MENTAL HEALTH CARE, GROUNDED IN NATURE AND HUMAN CONNECTION

Therapy on the Sunshine Coast that knows when to step outside.

Evidence-based clinical care, integrated with the regulating effect of time in nature. Unhurried by design. No GP referral needed. Medicare rebates available.

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What This Is

Tides & Trees is a mental health practice on the Sunshine Coast that combines evidence-based clinical care with the regulating power of nature, movement, and genuine human connection.

Sessions can happen in a clinic, outdoors, or both — depending on what you need. The work is unhurried and flexible, built around you rather than a treatment protocol. Whether you're navigating a diagnosis, working through something long-standing, or simply feeling like the standard system hasn't quite fit, this is a different kind of care.

Not all therapy has to happen in a room.

Steph Picanso spent more than fourteen years working in mental health, mostly indoors. Hospitals, community clinics, crisis services. She loved the work and stayed in it through hard seasons.

Over time, she noticed something. The clients who seemed to do best were not always the ones who came in to talk in the consulting room. They were the ones who walked their dogs. The ones who surfed before sessions. The ones who arrived a little out of breath because they had taken the long way through the park.

Two decades of research now confirm what those clients were already showing her. Time in natural environments lowers cortisol, supports nervous system regulation, and improves attention. The effect is particularly strong for people living with anxiety, depression, ADHD, PTSD, and chronic stress.

Tides & Trees came from that recognition. A practice with the same evidence base and clinical depth as any good clinic, with the addition of something the indoor model cannot offer. When the work calls for it, we step outside. When it does not, we do not.

How It Helps

Sessions long enough to do the work.
Initial appointments are 90 minutes. Follow-ups are spacious by design. Nobody leaves mid-thought because the clock ran out.
Direct access without a referral.
As a Mental Health Nurse Practitioner endorsed by AHPRA, Steph can assess, formulate, prescribe where clinically indicated, order pathology, and refer onward. Medicare rebates apply with no annual cap on sessions.
Three settings, one standard.
In clinic, outdoors as walk and talk therapy, or via telehealth. The setting fits the work, not the other way around.
Nature used clinically.
Outdoor sessions are not a wellness add-on. They are an evidence-based component of care, used when they serve the client and the work.

The Grounded Group

Eight weeks. Ten people. One small cohort moving through evidence-based therapy together, outdoors on the Sunshine Coast. Sessions are 90 minutes, weekly, and built around CBT, somatic therapy, polyvagal theory, and attention restoration theory.
Every participant completes a 90-minute individual clinical assessment before the program begins. This confirms suitability, supports thoughtful group composition, and helps us decide together whether the group, individual therapy, or a combination is the right starting point.
This is the most accessible way into the practice, and where most people start.
JOIN THE WAITLIST
Individual Therapy

Where the work is fully tailored to you. People come for anxiety, depression, ADHD, PTSD, grief, burnout, complex presentations, and the seasons of life that need a different kind of attention. Some come for diagnostic clarity, medication review, and psychotherapy from a single practitioner.
Sessions can be held in clinic, outdoors as walk and talk therapy, or via telehealth. Initial assessments are 90 minutes in clinic. Follow-up sessions are 60 minutes. Medicare rebates available. Spaces are limited and held carefully.
BOOK AN INITIAL ASSESSMENT
Clinical Supervision

For mental health nurse practitioners, registered nurses pursuing endorsement, allied health clinicians, counsellors, and others in helping roles. Standard clinical supervision is offered, alongside supervision for clinicians integrating nature-based practice into their work.
In clinic, outdoors, or via telehealth.
ENQUIRE ABOUT SUPERVISION

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Interested in working with us?

Tides & Trees is open to enquiries from clinicians interested in contracting or collaborating. Get in touch.

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Who It Is For

Adults from all ages and all communities. Often people who have done good work elsewhere and now want something a little different. More spacious, more grounded, more fitted to who they actually are.

Sometimes people who have not done therapy before, and want their first experience to feel human.

People who think and regulate better when they are moving. People who have always been most themselves outside. People navigating a season they cannot quite name.

LGBTQIA+ affirming. Culturally safe. All backgrounds welcome.

Why Tides & Trees

A practice built around a particular combination.

Mental health assessment, prescribing, psychotherapy, and nature-integrated care, available without a GP referral, all in one place. On the Sunshine Coast, this combination is genuinely uncommon.

Steph Picanso is a Mental Health Nurse Practitioner endorsed by the Nursing and Midwifery Board of Australia through AHPRA, the highest independent clinical qualification in mental health nursing in Australia. Over fourteen years of practice across hospitals, community mental health, and crisis services.
CBT, DBT, schema therapy, somatic therapy, polyvagal theory, attention restoration theory, experiential learning, and nature-based modalities. Clinical decisions are grounded in research.
Long sessions. Manageable caseload. Time built in to do the work properly.
AHPRA · AAPI · Outdoor Health Australia · ACNP

For Referring Clinicians

GPs, psychiatrists, psychologists, occupational therapists, and allied health colleagues are warmly welcomed. Tides & Trees works as part of a broader care team.

After an initial assessment, you will receive a formulation letter outlining diagnostic impressions where applicable, recommended plan, and any prescribing decisions. We copy referring practitioners on subsequent prescribing changes and significant clinical updates as standard practice.
For complex or higher-risk presentations, we coordinate with consultant psychiatrists and step up support transparently when that is the right call. Risk is managed in collaboration with the broader treating team, not in isolation.
All clients entering The Grounded Group complete an individual 90-minute clinical assessment before the program begins, ensuring group suitability and clinical safety.