Areas of Expertise
Anxiety
Adolescents
Depression
Anxiety is the body’s natural response to stress. It’s a feeling of fear or apprehension about what’s to come.
If your feelings of anxiety are extreme, last for longer than six months, and are interfering with your life, you may have an anxiety disorder.
Depression
Adolescents
Depression
Depression is a constant feeling of sadness and loss of interest, which often impedes normal activities and results in feelings of hopelessness and despair. Generally, depression does not result from a single event, but from a mix of events and factors.
Adolescents
Adolescents
Adolescents
In the care of adolescent clients, all aspects of clinical interventions are played out against a background of rapid physical, psychological, and social developmental changes. These changes produce specific psychosocial patterns, unusual presentations of symptoms, and above all, unique communication and management challenges.
As a young
In the care of adolescent clients, all aspects of clinical interventions are played out against a background of rapid physical, psychological, and social developmental changes. These changes produce specific psychosocial patterns, unusual presentations of symptoms, and above all, unique communication and management challenges.
As a young person enters adolescence, their parents are still largely responsible for all aspects of their wellbeing. By the end of adolescence, issues will be almost entirely the responsibility of the young person. The challenge is to maintain an effective clinical relationship while assisting clients to move toward autonomy and a life worth living.
Trauma
Personality Disorders • Specializing in BPD
Adolescents
Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD)
When someone has experienced a traumatic event and is having particular types of problems as a result, a mental health professional may diagnosis the client with PTSD. The major types of symptoms experienced by people with PTSD include:
- Re-experiencing symptoms:
- Flashbacks or intrusive thoughts about the
Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD)
When someone has experienced a traumatic event and is having particular types of problems as a result, a mental health professional may diagnosis the client with PTSD. The major types of symptoms experienced by people with PTSD include:
- Re-experiencing symptoms:
- Flashbacks or intrusive thoughts about the traumatic event
- Intense physical or emotional reactions to reminders of the event
- Nightmares
- Avoidance symptoms:
- Avoiding thinking or talking about the trauma
- Avoiding people, places, activities or sensations that remind you of the trauma
- Chronic dissociative symptoms
- Negative changes in your thinking and emotions:
- Feeling more down, depressed, angry or anxious
- Finding it hard or impossible to feel happy
- Feeling shameful or guilty
- Feeling distant from other people
- Losing interest in things you used to enjoy
- Being unable to remember important parts of the trauma
- Having more negative thoughts about yourself, other people and the world
- Hyperarousal or emotional/physical reactivity:
- Being always on guard and/or easily startled
- Having trouble concentrating
- Being quick to anger and aggression
- Doing things that are risky (e.g., impulsive sex, binge drinking)
- Having trouble sleeping
Complex Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (C-PTSD)
This phenomenon has many symptoms in common with PTSD, including re-experiencing, avoidance, and hyperarousal, as described above. However, C-PTSD also include:
- Problems in emotion regulation, like having difficulty managing ones feelings
- Problems in self-image, like feeling completely different from other people and/or having a negative self-view
- Interpersonal problems, including having trouble trusting others
Personality Disorders • Specializing in BPD
Personality Disorders • Specializing in BPD
Personality Disorders • Specializing in BPD
Borderline personality disorder affects how you feel about yourself, how you relate to others and how you behave. Signs and symptoms may include:
- An intense fear of abandonment, even going to extreme measures to avoid real or imagined separation or rejection
- A pattern of unstable intense relationships, such as idealizing someone one moment
Borderline personality disorder affects how you feel about yourself, how you relate to others and how you behave. Signs and symptoms may include:
- An intense fear of abandonment, even going to extreme measures to avoid real or imagined separation or rejection
- A pattern of unstable intense relationships, such as idealizing someone one moment and then suddenly believing the person doesn't care enough or is cruel
- Rapid changes in self-identity and self-image that include shifting goals and values, and seeing yourself as bad or as if you don't exist at all
- Periods of stress-related paranoia and loss of contact with reality, lasting from a few minutes to a few hours
- Impulsive and risky behavior, such as gambling, reckless driving, unsafe sex, spending sprees, binge eating or drug abuse, or sabotaging success by suddenly quitting a good job or ending a positive relationship
- Suicidal threats or behavior or self-injury, often in response to fear of separation or rejection
- Wide mood swings lasting from a few hours to a few days, which can include intense happiness, irritability, shame or anxiety
- Ongoing feelings of emptiness
- Inappropriate, intense anger, such as frequently losing your temper, being sarcastic or bitter, or having physical fights
Psychoanalysis • (Jungian) Depth Psychology
Carl Gustav Jung, was a Swiss psychiatrist and psychoanalyst who founded analytical psychology. Jung's work has been influential in the fields of psychiatry, anthropology, archaeology, literature, philosophy, psychology and religious studies. Psychoanalysis, is a method to access, experience and integrate unconscious material into awareness. It is a search for the meaning of behaviors, feelings and events. Many are the channels to extend knowledge of the self: the analysis of dreams is one important avenue. The goal of Jungian therapy is to facilitate individuation, the becoming of, the unique person one is meant to be. Psychological symptoms are viewed as a sign of something blocked or gone awry in this process.
Psychoanalysis is a life-long process and coincides with DBT's hierarchy of treatment target of quality of life interfering behaviors.
The Four Theories of Carl Jung
The Persona
- In every public arena we present an exaggerated version of ourselves which we hope will make an impression. The character we display in our occupation is not the same as at home. When alone we have no one to impress, but in public we wear a mask, a persona, so that we might impose a desirable image of ourselves onto others. It is then the distinct purpose of the persona to subdue all of the primitive urges, impulses, and emotions that are not considered socially acceptable, and that, if we were to act upon them, would make us look foolish. The difficulty with the persona arises only when one becomes so closely identified with the persona that the sense of Self is lost.
The Shadow
- The shadow is everything that we have denied in ourselves and cast into oblivion, or rather everything that the ego has refused to associate with itself, but that we can notice in other people — such things might include our sexuality, spontaneity, aggression, instincts, cowardice, carelessness, passion, enthusiasm, or materialism. It embraces all those sins, dark thoughts, and moods for which we felt guilt and shame. When we perceive a moral deficiency in others we can be sure there is a similar inferiority within ourselves.
Anima / Animus
- Jung believed that nested inside the shadow are the qualities of our opposite gender. The anima is the archetype that expresses the fact that men have a minority of feminine qualities; and the animus expresses the masculine qualities within women. Jung presented the concepts of the anima and animus as the ancient archetypes of Eros and Logos. Eros (the female) is associated with receptivity, creativity, relationships, and wholeness. Logos (the male) is identified with power, thought, and action. The anima then is a personification of all feminine tendencies, positive or negative, in a man’s psyche. A positive expression of the anima might include sensitivity and empathy, capacity for loving relationships, a feeling for nature. But if the anima is rejected — that is, if a man represses those characteristics which might be considered classically feminine — the anima becomes deformed: feelings and emotions are replaced by moodiness; fidelity becomes possessiveness; tenderness becomes effeminacy; imagination becomes mere fantasizing. The animus, on the other hand, is a personification of masculine tendencies in a woman’s psyche, such as strength of conviction, assertiveness, courage, strength, vitality, and a desire for achievement. If the woman disregards her masculine edge then she will become possessed by the animus: assertiveness will become aggression and ruthlessness; and analytical thought will become argumentativeness.
The Self
- After one has overcome the persona, and integrated his shadow and the aspects of the anima/animus archetypes into one’s character, one then is given access, Jung believed, to enter into the deepest and highest reaches of the psyche, the archetype of wholeness– which Jung named the ‘Self’, the most significant of all the archetypes. The self then is the sum of everything we are now, and everything we once were, as well as everything we could potentially become; it is the symbol of the ‘God within us’, that which we are as a totality. Jung believed that it is the end purpose of human life to experience this coming together of the whole, to fully integrate and make conscious everything about ourselves that was hidden in the shadow. This end is the fullest expression of one’s character, and allows one to hold firm their individuality against the collective mass unconscious. This process is known as individuation.
Dialectic Behavior Therapy (DBT)
mindfulness
This process leads an individual to practice being present and fully aware within the moment, feel life for what it is and not live in the future or the past. This specific skill is considered the foundation of DBT. Becoming a mindful person will help you accept and tolerate any form of powerful or overwhelming emotion you may have to deal with during day-to-day life. Mindfulness relies heavily on the principle of acceptance.
Through mindfulness, you will learn to accept all situations, no matter how intense or overwhelming your feelings may become. This technique focuses on mentally slowing down in life and focusing on you and the positives around you, no matter how stressful or negative a situation currently is or could become.
interpersonal effectiveness
Learning interpersonal effectiveness is a skill that closely follows once you have effectively grasped the skill of mindfulness. Learning how to interact with the people around you, personal relationships and the challenges that can create a stressful environment.
When learning interpersonal effectiveness skills, you will understand how to communicate clearly and without animosity when you disagree or say no to a situation or request. You will also learn how to ask for what you want while maintaining self-respect and a functional relationship with others.
distress tolerance
The objective of distress tolerance is for you to learn the art of acceptance and change. You will discover four primary technique that will help you handle any crisis:
- Self-soothing
- Improving the stressful situation
- Thinking of the pros and cons of the situation
- Distracting yourself
A critical element of learning acceptance is first to grasp the idea of radical acceptance.
Radical acceptance allows you to embrace the idea that you will face both negative and positive situations within your life. Still, you will learn how to view these situations without being judgmental—learning how to accept the outcome no matter the problem. This skillset heavily incorporates mindfulness.
emotion regulation
This technique is essential to master, learning to control your emotions when you are an intense person can be a struggle, but with the right help, you can achieve anything. Emotion regulation is perfect for individuals who are regularly overcome with the following emotions:
- Anger
- Depression
- Anxiety
- Frustration
An individual who regularly goes through intense negative emotions will benefit from learning how to regulate and control their emotions. Once you have learned how to manage your feelings, you will be able to decrease your vulnerability to any form of painful emotions caused by situations that are entirely out of your control.
Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR)
What is EMDR?
When something disturbing takes place, the experience gets stored in the brain as a memory and our mind/body system can develop a belief that event is either going to happen again at any moment or is still happening. Later on, a seemingly unrelated event can trigger this initial disturbing event, and the body and mind experiences a retraumatization.
EMDR helps to release the hold that original memory has within a person's body. The events that used to trigger the brain into over-reaction no longer have that effect. The person can now react to the present without the past interfering. In doing so, EMDR makes it possible for an actual physiological change to take place and calms the nervous system.
adaptive information processing (AIP)
EMDR relies on the Adaptive Information Processing (AIP) model, a theory about how your brain stores memories. This theory recognizes that your brain stores normal and traumatic memories differently.
During normal events, your brain stores memories smoothly. During disturbing or upsetting events, networking doesn’t happen correctly. The brain can go “offline” and there’s a disconnect between what you experience and what your brain stores in memory through language.
Often, your brain stores traumatic memories in a way that doesn’t allow for healing. Trauma is like a wound that your brain hasn’t been allowed to recover from. Because it didn’t have the chance to heal, your brain didn’t receive the message that the danger is over.
Newer experiences can link up to earlier trauma experiences and reinforce a negative experience over and over again. This happens not only with events you can remember, but also with suppressed memories.
what does emdr treat?
The most widespread use of EMDR is for treating post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) however, EMDR has been proven to effectively treat:
- Anxiety disorders: Generalized anxiety disorder, panic disorder, phobias and social anxiety/phobia.
- Depression: Major depressive disorder, persistent depressive disorder and illness-related depression.
- Dissociative disorders: Dissociative identity disorder or amnesia and depersonalization or derealization disorder.
- Eating disorders: Anorexia nervosa, bulimia nervosa and binge-eating disorder.
- Obsessive-compulsive disorders: Obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD), body dysmorphic disorder and hoarding disorder.
- Personality disorders: Borderline personality disorder, avoidant personality disorder and antisocial personality disorder.
- Trauma disorders: Acute stress disorder, PTSD and adjustment disorder.
advantages of emdr therapy
EMDR has several advantages.
- It works. Peer reviewed scientific studies have found that EMDR is effective.
- It tends to work faster than other forms of therapy. People receiving EMDR typically start seeing results much sooner than with other forms of therapy. One EMDR session can be the equivalent of ten 'talk therapy' sessions.
- It involves less homework. Other forms of therapy typically involve journaling or other types of homework outside of your sessions. EMDR usually involves only writing down any thoughts or ideas you want to bring up at your next session (if and when those thoughts happen).
- It is less stressful. EMDR focuses on processing and moving past your trauma. Other methods involve having you describe and even relive negative events.
Ketamine Assisted Psychotherapy (KAP)
what is Psychedelic Assisted Therapy?
After decades of neglect and relegation to illicit partying, psychedelics are, once again, being researched for their enormous potential to heal anxiety, depression, distress and addictions.
ketamine
Ketamine assisted psychotherapy (KAP) is finding its rightful place with scientific discovery. Ketamine has extensive evidence for safe and effective treatment. The introduction of this powerful medicine is leveraged within an intensive therapeutic experience to relax prior habitual ways of thinking and update the nervous system with new motivation, and capacity to feel joy.
KAP is an intensive psychotherapy that gets to core feelings and rewires emotional memories. Ketamine lowers anxiety and helps bypass defenses, allowing access to deep feelings. At one time we needed the protection of defenses and anxiety, but today they are activated automatically, underneath our awareness, and keep us stuck. Once they are soothed, a natural healing orientation is released.
Researchers have called this ‘inner healing intelligence’, but we think of it as a human’s innate orientation to healing, connection, empowerment and curiosity, so clear in childhood but stifled in difficult or traumatic development. KAP certainly also has a psychedelic component, that releases us from those stuck pathways, probably through temporary modulation of a specific serotonergic gate; and it also enhances new learning through glutamine mechanisms, so that we can quickly learn new habits.