In “A Conversation With Dr. Jessica Byrd-Olmstead, PhD: Part One” we talked about Dr. Byrd-Olmstead’s journey to private practice, and left off as she began to talk about the challenge – and excitement – of leaving a salaried job to focus on her own private practice full time. This article picks up the conversation right […]

Dr. Jessica Byrd-Olmstead is a licensed psychologist in the Bay Area treating adolescents, adults, and their families. Currently, she’s president of the Santa Clara Psychological Association. In addition to psychotherapy, she provides training and consultation to organizations in both the public and private sectors. She advocates at state and federal levels for improved psychological services […]

According to NAMI, any traumatic event can trigger a psychotic episode. Car accidents. War. Violent assaults. Terrorism. Physical abuse. Sexual abuse or extreme neglect. However, certain events are more highly linked to psychosis. Experiencing a natural disaster and seeing someone killed or injured are both traumas that have been shown to induce psychosis in many […]

With school doors still shuttered due to COVID-19, most teachers and school counselors have been forced to shift to online formats. But there are some schools that have been online since day one, and their staff members have a thing or two to teach the rest of the world. Valencia Johnson, M.S./P.P.S., is the academic […]

With schools closed due to the COVID-19 pandemic, high school counselors are in a strange position: They need to keep tabs on their students’ mental health, but they’re forced to do so from afar. So how have they been managing this difficult feat? And what lessons have they learned – so far – from the […]

What is burnout? Burnout is a state of physical, emotional, and mental exhaustion caused by exposure to long-term stressors in one’s profession. Dr. Christina Maslach, a burnout expert and a professor at the University of California-Berkeley, is the creator of the Maslach Burnout Inventory. In her research, she finds that burnout is particularly common in […]

With schools closed due to the COVID-19 pandemic, high school counselors are in a strange position: They need to keep tabs on their students, but they’re forced to do so from afar. And when it comes to underserved youth, the situation is even more difficult. Alejandra “Ali” Cortes, MA, MFTI, is the Clinical Youth Outreach Worker […]

The New Normal – For Now Yoni Lichtman, LMFT, is a teacher and school counselor at Valley Torah High School (VTHS), a private all-boys high school in Los Angeles, California. Like other schools around the state, COVID-19 forced VTHS classes to shift all classes to an online format. We were very curious to learn what […]

We’re in the midst of a global pandemic. It’s a big deal. But it doesn’t change the fact that teenagers all over the country still need intensive treatment for mental health and substance use disorders. In light of the current regulations, most therapists have shifted over to teletherapy. Likewise, since adolescent intensive outpatient programs (IOP) […]

Families around the U.S. are adapting to a new normal. Not just one new normal, but new patterns in almost every area of life: how they shop, how they work, how they spend free time, how they exercise, and how they maintain relationships with friends and extended family. They’re also adapting to how their kids […]

People often think therapists don’t have the same kind of problems the rest of us have. They have all the coping mechanisms at their disposal, so they should be fine – right? But the truth is that more than three-quarters of psychologists acknowledge experiencing distress in their personal lives. And almost forty percent say that […]

Disruptive mood dysregulation disorder, or DMDD, is a relatively new psychiatric disorder described in the latest edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Behavioral Disorder (DSM-V, 2013). The diagnosis was created for children with behavioral symptoms that overlap with oppositional defiant disorder (ODD), bipolar disorder, and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), but do not […]

Your client is upset about something or another. You know you have to validate. But did you know there are six levels of validation, according to Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT)? DBT developer Dr. Marsha Linehan identified six ways to validate another person, with each level increasing in difficulty. The higher the level, the more intensely […]

Meet Carolina, DBT Therapist at Evolve—and a Nike-Affiliated Athlete Evolve prides itself on its dedicated staff. Often, our clinicians are experts not only in their field of mental health, but in other areas as well. One such example is Carolina Dozal, primary therapist at Evolve Vanalden in Tarzana, California. Dozal attended the University of California-San […]

Many teen treatment centers offer Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT). But some treatment centers specify that they are “Comprehensive,” while others note that they are “DBT-informed.” What’s the difference? When Dr. Marsha Linehan developed Dialectical Behavior Therapy in the 1980s, she delineated four components of treatment. These four treatment delivery requirements were originally meant to be […]