Therapy for adults, children, and adolescents

WOrking with Psychological and Emotional Challenges

Many of us seek therapy because it seems the world is collapsing. Whether the collapse is "out there" or "in here," the sense of losing our mind, our self, our loved ones, or our livelihood is terrifying, and the threats of catastrophic loss are debilitating. Keeping our shape and holding on to ourselves in the presence of others becomes increasingly difficult. We fold-up or fold-in to protect ourselves and those around us, but aloneness, desperation, panic, and self attack quickly set in.  

We know that damage happens and is endured. But can these experiences also be taken up, and can we can learn to work with them so they don't pull us under? There's no shortage of names for the psychic, emotional, and self injuries we endure. Whether we name them bi-polar, psychoses, depression, anxiety, borderline, PTSD, abuse, addiction, or grief, we are working with real wounds that we can learn to unclot and heal. Deforming or warping ourselves to survive what seems unsurvivable isn't the only way forward. Psychoanalytic treatment is where we care for what deserves care and we can pick up the debris, turning it this way and that until we are reworked into something more than we could have imagined before. 

Starting the process of therapy is usually empowering and frightening, especially since it is so often done during a time of pain and confusion. So you can be sure that I will provide an empathic, supportive space in which you can take up your life, explore your goals, move in directions that you may not have imagined, and develop ways of living that bring comfort, humor, creativity, and authenticity to your current experiences. Understanding and honoring how you've survived up until now is as crucial as your safety, wholeness, and growth. 

There are times when we all need some guidance or mentoring from a professional. There is tremendous value in talking through your ideas, problems, and feelings with a psychoanalyst who has the experience, training, and expertise to understand what you are going through.   

Working with parents, children, and adolescents

No conversation about parenting and children gets it right without making loud mention that no parent or child makes it alone. And that's because both the work of parenting and the work of growing up are nearly impossible tasks.

Nearly, because children and adolescents struggling from behavioral problems, learning issues, anxiety and depression, toilet training concerns, as well as eating and sleep difficulties can be helped. And us parents can be supported along the way to find more ways of connecting with our kids, even when every fiber of our being screams, "Disconnect!" 

I believe understanding children and their development is so important that I gave three years of dedicated time and attention to the most up to date research in child development, neuropsychology, child trauma, and infant-parent dynamics through the Child and Adolescent Psychotherapy program at The Institute for Psychoanalytic Training and Research in New York, NY. 

Along the way, I got some tips for parents.

Working With Couples

Times have changed when it comes to love and relationships. We're in a new epoch. Wives used to be shamed for divorcing their cheating and insufferable husbands; today, they are shamed for staying with them. Only 30 years ago we believed deep intimacy and satisfaction resulted from time together; today, we believe we'd better provide intimacy and satisfaction if we want a relationship that stands the test of time.  

All our stories are about what happens to our desires: our experience and the world as we wish it was, and our experience and the world as we actually are. It's not so different in couples therapy: our relationships as we wish they were, and our relationships as they break open and fail our deepest desires. Communication sinks into discord; what was once easy trust fragments and shatters into bitterness; and sex can be damaged by abuse or boredom, even disappearing into non-existence. The story of resentments setting in and conflicts becoming unsolvable is told every moment of the day in every corner of the world. One partner wants independence while the other wants to depend; one wants separateness while the other wants closeness. Add in our unruly tendencies toward jealously and righteous indignation, our inevitable value differences and desires around sex, parenting, religion, politics, and money - - - not to mention our own psychological and emotional struggles - - - and a happy, satisfied, and thriving couple sounds more like the definition of a miracle. 

And yet, that happens...

Partnering With GLBTQ Community

One of the great gifts of my professional life was beginning my clinical career at The Institute for Personal Growth, an agency that since 1983 continues to be internationally recognized as a leading provider of expert, compassionate psychotherapy and counseling people in the LGBTQ community. 

Not only are your concerns or challenges safe here, I also have a vetted list of New York professionals in just about every domain of life who will treat you as you deserve to be treated. You are safe here. 

Working with Trauma

Deep lines cut by trauma provide access to depths that are otherwise unreachable. When the unimaginable becomes real, disarray and scrambling result. Our bodies become discorded, minds scramble, symptoms scream what we can't silence or make sense of, and dreams wake us up catastrophized. We wish things could be otherwise, easier. But we have little choice when it comes to trauma. Trauma imposes itself and wounds every dimension of our lives, regardless of how hard we try to contain it or make it go away.

But the other side of trauma is a kind of deep nourishment not found elsewhere. We've come a long way in understanding what trauma is, how it can be transformed, and how it can transform us. When taken together, various combinations of Sensory Motor Therapy, Gestalt Therapy, EMDR, and especially new ways of working in talk therapy have relieved millions of people from the debilitating effects of traumatic impact. The confusion, the rage and mood swings, the horrific panic, the night terrors, the flashbacks, the excruciating intrusive thoughts and hallucinations, and even the fog of deadness and numbness that result...

Symptoms can transform. Relief happens.