What I Offer
I provide compassionate and effective individual and group psychotherapy that includes actionable strategies to help you detach from entangling patterns and embrace the life you want to live.
I work well with clients who are motivated to examine how they relate to their own internal and external obstacles. And, who are willing to explore new ways of relating both internally and with the world at large to experience more freedom, fulfillment, vitality and connection.
Speciality Areas
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I have worked extensively with clients who struggle with anxiety, depression, unhealthy habits, a harsh inner critic, and rigid perfectionism. I will help you clarify what really matters to you, help you connect more deeply to your purpose, and guide you in how to overcome internal and external obstacles, develop healthier habits, and healthier ways of relating to yourself and others.
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I have years of experience supporting patients and their loved ones at the bedside in hospitals and in outpatient medical clinics. I provide psychological support and foster emotional resiliency and skill building. I have sat with hundreds of patients as they receive new medical diagnoses, assisted patients and their loved ones with coping with and accepting diagnoses, and partnered with patients to make lasting changes to improve their overall health and well being.
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As a pain psychologist I have interned at the Stanford Pain Management Center in Palo Alto, CA, the University of Colorado Department of Family Medicine in Aurora, CA, and the Institute for Health and Healing in San Francisco, CA. I am also an Advanced Practitioner in Pain Reprocessing Therapy (PRT). I draw primarily on PRT, Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) and Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) in my work with individuals with chronic pain.
I also co-facilitate an 8 week Pain Reprocessing Therapy Group with Dr. Joseph Frawley, a board certified physician. This is an in person group and more information about this group can be found here.
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I trained in Cognitive Behavioral Therapy for Insomnia (CBT-I), a frontline, evidence-based behavioral treatment for insomnia, with Dr. Rachel Manber who was my dissertation chair and the director of the Stanford Sleep Health and Insomnia Program. CBT-I focuses on restructuring thoughts, beliefs, feelings and behaviors that contribute to poor sleep.
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I also work well individuals who are experiencing major life transitions, such as leaving home for college, getting married, becoming a parent, navigating a divorce or break up, loss of a job, and/or retirement. Together we will connect with your heart and your head, clarify how you want to show up in this time of change, and help you navigate this period with vitality and resiliency.
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Whether it’s assisting a client with improving a current important relationship, or helping them navigate the dating world to find lasting love, helping clients experience more meaningful and fulfilling relationships is a favorite area of speciality.
Together we will explore attachment theory to help you better understand your attachment style and how it influences your approach to close relationships. With compassion we will identify patterns in how you relate to others and help you unhook from the unhelpful patterns that keep you stuck. This will give you the freedom to step away from unhealthy cycles and build more secure, fulfilling connections.
As a dating coach, we will also explore your relationship history and what you seek in a partner. From here I will provide nuanced and personalized guidance to help you improve your self image, heal attachment wounds, uncover blind spots, spot red flags, and navigate deepening intimacy, communication skills and n challenges with potential matches.
Therapeutic Approaches
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ACT is an evidence-based form of psychotherapy that promotes psychological flexibility by teaching you how to accept difficult thoughts and feeling rather than trying to suppress them. It also teaches you how to keep moving in the direction of where you want to go in life despite what your thoughts and feelings may be screaming at you by helping you clarify and remember what matters, and through the use of mindfulness, perspective taking, acceptance, cognitive defusion, and compassion techniques.
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This evidence-based approach to treating chronic and neuroplastic pain targets pain circuits in our brain that became stuck after an injury or pain condition develops. This approach is particularly effective if your pain condition has not responded well to usual medical treatments and teaches you how to re-train your brain’s neural pathways to reprocess physical pain differently.
This is achieved through psychoeducation, mindfulness, getting better at noticing positive sensations and feelings, and enhancing a greater sense of safety in your body and life in general.
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CBT-I is an evidence-based behavioral treatment for insomnia. It focuses on restructuring thoughts, beliefs, feelings and behaviors that contribute to poor sleep.
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Attachment-Based Therapy is based on research that early emotional bonds with our caregivers impact how we behave and relate to others in future close relationships.
In a nutshell, if our early caregivers were able to adequately meet our emotional needs we develop a secure attachment style which makes it easier for us to give and receive love, trust and be trusted, and seek vulnerability and closeness with future romantic partners and other loved ones like our children. However, if our early caregivers were not able to adequately meet our emotional needs, we may develop more of an insecure attachment style which makes it harder for us to experience and provide these qualities.
Attachment wounds can trip us up in relationships and Attachment-Based Therapy harnesses the power of the therapeutic relationship to help clients develop a more secure attachment style. This in turn will help them experience healthier connections and more deeply satisfying relationships.
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Interactive Guided Imagery integrates techniques from hypnosis, neurolinguistic programming, and Jungian active imagination to still the mind and interact with beliefs, intuitions and emotions held within your unconscious. This may aid you in accessing your own internal wisdom, seeding transformation, or remedying limiting beliefs or stored physical trauma.
More information about this approach can be found on the Academy for Guided Imagery website.
Services
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FAQs
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I offer individual therapy typically on a weekly basis, although frequency may differ depending on the goals and needs of each individual.
If you are interested in the Pain Reprocessing Therapy Group, I highly recommend that you join a group series that you are fairly certain you will be able to attend for the prescribed 8 week period. This is because this is a skill-based group and each week build on the skills learned in the prior week.
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My initial intake (first session) is 60 minutes in length and $240.
Subsequent individual sessions are 50 minutes in length and $225.
My 8-week Group Pain Reprocessing Therapy (PRT) course is $45 per session. Each sessions is 90 minutes in length.
Medicare is the one insurance that I accept at this time.
While I am not an in-network provider with other insurance programs, if you have a PPO insurance plan I can provide you with a "Superbill" to submit to your insurance company for possible partial reimbursement. Please check with your insurance company if you want to determine whether they may reimburse you for our sessions.
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I require at least 24 hours notice for cancellations for all services, otherwise the session fee will be charged out of pocket.
Contact me
Interested in working together? The first step is to request a complimentary 20-minute phone consultation to see if I am the right fit for your needs.