My Background

My first career was working as a paramedic where I first learned to deeply empathize with others in the most difficult of circumstances. I have been a student of human potential for my entire adult life and desired to study human transformation after a peak experience in 2007 when the “parking brake” that was holding me back in life was released and I caught a powerful glimpse of the psychological potential in everyone.

I have studied everything I could get my hands on as far as eastern and western meditative approaches. After exhausting this search, I realized that psychotherapy has found its footing as a powerful force of change in the new millennium.

Using new neurosciences, attachment theory, trauma approaches, inter-relational approaches, emotional neuroscience, and somatic (body experiential) forms of therapy, psychotherapy is becoming more effective and efficient at deep and lasting change than the older (meditative/spiritual) approaches to change.

I studied many experiential psychotherapies and am currently being mentored by master psychotherapists in a particular school of therapy in the Maryland and D.C. regions.

I work constantly on my own mental health and growth as well, and I never practice interventions with a client that I have not experienced myself.

My Services

I provide intensive psychotherapeutic services for adults 18 years and up.

My focus is individual psychotherapy combined with a human potential focus,  with difficult emotional experience and yielding positive emotional and relational experiences.

I work with the goal to go beyond reduction in symptoms to making the way for human flourishing and deeply pro-social existence with others.

I believe that psychotherapy is not simply working with mental disease and pathology, but about transforming to the degree that others can live a life outside of the fight/flight/freeze states of stress, trauma and reactivity to realize who one truly is beyond our past conditioning.

My Specific Approach and What to Expect

I consider my school of psychotherapy to be a gentle experiential way of working towards change. This means that I work in the moment in a deeply mindful manner. I create a space where everything about the other is accepted and validated without any judgement.

I do not believe change and transformation can begin to happen unless the normal stresses and anxieties of a client’s everyday life are lessened or ceased, so that the psychotherapeutic space can feel good, and comfortable.

Thus, I do not simply talk at a client. I work to slow down with and regulate a client’s anxieties and negative emotions so as to cultivate this space where what is difficult can be tolerated so that deep work can happen.

I work with almost surgical precision to assess my client’s anxieties and ability to handle the next step or intervention. I never force anything and always ask permission to try new things or explore new areas.

The most I expect from clients is a willingness to explore their edge of change to the degree that this is possible and I will help with the rest.

Telemental Health

I am offering telemental health video sessions over the internet both to supplement clients who may have difficulties attending sessions in person on a regular basis and for anyone living in Maryland (telemental health can only be used state wide so far for legal purposes) who may live too far away to come to my office in Catonsville.

My work is heavily influenced by:

  • Trauma theory
  • Attachment Theory
  • New frontiers of neuroscience on the human change process
  • Positive Psychology, the psychology of human potential
  • The places where neurology meets psychotherapy
  • Creative methods of art and other multimedia approaches

Late Cancellation and No-Show Policy

I charge $15.00 for a late cancellation which is defined as cancelling less than six hours before the appointment.

For a no-show, which is not calling about cancelling 30 minutes into the scheduled session, I charge $15.00 for the first time and $70.00 after that.

The exceptions are medical, mental health, and other emergencies such as family emergencies. Note that this applies for private insurance as it is not legal to charge these fees for medicaid insurance.

*There is always an option for automated email and text reminders that occur 24 hours ahead of session. Simply request if you would prefer email, text or both*

My Professional Stance

Most psychotherapists tend to be high in the personality trait of openness. Meaning they can create a relational space that is not one sided sympathy or judgmental, but open and empathetic and compassionate.

My stance makes this more explicit where the relational space is cultivated to help create new and corrective experiences where a client can possibly be heard and felt and understood in ways they may never have experienced in the past. This is especially true for childhood trauma where many children in abusive or neglected early family environments lack the experience of truly being heard, seen, and felt by the other.

Additionally, I see my stance with a client as more dynamic than simply being a psychotherapist.
I dynamically move between being a therapist to a coach and then more of a peer facilitator and back and forth.

There are times when I need to be more directive and assisting with understanding which I consider the therapist stance.

Next, when the work deepens, I become a coach to stay with the deepening and change experience.

Less often but equally as powerful, we may find ourselves as simply peers where I’m facilitating in a more passive and listening manner while we are in awe of where we ended up together and the power differential seems to vanish.