Self Blame and the Internal Critic: Overcoming the Tyranny of "Shoulds" You Impose on Yourself

Many people have such a strong internal critic that they feel overwhelmed by that self blaming part of themselves.  The internal critic imposes so many "shoulds" that it becomes emotionally and physically exhausting.

Self Blame and the Internal Critic

For many people, this internal critic is so strong that it stops them from even starting a new endeavor because they know in advance that they'll be overwhelmed by self criticism.  It feels safer to just stick with what's familiar than risk the tyranny of "shoulds" they impose on themselves.

The Internal Critic Can Show Up in Any Area of Your Life
For some people, the internal critic comes up in specific areas, like their physical appearance.

For those people, just looking in the mirror can be emotionally painful as the internal critic criticizes their physical appearance, often in very distorting ways.

For other people, the internal critic comes up, not just in specific areas, but in most areas of their life, no matter what they're doing.

Parts Work Combined with the Mind-Body Connection in Therapy to Overcome the Internal Critic
Parts work in therapy has many different names, including ego state therapy, internal family systems, and so on.

Parts work combined with the mind-body connection can be a very effective way to overcome the internal critic.

Self Blame and the Internal Critic

Using parts work and mind-body therapy, like Somatic Experiencing, the therapist can help facilitate the identification of the different internal aspects of self (or parts) that are affecting the client, including the internal critic.

Parts work is non-pathologizing, so that all the parts are recognized as having a good intention of wanting to preserve the self, but the parts might be going about it in a skewed way.

Here's an example of a client struggling with a strong internal critic and how a combination of parts work and mind-body therapy helped.  As always, this is a composite of many cases with all identifying information changed:

Nina
When Nina came to therapy, she was nearly paralyzed by self blame.  In almost every situation in her life, she had self blaming thoughts like, "You should have done it this way instead of that way" or "You shouldn't try that--you're just going to fail."

Before she could embark on any new endeavor, like a new job or a new project, she had to do battle with all her negative thoughts.  It was mentally, emotionally and physically exhausting.

Nina was aware that she grew up in a home where both of her parents were highly critical of her and of themselves. So, she knew she internalized this critical part of herself from an early age.  But just knowing this wasn't enough to change it, which is often the case with problems like this.

Helping Nina to get into a relaxed state, I asked her to recall a memory when she felt the internal critic as being especially strong.

Nina remembered how she felt when she moved to NYC from her small hometown in the Midwest to attend college in NY.

She remembered being plagued with negative thoughts about how she would never make it in NY, including the thought, "You should stay home and go to the local college.  You'll never measure up to the other students in NYC."

We continued to work with this self blaming part to try to understand what its intention was.

Before I go on, I should explain that looking at the internal critic this way is a symbolic way of making it come alive in an accessible way.

Rather than just thinking about the thoughts, we explored the internal critic almost as if it was a person.  After a while, Nina was also able to identify where she sensed the internal critic in her body, including a tightening in her throat and in her stomach.

Using parts work and the mind-body connection (i.e., identifying where the feeling is sensed in the body) helped Nina to continue to explore the feeling more deeply.

After a while, what she discovered was that the internal critic really did have a good intention, which was to keep her from getting hurt.  So, for instance, when it told her that she should stay home instead of moving to NYC to attend college, this part held a lot of fear and its intention was to keep Nina safe.

The problem was that, even though the internal critic's intention was good, the way it expressed itself was critical and damaging.  So, we worked towards helping that part to be more balanced in its expression.

With practice, instead of being critical, Nina learned to soften this part's expression so that it could evaluate in a more balanced way instead of being critical.

Of course, this takes a lot of work because the internal critic doesn't develop overnight and it takes a while to change.

As Nina became more aware when the internal critic was operating, she asked herself, "What's the intention of this part?  What is it trying to do?"

By looking at the internal critic in this way, Nina learned that there were times when the internal critic had something of value to express but, as mentioned before, it was expressing it in a skewed way.  Nina could stand back and look at her negative thoughts (the internal critic) and use her judgment to assess when to pay attention and when to gently put the thought aside.

Doing Parts Work and Mind-Body Psychotherapy
Parts work combined with mind-body psychotherapy is a gentle process.  We're never trying to squelch or get rid of a part.  Instead, we're recognizing that the part usually has a good intention, but there's a distortion involved and the part needs to be modified in a way so that it's more balanced.

Parts work helps with many different aspects of yourself.  It can be an angry part, a sad part, a fearful part, and so on.

Parts work combined with mind-body psychotherapy helps you to recognize how many different aspects of yourself are involved in you, and how the different parts can manifest at various times and in different ways.

It also helps to explain why you might feel many different feelings at the same time.  Before you recognize that you have many different aspects of self, this can be confusing.

Mind-body psychotherapy and parts work work well together in combination in dealing with difficult parts.

Getting Help in Therapy
If you feel overwhelmed by self blame that comes from a harsh internal critic, you could benefit from working with a therapist who does parts work and mind-body psychotherapy, like Somatic Experiencing.

If you work through the issues involved with your internal critic, it's possible to feel a heavy burden being lifted from you and you'll feel freer to live your life.

About Me
I am a licensed New York City psychotherapist, hypnotherapist, EMDR and Somatic Experiencing therapist who works with individual adults and couples.

To find out more about me, visit my website: Josephine Ferraro, LCSW - NYC Psychotherapist.

To set up a consultation, call me at (917) 742-2624 during business hours or email me.

Discovering That Sadness is Often Hidden Underneath Anger

People are often surprised to discover that when they deal with their anger in therapy, underneath their anger is sadness.

While this phenomenon might not be true for everyone, as a psychotherapist in NYC, I've seen that underlying sadness or grief is often the underlying emotion for many people who experience a lot of anger.

Sadness is Often Hidden Underneath Anger

Anger Feels Easier To Deal For Many People Compared to Feeling Sadness
Many people find it easier to be angry than to be sad.  Feeling angry makes them feel more empowered as compared to feeling sad, which feels disempowering.

So, anger often becomes a cover up for sadness when people feel uncomfortable dealing with their sadness.

Let's look at the following example, which, as always, is a composite of many cases to protect confidentiality:

Mark:
Mark's wife urged him to come to therapy because he was snapping at her and their children.

Mark recognized that he had a problem with anger, but he wasn't sure what to do about it.  He came to therapy reluctantly at first.

Mark, who was in his mid-30s, had never been to therapy before.  Prior to coming to therapy, he thought that only people who had serious mental illness came to therapy, so I provided Mark with psychoeducation about therapy, which included common reasons why people came to therapy.  He was surprised that many people came to therapy for problems that were similar to his problems.

When we went over his family history, he realized that his parents didn't deal with their emotions.  Not only did no one at home talk about how they felt, but talking about emotions was actually discouraged.  So, Mark never learned how to deal with his emotions.  Instead, he stuffed his feelings, and he was hardly aware, at any given time, what he was feeling.

Identifying Emotions
The first step in our work together was helping Mark identify his emotions.  At first, he was able to only identify in a very general way uncomfortable and comfortable feelings, but nothing specific.  This was a good start.

The Mind-Body Connection in Therapy
I worked with Mark to identify where in his body he was feeling his comfortable and uncomfortable feelings.  This was completely new to Mark because he was somewhat cut off from what he felt in his body.

Just learning to sense into his body was a big step.  This took time because Mark felt like he was going against an unspoken family rule that they shouldn't acknowledge their feelings--let alone intentionally sense them.

Gradually, he discovered that he generally felt his comfortable feelings in his chest and his uncomfortable feelings in his gut (this is a very individual pattern, and it will be different for each person).

Then, we worked towards helping Mark to differentiate his feelings.  Over time, he learned to distinguish anger and happiness.

Since Mark was struggling not to lose his temper with his family, we spent more time on his feelings of anger.

After a while, Mark was more adept at identifying his anger and where he sensed it in his body, so I encouraged Mark to talk about an incident where he became angry at home and to stay with these feelings as long as his feelings remained tolerable.

It took a while for Mark to build the emotional capacity to tolerate staying with his feelings.  At first, his inclination was to either distract himself with other feelings or to shut down emotionally.

Just like building a muscle takes time, building the capacity to stay with uncomfortable emotions can also take time.

On an intellectual level, Mark knew that he learned unhealthy patterns in his family about dealing (or not dealing) with his feelings, but knowing this alone wasn't enough to change it.  So, we worked towards increasing his capacity a little at a time.

When he got to the point where he could stay with his angry feelings, he was able to go deeper, and that's when he discovered the sadness underneath his anger.

To say that Mark was surprised would be an understatement.  Until then, he had no idea of just how much sadness he was carrying inside of him.

Working with the mind-body connection, Mark began to identify the early memories of loss that were connected to his sadness so we could work through those feelings.

Getting Help in Therapy
As I mentioned earlier, anger often masks sadness.  This is usually an unconscious process.  Until you can work through the sadness in therapy, more than likely, you'll continue to have problems with anger.

Working with clients who mask sadness with anger, I've found that working with mind-body psychotherapy like Somatic Experiencing is often much more helpful than just using regular talk therapy alone.

The body is also a window into the unconscious (see my article: Mind-Body Psychotherapy: The Body Offers a Window Into the Unconscious).

Mind-body psychotherapy helps people to orient themselves to the physical cues that are in their bodies.

If you think your anger could be a mask for underlying sadness or trauma, you could benefit from working with a therapist who has expertise with this problem and works with the mind-body connection.

About Me

I am a licensed NYC psychotherapist, hypnotherapist, EMDR and Somatic Experiencing therapist who works with individual adults and couples.

I have helped many therapy clients to lead more fulfilling lives.

To find out more about me, visit my web site:  Josephine Ferraro, LCSW - NYC Psychotherapist

To set up a consultation, call me at (917) 742-2624 during business hours or email me.

Also, see my article:  Mind-Body Connection: Responding Instead of Reacting to Stress

What is Happiness and Where Do You Find it?

As far back as the ancient Greeks and beyond, people have been asking the question, "What is happiness?"  The journalist, Eric Weiner, has written a book called The Geography of Bliss where he travels around the world in his quest to discover what happiness is and if there are certain countries where most people are happy.  

What is Happiness and Where Do You Find It?

His travels take him to the Netherlands; Switzerland; Bhutan, where they keep track of Gross National Happiness instead of Gross Domestic Product; Qatar, the richest country in the world; Iceland; Moldova; Thailand, Great Britain and India.  

The Geography of Bliss is well written, thought provoking, enlightening and entertaining. As Weiner travels from one country to the next, asking people about their happiness, their culture and philosophy of life, he experiences different ways of life and engages in his own self exploration.

I won't spoil the book by giving it away. But if you've ever asked yourself the question:  "What is happiness?," I recommend that you read this book The Geography of Bliss - One Grump's Search for the Happiest Places in the World.

"Are You Happy?"
It's interesting that when someone asks you, "Are you happy?," it becomes a difficult question to answer.  It might even make you feel uncomfortable.  Often, people respond to this question by not even being sure what happiness is.  How do you know if you're happy?  Is it a state of mind?  Is it too elusive to gauge?

Will Having Lots of Money Make You Happy?
Many people are sure they'd be happy if they had a lot of money.  And, since many people feel this way, social scientists have been curious about the possible connection, so there has been a lot of research about happiness and money.

As you might guess, based on this research, it seems that you need to have at least enough money so you feel comfortable (however you measure that).

Most people who are struggling in dire poverty find it difficult to be happy.  But, beyond feeling comfortable, the happiness that people feel initially after they've either inherited a lot of money or won millions in the lottery is short lived.  So, more isn't always better.  In fact, there have been many stories of people who won millions who end up feeling miserable.

What Makes Us Happy Can Change Over the Course of a Lifetime
For most of us, the answer to "What is happiness?" changes over the course of a lifetime.  When you're a child, happiness is getting a new toy (at least for a while, until you get tired of it).


When you're a teenager, you might imagine that happiness would be getting away from your parents, having your own place and your independence.  When you're in your 20s and 30s, happiness might be succeeding in your career.

Meaning and Purpose in Your Life
Ask 100 people what happiness is to them, and you'll get at least 101 different answers.  For many people, happiness is finding meaning and purpose outside of themselves, something that is bigger than they are.  This might be their religion or their spirituality.

For others, happiness means having loving family and friends.  For others, happiness is knowing that they are rooted in a long line of ancestors and the family line will continue beyond them.

What is happiness to you?  I would love to hear your responses.

About Me

I am a licensed NYC psychotherapist, hypnotherapist, EMDR and Somatic Experiencing therapist.  

I work with individual adults and couples, and I have helped many clients to overcome obstacles that keep them from leading a fulfilling life.

To find out more about me, visit my website:  Josephine Ferraro, LCSW - NYC Psychotherapist

To set up a consultation, call me at (917) 742-2624 during business hours or email me.

The Mind-Body Connection: Mindfulness Meditation

Mindfulness Meditation:
When you're overwhelmed by stress, you might experience anxiety-related problems, such as difficulties concentrating, memory problems, or problems with insomnia, to name just a few possibilities. On a physical level, if you're under too much stress, you can become physically exhausted and your immune system can become compromised, causing you to get sick.

Mind-Body Connection: Mindfulness Meditation

This is why it's so important to learn ways to take care of yourself on a regular basis to keep your mind and body calm.

Why Mindfulness Meditation?
Mindfulness meditation is one way that many people find helpful, not only to stay calm, but also to become more aware and develop insight about their inner emotional world.

When you practice mindfulness meditation, you allow whatever thoughts and feelings that arise to come up and you just notice them. You don't try to control them. You don't make judgments about them. You're simply observing what's happening in your inner world. Everything and anything that comes up is welcomed in mindfulness meditation.

The intention of mindfulness meditation is to be aware and awake to what's going on inside you. You're developing the ability to become a impartial observer of your own internal experience.

Mindfulness can be used in just about any area of your life. You can eat in a mindful way. You can walk in a state of mindfulness. You can engage in your relationships in mindful ways.

People who practice mindfulness meditation over a period of time often become insightful about themselves and others.

How to Begin Mindfulness Meditation:
As a psychotherapist, I usually recommend that clients begin with a guided mindfulness meditation CD (see resources below).

As a beginner, you can start by just paying attention to your breath, feeling what it's like to inhale a refreshing breath and what it's like to exhale, letting go of stress. It helps to close your eyes to keep your eyes and mind from wondering.

You an also look down at a point close to you if you don't feel comfortable closing your eyes. I also usually recommend that people sit up when they do meditation because it's easy to fall asleep if you're lying down, and this is not the purpose of doing meditation. Usually, a chair where your spine is straight and comfortable is best.

Mind-Body Connection: Mindfulness Meditation

Everyone is different as to when they like to do meditation. Some people find it most helpful to do in the morning before they start their day. It sets the tone for their day. Other people prefer to do it at night before they go t sleep. And others prefer to do it some time in the middle of the day. To be consistent, it's helpful to have a regular routine for meditation.

Some people who begin mindfulness meditation, find it helpful to concentrate on how their abdomen expands and contracts when they breath. You can begin by practicing for 5 minutes a day and work your way up, over time, to 20 minutes or more.

You don't have to be spiritual to practice mindfulness meditation. Mindfulness meditation can be done in a secular way (see resources below). And if you are spiritual, you will probably find that it will enhance just about any spiritual practice.

As a beginner to mindfulness meditation, you can expect that your mind will probably wonder. This is normal. The important thing, rather than getting frustrated with yourself, is to bring your attention back to your breath each time, even if you must do this countless times. It gets easier over time if you persevere.

Resources for Mindfulness Meditation:
Any of the books and CDs by Jon Kabat-Zinn, PhD., are especially helpful.

Websites:
Mind and Life Institute: http://www.mindandlife.org/

Mindfulness CDs: http://www.mindfulnesstapes.com/
CD for Beginners: Mindfulness for Beginners - by Jon Kabat-Zinn

Books:
Wherever You Go, There You Are - by Jon Kabat-Zinn

Full Catastrophe Living: Using the Wisdom of Your Body and Mind to Face Stress, Pain and Illness - by Jon Kabat Zinn

The Mindful Way Through Depression (includes CD) - by Jon Kabat-Zinn

Mindfulness meditation is one way to de-stress and become more aware of your inner emotional world. In future blog posts, I'll discuss other ways.

I am a licensed NYC psychotherapist, hypnotherapist, Somatic Experiencing therapist, and EMDR therapist.

To find out more about me, visit my website: Josephine Ferraro, LCSW - NYC Psychotherapist

To set up a consultation, call me at (917) 742-2624 during business hours or email me.

Mind-Body Connection: Focused Meditation

In prior posts, I discussed The Mind-Body Connection: Coping With Stress - Calming the Body, Calming the Mind. In this blog post, I will discuss focused meditation.

What is Focused Meditation?
As I discussed in my prior blog post, in mindfulness meditation, you focus your attention and awareness on your internal experience. In focused meditation, you concentrate on an object. The object can be a flower, a shell, a gem, a stone or whatever you choose to focus your attention on.

Mind-Body Connection: Focused Meditation

The goal of focused meditation is to stay in the moment.

When you're practicing focused meditation, it's normal for your attention to wander at times, especially when you first begin practicing. Rather than getting frustrated and giving up, you just bring your attention back to the object each time. You also remember to breathe and allow your breath to help you to relax.

As a beginner to focused meditation, you might want to begin by focusing your attention on a category of objects rather than a single object. 

So, for instance, instead of focusing on one flower, you can look at four flowers. This allows your mind and eyes to wander to the different flowers, when your mind and eyes want to wander and, generally, it's easier to start in this way. Over time, you can train your mind to focus on one object. Gradually, you can learn to stay with that focus for longer periods of time.

Focusing on an object helps you to relax and it's a good way to de-stress.

In my psychotherapy private practice in NYC, I encourage clients to find a method of meditation that works for them. Usually, they find that it helps them to relax and also increases their ability to concentrate and be more aware of themselves and others.

About Me

I am a licensed NYC psychotherapist, hypnotherapist, EMDR therapist, and Somatic Experiencing therapist.

I work with individual adults and couples.

To find out more about me, visit my web site: Josephine Ferraro, LCSW - NYC Psychotherapist.

To set up a consultation, call me at (917) 742-2624 during business hours or email me.

Coping With Stress and the Mind-Body Connection: Calming the Mind, Calming the Body

When you're overwhelmed by stress, calming your mind can help you to calm your body. It also works the other way around: Calming the body helps to calm the mind.

Coping With Stress and the Mind-Body Connection

Your particular reaction to stress is determined, in part, by your sympathetic nervous system, which is part of your autonomic nervous system.

The function of the sympathetic nervous system is to mobilize you for a fight-flight response if you're in danger. When you're in a high degree of stress, whether it's about positive or negative events, you might experience various stress-related symptoms, including an increase in heart rate, dilated pupils, an increase in blood pressure, pale, cold skin, and so on.

Many people who have experienced a significant amount of stress over a period of time are in a constant state of anxiety, and even relatively minor incidents of new stress can trigger a high degree of emotional activation.

For these people, even minor stressors, like waiting on a grocery line, getting caught in traffic, or waiting for a train, can cause an emotional overreaction because they're already in a state of high activation from chronic and unrelenting stress. Just coping and getting through each day can be a challenge.

Over time, an inability to cope with stress can have a negative impact on a person's confidence and self esteem.

Stress Management:
In order to cope more effectively with stress, it's important to find healthy ways to de-stress.

In the next few blog posts, I'll discuss specific, effective methods for calming the mind and the body. As a psychotherapist in NYC, I often recommend and teach these methods to my clients in my private practice.

About Me
I am a licensed psychotherapist, hypnotherapist, Somatic Experiencing therapist, and EMDR therapist in NYC.

To find out more about me, visit my website: Josephine Ferraro, LCSW - NYC Psychotherapist

To set up a consultation, call me at (917) 742-2624 during business hours or email me.

See Articles: 

Mind-Body Connection: Focused Meditation

Mind-Body Connection: Mindfulness Meditation

Overcoming Loneliness and Social Isolation

As a psychotherapist in New York City, I've noticed that more clients are struggling with feelings of loneliness than I've encountered with clients in prior years.

Why Are People More Socially Isolated and Lonely Now Than in the Past?
There are many reasons why people are more socially isolated from one another and, as a result, more lonely than before.  

Overcoming Loneliness and Social Isolation

A Decrease in In-Person Social Contact

As a society, we have less in person contact these days than we used to before.  We rely more on email and text messages now.  While there are definite advantages to these technological advances, there have also been disadvantages, especially for people who live alone and have few close friends or family members.

Young adults, many of whom rely almost exclusively on text messages or social media to communicate, often don't develop the social skills necessary to communicate with potential friends or romantic romantic partners.  Many of them complain to me that they feel awkward talking to new people, and they don't know how to start a conversation at a social gathering.

Loneliness vs Depression

Loneliness is often confused with depression, and many people would prefer to say they're depressed and seek antidepressant medication from their doctor than admit that they're lonely.

While there can be a connection between loneliness and depression, very often, loneliness can be confused with depression.

Loneliness and Shame

For many people the shame of admitting that they're lonely is so great that they might even have a hard time admitting that they're lonely to their therapists.  

Admitting to feeling lonely often involves a certain emotional vulnerability that many people can't tolerate.  Many of them feel that by admitting that they're lonely, they'll be judged and people will think there's something wrong with them.  They feel that admitting to being lonely puts them at risk for people thinking they're not likable, and they might have their own fears about this.

Being Willing to Extend Yourself

If you're feeling lonely, it can help to extend yourself to others rather than waiting for others to approach you.

If you have a particularly difficult time initiating social interactions, you might want to consider doing volunteer work.

When you volunteer for a cause or a particular group, you're usually given a particular task to do and talking to others is easier because you're interacting within the context of doing the volunteer work. 

The following scenario, which is a composite to protect confidentiality, illustrates how a client was able to overcome feelings of loneliness:

Bill

When Bill graduated college and moved to NYC to take a job as a computer programmer, he didn't know anyone in the city.

Bill interacted with coworkers at work, but most of them were older and married.  As a young, single man in a new city, Bill often felt lonely when he was home alone.

He kept up with college buddies and friends from his hometown mostly via text messages.  He also called his parents once a week.  And these interactions were the extent of his social interactions outside of work.

After a few months, Bill thought he was depressed, so he came to see me for help.  It became apparent early on that not only was Bill socially isolated, but he felt uncomfortable initiating social interactions with new people.  Even when he was in college, most of the other students that he became friends with were people who were more outgoing and approached him first.

As we talked about what Bill thought were depressive symptoms, it turned out that when he went home and saw his family and friends, he didn't feel sad.  He also didn't have most of the other symptoms associated with depression, so I surmised that Bill was really lonely as opposed to being depressed.

When I work with clients, whether it's about problems with loneliness or other emotional issues, I tend to be interactive.  So, Bill and I talked about what he would be willing to do to be less socially isolated in NYC.

Since Bill was very fond of animals, he came up with the idea of volunteering his time at a no-kill animal shelter.  From the start of his volunteer work at the shelter, the dogs and cats, who longed for attention, gravitated towards Bill and he loved spending time with them.  He even adopted a dog and a cat.

He loved his pets, and having affectionate pets, who waited eagerly for his arrival when he got home, made it a lot easier for Bill when he came home.   

But Bill also wanted human social interaction, so we talked about what type of volunteer work he would like to do to meet new people.  As it turned out, Bill was very interested in local politics and there was a particular local candidate that he liked.

When he looked into volunteer opportunities with this local political candidate, he discovered that the campaign had a real need for volunteers.  So, Bill spent a few hours each week volunteering his time.

Initially, Bill felt awkward because most people already knew each other and he was the new volunteer.  Breaking into a new group, especially if someone is self conscious and somewhat shy as Bill was, can be difficult, so Bill had to lower his expectations at first.

But after the second week, one of the other volunteers, Ed, told Bill that there was a group that went out for burgers afterwards, and he asked Bill to join them.  

Over time, Bill became friendly with a few of the other volunteers, and he began to socialize with them more.  And, as he developed friendships with these people, he realized that he no longer felt lonely.  He also realized that his problem wasn't depression after all--it was social isolation which had resulted in loneliness.

Overcoming Social Isolation and Loneliness Can Be Challenging For the Elderly or People Who Are Home bound

For people who are either elderly or home bound due to health problems, social isolation and loneliness can be challenging because they might not interact with others.

Being isolated, they're also more at risk for health problems that might not be detected because they have little or no social interactions with others.

In some communities, religious organizations and social service agencies have volunteers who can visit the elderly or the home bound.  In many major cities, like NYC, there are senior centers with free transportation where the elderly can meet other people and engage in social activities.

Social Anxiety Can Complicate Efforts to Overcome Social Isolation and Loneliness

See my article:  Overcoming Social Anxiety

Feeling Lonely in a Relationship

Loneliness doesn't just occur because people are socially isolated.  People in relationships where their emotional needs aren't being met are often lonely too.

See my article:  Feeling Lonely in a Relationship

Getting Help in Therapy

If you've been unable to overcome feelings of loneliness and social isolation, rather than remaining isolated and unhappy, you could benefit from seeing a licensed psychotherapist who has helped psychotherapy clients to overcome this problem.  

About Me

I am a licensed New York City psychotherapist, hypnotherapist, EMDR and Somatic Experiencing therapist who works with individual adults and couples.

To find out more about me, visit my website:  Josephine Ferraro, LCSW - NYC Psychotherapist.

To set up a consultation, call me at (917) 742-2624 during business hours or email me.

Also, see my article:  Solitude vs Loneliness