You, therapy, and my approach to the therapy relationship
Do you believe that you have more to learn about yourself; or more work to do in your relationships, profession/job, or life in general?
Do you find that problems or questions in any of the following areas of your life repeatedly present themselves for your attention?
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Your past, related to family relationships and other concerns
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Your current relationships in dating, partnership or marriage
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Your divorce or separation and/or how to establish a working relationship with your children’s other parent(s)
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Your parenting abilities
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Your career
My services for consultation and therapies in these areas are available. Please review the information provided here and become acquainted with my therapy approach. From the beginning session, I work with each client in a manner tailored to his/her unique attributes and capabilities, to allow maximum client safety and self-determination.
I am licensed in Nevada as both a Clinical Social Worker and an Alcohol and Drug Counselor. My areas of specialization include generational and relationship issues for families, couples and individuals; change and transitions, such as divorce and blended or diverse/non-traditional families, including Independent Child/Adolescent Clinical Evaluations for Family Law clients and attorneys; recovery from addictions and substance abuse; dissociative disorders (multiple personalities) and trauma-related problems; and attention deficit disorders.
My primary role as therapist is to help my clients identify and build on their strengths. Everything my clients do, can, and does, make a difference in their lives. I work with client(s) to establish awareness of their emotional state, and to learn and practice emotional and behavioral self-management as a means toward improving relationships. Rather than make enormous changes, clients can take a series of smaller steps to get to their goals.
We first discuss the history of the identified problem and its impact on family and other aspects of their life. Just as important, I interview clients to determine their degree of motivation and readiness to make the efforts required in therapy. Are they willing to do the work necessary to bring about positive change? I am totally committed to my role, but therapy is effective only to the extent that a client is open to the possibility of change.
Areas of Specialization
- Generational and/or Relationship Issues: Family, couple and individual therapies can be coordinated for senior adults, parenting adults, partners and children, helping them to successfully challenge, change or resolve long-standing patterns of relating. The process assists everyone concerned to develop more adaptive interactions.
- Individual and Family Counseling including during Major Family Change/ Transition:
- Counseling with divorcing/seperating/blending families, and in some cases, assisting with adjustments in diverse/non-traditional family units.
- Helping both adults/parents and children to function when the children live or have visitation in two parental homes;
- Serving as Co-Developer and - Facilitator for “Emotionally Intelligent Parenting” classes. EIP is presented as a series of eight 1.5 hr weekly classes, offered quarterly, from a parenting curriculum which is unique in Northern Nevada;
- Conducting Independent Child/Adolescent Clinical Evaluations, as an invited therapist by Northern Nevada Collaborative Law group, as part of the decision-making process to determine children’s/adolescents’ residence arrangements.
- Dissociative Disorders, i.e., Dissociative Identity Disorder—DID, formerly known as multiple personality disorder, and PTSD or other trauma-related problems.
From May 2007 through February 2008, I will be in Nevada City, CA over 7
weekend training sessions, to become certified in Sensorimotor Integration
Therapy. This model of therapy assists clients with resolving and healing
from developmental issues and/or traumatic wounds.
- Providingevaluation,assessment, and/or individual and family therapy, as well as referral (for psychiatric evaluation and medication recommendations, if needed).
My assessment/evaluation provides the client, the referring agency, and/or
the Court (if involved) with a dynamic portrait of the client’s personal and parenting strengths and capabilities, as well as identified needs, based on often complex relationship(s) between mental/emotional history and past/current substance use.
- Combining conceptual/therapy bases (similar to those noted for Dissociative disorders) in the client’s treatment.
- Conducting ongoing psycho-educational group therapy for Co-Occurring Disorders, to address recovery issues, relapse prevention, and maintenance of clean and sober living.
- ADD/ADHD in Children/Adolescents/Adults:
- Assessing for ADD/ADHD
- Assessing for co-occurring conditions.
- Referring for psychiatric evaluation when necessary.
- Working collaboratively with clients/parents on plans (w/school, legal system, or intra-family) for providing structure/predictability/emotionally intelligent action and behavioral maintenance.
My overall therapy and evaluation approach is:
- Pro-active: teaching the client to act in her/his social environment instead of reacting to the environment;
- Strengths-based: assisting her/him to identify her/his strengths and to build on those aptitudes and skills toward self-efficacy;
- Collaborative: working with the client to reframe the situation in a manageable way, setting attainable goals for therapy, and connecting client w/other resources as needed;
- Integrative: blending elements of humanistic, cognitive-behavioral, contextual, family systems, solution-oriented, narrative and other therapies; and
- Holistic: respectful and inclusive of all aspects of the client‘s being - emotional, physical, mental and spiritual.
I combine elements of formal assessment and evaluation with:
- Narrative therapy,
- Expressive arts/metaphor,
- Behavioral contracting,
- Internal family systems theory,
- Attachment theory,
- Neuroscience/brain development,
- EMDR (eye movement desensitization and reprocessing, which helps to reprocess and resolve traumatic memory... click here to learn more.)
- Relaxation/meditation
Individual therapy
When I meet with an individual, we create a treatment plan that builds on the client’s strengths and current levels of support, with a goal of developing positive change in her/his life. This plan includes the client’s identified [one or more] problems to work on in therapy; awareness of what s/he may be doing to keep the problem going; deciding what s/he want wants to change and how; and making a commitment to learn and practice new skills to achieve that goal.
Family Therapy
I often see families when the parents or the children are having difficulties, since everyone is affected. I encourage everyone to hear each other's perspectives and what each is going through at such difficult times. Sometimes I develop a treatment plan for the family, so each person can do his or her share to contribute to conflict resolution.
These “family treatment plans” follow the same basic format as treatment plans for individuals, but all family members contribute their input and accept responsibility for working on their own behavior.
Couple therapy
While it may be helpful to see both partners when there is a problem with a couple's relationship, if only one partner comes in, there can still be change for the better. Often, the person seeking therapy is willing to work very hard to do her/his part to change some recurring pattern in order to preserve the relationship. This can be and often is the “jump start” for a shift in the couple’s dynamic. They then can work on their own toward mutually defined goals or toward satisfactory changes both can make to improve the relationship.
This same principle holds if both partners come in with a genuine desire to work on changes within the relationship, to stabilize and strengthen the positive aspects of the partnership. When couples come to see me, I do a complete assessment to determine their view(s) of a specific problem. If one of the partners has already made a decision to end the relationship, s/he may be coming to therapy for support of that decision or to relieve guilt. In that context, therapy for the couple probably will not be helpful. However, if both parties agree that the relationship is ending and commit to continue the work toward an ending, I can facilitate the process of closure.
Independent Child and Adolescent Evaluations for Family Law Attorneys/Clients
Divorcing parents may (and often do) disagree about where and with whom older children and adolescents should live, often without knowing how best to incorporate the children’s desires and needs. Divorced parents may want to make changes in an existing parenting plan. One parent may want to change the primary residence of the children. One or more of a divorced couple’s children may want to change location of their primary residence. In these instances, at the request of the parents’ attorneys, I can provide the neutral environment in which to explore the child’s or adolescent’s general emotional and behavioral adjustment; her/his adjustment in each of the homes in which there is visitation and/or residence; her/his thoughts and feelings regarding transitions between family homes; and his/her preferred location for primary residence. My rates for these services are higher than what I charge for therapies.
My services in this area do not include: providing case consultation with parents once the process is initiated; writing child custody or forensic evaluations (evaluations to determine abuse or neglect) in one parent’s care; or making recommendations as to custody or change of residence. Although as a mandated reporter of suspected abuse, I am legally bound to report any child’s disclosure of abuse or neglect, in the context of these evaluations, I am solely a reporter, or “voice,” for the child(ren) or adolescent(s) in question.
Office Hours:
My private-practice office is located in a small, friendly, relatively new community clinic called Pioneer Health Resources. My hours in the Clinic/my office are noted below. I am able to serve my private clients during regular Clinic hours. I also reserve time early evenings, & on Fridays and Saturdays for Lifespan clients.
§ Mon - Fri: 7:30am - 6pm
§ Sat: 8am - 12pm, or by special arrangement
Telephone and Email
§ I check my voicemail for messages on weekdays several times daily and once each evening; and on weekends once each day.
§ I will return calls as quickly as possible, in nearly all instances within 24 hours.
§ I have developed a protocol for clients needing support between sessions; I am available via this protocol when I am out of town.
§ Under certain circumstances and for non-clinical information exchange, my business email address is available to clients. My computer system is not equipped with an encryption program to ensure HIPAA-compliant communication protecting client information.
