Welcome to East Bay Holistic Therapy. Proudly serving the Oakland California community.

Meet Joan Gold, MFT.

I am a licensed Marriage and Family Therapist with a Masters Degree in Counseling Psychology, Transpersonal Specialization, from John F. Kennedy University. I have been providing therapy to the Oakland community since 2005, both online and in person.

As a holistic psychotherapist – working with the mind, body and spirit, and pulling from many different therapeutic traditions – I am committed to providing an environment that supports personal growth and transformation.

My Specialties:

Healing Shame

Shame lies at the root of many of our most common problems – depression, isolation, unworthiness,  perfectionism, self-hate. We all have shame, but because shame itself is experienced as shame-full, we rarely talk about it. We do our best to pretend, cover-up, stay busy, avoid, but too often it only gets worse.

Healing Shame® (Lyon/Rubin Method) is a targeted way of working with the four physiological responses to shame: Attack Self, Attack Other, Deny and Withdraw.  Through education and resourcing, we build resilience in individual sessions or in a small, safe group environment.

Who can benefit from healing shame? 

• Anyone who struggles with feeling good about themselves

• Anyone who can identify shaming or traumatic life events

• Anyone in long term recovery from substances or compulsive behaviors

• Anyone who grew up in a home with addiction or mental illness

• Anyone whose grief or anger feels frozen

• Anyone who feels stuck, hopeless or unlovable

Depression

There are many reasons for depression, which may show up in a variety of ways including lack of energy, loss of pleasure, loss of appetite, irritability, endless feelings of emptiness or grief. 

The good news is that depression is almost always treatable. It is not uncommon for treatment to be avoided, however, because the same belief system that created depression may be responsible for making us believe we are doomed. The first step is facing depression and opening the doorway to change. 

Family of Origin Trauma

The struggles you experience in your life today can oftentimes be traced back to your family of origin, the original blueprint for how you experience yourself and the world around you.

By taking the time to explore concepts such as family roles and rules, how emotions like grief and anger were handled, how power was shared, how your family communicated love and expectations, and any unprocessed traumatic memories you may still carry, you gain access to your own unconscious and the ways you may be blocking yourself from getting what you think you want.

Relationships 

We are relational creatures living in a time of increasing confusion about what it means to be connected to others. 

If you didn’t grow up in a nurturing environment, therapy may be one of the few places you can come to as an adult to learn the basic skills of healthy relating: direct communication, appropriate self-care, personal boundaries, and conflict resolution. 

Benefits of Therapy

Therapy is a way to create change, find happiness, and make meaning of our lives. 

Life is a journey.  We all need help at times to find our way through the wilderness, pull ourselves up from the quicksand, and face down the dangers — both real and imagined — encountered along the way.

Few of us are born into optimal conditions. Too much loss, too little nurturing, certain kinds of injuries to our internal compass can make it difficult to navigate life. As adults we develop symptoms like depression, addiction, codependency, loneliness, and anxiety. 

Therapy helps us make sense of and manage symptoms, but it can also direct us back to our lost sense of self, releasing our considerable life-energy to its fullest expression. 

“When we are no longer able to change a situation – we are challenged to change ourselves.”  (Viktor E. Frankl)

If you are looking for a therapist who serves the Oakland, California community, you can contact me here  I usually return my calls and emails within 24 hours. I look forward to speaking with you soon.