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The truth about community counselling and psychotherapy in Ottawa
When COVID‑19 arrived in early 2020, Ottawa’s healthcare system—like those around the world—shifted priorities rapidly to cope with an unprecedented infectious threat. According to a June 2020 survey by Ottawa Public Health, nearly two-thirds of Ottawa residents reported appointment delays or cancellations for services they would typically have sought before the pandemic, and 45 percent avoided care entirely Reddit +2 CIHI +2 Reddit +2 ottawapublichealth.ca . In turn, over a quarter (28 percent) said these disruptions detrimentally impacted their health, especially among those already experiencing mental health challenges. This initial disruption sowed the seeds for an ongoing decline in timely access to essential services—including regular primary care and mental health support. By spring 2022, demand for mental health care surged: one in four Ontarians reported accessing mental health help—up from just nine percent before the pandemic—and 43 percent said getting support had become more difficult ottawa.cmha.ca . As need steadily climbed, Ottawa’s community-based services struggled to keep up. Public crisis lines faired little better, with reports of overwhelmed hotlines, while long-term counselling became an increasingly elusive resource.
NOVA VR THERAPY
Athem Houssein
5/6/20254 min read
The hard truth is...
Extended Waits for Community Counselling
Ottawa’s publicly funded counselling services face staggering wait times. According to the Canadian Institute for Health Information, half of Canadians wait up to a month for ongoing community counselling, and one in ten wait four months or longer CIHI. Ottawa’s local services echo this national trend and, in some cases, fare worse. A 2022 CityNews report noted that public systems tend to triage only acute cases, leaving many Ontarians—especially those with mild to moderate needs—on waitlists for months, even years CityNews Ottawa. The limited offering of sessions under such publicly funded programs leaves people “lost” once the initial therapy blocks conclude.
A Toronto-based study from the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health (CAMH) noted community counselling waitlists in Ontario can stretch “six months to one year” capitalcurrent.ca+1CityNews Ottawa+1. With the pandemic intensifying feelings of isolation, burnout, and anxiety, Ottawa psychologist Dr. Andrea Ashbaugh warned that the mental health system is under strain “we’ve never seen before,” and a few weeks’ delay can feel like a cliff’s edge for vulnerable individuals capitalcurrent.ca.
Write a short text about your service Tributes to real-life experiences underscore the emotional toll of these barriers. A 26‑year‑old Ottawa resident described her mind on the "edge of a cliff" while waiting a year for psychiatric referral and receiving no support in the meantime. She said, “I need help, and what you’re telling me is that you’re going to wait for me to jump off that cliff… and only then pick up the broken pieces” capitalcurrent.ca. Adding to the urgency, numerous voices on Reddit highlighted widespread failure: “It’s fucking impossible,” wrote one, referring to Ottawa’s ER and referral axis that shunts patients from place to place with no resolution.
One Reddit user described how eight years of struggling with mental illness was met with repeated outpatient rejections, nine-month waits for a psychiatrist who only offered a single consult, dismissive ER encounters, and minimal follow-up. They noted, “It’s disgusting … this incompetence … will lead to a lot more suicides,” a raw indictment of a system stretched to collapse.
Carleton University students also illustrate another layer of the challenge: campus mental health services are consistently overwhelmed. One student recounted receiving appointments canceled five minutes before they began, being labeled “too complex” for available therapy modalities, and even having the police called during crises Reddit. Such experiences speak to thinly stretched resources, limited scope, and inadequate referrals to community care—all hallmarks of a system buckling under demand. Many were told: “they’re better suited to serve emergent or crisis based mental health experiences,” not the long-term care many require
In response, Ottawa’s healthcare community innovated under duress. Within weeks of the pandemic’s onset, local providers—including the Canadian Mental Health Association (CMHA) Ottawa and 12 other agencies—joined to launch Counselling Connect, a free service offering same- or next-day phone or video therapy without waitlists. The initiative scaled swiftly: between May 2020 and mid-2021, it processed over 3,300 bookings covering diverse age groups—including children, youth, elders, and 2SLGBTQ+ and Black community members. There’s no referral required, and bilingual/multicultural counsellors are available. Reddit users repeatedly praised Counselling Connect as a rare lifeline in an otherwise inaccessible system.
Yet, users emphasize that the service is a temporary relief, not a long-term solution. Counselling Connect is invaluable for crisis episodes and early intervention, but it cannot replace ongoing therapeutic relationships or specialized care.
The pandemic highlighted not just wait times, but deep-rooted structural flaws in Canada’s mental health landscape. As Dr. Karen Cohen, CEO of the Canadian Psychological Association, observed: when psychological treatment isn’t delivered by physicians, it falls outside public funding. That forces people to depend on limited and often inadequate private insurance or to pay out of pocket. Cohen noted that many insurance plans cap coverage at just a few hundred dollars—an amount that may cover only one or two sessions whereas typical therapies span 15–20 sessions ($3,000–$4,000 in total) capitalcurrent.ca.
Furthermore, inequities are stark. Immigrant, racialized, Indigenous, and low-income communities often face heightened barriers—language, cultural misalignment, systemic bias—and are disproportionately unable to secure culturally relevant mental health care . This aligns with Ottawa accounts of waitlists or service “gaps” for Black, Indigenous, or newcomer clients, despite targeted Counselling Connect streams.
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