7 simple (yet powerful) ways to stand out in the crowd and get more clients!

      Guest author: Deb Legge, PhD, CRC, LMHC                 If you are holding off on your marketing efforts because you feel you haven’t found that “MAGICAL" thing that will get you noticed, here’s a secret you should know… “Magic” comes in many forms! As a mental …

Men and Trauma: 5 Dynamic, Solution-Focused Questions to Use in Therapy

Guest Author: Daniel Lawson, LMHC, CASAC             “I am not what happened to me, I am what I choose to become.” -  Karl Jung Jung penned these words in 1965, and I find myself returning to them often in my work. The intention of this blog post is to provide …

When Veterans and Their Families Come for Help: What Service Providers Need to Know

Guest author: Erica Zulawski, MS, LMSW Through my personal and professional experience with veterans, I have come to understand the unique needs and challenges some male and female veterans experience when readjusting to civilian life. Many veterans say that the military has forever changed them, especially if deployed to areas of combat or conflict. When …

Got Barriers? Improving Access to Mental Health Care for Children and Adolescents

Guest author: Melanie Washington, MSW, MPH, PhD    If it were not for social work interventions I had as a child, my life trajectory may have been completely different.  I am eternally grateful for those individuals who, with moderate intervention, helped to shape the individual that I am today and be a part of what …

Behind the Human Curtain: The Courage to Look

Wow…I was blown away when I read In the Ogre’s Lair: Seeing Light in Shadow by J. Scott Janssen, LCSW, in The New Social Worker Magazine. Scott tells a powerful story of helping a challenging client who was hiding behind his ‘curtain’, behind a very big and intimidating wall. What a blessing it was for …

Improving the System for Our Loved Ones: A Mother’s View of Addiction and Services

Guest author: name withheld for confidentiality The day before Christmas, I received a phone call from my oldest son asking me to pick him up on a downtown corner in a risky neighborhood. He gets in the car wearing sunglasses even though the day is dark and cloudy.  My inner alarm sounds and my heart …

Hoarding: the complex slide into clutter blindness

Hoarding is a personal and/or professional issue for many of us. Some have a gift for viewing it compassionately. For others, especially when confronted by family members who are hoarding, it can create revulsion, horror, anger and great sadness for their lack of quality of life. Children may grow up experiencing shame and trauma from …

Perfectionism: stalker, hunter, destroyer

Perfectionism, with its burden of dysfunction, guilt and shame, is not always just a client issue. As therapists, supervisors and other human service professionals, we need to be self-aware if this stalker lives within our own mind and body. We cannot help others heal if perfectionism has us by the throat. It will choke our …

EMDR- rapid healing of “small t” and “big T” trauma

The beginning of the end… I recently received a new, unexpected diagnosis when I went to a skilled EMDR  therapist for help with chronic pain: Post-traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD- DSM-IV definition and PTSD DSM-5 definition). Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR) is an evidence-based treatment for trauma developed by Francine Shapiro, PhD.  I have a less severe form …

Therapeutic Relationships: What more do you need?

I spent a day with Scott D. Miller, PhD, watching him training people on the power of the therapeutic relationship and how to assess client satisfaction and outcomes with performance metrics for session and outcome rating tools. Since then,  I have been fascinated by the healing power of the therapeutic relationship and its relationship to …