I am a psychotherapist with 14 years of experience helping people overcome depression and anxiety. I offer a unique three-part approach that addresses current circumstances and stressors as well as the root causes of depression.
The first part of this approach is focused on improving your mood and increasing your ability to cope with what is happening right now. This includes instituting healthful practices, expanding core resources, and increasing coping skills.
The second part involves exploring and addressing the structural present-day circumstances that lead to or contribute to depression and disconnection from life. These can include:
Too much time alone, not enough to do, lack of connection
Too many demands on one's time and feelings of overwhelm
Imbalances, mismatches, and dysfunctions in the realms of work, family, or intimate relationships
Lack of meaning or purpose, feelings of emptiness, existential questions
Finally, once you are feeling better, we work together to identify and address the roots of the depression so that you do not fall into it again in the future. Because every individual is unique, the core issues are different for everyone but common themes include:
Unprocessed traumas or grief
Inhibited stored emotions
Early childhood family dynamics
Lack of self-love / feelings of worthlessness
Over-identification with the mind/thinking
Lack of connection to or inability to connect with the heart
We work to clear out the old traumas, emotions, and grief, reconnect to the heart, the emotional body and the physical body, and learn to balance the mind/thinking with the heart/love and the body/feelings.
This unique approach is based on my 14 years working with people suffering from depression in many different contexts, including in psychiatric hospitals, private practice, and spiritual healing retreats and combines elements of evidence-based western psychotherapy and eastern spiritual practices, including:
Together, these are powerful tools for overcoming depression and creating a happier, more balanced, and more harmonious life.
Alex Theberge, MFT
As a psychotherapist, I have 18 years experience helping people suffering from conditions like depression, anxiety, loss/grief and PTSD/trauma including 3 years working with people in acute states of crisis and treatment resistant depression at the University of California San Francisco. I also have 2 years experience as a shamanic guide and apprentice shaman at Blue Morpho Center for Shamanism and Ayahuasca in Peru, where I help guide people from all kinds of backgrounds through their transformative journey with Ayahuasca plant medicine. Because of my unique background, I bring an innovative and holistic approach to working with depression.