A consultation is a time limited experience with Joanna where you provide specific information so Joanna can give you her opinion or perspective on your possible options.

One type of consultation occurs over the phone at no charge.

A second type of consultation occurs in Joanna's office and is billed at her normal fee.

If you are considering making an appointment with Joanna to do eating disorder recovery work you call.  You and Joanna will schedule a time for a telephone consultation that can be from 5 to 20 minutes. During that consultation you describe what is troubling you. You may talk about your eating disorder or the eating disorder of someone in your family. Joanna will help lead you, if necessary, into describing a few details of your experience and what you have done or are doing so far to address the situation.  She will listen to what you have found helpful or not helpful. Then she will ask you questions that are designed to clarify your situation for you and Joanna.

If you are struggling with any issues related to eating disorders, yours or someone else's and want a more lengthy discussion with Joanna in order to figure out what your best course of action might be, then you would make an appointment for an in person session in her office.

If Joanna believes she can offer you some useful information or perhaps help you rally your own thoughts and feelings to help you find a promising therapeutic path that suits your situation she will give you one or perhaps two in person consultations.

At the close of either type of consultation Joanna will do her best to provide you with recommendations that can vary. She may refer you to a private psychotherapist or a clinic or an in-patient treatment center.  She may refer you to a parenting class or to a support group or to a 12 step program.  She may determine that what you are describing may not be an eating disorder but be an indication of some other issue that needs to be addressed. If this is the case she will make a different kind of referral suggestion.

And, if during the consultation you feel you would like to work with Joanna and she believes you qualify for her practice and that she might be able to help you, then you would make a first appointment to meet in person at her office for psychotherapy.

While a consultation can sometimes feel and be therapeutic, it is not psychotherapy.

A regular appointment with Joanna consists of time you spend together in the work of psychotherapy. Any topic, any feeling, any experience that you choose to bring up or that spontaneously emerges determines the content for the appointment. Together, in secure privacy, you experience your own feelings and thoughts coming together in the presence of someone who is listening deeply to what you express and what you may convey without knowing. Bringing those three elements together can create greater clarity for your experience and more internal unity in your psyche.

The consultation is designed to help you find your starting place for healing.  The psychotherapy appointment is where the healing work gets done.

| More...