~ About the Practice ~

During my mid 20’s, my husband and I began contemplating having children. Instead of an enthusiastic thrill, I was overcome with intolerable distress.  What had previously seemed like minor misalignment in certain areas of my life, was now clear evidence that a larger problem existed. My most authentic self had become altered by the psychological effects of child maltreatment and buried under societal expectations and cultural norms. It was unacceptable to me to become someone’s mother while I was so increasingly confused about who I was and who I’d become.

During this period of turmoil, I explored many avenues for relief; some of them dramatic, some more subtle.  I left my social work job in treatment foster care, which had become increasingly beurocratic, in search of work I could feel good about again.  I traveled across country independently staying in youth hostels and exploring in the woods.  I scrutinized every aspect of the life I had chosen and feared I’d made many wrong choices.

In a moment of great vulnerability and despair On New Year’s Day of 2002, I asked, outloud, for guidance.  What followed was a clarifying ‘vision’. In this revelation I saw myself joyfully working with private therapy clients in a holistic and integrated way; my soul fully unrestrained.  And, in being free, I was inviting others to find their own freedom.  This revelation would prove to be of meaningful significance as I continued my journey.

Shortly after attaining my private therapy license, I became pregnant with my first child.  By this time, many things in my life had begun to settle into place. I felt home-free among all the sweetness and excitement.  During a marathon labor and life-threatening delivery, my brain and body were slammed with a severe episode of postpartum depression (PPD).  I was blindsided.

The depths of my pain and panic were shocking.  During those first weeks, when I looked in the mirror I did not recognize the pale and shallow-eyed stranger returning my gaze. Uprooted from a time of great hope and ease, I had been plummeted down into a cavernous despair.  I was lost.

Through the support of many, my daily battle with PPD was a brave yet tenuous one. Some days it defeated me, slamming me back into an ocean of blankets and tissues.  Countless hours were spent struggling to remember what life had been like before the beast had taken me over so completely. I wondered, how could others be so seemingly functional and I was in such a state of torment?  I fantasized about abandoning my family to disappear in some faraway land where no one would know my name. The possibility of one day finding purpose and meaning in the depths of this misery were of no consolation. But in time, great purpose and meaning did, in fact, come.

There exist several risk factors which can predict the likelihood of a woman developing PPD.  Therefore, the subsequent healing (through the deepest layers of the illness) offers a strong invitation to become present to, and more fully resolve, those associated factors.  As my own buried struggles came to the surface, I was drawn to seek more exposure to holistic healing methods. I worked with energy healers using breath work and body awareness skills. These supports reignited my creativity and vigor, greatly enhancing my healing process.  They allowed me to more fully honor the wisdom of my pain rather then reject it (only to have it resurface again during some future time of difficulty).

In exposing myself to these various techniques I was, not only emerging from my PPD nightmare, but was grooming myself to be the kind of therapist I had envisioned on New Years Day only two years previous.  I did not just access holistic healing so as to find my own greater sense of inner peace, but I studied it passionately so as to be better equipped to, one day, be a support in the healing journey of others.

As a result of these experiences, I have dedicated my professional life to a unique form of integrated counseling; uniting traditional and holistic methods with my innate intuitive gifts. Through my practice, Healing Therapies, I treat clients around a variety of emotional issues (including anxiety, depression, distractibility, grief, relationship challenges, work stress, family dynamics, loss/lack of direction) and specialize in the treatment of Postpartum Disorders.