Where this comes from

I worked with first responders on a daily basis for over a decade in correctional health, on patrol, and in mental health co-responder services. Not as a consultant who visited. Side by side, on your shifts, in your buildings.

During that time I provided extensive training to police, corrections and other first responders on mental health crisis management, police stress, and navigating the political environment of public safety organizations. I led regional forensic mental health and threat management task force groups representing multiple agencies, and provided critical incident response, law enforcement academy training, and correctional standards training for agencies throughout the Western US.

What that means when you sit down

My experience working with police and other first responders means I understand, as much as any civilian can, what it means for the men and women who risk their lives in public service to experience mental health or addiction challenges in a culture that demands perfection and scrutinizes displays of emotion or weakness other roles would not.

I also deeply understand the difference between a job and the personal identity that dedication to public safety requires. That distinction is usually where the work starts, and it is the part most clinicians miss entirely.

Practically, it means you will not spend your first session explaining the difference between a sergeant and a lieutenant, why you cannot just call in, what a use-of-force review does to a person, or why the department's wellness email is not the same thing as help.

You can talk to me like a first responder, in police language, not like a civilian.

Say it the way you would say it in the car. I am not going to flinch at the humor, ask you to rephrase it, or quietly file it as a symptom.

What we work on

If you need help to keep balance between being a first responder and being a husband or wife, a mother or father, together we can find that path. The aim is to get you back to sleep at night, and to prevent the accumulated critical incidents every first responder experiences from reaching your life, your job, and the people closest to you.

Sleep that stopped working
Accumulated critical incident exposure, not just the one everybody knows about
The distance that grows between the person at work and the person at home
Anger, numbness, and the vigilance that will not switch off
Alcohol and other coping that started out working
Identity after an injury, a transfer, an investigation, or retirement

The practical obstacles

Shift work: The telehealth schedule is built to accommodate shift work. Sessions are arranged around your rotation, not around office hours.
Getting there: Telehealth only, so no waiting room, no parking lot, and no one who recognizes you and tells your agency.
Fitness-for-duty and disability evaluations: I do not perform them. Not for you, not for your agency, not for anyone.
Peer support and EAP: I am neither. I am your therapist, and nothing else.
Where you can be seen: Anywhere in Colorado or California, on the clock or off.

I am your clinician, and only that

I do not perform fitness-for-duty or disability evaluations; I am not an EAP provider, and I am not attached to your peer support program. There is no second role in which I could be asked for an opinion about you, because there is no second role. That is deliberate: a clinician who also evaluates cannot be trusted the way a clinician who only treats can.

This is a cash practice, which matters here

I am not enrolled with any insurance plan, and I submit nothing to one on your behalf, so no claim, diagnosis, or treatment record reaches a health plan because of anything I do. For people who worry about a paper trail, that is often the point. It also means you pay the full fee.

If you do want to use out-of-network benefits, I provide superbills through Mentaya, which checks your coverage and files the claim for you. The process is easy. The decision is not: a superbill carries a diagnosis, and filing a claim creates a record of it with your insurer. Whether that trade is worth making is your decision, not mine, and in this line of work it is worth making on purpose. See fees.

Get in touch Others I work with

First responders