Hello and welcome. I’m Zakia Ovington, a trauma therapist specializing in PTSD, complex trauma (CPTSD), childhood trauma, narcissistic and emotional abuse, sexual trauma, and workplace trauma.
Many of the people I work with have spent years functioning well on the outside while carrying anxiety, shame, self-doubt, hypervigilance, or a persistent feeling that something isn’t quite right. You may understand what happened to you intellectually, yet still find yourself reacting to situations as though the past is happening all over again.
Trauma can affect how you see yourself, how safe you feel with others, how you respond to conflict, and whether you trust your own thoughts, feelings, and perceptions.
My approach to trauma therapy is compassionate, collaborative, and grounded in specialized trauma treatment. Together, we work toward understanding what happened, how those experiences continue to affect you today, and what your mind and body need in order to heal.
Healing trauma is not about changing who you are. It’s about understanding what happened to you and finding your way back to yourself.
My Story
My own story began in a small mountain community in India, while my parents built a life in the Middle East. During my early childhood, I moved between boarding schools and extended family before eventually reuniting with my parents in Saudi Arabia. Living across different cultures, languages, and family environments shaped my early understanding of belonging, identity, adaptation, and safety. The Gulf War brought another period of uncertainty and displacement, eventually leading my family to relocate to the United States.
Before becoming a counsellor, I built a career in the corporate world, working with organizations including Microsoft, GE Digital, Oracle, and Salesforce. Those years gave me firsthand insight into the pressures of demanding professional environments and the ways workplace culture, leadership, power dynamics, chronic stress, and psychologically harmful workplaces can affect a person’s sense of safety and self-worth.
Over time, I realized that the work that felt most meaningful to me was understanding people and helping them heal. I left the corporate world and pursued graduate training in counselling psychology, eventually focusing my clinical practice on trauma and trauma recovery. Today, my work brings together specialized trauma training, clinical experience, and a personal understanding of how experiences of family, culture, displacement, relationships, and work can shape our sense of safety, identity, and self.
Who I Work With
I work with adults who have experienced trauma in many different forms. Sometimes the trauma is easy to identify: childhood abuse, sexual trauma, intimate partner violence, emotional abuse, a psychologically harmful relationship, or a traumatic event. Other times, it is more difficult to name. You may have grown up feeling responsible for everyone around you, learned to suppress your own needs, lived with criticism or unpredictability, experienced racism or displacement, or spent years in a workplace or relationship that slowly caused you to question yourself.
You may now struggle with anxiety, shame, guilt, perfectionism, people-pleasing, emotional overwhelm, difficulty trusting others, chronic self-doubt, or feeling disconnected from yourself. You do not need to have a diagnosis. You do not need to remember everything that happened. And you do not need to decide whether your experience was “bad enough” to deserve support. We can start with what is affecting you now.
Areas of Focus
Trauma & PTSD
Complex Trauma (CPTSD)
Childhood & Developmental Trauma
Narcissistic & Emotional Abuse
Sexual Trauma & Childhood Sexual Abuse
Workplace Trauma & Toxic Work Environments
Attachment & Relational Trauma
Immigration, Displacement & Cultural Trauma
My Approach to Trauma Therapy
Trauma therapy is not about forcing you to revisit painful experiences before you are ready. For some people, our work begins with understanding their nervous system, developing emotional safety, and building the ability to remain present when difficult feelings arise. For others, we may work more directly with traumatic memories, deeply held beliefs, or experiences that continue to feel emotionally unresolved. I integrate evidence-based and trauma-focused approaches including EMDR, Internal Family Systems (IFS), Trauma-Informed Stabilization Treatment (TIST), Brainspotting, Ego State Therapy, ACT, DBT, and somatic and nervous-system-informed interventions.
I don’t believe therapy should be one-size-fits-all. We will decide together what approach makes sense for you and move at a pace that respects your history, your nervous system, and your goals. I also want you to understand what we are doing and why. Therapy should be something we do together, not something that is done to you. I don’t just focus on what you’re struggling with today. I help you understand where those patterns began and how to change them.
Education
Master of Arts in Counseling Psychology
Master of Science in Information Systems
Bachelor of Arts in Feminist Theory
Bachelor of Arts in Economics
Selected Trauma Training
My ongoing professional development has focused extensively on trauma, complex trauma, dissociation, abuse, and trauma recovery.
• EMDRIA-Approved Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR) Basic Training
• EMDR Treatment for Adult Survivors of Child Sexual Abuse
• Certified Narcissistic Abuse Treatment Clinician
• Trauma-Informed Stabilization Treatment (TIST) Certification
• Internal Family Systems: Complex Trauma and PTSD
• Foundations of the Internal Family Systems Model
• Brainspotting Phase 1
• Sexual Trauma Therapy
• Domestic & Intimate Partner Violence: Trauma-Informed Interventions, Documentation, Reporting and Ethical Issues
• Treating Borderline Personality Disorder with EMDR