MY approach
My approach as a therapist is down to earth, warm, genuine, and inclusive.
I practice rooted in a relational, psychodynamic approach to healing, meaning I give attention and care to what is happening between us in the therapy room, what is conscious and what may be unconscious in your experience, and how the past might be influencing the present. To guide my work, I draw on varied schools of psychological and philosophical thought, and I integrate current scholarship from different theoretical schools including psychoanalytic theory, attachment theory, neuroscience, and somatic, trauma-informed research.
I strive to be flexible and open in my work and am actively engaged in anti-oppression work, both personally and professionally. I honor diversity, and accordingly welcome people from all walks of life. I'm poly-friendly, trauma-informed, LGBTQ allied, and kink-aware.
My background in ecology – the study of how natural systems interact to resiliently adapt and grow — informs my belief that change and growth happen naturally, when we honor and more fully inhabit who and where we are.
I've studied the broad global issues of our time--- the climate crisis, our relationship to each other and to our surrounding environments and ecologies, the world's economic systems and their attendant inequalities, and social justice movements throughout history. I find these larger systems perspectives invaluable in my work as a therapist. I believe we are not separate from the world around us, and that the personal is political. For me, therapy is a subtle yet powerful activism, a way to actively support the values of justice, inclusivity, diversity, creativity and compassion in the lives of my patients and in the communities to which they belong.
I received my formal training and education from the following institutions:
- The Psychotherapy Institute - Berkeley, CA - Post Graduate Training Program (PGTP) in Psychodynamic Psychotherapy
- Integral Counseling Center - San Francisco, CA - Practicum and Internship in Psychodynamic Psychotherapy
- California Institute of Integral Studies - San Francisco, CA - Master of the Arts in Counseling Psychology
- University of Wisconsin - Madison, WI - BS, BA, Life Sciences Communication and International Relations
I'm a member of the following professional organizations and continually educate myself for the benefit of my clients:
