Psychoanalytic

Psychoanalysis is an intense and life changing type of therapy that will help you get a deeper sense of who you are. Psychoanalysis will help you uncover and explore inner conflicts and coping mechanisms that are out of your awareness. This emotional knowledge will help create long- lasting personal transformation. Psychoanalysis requires a commitment of at least three sessions per week for a long term.

Why psychodynamic/analytic therapy? The here and now psychotherapy relationship opens a stunning window into past, present, and future; into the deep wisdom of the unconscious; and into a creative flexibility that brings more and more wholesomeness, freedom, intimacy, and flourishing of the soul. I have doctoral and postdoctoral training in various contemporary analytic approaches, and I practice from a liberatory, feminist, relational stance.

I specialize in Jungian Psychoanalytical Therapy model. I facilitate my clients to understand the root causes of their behaviors, negative beliefs related to childhood and relationships. I teach concepts and tools for building a strong confident Self, awareness of Shadows and complexes, and teach Integration for Psychological Wholeness and Full Individuation.

Attachment Theory and Relational psychology has its roots in Kleinian, Winnicottian, Lacanian, Intersubjective psychologies and the sciences of neurobiology and neuropsychology. Attachment and Relational work explores development in early and important relationships, how that influences our perception of self and others in relationships, and it's impacts. (See John Bowlby, Mary Ainsworth, Mary Main, Donald Winnicott, and more recently, Philip M. Bromberg, Thomas Ogden, Christopher Bollas.)

While many psychoanalytic concepts can feel dated, psychoanalysis has grown up and can be incredibly helpful. For example, psychoanalysis has great respect for the influence that our past has on our present and on our future. It gives us tools for thinking about how our minds take in information and how we make use of it. Perhaps most importantly, psychoanalysis has great respect for our unconscious minds and seeks to help us understand what might be going on "underneath the surface."

I completed a four-year full-time training in psychoanalysis at the Psychoanalytic Psychotherapy Study Center of New York in 2001, including Freudian, ego psychology, object relations, interpersonal, self psychology, modern, intersubjective and relational (my ultimate focus) approaches.

The current versions of psychoanalytic therapy all examine how a person’s mind works and affects their view of themselves and the world they live in. One central focus is that unconscious factors affect current relationships and behaviors. Psychoanalysis changed since Freud founded it. I focus on how the ways trauma and attachment are central to understanding how the mind works and impacts current thinking, feeling, and behaving, as in my new book, Traumatic Experiences of Normal Development.

We cannot help but be shaped by our past experiences, and oftentimes, we are unaware of how those effects are showing up in our patterns of behavior and thinking. I focus on connecting dots between past and present experiences to offer you possible answers to questions you may ask yourself such as, "why am I like this?"

By "psychoanalytic therapy," I mean that my work is influenced by Contemporary Relational Psychoanalysis. Unfortunately, psychoanalysis has picked up somewhat of a negative reputation along the way! While I agree that many psychoanalytic concepts feel dated and don't speak to many of us, there are also many valuable ideas that are very helpful. For example, psychoanalysis has great respect for the idea that our past has an impact on our present and on our future, even though we may not remember the exact details. It also gives us tools for thinking about how our minds take in information and how we make use of it.

Maria graduated from Alliant International University with a Master of Arts in Marital and Family Therapy (Accredited by the American Association for Marriage and Family Therapy). Where she learned many trainings on different treatment modalities such as psychoanalytic.

We approach therapy through a contemporary psychoanalytic lens to understand what is being communicated through one's behaviors and understand how past experiences are influencing current relationships. As we form our relationships we have found that individuals develop deeper insight, aiding with a deeper understanding of themselves, and experiencing more lasting and sustainable relief.

Under this umbrella falls many theories and approaches such as : object relations and modern psychoanalysis. Object relations is in a nutshell you relate to others including partners how your caregiver related to you. We all strive for perfection but it is really about being "good enough". Modern psychoanalysis is focusing on protecting from self attacks and self-sabotage. (cue Bestie Boys music). The therapist job is to have the client "say everything."

Psychoanalysis basically means a kind of talk therapy that helps you discover the deepest core meaning to you behaviors, emotions, and problems. Often these reasons are deep in the unconscious or outside of your awareness. We work together to help figure out what those unconscious things are so you have more control over them.

Let me help you untangle some of what is going through your mind, and help you find hidden meanings and thought patterns to your awareness and reframe them.

Carefully listening to the conflicts and desires hidden within your story, through which we can establish new ways for you to live and thrive.