i am melanie xavier… a family therapist and soul finding specialist
Mental Health Support - finding connection in a polarised world
My way is slow is sacred. I believe healing isn’t just internal - it’s relational, cultural, intergenerational. I work from a place of lived experience, deep training and a commitment to staying real. You won’t find buzzwords here. Just honest work, quiet integrity and fierce care.
I believe in sanctuary - for myself and the people I serve. I practice from the ground up, with strong boundaries, good soil, warm tea and a couple of wise dogs often nearby.
My approach emphasises the whole body and somatic awareness, rather than focusing solely on the mind or thought processes.
I offer therapy, family support and psychedelic integration work rooted in lived experience. I am based in South Australia, working both online and on country.
My work grows as I do - shaped by curiousity, courage and a quiet longing for deeper ways of living and showing up. I follow what stirs me, stretches where I am called, whilst staying honest with what no longer fits.
Reclaiming the human story in Mental Health…..
Over recent decades, we’ve seen a growing tendency to frame distress—grief, anxiety, loneliness, exhaustion - as symptoms to be eradicated, rather than signals to be understood. The medical model, with its roots in biology and diagnosis, has increasingly shaped how Psychiatry and Psychology respond to human suffering. Manuals like the DSM and the rise of "evidence-based" quick fixes can sometimes offer certainty, but they risk flattening the rich, relational context behind why we hurt.
We live in a time where even natural human experiences—sadness, fear, aging, sexual disconnection, grief - are often pathologised. People are conditioned to seek fast solutions for slow wounds. And yet, in the background, something else is stirring.
There’s a quiet return to what we’ve always known: healing happens in relationship.
Not just in the therapeutic one, but in the deeper story of how we came to be - our childhoods, our nervous systems, our unspoken beliefs, our cultural lineages. These stories aren’t weaknesses or excuses. They’re maps.
When we begin to reframe our experiences—not as illnesses to cure, but as meaning to uncover - we make space for healing that is grounded, real, and lasting. This isn’t about rejecting science or medication, but about honouring the complexity of being human.
I believe stories are sacred.
They offer more than data ever could: insight, nuance, tenderness, truth. To witness someone’s story with care is to become a co-regulator, a companion in the re-authoring of their life. In that space, transformation happens—not through control or labels, but through connection.
The quiet ache beneath it all……
Wounding often begins in the places where we were unseen, unheard, or misunderstood - when those meant to hold us with care did not, or could not. These are not just individual failures, but systemic and cultural ones: moments where our humanness was overlooked, and we were treated more like roles, burdens, or problems to fix.
When empathic connection is missing - whether from early caregivers, peers, or the systems we grow up in - it can leave lasting impressions. Feelings like shame, disconnection, abandonment, and anxiety often take root.
In response, we adapt. We build what some call a survival self - a way of being that helps us belong, be acceptable, or simply get by in a world that doesn’t always make space for who we really are. This survival identity is wise. It formed for a reason.
But over time, it can become limiting.
We might see it show up as overthinking, people-pleasing, control, addiction, emotional shutdown, perfectionism - or any behaviour that helps us manage pain we’ve never been supported to heal.
At the core of this is what many refer to as the Primal Wound—a deep, often silent ache to be seen, loved, and accepted as we truly are.
And that wound… it doesn’t stay quiet forever. It calls to us.
Not to shame us, but to guide us back to our whole selves. To invite us into lives of greater ease, presence, and peace.
I’ve wrestled with my own survival story. And I continue to meet it with compassion and curiosity.
If you’re feeling the stirrings of your own call to heal - perhaps we can walk that path together.
Freedom is the willingness to risk being vulnerable to life.
Every individual has the ability to be their own guru…
My professional qualifications include:
Clinical Family Therapist - Graduate Diploma in Family Therapy and Systemic Practice
Bachelor of Psychology (hons)
Graduation Diploma in Family Dispute Resolution & Mediation
Professional Clinical Supervision - PACFA Accredited
Psychedelic Assisted & Integrative Therapist
Degree in Aboriginal Studies and Indigenous Cultures
Psychosynthesis Psychoanalysis (Roberto Assagioli)
The Gottman Relationship Principles Certificate
Diploma in Youth Justice
Aboriginal Mental Health Certificate
Life Coaching
Executive positions:
Executive Committee Member for the Australian Association of Family Therapy
- Chair of Professional Development Committee
- Chair of Training and Accreditation Committee
Associations:
Australian Association of Family Therapy (AAFT) - Clinical Member
Psychotherapy and Counselling Federation of Australia (PACFA) - Clinical Member
International Family Therapy Association (IFTA) - Clinical Member
Australian Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Practitioners (AMAPP) - General Member
Australian Psychological Society - Affiliate Member
More about me:
Nicknames
I love terms of endearment- I will call you “sweet, my love, hun, darling and kid” often.