Background

In 2007, I enrolled at the University of Integrative Learning with the goal of using the program's intellectual rigor to write a memoir centered on my experiences as a feminist singer-songwriter and organizer in Women's Music.

I did not anticipate that the very process of memoir writing would lead me away from a life in music and toward a new calling. Although I had been deeply involved in 12-step sponsorship for three decades, and was mentored by a clinical psychologist who was in recovery herself, I had considered those activities to be part of my personal life.

During the course of examining defining moments and themes in my life story, I came to view my experience, education, and skills differently. This new perspective provided me with the impetus to radically shift direction, and pursue a PhD in Counseling Psychology. My dissertation, entitled "12-Step Sponsorship and Psychotherapy: In Search of a Hybrid Modality, became the foundation for what I call integrative counseling.

I opened a practice as an integrative counselor in the San Francisco-Bay Area in 2010, with an office in Oakland. My special affinities are with individuals recovering from addictions and co-dependency, artists with creativity issues, and women in transition.