The Laurel Centre
(Winnipeg)

The Parenting/Youth/Girls Program is located at and sponsored by The Laurel Centre Inc., in Winnipeg’s West Broadway neighbourhood. The Laurel Centre provides assistance to women who have experienced childhood or adolescent sexual victimization and want to resolve the long-term effects of the abuse (addictions, in particular).

The Laurel Centre’s CAPC project began in 1994 as the Parenting Program. The Parenting Program provides solution-focused group sessions for clients parenting children age 0-6 that address parenting while dealing with the dual issues of sexual abuse and addiction. A youth component was added to provide young women (age 16-24) with the information and resources to deal with past victimization, assistance in developing more adequate coping skills and increased self-esteem, and parenting education (for those who are pregnant or already parenting). The Laurel Centre has also partnered with Andrews Street Family Centre (ASFC) to create a girls program that addresses issues of physical and sexual abuse. This program operates at ASFC and fills a gap in service for programming for girls age 6-15 in the William Whyte neighbourhood in Winnipeg’s North End.

The Laurel Centre provides counselling which allows women to understand the context of their lives and to make the link between compulsive coping behaviours and trauma experienced in childhood. Making this link can empower them to make life-affirming choices and to resolve the impact of trauma by integrating physical, emotional, intellectual, social, and spiritual aspects of self in context.