FAQ’s: Counseling in San Diego, CA

Imago therapy is based on the relationship work of psychotherapist Harville Hendrix, based on the theory that feelings you experienced in your childhood relationships are bound to come up in your adult relationships. Imago Relationship Therapy has been considered as one of the most effective forms of couple’s counseling for over 25 years. By understanding how negative experiences and feelings from childhood carry over into adult relationships, you can better understand your reactions to your partner, and vice versa, and develop the skills and empathy necessary to transform your individual self and your relationship. The goal of Imago Therapy is to help couples stop blaming, criticizing, and negatively reacting to their partners and, instead, become more understanding and empathetic.

Imago relationship therapy can help those in committed relationships work out their misunderstandings, minimize conflict, and reimagine ways to bond, effectively communicate, and find common ground. Imago relationship therapy uses the process of engaging into a structured dialogue to be truly appreciated, heard and understood by your partner. It also allows you to engage in a conscious relationship that encourages each partner to be their own individual self, but to fully enjoy connecting, feeling fulfilled and in love with their partner. Two individuals consciously choosing one another and co-creating their relationship in a present, mindful and deeply connected shared relationship.

EFT was originally founded by Sue Johnson, is an evidence based practice and is designed to address distress in the intimate relationships of adults. As an EFT therapist, I observe the dynamics between clients in the therapy setting, which often ties into the dynamics in their home lives, and help direct new conversations and interactions based on more honest feelings. To accomplish this, I will encourage you to look at your current emotional issues and then help you discover feelings and emotions that you may not realize you have. You may discover deeper past feelings and vulnerabilities that are blocked by the more immediate emotions you display in your current relationship. You will learn to express these emotions in a way that will help you connect, rather than disconnect with your partner or family member. You will learn new ways to listen and stay attuned to another’s emotions and discover more productive ways to respond to emotional situations. EFT focuses on the present time to make changes in the here and now. Clients come to see that the problems lie in insecurities and distance.

EcCT is a type of relationship healing that helps partners connect with each other more fully and authentically and empowers couples to discover new, more authentic ways to engage with each other in order for their relationship to thrive instead of simply survive.

Hedy Schleifer’s approach is rooted in Imago Relationship Therapy and in the philosophy of Martin Buber. She identified the ‘three invisible connectors’ that exist within relationships. These connectors—the Space, the Bridge, and the Encounter—serve to draw partners close to each other and allow them to fully connect.

Couples develop a ‘survival dance’ or pattern of interacting where one partner attacks or retreats and then the other attacks or retreats and round and round they go until their shared space is no longer safe. EcCT offers tools to help the couple recognize and identify their particular ‘survival dance’, STOP it and heal it through the ‘three invisible connectors’.

The Space is the atmosphere and environment shared by the couple. Both partners are fully responsible to keep their Space empty of criticism, judgement and detachment and full of acceptance, benefit of the doubt, smiles and forgiveness.

By crossing the Bridge to one another, each partner enters the world of the other with curiosity, warmth and empathy and the desire to learn something new about the other – without judgment. The couple then creates an Encounter – of souls, of essence, of good will, of presence and open hearts. It is crucial for each partner to bring their full and authentic presence into the world of the other, as this is what allows them to truly meet each other and have an “encounter” that can then provide the basis for a new or restored relationship that is nurturing and fulfilling.

Through EcCT, couples agree to be courageous, vulnerable and open to exposing new parts of themselves. Partners learn to listen with openness and empathy, with new eyes, compassion and curiosity. Along the way, they may explore each other’s past and uncover wounds that need healing. The goal is for the partners to become thoroughly connected with each other and to better understand the experiences of the other in the journey they have made together. Through ECCT, a couple develops new ‘muscles’ of relating and deeply connecting in a way that breaks the automatic survival cycle and replaces it with support and security, with love and closeness.

Relationships Redefined is a boutique style private therapy practice, rather than a managed-care driven mental health clinic. We work for you, not the insurance companies.

If you choose to use insurance for therapy reimbursement, your clinician can work with you as an out of network provider. Usually PPO or POS plans are in this category.

Many of our clients who use their OON (out of network) benefits get reimbursed 65-80% of the counseling fee. Others use their Health or Flex Account, which may cover all of it and allows tax advantages.

You’ll need to check your plan first to determine your benefits for licensed counselors as OON providers, if there’s a deductible and if its been met, and what percentage they cover for individual or couples counseling or sex therapy.

We can provide you with a receipt, called a Superbill, with the necessary info to obtain counseling fee reimbursement based on your plan.

Psychologists & psychotherapists who choose to directly contract with insurance companies have to make concessions, as do their clients. Rather than focus on a diagnosis, we believe in treating you as a whole person whose issues are rooted in the context of your life, rather than in disorder or illness. It’s important to us to preserve the integrity of the therapeutic process and avoid issues with a managed care company at times requiring personal therapy data and details about your treatment.

We strive to offer a premium couples counseling and sex therapy experience without involvement from insurance companies or the various entities they now employ or outsource to for managing their electronic data. However, we also understand that without insurance reimbursement, the therapeutic support you need may not be financially accessible. Therefore, we are happy to provide you with a superbill (please note it will be required by the insurance company to contain a clinical mental health diagnosis

INSURANCE REIMBURSEMENT

Please note that while we do not work with insurance panels, we are happy to provide therapy invoices to the client to submit to their insurance for out-of-network reimbursement after full payments. Services may be covered by your health insurance or employee benefit plan if they offer out of network services. Please keep in mind that all insurance companies require a diagnosis to approve your claim. If you do have out of network coverage, we are happy to give you an invoice (called a superbill) to submit to your provider.

SUPERBILLS

Payment for therapy is made at the time of your visit. Your clinician will provide you with an invoice of services on a monthly basis. You must submit this invoice to your insurance company to receive reimbursement. We are considered an "out of network" provider. If you are considering using health insurance to cover the costs of therapy, it is important to know that insurance companies and plans vary according to their coverage of mental health benefits. It is important, therefore, to research your coverage prior to commencing therapy. You would pay us and then get reimbursed if that is the arrangement you have with your insurance provider. We cannot guarantee reimbursement but are happy to walk you through a list of questions to ask your insurance provider.

INSURANCE QUESTIONS CHECK LIST

Please check your coverage carefully by asking the following questions:

Do I have “Out-of-Network” insurance benefits for “Outpatient Mental Health Services”?

Is individual couples, sex or family therapy covered?

What is my deductible and has it been met?

How many sessions per year does my health insurance cover?

What is the coverage amount per therapy session (percentage and monetary amount)?

Is approval required from my primary care physician?

We have written an article about using your Out-of-Network benefits for counseling. Feel free to use this guide when calling about your plan.

Payments are due at the beginning of session. Cash, check and Venmo are all accepted as forms of payment. Rates for service can be discussed during your free phone consultation and will be agreed upon before your first session.

This is dependent on the client. I work very intensely with my clients, so I ask that they come in for weekly sessions in order to get the most progress out of our work together. In my experience, therapy has been found to be most productive when it is incorporated into a client’s lifestyle for approximately 12-16 sessions. Therapy should always have a goal, so it’s important to implement this into your life. If you wait too long in between sessions, it’s often harder to see progress.

Online therapy accounts for your convenience, often eliminating the negative factors associated with therapy like dealing with parking, traffic, transportation difficulties, seeing someone you know in the waiting room, time availability, scheduling difficulty, etc.

Online therapy allows the client to have access to their therapist when it is convenient for them. With the use of online therapy, it’s even possible to have your partner or spouse do couples therapy with you when they are geographically in a different location than you.

The American Psychiatric Association(APA) published a physician reviewed article in 2017 that notes the following:

“There is substantial evidence of the effectiveness of telepsychiatry and research has found satisfaction to be high among patients, psychiatrists and other professionals. Telepsychiatry is equivalent to in-person care in diagnostic accuracy, treatment effectiveness, quality of care and patient satisfaction. Patient privacy and confidentiality are equivalent to in-person care.” https://www.psychiatry.org/pat...

According to a 2016 article in the World Journal of Psychiatry:

“...telepsychiatry is comparable to face-to-face services in terms of reliability of clinical assessments and treatment outcomes . . .  telepsychiatry performed as well as, if not better than face-to-face delivery of mental health services.”

Advantages of Teletherapy

*Note when seeing the word Telepsychiatry, it is defined by the following --a subset of telemedicine, can involve providing a range of services including psychiatric evaluations, therapy (individual therapy, group therapy, family therapy), patient education and medication management. (APA, 2017)

Other helpful information about telehealth care:

Advantages of Teletherapy

How to Make the Most out of Teletherapy Right Now:

The new world of virtual psychotherapy is brighter than you think. 

Yes, we use a secure HIPAA compliant platform to offer video counseling. If you have any questions regarding this process, please reach out to us here

We offer couples therapy, marriage counseling, premarital therapy, individual therapy and intimacy & sex therapy online in San Diego and California.

This will vary depending on your goals and differs by client. There are a lot of factors that contribute to the length of counseling, so it is difficult to predict until we begin working together. Typically, clients commit to counseling for 6-8 months and progress is measured monthly. We want to make sure you have support to move forward, to learn the tools to implement change for yourself and possibly in your relationship if you are coming in with a partner. In order to sustain long-term change without regressing into old patterns, it will take patience and commitment.

We set our clients up for long term success as many will have a proclivity to default to old patterns. We all get busy with life, and in doing so we sometimes forget how to use and practice the tools and learnings we work to achieve. If you are making the financial committment, emotional contribution and the effort and time to do the work, we hope to support you in your growth over time so we will do 3 month, six month and annual check ins to retune your tools and skills just as you would for your body (physician), car (mechanic) or teeth (dentist) so why not for your psychological well-being (therapist and coach)?

We have found that meeting weekly dramatically improves clients’ progress toward their goals. For that reason, we meet with clients weekly. We will establish a set to time to meet each week and that will be our reoccurring weekly appointment.

Sometimes, especially in the beginning. We will suggest things for you do to at home that will support the work we do in our therapy sessions. We have found that clients make significantly faster progress when they do the homework. Much of the homework is to support the integration of the deep work we do in session.

Individual Therapy generally breaks down as establishing goals and doing a thorough history for the first 1-3 sessions. The next 3-4 sessions, we will develop a tool kit for dealing with the current stressors that brought you to counseling. In the last part of therapy, we will do the deep diving work to help heal the roots of problems that brought you to counseling.

With couples therapy our first meeting will be determining goals for our therapy, some psychoeducation and sessions 2 and 3 will be sessions with the therapist and each individual seperately. This will help the therapist to understand your perspective, experience, history in order to know how to support your relationship in the future. A good couples therapist's client is always the relationship, not either of the partners, but to understand how each of your perspectives influence what is being put into the sacred space in between that you both contribute to.

We believe that it's crucially important for us to know our clients for who they are, not just what they are struggling with.

Our clients feel less anxious, more confident and in control of their thoughts and emotions, and less reactive in their relationships. they have more clarity, feel more connected, more trusting of their decisions and more authentic with their needs and desires they have. They learn how to communicate in a way that minimizes triggers and emotional eruptions, rather than reverting to old negative relational patterns and emotional reactions. At the end of therapy, they feel more secure, calm and in alignment with what they need, want or desire for themselves and their relationships.

We have a firm 48-hour cancellation policy, so if you need to cancel for any reason, make sure you give us 48 hours notice to avoid paying the late cancellation fee, which is the full session rate. We offer phone and video sessions in case something happens last minute that prevents you from coming to your appointment.

We see clients Monday-Thursday from 9 am to 7 pm. We currently have a few limited openings for new clients.

The best way to get started is to set up your free consultation. This will help you to consult with a therapist and you can then book an appointment with them directly and start from there! Click here for access to the booking page!