I’m a therapist because I’m a caregiver. I grew up in Poland, very close to my grandmother whose empathy I always admired. Whether bringing a treat to a sick neighbor or going with a friend to their doctor’s appointment, she was always concerned about the wellbeing of others. That natural inclination to care for those around her not only provided relief to them; it also created a sense of community that was heartwarming. In the 90s, as a teenager, I moved to the USA with my parents and quickly started to volunteer for a summer camp for families affected by the HIV/AIDS epidemic: Camp Viva. There I had firsthand experience of the need for mental health to help people cope with the devastating psychological effects of an HIV/AIDS diagnosis. Here the general attitude my grandmother had instilled in me took concrete form: to provide adequate care I had to study mental health and the strategies to achieve it. Thus begins my professional journey.

In graduate school, my training focused on psychodynamic and interpersonal approaches to psychotherapy. This is the foundation of my approach, which I quickly had to draw on when, after graduation, I worked for a community mental-health clinic. There I provided therapy for adults and children who had experienced trauma resulting from sexual abuse. Later on, I worked for a family-therapy program at a large child welfare organization, first as a therapist and then as a supervisor. There I became familiar with systems theory and structural family therapy, which allowed me to effectively assess problems in the family structure that led to adolescent mental-health problems. Finally, I worked as a clinical consultant for multi-systemic therapy (MST), a model that focuses on the adolescent’s close relations as the most effective path to stabilization and ultimately to healing. There I gained vast experience in couples therapy, helping couples with problems around intimacy and trust that often impacted their parenting.

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