I recently paused beside a young tree planted near the future site of a women’s addiction centre. At first glance it was an ordinary scene. But what caught my attention was not the tree itself—it was the pantyhose.

The tree was secured to two stakes with strips of pantyhose. Not wire. Not rope. Something soft. Something with enough strength to hold while also enough flexibility to move.

As I stood there, I realized I was looking at a metaphor for supervision.

In my Integrative Relational Feminist model of supervision, our role is not to hold people rigidly in place. Nor is it to leave them unsupported, hoping they will somehow withstand life’s storms alone. Rather, supervision provides what the pantyhose offered the tree: secure attachment without constriction.

The support is temporary, intentional, and responsive.

Holding Without Restricting

Many women entering addiction treatment have lived lives shaped by trauma, neglect, coercion, violence, shame, or impossible expectations. Their strategies for survival often became the very behaviours that others judged.

Recovery is rarely about simply removing the addiction.

It is about growing a stronger self.

Like the young tree, growth requires movement. Wind strengthens roots. Too much restraint weakens development. Too little support risks collapse.

The pantyhose allows the tree to sway.

Relational supervision asks the same question:

How do we offer enough support for growth without taking away another person’s agency?

Strength Hidden in Softness

Pantyhose are rarely associated with strength. Yet they possess remarkable resilience.

This reminds me of the women I have known throughout my counselling career.

Society often mistakes gentleness for weakness.

Experience teaches something different.

Compassion can survive extraordinary suffering.

Tenderness often coexists with immense courage.

Healing frequently begins not through force, but through the experience of being safely held.

The Supervisor as a Secure Base

Within supervision, I strive to create what attachment theory describes as a secure base.

A supervisee who feels psychologically safe becomes more curious.

More reflective.

More willing to acknowledge mistakes.

More able to tolerate uncertainty.

The supervisor does not become the source of answers.

Instead, supervision becomes the environment within which wisdom can emerge.

Like the stakes surrounding the tree, supervision offers structure.

Like the pantyhose, the relationship offers flexibility.

Neither exists forever.

The goal is independence.

A Feminist Lens

A feminist perspective reminds us to ask not only “What is wrong?” but “What has happened?” and “What systems have shaped this experience?”

Women’s addiction cannot be understood outside the realities of gender, trauma, caregiving, poverty, violence, relationships, and power.

Likewise, supervision must remain attentive to power.

The supervisor inevitably occupies a position of authority.

Authority exercised without humility risks becoming another experience of control.

Authority exercised relationally becomes protection rather than domination.

The supervisor continually asks:

• How am I using my power?

• Am I fostering dependence or confidence?

• Am I creating space for this clinician’s authentic voice?

Growth Cannot Be Rushed

Trees are not pulled upward.

They are nurtured.

Recovery follows the same principle.

So does professional development.

The most profound transformations often occur quietly, beneath the surface, long before they become visible.

Roots deepen before branches expand.

When the Supports Are Removed

One day the pantyhose will be taken away.

Not because they failed.

Because they succeeded.

The tree will have become strong enough to stand on its own.

Perhaps that is the deepest purpose of supervision.

We are never meant to become indispensable.

Our task is to help clinicians develop their own reflective capacity, clinical confidence, ethical integrity, and relational presence until they no longer require our constant support.

Final Reflection

Standing beside that young tree outside the future women’s addiction centre, I found myself unexpectedly hopeful.

Healing is rarely dramatic.

More often, it resembles a young tree learning to sway with the wind while quietly strengthening its roots.

Sometimes the greatest wisdom is found not in the tree itself, but in the soft, almost unnoticed support that allows it to grow.

May our supervision be like those strips of pantyhose—strong enough to hold, gentle enough to allow movement, and wise enough to know that the ultimate goal is not dependence, but flourishing.