About Alicia Patterson

As I continue to develop and mature, my commitment to this field as well as my training and experience grows. I invest in further training and education every year. In no order of importance, I hold training in Somatic Psychotherapy, Dance Movement Therapy, EMDR, Holistic Pelvic Care, Attachment Theory, Prenatal Psychology, Marriage & Family Therapy, PET-C (Practical & Experiential Therapy for Couples), Sex Therapy via AASECT sex therapists, Gestalt, Existential Therapy, Psychedelic Assisted Psychotherapy (I offer Ketamine Therapy), DBT (Dialectical Behavioral Therapy), ACT (Acceptance & Commitment Therapy), Suicide Assessment & Prevention, Severe Mental Illness Assessment & Stabilization, Multi-Cultural Competency, Motivational Interviewing, Solution Focused Brief Therapy (SFBT), Clinical Supervision, Cranial Sacral therapy & more.

Before I entered my graduate work, I completed a health coaching program with the Institute for Integrative Nutrition, taught yoga & meditation for years, and am also a licensed massage therapist which partners very well with my Somatic Counseling training. In addition to the trainings above, I draw heavily on Internal Family Systems (IFS, which is based on Gestalt which I have extensive training in for those who are looking for IFS), Accelerated Experiential Dynamic Psychotherapy (AEDP), The Gottman Method, Polyvagal Theory, the latest Neuroscience research, Transpersonal & Depth Psychology, Ancestry & Lineage focused multi-culturally competent work, and Brainspotting. I enjoy being an integrative practitioner and am not a “one modality is the answer for everyone” type of professional.

My work with couples evolved naturally from my focus on women’s health work. I eventually started seeing couples & families to help address the nuances of relationships, attachment & bonding, parenting, monogamy, marriage, fertility, and life planning. I enjoy working with couples and find the deepening of relationships a beautiful and stabilizing force in an uncertain world.

My women’s health work is geared toward extra support for the specific experience of living in a female body. Women are the center of their personal and familial universe, and when they are well, the system and their bodies can more easily thrive. The pace of our world and society can make this an on-going and tiring project that requires support. I also enjoy offering family sessions and have seen incredible fruits when families invest in getting support for the system.

In addition to the traditional counseling relationship, I offer intensive services / programs including:

- Ketamine Assisted Psychotherapy:
I think of ketamine as a fancy, short-term mood stabilizer without the sometimes tricky side effects of psychiatric medication. It can also be a very efficient tool for focused work around something specific or trauma work. Some clients who are active in psychotherapy with me engage in Ketamine work, and some clients see me specifically for Ketamine therapy and are not a long-term psychotherapy client (or perhaps they have their own psychotherapist but want to add an adjunctive treatment of KAP, this requires proper preparation but is available as long as it’s indicated and approved by the ketamine prescriber). I offer KAP in-person / in the office, in partnership with a local Holistic Prescriber and small local pharmacy. The highest quality small batch medicine / product is important. I do not offer KAP virtually or for self-use at home.

- Psychedelic Therapy Integration Support:
These sessions might be utilized as a support for clients who are working with intentional, safe, responsible psychedelic work with a facilitator and need extra support or who have gone on an intensive style retreat and can benefit from a safe landing pad in their daily life. Gentle nervous system support can be especially helpful to digest these expansive experiences.

- Therapeutic Touch Work:
Clothed, bodywork table sessions drawing on Cranial Sacral, Nervous System & Endocrine System support (informed by Chinese medicine training I did in massage school) & trauma-informed touch work. Clients with anxiety spectrum challenges / OCD / ADHD report extra benefits from this gentle approach. Being able to do this work with a trained psychotherapist who also knows your story and is trauma-informed is highly impactful.

- Nervous System Intensive Program:
I created a shorter-term, intensive program based on Polyvagal & attachment theory, breathwork, somatic movement practices, & bilateral resource work (informed by EMDR and Somatic Experiencing (SE). This program is a wonderful place to start for those who are not yet ready for the counseling relationship. Or for those who want to begin practicing somatic work and thrive on an experiential / structured program and may already have a psychotherapist who is helping with their mental health maintenance. This is best done in the office but can be offered virtually for those who want access and are too far away.

- Specialized Women’s Health Coaching Program:
Available virtually in a DIY course format. I am also willing to teach / offer this program “live” to those who prefer that and loved offering this to a group of young women who asked me to teach their group when they were in their early 20’s. Very special! This program is best for women who are ready to understand themselves more and may be at the early stages of the holistic women’s health journey and getting to know their bodies. We will engage in a structured process of psycho-education, practices & homework (almost like class), with space for process / experiential work associated with each topic, and establishing a stable foundation of health and connection with oneself. We’ll cover a variety of themes including anatomy, caring for the cycling body, emotional work, pelvic trauma recovery, lineage & ancestry, sexuality / attachment & human development, fertility tracking, and female body system care / tools. For those who are new to somatic work, some clients choose to do the nervous system program listed above as it creates a great foundation for the women’s health program and can build a foundation for this deep dive.

- Specialized Bodywork Program:
In-office. This program is best for women who know their bodies well, have built a foundation of support in life, do not need the above described program, and are ready to deepen. This might look like working with specific pelvic health symptoms / events / life transition / trauma resolution. Some clients complete one or both of the programs listed above before engaging in this bodywork process. Having a stable baseline of physiological health can help this bodywork program give the most fruits (an overly stressed system is not the best time to engage in the bodywork process as working deeply with the core can sometimes stir things up physiologically).

- Supervision:
Mentorship, and / or business development support for professionals / practitioners, I love working with practitioners. If a pre-licensed clinician wants supervision to go toward their licensure, this is a very specific and contained / structured relationship. I love offering professional support in a flexible consultation-like environment, and the official supervision of pre-licensure work is different. Please inquire to learn about both.

Please Note:
The intensive containers listed above are a different relationship and process than being an active psychotherapy client. A psychotherapy relationship is a very specific container with a certain set of important and strict ethical boundaries. Any type of intensive container work is a more brief, solution focused, heavily structured process and is not the same container of a long-term psychotherapy relationship or being on a licensed practitioner’s “active psychotherapy caseload”. Please inquire to discuss my services and different options. We’ll find the right path for you. While I have general protocols and processes I follow, all intensive programs are curated specifically to you and your goals. Intensive programs are typically completed over the course of about 3 months, though some have worked with me for 6 months or longer once we develop a relationship.

When I’m Not In The Office

Professionalism is one of my top core values. I hold strong values around working in a caregiving profession and have had a full working life for my entire adult career path. That said, I maintain a full and active life outside of my work and believe we need to prioritize a multi-faceted approach to our health in order to maintain our capacity for a long thriving life. When I’m not in my office, I enjoy time with friends and family, beloved pets, playing all types of racket sports, and am very partial to the beach. Part of my time outside work is maintaining strong personal practices to ensure that my work as a support professional is sustainable. I always tell my client, my field of work keeps me healthy. If I am not well, I am not able to show up my best and I prioritize my own health and stability as #1. I also prioritize continued studies that drive my evolution and development as a practitioner and find great fulfillment in this part of life.

Credentials:

Education & Licensure:
Mount Saint Mary’s University, B.A.
Naropa University, M.A. & Faculty in 2014
Boulder Massage Therapy Institute, Certification of Completion & Faculty in 2018
LPC - Licensed Professional Counselor, 2016 - present
LMT - Licensed Massage Therapist, 2017 - present
R-DMT - Registered Dance Movement Therapist, 2013 - present

I’ve been working in human services in some capacity since 2008. As I grew my private practice, I honed my skills in emergency rooms providing psychiatric evaluations alongside working in the hospital psychiatric inpatient unit, private residential treatment, community mental health crisis services, and a small trauma-informed agency. As a younger professional, I worked in an autism preschool classroom in one of the most robust school counties in Maryland (Montgomery County), for the orthopedic surgery practice for years in the Washington D.C. area, and with inner-city healthcare staffing in Baltimore, MD. I also worked for a small startup in the digital marketing field before the internet became what it is today. I enjoy visiting classrooms and speaking with students in training as well as mentoring professionals and working with practitioners as clients. I am a strong advocate for mental health awareness, especially in our country today as suicide awareness has gotten more and more prevalent. I strive to contribute to the field gaining needed attention amongst our society that still has old school taboos about mental health. I maintain strong professional and supervision relationships. I've been affiliated with the ADTA American Dance Therapy Association since 2011, served on the board for the Rocky Mountain Chapter of the ADTA as president and other roles for years, and follow ACA (American Counseling Association) guidelines. I’ve been very involved & engaged in my career in a wide variety of settings and feel my experience and exposure is invaluable.

Frequently Asked Questions:

- What does this process entail?
Sessions look different depending on the circumstances and needs of each client and can be difficult to describe what it always looks like. We will begin with a few history taking sessions which is always an evaluation and does not qualify as active treatment. After we assess if we are a good fit to work together, we’ll work toward establishing a strong relationship and goal setting, followed by meeting regularly to discover ways to support you to find a more fulfilling life and reduce suffering. In couples and family work, we strive to create mutual understanding, improve communication, implement respectful engagement protocols, and establish agreements / shared goals. I love working in the office with clients but am also happy to offer virtual work. Many clients enjoy working together virtually for the comfort, quiet, convenience of their own space in addition to avoiding driving in busy areas. Some clients come into the office and do some virtual in a kind of hybrid way of working together. Though in-person connection is indeed different than being on a device, I find tele-health works just as well for some clients and I feel confident & comfortable offering telehealth services. I even do EMDR virtually, and am happy to offer the flexibility as I know a post 2020 life looks different for many people now in terms of schedule / work / travel, etc.

- Cadence and frequency:
Again, there’s no general standard and it truly looks different for everyone. Generally, most clients engage in consistent meetings for therapy for 6 months and sometimes more. An intensive container is typically 3 months though I have worked with some of those clients for longer as well. This process of establishes a strong relationship as a foundation can allow deeper flourishing of the process. Many clients maintain weekly meetings, and some every other week. Once a month is “maintenance” in the psychotherapy field to support thriving and maintenance is appropriate for those who are stable, doing well, and just want a witness / therapeutic professional in their life as an investment. For those who are in distress, at times I have seen clients twice per week if I have the capacity for that and we are in an established therapeutic relationship. At times, a small amount of sessions can provide the needed tools and results happen quickly, more swift than perhaps expected. I’ve seen some clients for an intensive period of 3 months, and some have stayed connected or active for over a decade. Having a witness in life, a strong bond with one person who stays with you, is part of a value system for some clients. Intensive programs offer the value of seeing someone who is a trained therapeutic professional, but in a container of a set number of sessions designed around education / structure / specific exercises / tools. Please inquire about the difference between psychotherapy and working together in an intensive program.

- Results:
I am always wanting you to gain results and tools as well as feel better. Sometimes we feel a little ruffled before we get relief and that requires patience. Over time, ideally, we support you to find homeostasis, physiological balance, and stability within yourself and your support system & resources. Developing this can take some time and it depends on the circumstance / history. This is a process of fortifying oneself and building inner ground which can feel hard to do in today’s world. Sometimes, in the current culture, people are looking for a miracle, a quick fix, the next thing that will work magic. While a variety of modalities and exploring is always supported, sometimes we need to commit, slow down, and orient toward the long road. Awakening your deepest intelligence is a practice and can take time, but eventually it should bring centeredness and ground to your life. Sometimes change is experienced fast and it takes time for it to last. At other times, it can take extended time for change to show up but when it does, the roots goes deep and a whole new foundation is created. I know this journey in my own life and body, and I know what it looks like in people after all of my experience. Having a partner with you to help you track and witness your inner world is a specific resource.

- Payment: Participating in this process asks us to place your well-being as top priority. This includes a financial investment. When we work together, we both commit resources, which symbolizes your health as a core value in life. I am committed to offering payment schedules which are manageable for clients and integrated into the goals of our work together. As a licensed psychotherapist, I provide statements which you can submit to your health plan. I do not participate directly with insurance carriers through my private work. I accept Cash App to avoid fees and Ivy Pay (payment app for therapists which adds a 2.75% payment processing fee). Please inquire to discuss options. There is no insurance coverage for intensive programs except at times your insurance may reimburse you for Ketamine Assisted Psychotherapy, all other intensive programs are private pay and not considered a psychotherapy service (psychotherapy services are medically billed under license and that’s the superbill / statement that I can provide you for reimbursement that you will handle with your insurance plan on your end).