship options begin at $500 and go directly toward funding a woman’s participation in this life-restoring experience.
When one woman receives support, the ripple is undeniable — families shift, workplaces shift, and entire communities feel the impact.
If you or your organization would like to sponsor a woman, or learn more, connect with us at:
📩 info@teaocanada.com
Healing is a gift we give together.
#CollectiveHealing #CommunityCare #TEAOCanada #DoBetter

SING with Us! 🫶🏾♥️♥️
You are invited to sing with us because healing is not meant to be done alone — every voice becomes a bridge from what happened to us, to who we choose to become together.
Reposted @leonieraube
Sing with us. United as one world.
“I’m not what happened to me.
I’m what I choose to be.
Each step I take, I shift, I rise.
The past dissolves before my eyes.”
Even the genocide.
Even the poverty.
Even the misery.
I’m not what happened to me.
We all have to challenge this life.
So let’s stay together.
As one.
Lots of love,
Leonie & Chantal from @ishoberwanda
The song is from Good Vibes Tribe 11:11 “I’m not what happened to me”
Share this — and let’s remind the world that we will heal together 🔆
Videographer @ni_kelly71
We LOVE this Educational Awareness: For those working in community with both systemic and collective trauma this may support your unlearning so we can learn how to hold space, treat and understand without stigmas & unconscious bias when working with racialized families, youth, & individuals.
Let’s get the real education from the lived experiences of the community themselves. #dobetter
1.
When we treat trauma as an individual failing, we erase the systems that created the conditions for harm.
Systemic and collective trauma are not personal flaws — they are inherited survival responses rooted in colonization, displacement, racism, and structural violence.
If we do not understand this, we unconsciously pathologize racialized communities instead of supporting them.
2.
Trauma shows up as patterns: silence, secrecy, shame, hoarding, hyper-independence, distrust, emotional withdrawal, and “just push through.”
These are not character defects — they are adaptive strategies passed down from people who were forced to survive with no safety, no rest, and no resources.
When we work with families or youth, we are not just meeting the person in front of us, we are meeting their history.
3.
Unlearning stigma means shifting from “What’s wrong with you?” to “What happened to you, your family, and your community?”
This reframe protects dignity and allows care workers, educators, and service providers to hold space without bias, judgment, or saviorism.
4.
Communities living with the emotional legacy of slavery, migration, and systemic neglect develop their own ways of coping — some healthy, some harmful — but all rooted in survival.
When we dismiss those responses as “bad behaviour” or “poor choices,” we miss the deeper story of unresolved grief, inherited fear, and generations of unmet needs.
5.
Educational awareness must begin with lived experience.
Policy makers, clinicians, teachers, and community workers cannot meaningfully support racialized people without listening to the people themselves.
Textbooks do not explain what it feels like to be raised in a home shaped by unspoken trauma — elders and survivors do.
#TraumaResponsiveCare
#EmbodiedSystemicAwareness

— What We Just Achieved 📣📣📣👏🏾👏🏾👏🏾
Our First Public Annual General Meeting
2024–2025 marks one of the most significant chapters in TEAO history, last night.
Built without corporate backing.
Built through community.
We are growing because people can feel us.
What We Celebrated:
📈 From startup to growth phase.
In June 2024, the Upstream Fund @regionofwaterloo recognized TEAO’s potential — and everything changed!
Key Impact:
•44 programs & events delivered
•394 ticket orders
•60–70% average turnout
•16 fully onboarded volunteers
•13 confirmed partnerships
•6 active Peer Support Certification trainees
•~$6,700 earned via Eventbrite
We didn’t grow because we followed the rules.
We grew because our communities were ready.
Because trauma healing cannot be theorized — it must be embodied.
Because people are tired of waiting for systems to care.
TEAO Canada is not a nonprofit project. It is a trauma-responsive ecosystem built by lived experience, cultural wisdom, and nervous systems that learned to survive — then thrive.
👥 Leadership, Not Performative Governance
We welcomed two powerful board members:
Molly Tandon — Director of Strategic Partnerships & Community Engagement
Victoria Lewis — Director of Digital Innovation & Accessibility
Alongside:
Kristina — Leadership & Advisory Director
Becca — Administration Officer
And our growing team & staff of: equity advisors, community engagement workers, youth liaison, fund development, trauma-responsive care personnel, and volunteers who show up — in bodies, not just names.
If you’ve been watching the journey from the sidelines…
It’s time.
✔️ Train with us
✔️ Heal with us
✔️ Volunteer with us
✔️ Build THEC with us
✔️ “Do Better” trademark merchandise — together
#TEAOCanada #TraumaHealing #EmbodiedHealing #SomaticPractice #CollectiveCare
MentalHealthEquity TraumaResponsiveCare SystemicChange
DoBetterMovement CommunityLeadership NonprofitLife OntarioNonprofit
HealingJourney IntergenerationalTrauma TraumaRecovery

Educational Embodied Awareness: #this 👆🏾👏🏾👏🏾
Grief isn’t linear.
🎥: lifeinfocuswithsuttida
#griefjourney #healingtogether # grievingmothers
This Week’s Trauma-Informed Offerings: Circles, AGM, Orientation
We’re holding space across three key events this week — each offering a unique way to explore trauma-informed practice, connect with others, and deepen our collective capacity for care.
📍 November 26 — Trauma-Informed Care Circles (In-Person)
🕖 6:45 PM – 8:00 PM
📌 Cambridge Public Library (Hespeler)
Grounded in gentle somatic practices, this free in-person series offers space for reflection, regulation, and reconnection. All are welcome.
🔗 Register: https://lnkd.in/eZJAJRM2 or link in bio
📍 November 27 — TEAO Canada 2025 Annual General Meeting (Online)
🕔 5:15 PM – 6:15 PM | Zoom
A virtual gathering to reflect on our 2024–25 impact, share strategic updates, and build momentum toward launching Canada’s first Trauma Health & Embodiment Centre (THEC).
🔗 Register: https://Inkd.in/e7cNQPgf or link in bio
📍 November 28 — Foundations of Care: Volunteer Orientation & Community Workshop
🕛 12:00 PM – 12:45 PM | Zoom
This month’s theme: Mutual Aid & Systemic Impact Awareness. Open to new and prospective volunteers, practitioners, and community members.
🔗 Register: https://Inkd.in/eFVXJCNY or link in bio
Whether you’re exploring trauma-informed care for the first time or are a long-time practitioner, these offerings are a welcoming entry point to connect, grow, and deepen your practice in community.
We look forward to seeing you there.
#TEAOCanada #TraumaResponsiveCare #SomaticHealing #CommunityCare #EmbodiedLeadership
We love this 🫶🏾♥️♥️: Repost from @refugeingrief
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Are you wondering how you’re going to get through the holiday season? Here are some of my holiday survival rules from my own early days.
Do you have questions about getting through the holidays (or any other day of the year)? Come get answers in my monthly support group, exclusively on Patreon. Comment GRIEF CLINIC and we’ll send you the link.
Remember, whatever you choose to do (or not do), staying true to yourself is important.
Friends & family get to feel disappointed in your “no.” But they don’t get to force you to say yes to things you don’t want to do.
May your holiday season (or non-holiday, depending) be as safe, and full of love & connection as it can be.❤️🩹
#MeganDevine #GriefEducation #HolidayGrief #HolidaySeason2025 #GoodAdvice

We Love This #spokenword Awareness & Education 🫶🏾♥️
Repost repost from @_havfy 🫶🏾🫶🏾👏🏾
A boy’s idea of a man is everything
he’s told that a Man is “supposed to be?”….
I can assure you that not too many men know that today is INTERNATIONAL MEN’s DAY. And even the men that know do not care too much about it how much more to celebrate it.
This goes to show the conditioning of our immediate society. A society where so many men are afraid to show any kind of affection to themselves because the status quo had made it so that affection is perceived as weakness.
In a society where men are trending for all the wrong reasons, let this is proof that the patriarchy does not benefit anyone including the men. And these awkward status quo and conditioning has become the epitome of the current problems of our immediate society. Where men’s humanity are overlooked and women’s emotions are over exaggerated. As a result, most men who do not result to the usual (s*cide) resort to other destructive habits to cope, and some of this habits poses as a danger to them and the people around them.
To build a progressive and a gender equitable society, there must be a consideration of all sexes. Where men have a balanced view of women and their masculinity, we need to normalize men speaking up and showing a bit of more humanity. We also need both the Men AND Women to undo all the loopholes in this questionable system. And one way is to acknowledge and celebrate each other.
Let’s do less criminally the problems and more about looking for the cause.
Let this also be a subtle reminder to all the men out there, that we care, and we see all they do and contribute to society and we appreciate them.
So happy INTERNATIONAL MEN’s DAY to all the GOOD MEN out there. ( emphasis on *GOOD MEN*😂😆❤️
Xoxo
Your favorite poet,
Havfy😉❤️
#spokenword #internationalmensday poet
THANK YOU TO OUR FUNDERS