Individual Therapy

AEDP psychotherapy is about change. I work with clients who feel overwhelmed by crisis, worries and fears, clients who are weighted down by chronic pain, grief and aloneness, clients who are disoriented by transitions and multiple stressors, and clients who lost trust in themselves and others during period of trauma. I understand that when they reach out to me, they are leaning into a sense of hope, hope for change, no matter how small the glimmer of hope might seem.

My work is around identifying their hope and motivation, gathering their resources (the therapy space being one), so the clients can work towards the change they are longing for. A big part of this process is to help the clients to find the direction through reconnecting with their body and emotions, which speak the importance truth about who they are and what they need. It is also to remove the barriers, including external obstacles and prejudice, old coping mechanisms that no longer work, and old ways of approaching the world that limits them receiving from love and support.  

Different from the practice of some traditional talk therapies, my work as an AEDP therapist has a lot to do with understanding and co-regulating individuals’ emotional brain and nervous system. Often clients ask why they rationally know one thing, yet they choose the other, and sometimes doing so without “thinking”. This is because our emotional brain has its own pathway to impact our behaviors outside our rational brain. Only when we trace the emotional pathways, find out about how the pathways were imprinted since our early childhood, and during critical moments such as trauma, we can “decode” the messages and help our nervous system to re-wire towards safety and wellness through possibly new and more balanced alternatives.

AEDP also recognizes that the experience of unwanted and unbearable aloneness in the face of overwhelming emotions is by itself traumatizing, and by itself the common cause of psychopathology. Such experiences of aloneness pose massive challenges to our nervous system, lead to flight-fight-freeze reactions both during and long after the event. Therefore, I understand that hyper-vigilance and disconnection from our bod/emotions and intimate others, although counter-intuitive sometimes, can be a reflex of self-protection. In such cases, building a new sense of safety, internally within one’s body, and externally/interpersonally with therapist is the first and the key step towards change and healing.

When you work with me, you may also notice that I tend to focus on what feels alive and important for you in the present moment, because change happens in here and now. I make space for your good feelings, occur when things feel right to you and when you have a sense of achievement in our work and in your life. This is because joy and sense of calmness can point us towards direction of personal wellness and emotional truth, offer us energy and fuel for further growth. Throughout this process, I aim to serve as a companion, guide, and advocate, supporting you to move towards the life in which you feel confident, fulfilled, and connected. 

Couples Therapy

In the fast changing world, it is increasingly challenging for us to maintain a healthy loving relationship, yet not less beneficial than our parents’ generations. 

Marriage researcher John Gottman demonstrated in his study, that even successful marriages couples disagree with 70% of the issues, what matters is how they talk about their disagreement. Indeed, whether we can handle our differences with openness and respect, communicate our emotional needs effectively, hold on to ourselves during moments of stress and also stay connected with on our partner, actively repair when we cause hurt and disappointment, those factors often predict the success of the marriage. 

The good news is, all these can be learned. Although I had witnessed plenty of examples of failed marriages in my early life, I have learned first from my training and then witnessed in my work and personal life, that building a lasting love bond is a possible and concrete learning process. 

Trained primarily by EFT for Couples and AEDP for couples, I work on understanding the positions of both partners and your deep longings underneath those positions. I help you effectively communicate your emotional needs in the way that can be heard and responded by your partner. I assist you to trace that the lack of emotional safety back to the sources both inside the relationship and prior to the relationship, including from past trauma. Ultimately I aim to help you reconnect with your partner and re-new you love, in a place that honors your loving bond and also whom you are as individuals.

I work with both same-sex and opposite sex couples. 

Supervision/Consultation

As a certified AEDP supervisor, I provide individual and group consultation for therapists who are interested in growing their clinical skills, particularly related to, but not limited to the practice of AEDP therapy approach. 

My approach of supervision/consultation is guided by AEDP supervision approach and centers around the consultee’s interests of growth. I work on providing perspectives around interventions that can be more effective and ”AEDP” as well as interventions that is already effective and “AEDP”, with the goals of both amplifying consultee’s strength and their clinical awareness, and adding new perspective/tools to their work. I also assist consultee to explore the factors of cultural influences and minority identities that would impact the sense of connection and power dynamic in their therapist-client dyads. 

The consultation groups I currently provide include the following: AEDP supervision group for BIPOC therapists, AEDP Supervision Group with Special Interests on Trans-generational Trauma , AEDP Supervision Group with Special Interests on Working with Emotions in the Context of Asian Cultures

Training & Recent Projects

I have taught various courses on AEDP, including Immersion, Essential Skills, Core-training courses in the U.S., China, and internationally. I also present my AEDP work at international conferences and wrote about it. Please refer to this link for my teaching in relation to the AEDP Institute:  https://aedpinstitute.org/faculty/h-jacquie-ye-perman-phd/