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September 2012
The Institute Insider
Keeping you connected ~ Nurturing your professional growth
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Meet our Faculty
Kate Oliver, LCSW-C
Kate Oliver, LCSW-C , is co-owner of A Healing Place, a private practice in Columbia, MD. Before opening her private practice, Ms. Oliver worked first at the Sexual Trauma, Treatment, Advocacy and Recovery Center (STTAR) in Columbia, MD for five years. During her time with the STTAR Center, Ms. Oliver completed a year-long program where she earned a certificate in working with children and adolescents with attachment disorders. After learning more about attachment, Ms. Oliver went to work with incarcerated, pregnant mothers in Baltimore City as the Clinical Director for the program, Tamar's Children. Tamar's Children worked with an attachment protocol, The Circle of Security, which taught adults with a history of trauma and neglect to bond with their infants. She used this method with the residents and added an additional group for women already in the program who were going to be reunited with older children in foster and kinship care. In 2007, Ms. Oliver opened A Healing Place, where she now specializes in working with children with trauma and attachment related issues. Additionally, she has a blog, Help4YourFamily.com, where she writes about ways to help children and parents feel happier and healthier.
Kate will facilitate a half-day training on October 24 entitled When Nothing Else Works, Start at the Beginning: Attachment 101. Click here
for details and registration.
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Message from Lisa Ferentz LCSW-C, DAPA
Founder and President
Dear Friends,
In my neighborhood, this time of year always signals the return of giant yellow school buses stopping on corners with that familiar screech of brakes, those flashing red eyes, the whoosh of doors yawning open to inhale children heavy with anxiety and 50 pound book bags. "Back to school"- whether it's off to kindergarten or college- represents that forever dance of attachment and separation, for parents and kids alike.
With that in mind, this month's newsletter focuses on the important issue of attachment. We've included some insights and some resources, as well as a spotlight on our faculty member, Kate Oliver, who specializes in working with the complex dynamics of attachment in the parent-child relationship. Your feedback after last month's newsletter was so gratifying, and I thank you for that! I am delighted that so many of you took the time to discover our new format and appreciate the more clinically relevant content. We hope you continue to stay "attached" to the Institute, as we learn and grow together in our coming "school" year! 
Lisa Ferentz
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Off to College - A Lesson in Attachment
Those of
 | | Growing up with loving and safe relationships makes it possible for young adults to fully individuate, and begin the extraordinarily exciting and frightening next chapter in their lives. |
you who have trained with me in the past, are well aware that I take great stock in the impact that either secure, insecure, ambivalent, avoidant or disorganized attachment styles have on a child's emotional, neurological, and psychological development. The research is powerful and convincing: dysfunctional attachment patterns play a major role in affect dysregulation; impedes the functions of an infant's developing per-frontal cortex; profoundly interferes with the resolution of trust vs. mistrust and the subsequent relationship dynamics of intimacy; and increases the likelihood that self-destructive behaviors will be employed to self-soothe and dissociate from unresolved feelings of worthlessness and despair. As a therapist working with adult survivors who were not allowed to successfully attach because they had emotionally unavailable, abusive or mentally ill caretakers, I see the long-term effects of poor attachment every day in my practice. Click here to read the rest of this article. |
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A Quick Primer on Early Primary Relationships
by Kate Oliver, MSW, LCSW-C
 | | When babies look into the eyes of their parents, literally thousands of neurons per second get activated. |
Attachment is the relationship people develop with our earlycaregivers that shape how we form connections to other people throughout our lives as well as the lens through which we view the world. We are all born relying completely upon adults to meet our needs. Humans rely on parents to ensure survival longer than any other species for basic nourishment and caretaking making our connection to our caregivers incredibly important. Click here to read the rest of this article. |
Clinician Resources for AttachmentPublicationsVideo - Dr. Dan Siegel-On Disorganized Attachment in the Making, March 2011 (psychalive) 4:48 seconds
Interesting discussion about how a parent's own traumatic attachment experiences trigger subsequent inappropriate responses with their children.
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Self-Care and Counseling Tips
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 SELF-CARE: Some clinicians are afraid to take a sick day or vacation time, when many of their clients struggle with issues of attachment. Stay home when you are unwell, take a mental health day when you need it, and go on vacations to rejuvenate yourself. If you don't practice what you preach and offer your clients first-hand modeling for these important self-care behaviors, you will lose credibility in their eyes. When you struggle with whether or not to take that time off, ask yourself what you would encourage your clients to do!
COUNSELING: As we are mindful of our clients' attachment issues, we must balance their need for a reparative experience- through the availability of the therapeutic relationship- with inappropriate expectations and dependency on us. Identify and process with clients their internal and external resources for self-care and comfort in your absence. Encourage them to schedule the same "therapy hour" while you are away, to engage in journaling, exercise, reading positive affirmations, etc. Then use your return as a teaching moment by reinforcing the positive ways in which they coped without you. You can also highlight the idea that people can temporarily step away and then return- a new concept for many clients! |
ATTACH 24th Annual
International Conference* 2012 IFS Conference
 
September 19-22, 2012 October 5-7, 2012
Baltimore, Maryland Providence, Rhode Island
Click on the respective image to see each brochure
* Lisa Ferentz will present a training on Attachment and Self Destructive Behavior at the ATTACH 24th Annual International Conference; IAPTE Faculty Member Joy Silberg
will be one of the keynote speakers
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- Click here to see our Calendar of Classes and to register online.
- Don't miss our new Master Class Consultations: Working With Trauma and Dissociative Identity Disorder. This special series is designed to help you safely process difficult cases involving child, adolescent or adult trauma survivors that evoke feelings of 'being stuck,' angry, frustrated, anxious, overwhelmed or afraid. Learn more here.
- Room is still available in the Level II Trauma Certificate Program, offering valuable continuing education, and CEU's, needed to expand your knowledge and practice. Learn more and register today! Level II
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The Institute for Advanced Psychotherapy Training and Education, Inc. is an approved sponsor of the Maryland Board of Social Work Examiners for continuing education credits for licensed social workers in Maryland. CEU approval for all trainings is also granted to Psychologists, LCPC's and MFT's. In addition, reciprocity has been granted for clinicians in Washington, D.C., Virginia,
and West Virginia.
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