There are two streams of experience that help to guide my work. One is over 30 years of practicing meditation. This practice helps me to create an environment of focused calm where my clients can retreat from the pressures and activity of their outer lives to do the inner work required to make difficult changes. It helps me to sit with others in kindness, compassion, and attentiveness while listening to both the possibilities and the problems in their lives.
The other stream of experience is my professional training. In addition to being a Licensed Clinical Social Worker (LCSW), I have worked as a teacher, camp director, and preschool director. In all of these jobs I saw hurt people struggling to manage daily life. It became my goal to understand the impact of early wounds and to find ways to support people suffering because of them. I studied with Dr. Bruce D. Perry, who helped me understand how early wounding impacts a person’s development. He also described the protective and enriching role that healthy attachments can play. I learned the importance that attachment, safety, and humor have in helping promote real change. I sought training in additional techniques that would support effective and quicker change.
EMDR Therapy, Attachment Therapy, and Couples Therapy
My trainings in Somatic Experiencing, EMDR and Brainspotting have given me diverse tools to support healing deep emotional wounds. These methods, which complement each other, bypass the cognitive parts of the brain to access the areas where deep wounding often occurs. Combining them with more traditional methods provides me with the flexibility to tailor my approach to meet each client’s individual needs and preferences. After mastering my work with individuals, I expanded my practice to work with parents and couples, as it is within these relationships that developmental wounds and difficulty with attachments are so vividly played out and in need of care.
In addition to my private practice, I am on the advisory board of Project Avary. This non-profit improves life outcomes for children with parents in prison or jail. I have supervised a therapist training program at a community mental health clinic. For almost two decades, I worked in residential treatment, first as a therapist and then as the Clinical Director, with children who had experienced traumatic abuse. I am a recommended therapist by Hand in Hand Parenting, a non-profit nurturing the parent-child connection to foster meaningful communication and connection. I have experience working with abuse, trauma, depression, anxiety, relationship problems, life transitions, and parenting. I work with adolescents and adults, parents and couples, and families.
Suggested Resources:
Link:
“Neuro-science and Mindfulness” a talk by Dan Siegel
Reading:
Zen Mind, Beginner’s Mind by Shunryu Suziki
