Experience

I have 14 years of experience counseling children, adults, couples and families in the Los Angeles area. 

Current work experience

I am in private practice as a Marriage and Family Therapist (license no. MFC37697) in Los Angeles, California. My clients include adults, couples, families and children. I have developed a specialty in treating children with learning disorders, AD/HD and autism spectrum disorders and I work with their families as well, to assist in parenting and adjustment issues.

I also run social skills groups for children who need a safe place to learn about and practice the often subtle social skills that can determine one's success in interacting with others. We have a lot of fun while learning these skills in a positive setting.

In the fall of 2002, I attended a workshop given by Steve Gutstein of The Connections Center in Houston.  The workshop described a new model of working on social interaction with autistic spectrum and other people of all ages, called RDI (Relationship Development Intervention).  I have learned about various models, but when I heard about this one, I felt "THIS IS IT!"

 

Accordingly, I began my training with the Connections Center in February of 2003 and in September of 2004, I became a Certified Relationship Development Intervention Consultant.  RDI is an intensive, family-based therapy that works at levels deeper than rote learning of social skills.  It seeks to provide the developmental experiences that many of these children passed by without noticing, and leads to a more natural way of relating to others and being successful at work, love and play!

Related prior work experience

For eight years, I was a counselor at the Southern California Counseling Center, a top-quality training center in Los Angeles. There, I concentrated on the treatment of individual adults with a wide range of mental health and relationship issues. I have been exposed to many schools of thoughts and modes of doing therapy; I have felt free to take the best of each and use them for the benefit of my clients as appropriate. However, my most extensive training has been in family systems theory and self-psychology.

For a year and a half, I was the school mental health counselor for a Culver City elementary school, where I assessed and treated over 80 school-age children with a wide variety of difficulties, such as anger or frustration management, adjustment to divorce/separation in family, anxiety disorders, learning disorders, neurological and autism spectrum disorders, peer relations and social skill problems, behavior disorders, family violence, etc. I love working with children!