Melinda is dedicated to supporting individuals through life’s challenging experiences and transitions. She specializes in fostering resilience and promoting healing for those navigating the effects of childhood trauma, grief, anxiety, depression, health and relationship issues as well as professional stress. A clinician with three decades of experience, Melinda uses a holistic, client-centered and trauma-informed approach tailoring evidenced based practices, including Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT), to the needs and goals of her clients.
Education
Melinda is a Licensed Counselor in Missouri and North Carolina. She has been a National Certified Counselor for 30 years, and holds a Bachelor of Arts Degree in Psychology and a Master of Science Degree in Clinical Psychology, both from the University of Central Florida (UCF) in Orlando. Her graduate training emphasized Intelligence and Personality Assessment and Diagnosis, as well as evidenced based practices such as Cognitive Behavioral Psychotherapy.
Experience
Melinda takes a very collaborative approach and believes that we all have an innate power for healing and growth that is released when we feel seen and heard. When someone gains insight, makes changes in their lives or just feels better it is very satisfying for her. She has provided therapy and assessment for people of all ages in community mental health agencies, private practice, hospice, and university counseling settings. She has served as an executive leader, clinical trainer and supervisor for other behavioral health professionals over her career, often mentoring new counseling professionals.
Melinda started her career working in community mental health seeing clients of all ages with all types of concerns. During this time she gained extensive experience supporting adults and children dealing with the long term effects of childhood abuse, neglect and family dysfunction. She was part of a small cohort of North Carolina clinicians trained to provide Trauma Focused Cognitive Behavioral Therapy for underserved children and adolescents, and completed a year-long Program Collaborative through the University of North Carolina School of Medicine, Center for Child and Family Health and the National Center for Child Traumatic Stress. She has trained hundreds of other clinicians in Cognitive Behavioral Therapy and Person Centered Thinking and has supervised licensed clinicians and interns as they provided outpatient counseling as well as intensive home based services for adults with persistent mental illness and children/adolescents with serious emotional disorders and their families.
Melinda worked as part of a hospice team in Central Florida. This experience enhanced her skills for end-of-life care and ability to address grief, fear, anxiety, and other emotions associated with terminal and chronic illness and loss. In this work, she employed diverse therapeutic techniques and further developed expertise in grief and bereavement, crisis intervention, and life review. This experience also enhanced her passion for helping others explore a deeper understanding of their life story.
In addition to being a clinician, Melinda has served as an executive leader including as Chief Executive Officer for a residential and community based service provider of intellectual disability and behavioral health services across over seventy sites in North Carolina. She served as Senior Quality Management and Staff Development Director for a national conglomerate of behavioral health providers, ensuring quality services, ethical and legal compliance and overseeing staff development.
Current Focus and Interests
Melinda decided to leave her executive position and return to her first love of counseling. She was director of a college counseling center and provided counseling to undergraduate as well as graduate students in the fields of pharmacy, physical therapy, occupational therapy, physician’s assistant, and business. Melinda enjoys working with people of all ages, but has especially enjoyed working with adults as they explore issues of identity and autonomy and navigate the world through skill building and insight. Melinda has had an interest in how we store and manage stress in our bodies and has been completing additional training in the area of mind-body connection.
