About
Change… the word evokes a wide range of feelings.
Often, change is positive. We eagerly grow, learn, plan, and anticipate new experiences. We pursue relationships, start careers, accept new jobs, or move to unfamiliar and exciting places.
But there are some changes and life passages that happen and are not of our choosing.
We lose jobs in which we have invested our time and energy. Our relationships falter, and we experience physical changes that impose limitations and loss of freedom. We retire from lifelong careers. Loved ones develop illnesses that change both them and our relationships.
Pandemics occur, bringing financial and human loss.
Despite all our planning, unexpected changes occur, and loved ones die. This change causes grief in its wake, overwhelming us with pain and an inability to cope. We wonder if we can go on.
Therapy helps you cope with change, both invited and uninvited.
When we don’t know where to turn, grief counseling and psychotherapy can be lifesaving.
The relationship between therapist and client is a unique and powerful one. It is a relationship that is about you and for you. It is a way of going deep within yourself and discovering what makes you tick.
It is a way of uncovering negative patterns and setting about to change them.
You, the client, bring your pain, your innermost thoughts, sometimes those that you told no one, and a desire to go on living. Although you may not recognize it yourself, I will believe in you until you believe in yourself.
I bring empathy and compassion; a hopeful attitude; years of professional experience, knowledge, and life wisdom. Together, in a safe, nonjudgmental environment, a trusting relationship is built between us, thus providing a crucible in which healing the pain of loss can occur.
We work together to bring about the changes you desire at your own pace.
Much research shows that the key ingredient in successful therapy depends on the relationship between client and therapist.
My therapy focuses on YOU.
I consider my role as a therapist to be a calling and an essential part of who I am.
To facilitate another’s healing and transformation is awe-inspiring, a responsibility, and a privilege that I take seriously. I am that therapist who goes the extra mile to help and cares deeply about you and your therapy. I am an active therapist, engaged and participatory, always learning and growing to serve my clients’ needs best.
Therapy is a journey that is not always easy, but the result can be magical! I believe that healing from loss and trauma leads to personal growth and empowerment, and a return to wholeness and fulfillment.
About Me
Stories are a part of my life experience.
I have always loved listening to people’s stories. As a young child, I listened intently to my grandmother’s tales of childhood experiences in a faraway land. I was awed by the challenges she faced in coming to a new country without her parents and impressed by how she survived multiple tragedies in her life.
While her stories were exciting and enjoyable, I used to wonder how this now frail woman survived all that she endured? I listened in silence.
Listening to stories was the beginning of becoming a therapist, though I did not recognize my penchant for listening to people’s stories of their joys and sorrows for what it was.
My professional background and training are varied.
I studied English literature and education at college and thought I would teach and write. I taught briefly; but while raising children and volunteering at a local nursing home for aged women, I discovered my true calling as a therapist.
That eureka moment stands out as life-changing. I returned to college and earned a master’s degree in social work. My curiosity about aging and desire to learn more about this field led to my decision to study gerontology and earn a doctorate in 2007.
After working in various settings with older adults, I established a private practice in 2008. Much of my practice centered on life passages and losses that people experience as they go through life. My interest became focused on the emerging field of grief and loss, which is still in its infancy to be recognized and fully understood as a discipline.
Over the years, I have worked with hundreds of adults who have experienced many types of loss – both “normal” loss and loss that is prolonged/complicated or traumatic. I am a certified grief counselor and have taken advanced training in these areas.
A little about me personally…
My personal experiences of loss and passage through many life transitions helped me gain insight and compassion for other people’s loss. My clients taught me a lot about the many types and ways of grieving, and these experiences make me appreciate the nuances of less well-recognized types of loss.
Self-care is an essential part of being a therapist. I enjoy walking, being outside, and gardening. I love art and color, spending time with family, always having a book or two in my purse or on my iPad!