My Approach to Helping
Tired of carrying around your anxiety and depression every day? Does it feel like you’re wearing a full backpack all the time? Do work and relationships add to your life or just use up your energy? Are you exhausted yet? There is a reason for the way you feel, and we’ll work together to get to the root cause of the problems you want to solve. This ensures that you don’t have to keep going back to the same old problems. You don’t have to carry the weight and experience of the past with you today. I have worked in diverse practice settings including private practice, community mental health, university counseling, crisis services, and inpatient psychiatric facilities. I have worked with over 1,000 people experiencing anxiety, depression, distress due to relationship issues, acute mental health challenges, chronic pain, alcohol and substance use problems, and more. I have worked with women, men, and members of the LGBTQ community. Gaining new information that allows manageable change in your life lightens your daily burden and improves your relationships, work, and life. Are you ready to take off that backpack and live less seriously and more freely? If so, I hope you\'ll give me a call.
More Info About My Practice
I believe we are all born as good people and that there is no limit to human capacity. We develop stress in life because of unhealthy learned behaviors picked up along the way—these can be unlearned. My family taught me how to be present for people. Given unconditional love and acceptance, I offer this to my clients. You can see and understand your true human capacity and goodness. I have done my own mental fitness work. A lifelong learner and avid reader, I have explored the issues that limited my life and often limit the lives of others. I sought individual therapy when I grew tired of daily anxiety and stress, relationship difficulties, concern about alcohol consumption, and sadness in my work and life. I participated in learning workshops that helped me see my life more clearly. I learned to hear my internal voice and trust that it would lead me to peace of mind, love, and joy. Through personal learning and growth, I discovered the fullness of what I bring to this life, and I learned how to support others in uncovering and living the best version of themselves. I discovered that life is not hard, it just requires us to gather and use consistently some new information in our daily lives. This is the work I support clients to accomplish. There are lifelong emotional benefits in assessing how we are doing and living while considering manageable changes that might improve our well-being and peace of mind. This is mental fitness. If you want to feel better for any reason, that’s the natural result of improving mental fitness, and everyone can do that. I use evidence-based measurement tools (MyOutcomes Outcome Rating Scale, the ORS; and the Session Rating Scale, the SRS) that have shown to more than double your progress in counseling while increasing the sustainability of your improvement. In other words, you improve more and get to keep your gains as you go forward in your life. These tools ensure that I am supporting you in the best way, acknowledging and relating to your unique needs and desires. It allows me to know when to make adjustments in how we work together.
What I Love about Being a Psychotherapist
When I watch a sunrise or sunset, or watch an iris bloom in the spring, I am always in awe of the miracle that is nature. When I see a fellow human being change their life and "bloom" in their fullness and beauty, it touches me in the depths of my soul. I never feel responsible for someone else's growth and improvement, yet I am always inspired and enriched by the profound gifts they are able to give themselves. Sharing in your growth makes me a better person and improves my life. When you grow and improve yourself, lives around you grow and improve. Sharing this experience with others is the profound experience of my life. This is why I do this work.
My Guiding Ethical Principles
I believe that we are all OK just like we are today. Each of us is unique and what is normal for one may not be normal for another. The key is that we are all normal for us. It denies our uniqueness to place one person's definition of normal onto another. There are emotional benefits in assessing how you are doing and living while considering manageable changes that might improve your well-being and peace of mind. Just as we can all improve our physical fitness, I strongly believe we can all improve our mental fitness which improves our daily well-being. I am here to help you find the unique answers to improve your mental fitness.
My View on the Nature of 'Disorders'
In my experience, labels we place on ourselves can become limits to our well-being. Within the business side of mental health, labels (the assignment of mental health "disorders") are used by insurance companies to justify payment for services provided by therapists, psychiatrists, and other mental health facilities. Unfortunately, many people experiencing life challenges adopt these labels, research them, and begin to carry them around and live them in their daily lives. I do not believe anyone will ever be inside your skin with you. That doesn't mean you won't share meaningful love and connection with others, you will. It just means that you know you better than anyone else. If that's true, why would you want to carry around someone else's label. I believe that we are all OK just like we are today. Each of us is unique, and what is normal for one, may not be normal for another. The key is that we are all normal for us. It denies your uniqueness and the miracle that is your human life to place one person?s definition of normal onto you.
