Rae Griffin-Carlson (she/her) – MSW, RSW, B.Ed – Algonquin Anishinaabeg territory (colonially known as Ottawa, Ontario)
Rae is a white, queer settler of Irish and Scottish descent, currently living and working on unceded and unsurrendered Algonquin Anishinaabeg territory. Her ancestors are settlers who took part in the ongoing colonization of both Hul’qumi’num and Algonquin lands. She was born on K’ómoks territory and raised among the lands of the Lekwungen and Songhees Nations, where early experiences of land, water, and relationship began to shape her understanding of belonging. Rae carries a commitment to ongoing learning, accountability, and relationship-building in support of decolonization and social justice.
Rae works alongside children, youth, families, and adults, accompanying them through seasons of change, growth, and connection. Her work is grounded in curiosity, collaboration, and play, and is shaped by a belief that healing is something we enter into together—relationally, slowly, and with care. She practices from a trauma-informed, culturally responsive, and neurodiversity-affirming lens, and warmly welcomes 2SLGBTQIA+ individuals and their families. With extensive experience supporting queer and trans communities, Rae is committed to creative spaces where people can show up as they are, without needing to translate or defend their identities. She offers a strengths-based and creative practice that often moves beyond words, weaving together art-making, movement, and time on the land as ways of returning to what is already known beneath language. In these spaces, she supports people in reconnecting with their own ways of knowing, sensing, and being in the world.
Rae is a Registered Social Worker and educator. She holds a Bachelor of Education, specializing in Art and Math, from the University of Victoria, and a Master’s degree in Social Work from Carleton University. Her clinical training includes Internal Family Systems, Play Therapy, Sand Tray Therapy, Narrative Therapy, and Dyadic Developmental Psychotherapy. She has completed her Forest and Nature School Practitioner certification with the Child and Nature Alliance of Canada.
She holds gratitude for the ways the land has taught her to listen –
In the Pacific Northwest,
feet sinking into spongy, breathing moss,
the sideways flicker of crabs beneath lifted stones,
barnacles opening to the pull of the moon,
an eagle’s voice splitting the sky.
In the Eastern Woodlands,
loon song carrying across water at dusk,
beavers tending the slow architecture of water,
coyotes slipping between shadow and story,
held in what is seen and what is sensed.
www.throughthesumac.ca
Rae is a Certified Nature-based therapist, level 1.