“Be who you are and say what you feel because those who mind don‘t matter and those that matter don’t mind.”
– Dr. Seuss
About Faye
I have over 33 years of experience working with individuals couples, families, adolescents.
My approach in therapy is to first engage in a process of discovery. As your therapist, we will work together to discover what events, situations, and relationships in your life or your past do not work for you now.It is really important to understand how your life works in order to set goals and create change. Most importantly, it is important to remember that change affects all the people in your life.
Education
- Bachelor’s Degrees from the University of Colorado in English Literature and Religious Studies
- Master’s Degree in Counseling from the University of Colorado
- Nationally Certified Modern Psychoanalyst-Colorado Center for Modern Psychoanalysis
Specialized Training
- Family Therapy
- Adolescent Therapy
- Couples Therapy
- Play Therapy
- Filial Therapy (Parent and Child and Family Play Therapy)
- Cognitive Behavioral Therapy
- Dialectical Behavioral Therapy
- Substance Abuse
- Eating Disorders
- Suicide Prevention–Director of Second Wind Fund of Boulder County
- Money and Emotions
- Pet Therapy
Associations
- American Counseling Association
- National Association for the Advancement of Psychoanalysis
- Licensed Professional Counselor-State of Colorado
- Member of the Financial Therapy Association
Services
“With adversity comes opportunity”
from the I Ching- Or Book of Changes
The decision to seek therapy can be due to times of stress or the desire to seek change. We know that change is not always a straight path. To take a “road less traveled” can be filled with a beautiful river that flows and leads to clarify or it be a be a river filled with large boulders that you need to traversed with help and support. Therapy can be a tool that facilitates resilience and transformation.
Individual Therapy
This is a collaborative process that aims to facilitate change and improve one’s quality of life. Therapy can help people confront barriers that interfere with emotional and mental well-being, and it can also increase positive feelings such as kindness, confidence, love, courage, and peace. Many people find they gain enormous self-awareness and continue therapy as a process of self-discovery, self-growth and to improve communication skills.
I find that individual therapy can be a useful tool for the following:
- Depression, anxiety, mood swings
- Traumatic experience
- Loneliness, alienation
- Excess anger, frustration
- Abuse or obsession with food, alcohol, drugs
- Self-Harming Behavior
- Communication Skills training
- Stress
Adolescent Therapy
One of my favorites books is called “Yes Your Teen is Crazy” by Michael Bradley. He often speaks about how the brain of the teen is temporarily imbalanced. Adolescence is a very turbulent time. It is filled with twists and turns, passion and excitement, dangers, challenges, difficulties and mood swings.
In my practice, I approach adolescence as a time of natural upheavals and imbalance. As parents and mental health professionals, we also must learn the tools of surfing through these turbulent waters to learn the art of compromise and no-drama conversation.
However, there are times when your child might need guidance and some assistance. If the scope of the problem is deeper and is causing some self-harm, destructive patterns of interacting with friends and family and serious struggles with untreated mental illness therapy could be enormously helpful.
If there is an imbalance in these needs, other areas of treatment could be the following:
- Depression
- Mood Swings
- Destructive Friendships
- Acting-Out Behavior
- Eating Disorders
- Impulse Control
- ADHD & ADD
- School Anxiety
- Social Anxiety
- Parent and Child Conflict
- Treatment after hospital release from inpatient
- Issues with planning, organization and achieving goals
Family Therapy
For family therapy to be successful, it is essential for all family members to commit to actively engage, explore, and develop shared goals for treatment. It is my belief that these shared goals are built by a trust in my skills, competence and understanding that change happens not through breaking down walls but by finding a way through the wall. As a family we develop ways of communicating and interacting that worked for us in the past but are no longer optimal. When this happens, we may need to reeducate our family to more positive ways of interacting. Other areas of treatment could include Child Counseling and Parent and Child Counseling.
Family Therapy can also be useful in the following areas:
- Grief
- Substance Abuse
- Mental or Medical diagnosis
- Separation, divorce or blended family adjustment
- Financial issues
- Job loss
- Life transition
Child Therapy and/or Parent and Child Therapy
In my office, your child will find Lego sets, games, Polly Pockets, doll houses, puppets, kitchen items, GI Joes, truck and cars and art therapy tools. Toys are the tools of childhood and children do not always have language for emotions. I use the tools to create an atmosphere of comfort and trust.
We might work on school issues such as bullying, academic performance or communication with parents or care givers.
With young children, I oftentimes use a technique called Filial Therapy. Filial Therapy is a treatment method of play therapy that includes family members. Oftentimes children do not feel comfortable without the parent in the office. Through the use of group play called Filial Therapy, the parent learns tools as well as the child to listen and verbalize emotional language. They discover new paths towards a resolution of the difficulties bringing them into treatment.
- Adjustment to issues that cause anxiety such as new sibling, new school and move
- Loss
- Fears
- Peer Difficulties
- School Avoidance or school Performance
- Parent and Child Issues
- Executive Functioning
- ADHD and ADD
Couples Therapy
Relationships are often complicated. Family patterns of interacting can be sometimes helpful and sometimes unhelpful. One’s family of origin often can have a strong influence on the way we related to our partners, friends and family. Couples therapy can be a strategy of “unpacking” family patterns of relating. When these narratives of the couple clash, a facilitator can help the them get on the same page when they are working through issues of decision making, conflict resolution and parenting. Other areas of treatment could be the following:
- Premarital Therapy
- Substance Abuse
- Parenting Issues
- Conflict Stemming from Financial Problems
- Infidelity
- Infertility
- Job Loss
Financial Therapy & Coaching
Oftentimes our conversation about money with our spouse, parents and children cause a great deal of conflict. Talking about money and finances is hard and money talk does not always feel safe. Difficulties can arise around spending too much, stinginess and making purchases. Through the years of economic turmoil, I have spent the therapy time in my practice dealing with issues related to money. Every family and couple must understand how money plays into their lives.
Office
4350 Drew Cir, Boulder, CO 80305
Oliver and Roxanne are both my office and therapy assistants. You will most likely be greated by Oliver as you go through the gate on the left side of my home office.
Let me know ahead of time if you are uncomfortable around dogs, and I will make sure they are not there for your session.
