Welcome.  

Take a deep breath. It is your time for you. Your time to unpack, understand, and let go of whatever is getting in your way. It is your time to be genuinely listened to, guided, supported, understood and encouraged. It is your time to become even more of the person who you want to be; who you know you can be. 

And I want to help you do just that. 

How I help

I help humans identify their concerns and blocks, establish boundaries based in integrity, respect, and self-care, increase personal understanding and self-empowerment, and then make the changes necessary to be more of the person who they want to be.

I have 29+ years experience as a cutting-edge, skilled, socially conscious counselor, consultant, relationship coach, and educator.

What I offer

Whether I am providing relationship coaching, counseling, consultation or presenting workshops, I offer a nonjudgmental, professional, and down-to-earth style that is layered with warmth, respect, and compassion. I approach my work from a holistic backdrop that takes into account the impacts of cultural and systematic oppression, injustice and trauma and the healing and unifying nature of connection with community and self. I am informed by decades of diverse training and direct service experiences.

Being self-employed provides me the opportunity to actively intertwine three of my passions:

1. The privilege to work directly with people who want to make personal, relational or professional changes using coaching or counseling.
2. To engage with many different people by offering workshops and trainings and professional consultation on such topics as professional ethics around burnout, vicarious trauma, and compassion fatigue; white professionals working with people of color; professional and personal self-care for mental health, social service, medical and education professionals; radical self-care, healing justice and oppression fatigue for social justice activists and community organizers; and fostering healthy LGBTQ+ relationships.
   
3. To actively volunteer in my communities. For example, I am the chair of the MN LGBTQ+ Therapists Network, past chair of the MN Coalition of Sexual Assault Services, past chair of the Seward Child Care Center, and a past Board Member of MN Women in Psychology. 

Who I am

I firmly believe that the personal is the professional is the political. I adhere to a fundamental consciousness for how the layers of cultural and systematic oppression and trauma influence personal, interpersonal and community health. And, conversely, how healing, empowerment, wellness and wellbeing are nurtured by human connection that is grounded in humanity, justice and equity. I hold this framework as the backdrop to the work that I do and the life that I live. 

I am a European-American (of Irish, German and Roma Gypsy ethnicity) cisgender woman, a lesbian from way back, a survivor, feminist, a parent by creative means, a social justice community organizer, and I hail from a small conservative farming community in Minnesota. These identities, with all of their colliding lessons, inform my motivation and dedication to the services I provide and the communities that I choose to serve. 

Resources

As you look through my website, note the resources section that includes recommended readings (PDF), Minnesota and national organizations (PDF), and other information related to coaching, self-growth and self-care, trauma, white-body privilege and racial equity, relationships, sexuality, LGBTQ+, burnout, vicarious trauma, and compassion fatigue. These are topics that I routinely address in the direct service and educational services that I provide. 

Feel free to print off the free resource list I researched and compiled: 14 No Cost Self-Care Tips.

If any of my services are of interest to you, please contact me to arrange a complimentary 30-minute phone consultation.

Take good care, lovely human.
Irene