Welcome

I offer compassionate, effective therapy and EMDR for adults seeking to better understand themselves, and to address obstacles to aliveness and authenticity such as:

Shame and guilt

Depression and anxiety

Unsatisfactory relationships

Creative blocks, procrastination and perfectionism

Self-defeating behaviors

Effects of trauma and abuse

Loneliness and isolation

 

My Approach

My work is informed by respect for the many forces that shape us –social, economic, cultural, relational, physiologic, and I enjoy working with adults from a diversity of ethnicities, class backgrounds, sexual orientations, and gender expressions. I am intrigued by the unconscious and the reverberation that our past experiences and early relationships have on our current functioning, often in subtle and unnoticed ways. As a mindfulness practitioner, I am attentive to the here and now; mining the current relationship between myself and my client for its richness of information and healing.

The latest brain research shows that for healing from the effects of trauma, talk therapy just isn't enough. Since trauma resides in the nervous system and the body, a non-verbal, somatically active approach is needed. For this reason I trained in EMDR and have been integrating it with talk therapy since the late 1990's.

 

Choosing a Relational Therapist

The choice of therapist is such an important decision. Relational therapy offers the therapeutic relationship itself as an agent of growth and change. Together, therapist and client refine a working model of connection that can be generalized to other important relationships.

I believe that when the match between therapist and client is a good one, you will feel understood and accepted. Most importantly, I hope that you will feel safe to introduce any subject. Nothing should be out of bounds. This might be as frightening as it is liberating, but it is essential to the therapeutic process.

Optimally, you will be able to talk about your feelings and perceptions of what happens between you and your therapist, especially the times when something doesn’t feel quite right. Often the deepest healing comes when you pay attention to and are curious about what has gone slightly wrong between you and your therapist.

 

EMDR

EMDR is an innovative, highly researched treatment for PTSD and other conditions.  It makes use of the brain's information processing system in a way that is believed to be similar to what occurs in REM sleep.  (See the EMDR International Association website for more detailed information).

Since I have been integrating EMDR into relational work, I have found that the therapy delves even deeper and moves even faster than previously.  My clients have been surprised at how rapidly they can shed fears, negative beliefs about themselves, and other demons they've lived with for their entire lives.

 

About Me

My first career, as a teacher of English as a Second Language, sensitized me to the importance of a sense of belonging, and the centrality of language, culture and community in one's identity. My students taught me in vivid, personal ways about the devastating effects of trauma, oppression, grief, and the daily experience of being invisible to- and misunderstood by the dominant culture.

In 1993 I pursued a lifelong dream of becoming a therapist and attended New College of California's Feminist Psychology Program. Early in my career I completed a three-year training at the Institute of Contemporary Psychoanalysis, where I developed my interest and skills in relational/intersubjective psychotherapy.

My early clinical experience was in community mental health, and I have been in fulltime private practice since 2004. I enjoy the richness of having clinical relationships with a widely diverse group of people.

 I have been on the faculty of John F. Kennedy University Graduate Psychology Program and the Women's Therapy Center in Berkeley, and currently facilitate at EMDR trainings with the Institute for Contemporary Mindfulness.

 

Meet Lula

My spaniel/setter mix who often attends sessions with me. She has a sweet and mostly unobtrusive presence, and sometimes cuddles with clients when invited to do so. Many folks have told me that having her there warms things up for them.  Since so many of us struggle with self-acceptance it can be reassuring to have Lula, who is a living example of a being who accepts herself and others exactly as they are.