Michele Passman (she/her)

I have worked in residential and outpatient settings for close to 10 years in which clients struggle with a variety of substance use disorders and co-occurring mental health disorders. Every recovery process looks different, and I will work with my client on an individual basis to identify the best treatment plan depending on your recovery goals. I have experience and knowledge in harm reduction, Medication Assisted Treatment, and abstinence.

Anxiety will present differently to everyone. I have worked with clients 18+ who are trying to cope with anxiety. There is no perfect treatment for anxiety and I work with each client to identify different tools and techniques that work most effectively for them.

Depression can create significant difficulties in peoples’ lives. Utilizing individual therapy sessions to process through depression and other life difficulties, people can often find a decrease in symptoms. Once there is a decrease in symptoms, clients can continue to work on developing tools to cope with future negative or uncomfortable feelings.

CBT has been found to be a successful treatment for individuals struggling with many life issues. We can actually change how we think and feel. We will identify a triggering event, the automatic thought, and the feelings associated with that thought. We will then work to change the negative automatic thought into a more positive one, where we can then start to identify the neutral or positive thought that follows.

I have utilized DBT with clients who may be confused by the spectrum of their emotions, and struggle to cope with their thoughts and feelings. The four tenets of DBT are mindfulness, emotional regulation, distress tolerance, and interpersonal effectiveness. By developing skills within those four areas, you can learn to effectively manage your emotions while acknowledging the validity of those emotions.

Mindfulness is the practice of staying in the moment and letting go of judgements of ourselves and others. We can often find ourselves projecting into the future, which can cause anxiety, depression, fear, etc. By developing or enhancing techniques such as guided meditation, you can reset your mind into staying in the present moment.