Weekly Group Therapy – Client Prep and My Background

In full time private practice with HRC I led and co-led 5 weekly adult [and child therapy groups my first 10 years in practice] for about 40 years, and led regular weekend and All Day adult Groups. I’ve co-trained Professionals in Group therapy, co-led psychotherapy groups for therapists, and led many other specialized groups including : priests; agencies’ organizational development and problem solving; supervising about 10 group therapy teams in twice weekly group supervision for 2 years at a local psychiatric hospital long ago when we had a fine Yalom-model in-patient group therapy program; and currently, a monthly Training Group for health professionals/therapists for 30 years in Raleigh.

    Now I’ve led 3 open-ended weekly adult therapy groups continuously for 30 years, which retains the group norms and health culture lost in closed-ended treatment groups : Mondays 5:30-7PM in Chapel Hill; in Raleigh Tuesdays 4:30-6PM, and Thursdays 5-6:30 PM.  I’ve been a Founding Member of the American Group Psychotherapy’s Certified Group Psychotherapist credentialing program, survived and learned a lot for 2 years of weekly group supervision/therapy with local rogue genius Martin Groder,MD, and trained residentially in transactional analysis-Gestalt therapy with Bob & Mary Goulding at what was the Western Institute for Group and Family Therapy, and in Gestalt therapy in Atlanta with Joan Fagan and Irma Lee Shepherd .

  My approach is integrative/eclectic, strongly influenced by 5 editions of the Interpersonal group therapy bible by Irvin Yalom [Theory and Practice of Group Psychotherapy], and by a fortunate, long ago dinner with him and his wife, when NCPA had him here to lead  a 2 day training and didn’t know what to do with him that night.  My therapeutic style is relatively active, candid, and transparent participant-observer, a combination of CBT/ Interpersonal/re-decision transactional analysis/Gestalt and hypnotic healing, which I absorbed from 2 weeks of training with Milton Erickson, Ma, MD and many of his leading students.

 I’ve been off all insurance panels for many years, and use a fee scale that slides both up and down, most group clients paying  $75. a group session. I usually see prospective group clients in 3 individual sessions to build a therapeutic alliance, send home various readings, and  fully inform/prepare them for group treatment. We develop individualized written therapeutic goals​ which are rated and shared in group,  about every 3 months. Group sessions are video-recorded so members can both see and hear themselves as they really are, and experience any sessions they miss.

I ask folks to see my site, especially the Home page text, explore my blog and the horizontal menu – for therapists, particularly  the Page for Professionals – then phone to consider if we seem a good match.