My Approach to Helping

Are you struggling with stress, anxiety, food and weight issues, addictive or compulsive behaviors, or relationship problems?

I provide a mindfulness based approach to relationship building, managing stress and anxiety, and achieving well-being.

My clinical services include specialization in three areas of treatment: eating disorders, anxiety and stress, and relationship difficulties.We conduct Life Choices groups.

Our treatment for anxiety disorders includes treatment of post-traumatic stress, panic disorder, social anxiety, phobias, obsessive-compulsive disorder, and generalized anxiety disorder. Drawing upon over 30 years of experience as a clinician and university professor, I have created C.A.L.M., a structured program which stands for Choices for Anxious Lifestyle Management. Our "Life Choices" groups have been highly successful for over 20 years.

Eating disorder treatment includes the treatment of morbid obesity, compulsive eating, anorexia nervosa, and bulimia nervosa. I have specialized in the treatment of eating disorders for over 30 years.

My third specialization is relationship therapy. It includes work with mediation, couples therapy, and the resolution of co-parenting conflicts.

We have over 30 years of experience working with couples, families, and workplace relationships, as well as decades teaching relationship therapy to graduate psychology students. We are serious about building strong, healthy, and enduring relationships.

More Info About My Practice

As a therapist, my primary professional interests are mentoring and coaching, relationship difficulties, mediation, eating disorders, workplace conflict management, anxiety disorders, and the development of cooperative team skills, with insights from research in Emotional Intelligence and Mindfulness. Above all else, I enjoy helping people change and grow. I look forward to supporting your own growth.

Life Choices/C. A. L. M.
Our Philosophy

For over 30 years we have specialized in the treatment of anxiety disorders and eating disorders. During that time our treatment approach has undergone an evolution. Originally schooled in the medical model, diagnosing and treating specific conditions or disorders, we've come to question whether those disorders actually exist in the way that we were taught to think of them - as distinct entities that have a life of their own. Instead of a medical model, we now embrace a wellness model. Instead of a focus on eliminating "disorders," we see our role as promoting well-being. We believe our clients have unlimited potential to grow toward lives of balance and wellness. Our role is teaching mindful awareness and mindful choice.

We view many psychological difficulties as symptomatic of a life out of balance, something we call "dis-ease," The term dis-ease is used by individuals and healing communities who are aligned with wellness, without focus on a particular ailment. Emphasis is placed on the natural state of "ease" having become imbalanced or disrupted. Life experiences have created a disruption of what was supposed to be, resulting in a loss of balance in one's life.

Psychological well-being means being able to function well in six key areas that taken together constitute mental health. These essential components to psychological well-being are:

1. Environmental mastery - having control over different areas of your life, such as your job, your home, where you live, your finances, your social life, or your love/sex/romantic life.
2. Autonomy - having the freedom to choose, the ability to think independently, and be accountable for, and responsible for, your own actions.
3. A sense of purpose - having fulfilling goals and a sense of direction.
4. Personal growth - being open to change, experiencing continued development, and feeling able to achieve your potential
5. Self acceptance - valuing all that you are and being kind to yourself.
6. Positive relations with others - feeling competent and skillful in achieving, satisfying relationships.

C.A.L.M., Choices for Anxious Lifestyle Management, is a program for achieving well-being through being guided in making choices that directly affect the six factors above. We believe small choices, frequently and consistently applied, result in major transformation over time, and a dramatic increase in psychological well-being. Our assessment-based program, Life Choices, is designed to facilitate making transformational choices, and following through to personal well-being, balance, and deep satisfaction with life.

Specific Issue(s) I'm Skilled at Helping With

We have over 30 years of experience working with couples, families, and workplace relationships, as well as decades teaching relationship therapy to graduate psychology students. We are serious about building strong, healthy, and enduring relationships.