Meet Virginia

 


Welcome. I'm so glad you're here.

I’m Virginia S. Grenier, ACMHC, CCTP, SSP-P—an Associate Clinical Mental Health Counselor, Certified Clinical Trauma Professional, and Safe and Sound Protocol provider. I hold a Master of Science in Clinical Mental Health Counseling from Rocky Mountain University of Health Professions.

Although my professional path into clinical counseling is a newer chapter of my life, I came into this work with decades of experience as a writer, editor, advocate, and nationally credentialed victim advocate through NOVA’s National Advocate Credentialing Program. Across all of those roles, I have developed a deep respect for how complex, layered, and non-linear healing truly is.

My counseling approach is grounded in person-centered values, existential therapy, logotherapy, relational work, and an integrative understanding of the whole person. In plain terms, that means I care deeply about your story, your sense of meaning, your relationships, and the experiences that have shaped how you see yourself and the world.

I draw from narrative, cognitive, relational, systemic, somatic, and trauma-informed approaches depending on the needs of the person sitting with me. I also integrate polyvagal-informed care, mindfulness, parts work, expressive practices, and sand tray therapy to support both emotional understanding and nervous system regulation.

Sessions with me are collaborative, responsive, and paced around the individual. There is room for reflection, curiosity, honesty, humor, discomfort, and growth—without pressure to perform, explain yourself perfectly, or have everything figured out.

Before entering the clinical world, I spent years walking alongside survivors navigating grief, trauma, abuse, violence, and recovery. That work, along with my own lived experiences, taught me that healing is not simply about fixing what appears to be broken. It is often about reclaiming voice, restoring agency, understanding the patterns we have carried, and choosing what we want our lives and identities to become.

I work with individuals, couples, and families navigating trauma, grief and loss, chronic illness, life transitions, identity questions, relationship and communication challenges, dissociation, addiction, anxiety, depression, and the impact of high-stress or service-oriented roles.

I have particular experience supporting first responders, veterans, medical and helping professionals, older adults, parents, adolescents, LGBTQ+ individuals and couples, neurodivergent clients, and people exploring identities, relationships, or ways of living that may not fit neatly within traditional expectations.

At the heart of my work is a simple belief: healing begins when people feel genuinely seen and heard.

I walk alongside my clients as they make sense of their experiences, reconnect with themselves, strengthen their relationships, and move toward lives rooted in meaning, authenticity, connection, and choice.

As I often say: "You are not who others say you are. You are who you choose to be."

For more information about my work as a mental health counselor, you can visit my Psychology Today profile. 

But like every story, there’s more beneath the professional headline.

I’m also the co-host and producer of Language of the Soul Podcast, where the main host, Dominick Domingo and I explore communication, identity, relationships, healing, meaning, and the complexity of being human through heartfelt conversation and storytelling.

Before becoming a counselor, I built a career in writing, editing, publishing, and creative development. Those parts of my life have never disappeared. They continue to shape how I listen, how I understand stories, and how I help others examine the narratives they have inherited, lived, questioned, and chosen.

At home, I’m a wife, a mother to three amazing humans, a dog lover, and a lifelong student of the messy, complicated, and beautiful human experience.

This blog is one of the ways I continue that learning—with honesty, curiosity, reflection, and presence.

Thank you for walking part of the path with me.

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