Services

IFS

Internal Family Systems, or IFS, is a form of therapy that is intuitive, potentially playful, and evidence-based. There are many forms of therapy that look at the psyche as being made up of parts, and this one has been around since the 1980’s. You might just be hearing about it for the first time because it has recently become quite popular, but it’s been around, refined, and explored for a long while.  

IFS believes our personalities are made up of parts, or distinct sub-personalities that each developed in a time and place calling for a way of coping. Many of us have Inner Critics, Perfectionists, Victims, and Overwhelmed Four Year Olds inside us, for example. Each part has a different way of helping the system, even when that ‘helping’ feels spiteful and discouraging. In a session using IFS, the therapist helps guide you into getting to know your parts and their needs by separating from them and then building relationship with them.

IFS’s goal is to bring us into ever deeper relationship with ourselves. For example, imagine becoming upset over a circumstance that typically leads you to lash out at people around you and then ruminate for hours about why you act this way! Then, instead of acting from the part of you who is upset, imagine taking a moment to notice that part’s feeling state (perhaps it’s fear) and finding a way to soothe it instead. Once that part’s fear of being abandoned or manipulated (for example) is understood, perhaps the part calms, and you take action from a different mindset. You begin applying curiosity to your inner world to fully understand your reaction, and from there, choose. 

This is not about applying coping skills or finding the right form of meditation, even though those are valid and appropriate uses of one’s time. This is about coming into relationship with yourself, learning to treat yourself as you would a dear child or friend or partner. This is very gratifying work, and I love being on this journey with my clients.

Here’s a blog entry I wrote elsewhere that further defines how you might know if IFS is for you.

EMDR

When we are overwhelmed by an experience - when we don’t have the resources to handle something happening to us - that can create what I think of as a metaphorical “tangle in the brain.” That tangle remains separate from the track of adaptive thinking and strategies for handling our experiences. That tangle remains unprocessed. Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR) is a way to decrease the intensity of (desensitize) an experience and restart the processing that didn’t occur or finish the first time by getting the tangle connected to adaptive thinking. 

It can take several sessions for EMDR to fully process a traumatic event, and, in my experience, some level of trust and relationship is needed between client and therapist. For that reason, I would likely not recommend EMDR in our first several sessions, but would get to it as fast as our relationship will allow. EMDR uses bilateral stimulation to restart the processing of an experience, and this can be accomplished through eye movement, body tapping, headphones/earbuds with bilateral sounds, or hand buzzers that alternate. 

Brainspotting

Brainspotting capitalizes on a direct pathway between eyes and brain. Where we look in space impacts how we feel, so we can use eye position to reach traumas that are otherwise difficult to get to with talk therapy. Brainspotting sessions often begin with locating a spot in the body that the client experiences as neutral calm, and this becomes a safe or “resource” spot the client can return to if feelings become overwhelming. When working with a painful memory or experience, Brainspotting helps bring the flame of arousal down so that the trauma takes its rightful place in the past, out of perpetual present-moment awareness.

In Brainspotting, the client can choose to talk or not talk – the brain can turn down the intensity without the client sharing the whole story. Brainspotting is gentle, and it acknowledges the nervous system and its overwhelm when trauma is present. The client is gently guided back to the body to notice what is happening there, and this information guides the experience. The client remains in control of direction and the therapist is available as support. I also love that mindfulness, a powerful tool in healing, is one of the key elements of Brainspotting – the therapist guides the client to observe the experience and take a non-judgmental stance on anything that arises. I appreciate that we don’t have to know or understand why Brainspotting is working in order to benefit.

Brainspotting offers hope, as many clients experience a shift in 3-5 sessions.

Pricing

I am not on insurance panels at this time but can offer you a Superbill which you can submit to your insurance carrier for possible reimbursement. A 15 minute consult can be arranged for free to determine if we are a good fit for each other.

  • Free

  • $175

  • $160

  • $240