Counseling

Counseling and Pychotherapy for:

Individuals – adults and teens

Couples – Married, engaged, divorcing

Race, Religion, Sexual Orientation, Sexual practices, Political Persuasion, etc are not issues in my office unless my ethics code requires me to make it an issue. I am   open to helping anyone who genuinely wants help. What is good and right is often different from what is legal.

The best way to describe my work as a counselor / psychotherapist is that it is eclectic and integrative.

Eclectic means that I have a lot of psychotherapy tools in my tool box and I am willing to use and competent with many different approaches. One size does not fit all. What works for a 13 year old girl with anxiety problems is probably not going to be what works for a 60 year old man dealing with a chronic physical disability. Different strokes for different folks at different times.

Integrative means that we need to work on everything. That’s a lot!  But, a simple way to think about it (thanks Ken Wilber) is working with the individual Body, Mind, and Spirit in the context of Nature and Culture. And, of course, some aspects will take precedence over others at different times. Ignoring any aspect can lead to failure or frustration.

Not every therapist works well with every person. There needs to be a decent fit. We need to be able to forge a partnership, a collaborative working relationship.

I have been doing this a long time, so I feel comfortable talking honestly and openly about my strengths and my limitations as a therapist.

I am really good at working with highly sensitive (regarded by some as ‘touchy’) people who want to change. That makes me excellent at working with PTSD, Borderline personality, Narcissism, anxiety, complex medical issues, and sexual issues. I am excellent in helping people make major decisions that involve  conflicting emotions. I am very good at working with adult couples and I am pretty good with families.

I sometimes don’t do that well with people who don’t want to be in my office who have been involuntarily forced into therapy by others. Sometimes significant others, probation officers, parents, or employers will require that someone “go to therapy or else”.  If the non-volunteer in my office really does not see that they have a need or desire for psychotherapy, we usually go nowhere.

On the other hand, sometimes I do OK with involuntary therapy. I have worked with numerous referrals from probation officers and parents.  I am pretty good at bonding with people because I focus on helping the person who is with me in my office and not whoever it was who referred them. Sometimes the experience of connecting with me in the office opens up the possibility that going to therapy might be helpful, and we then make some progress together.

I started reading psychotherapy books in 1971, so I have too many influences, too many mentors and role models to list.  Off the top of my head for where I am at today with psychotherapy I think of ACT, DBT, Carl Jung, Ken Wilber, Shadow Work,  John Boyd, Fritz Perls, and Carl Rogers. And there are many, many more.