Re-New Psychological Services, LLC

10/24/2024

Our updated website is live! Check us out at www.renewpsych.com
Thanks for your patience.

Guiding you towards a more fulfilling life

09/09/2024

While our website is under repair, please email scheduler@renewpsych.com for appointment requests. Thanks for your patience!

11/22/2021

Please share with anyone that you know who may be interested!

06/21/2020

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Father’s Day can bring up many different emotions for many people.
From those who are happy to celebrate with their dad-to those who wish they could be with him today. To those who are struggling with infertility and wishing they could be dads-to those who have been hurt deeply by their dads.
However you are feeling today is completely valid and you are definitely not alone!

05/10/2020

❤❤❤

04/22/2020

Quiet
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Over the past few weeks I've been struck by the quiet that exists all around me. I notice it when I'm standing in a line, 6ft away from my neighbor, waiting to enter the grocery store. As I'm driving, there are fewer cars on the road, fewer opportunities for me to honk my horn in frustration at another driver 🙃.
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I'm at my Thomas Circle office collecting mail, mostly magazines that won't be read. I did a walk through of both office suites. It feels so eerie; the vibe is that of human abandonment before a major storm- grab what you can and go find cover. That's how it was for us 5 or so weeks ago. Things escalated quickly.
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Wednesday at 1pm is therapy primetime; it still is virtually, but it feels so weird that it is not happening here, and knowing that it won't for a while.
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Be well, friends. @ Downtown (Washington, D.C.)

02/10/2020

I've had a hectic start to 2020- mostly (100%) of my own doing 🙃. One thing that has been exciting and time-consuming over the past 5 months is training. I knew from the first time that I practiced yoga 10 years ago in Baltimore that I wanted to be a yoga teacher- so I am working towards that now. I have 3 more months to go! I'm enjoying the process and looking forward to my continued practice. This is me doing handstand prep at my training last weekend. I'll pop in to say hi every once in awhile, but for the time being I'll be 🤸🏽‍♀️🧘🏽‍♀️
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01/01/2020

This is an excerpt of a blog I wrote- you can find it on daringinthedistrict.com

For the first time in my adult life, I’m waking up on January 1 not on a . I realized recently that I have been dieting yearly for the past 32 years.

Dieting kept me just outside of my body at all times; I never fully embraced it because it was temporary. I lived almost entirely in the future, fantasizing about my new body x number of pounds away, with the belief that once I reached that point, THEN I would be in my body. I didn’t need to buy new clothes for or even look at my current fat body, except to snap before and after pics of myself.

I told someone the other day that I will not be dieting and they asked me, “What does that mean?”. Isn’t this an interesting question? I find that I feel the urge to say “I’m not just going to eat whatever I want”- cause isn’t that the opposite of dieting? Dieting creates such an all or nothing- don’t eat this, only eat that, except on “cheat” days. Good foods and bad foods. Hypervigilance. Was I good or bad today?

I’m not doing that anymore. I can’t anymore. It has cost me too much. I’ve become greatly disconnected from my body and I want to reconnect. I want to learn how to listen to my body and feed it what it needs and wants. Honestly, this feels scary. How will I know what to do without rules? What if my body “gets out of control”?

So what am I going to do? I’m going to listen to my body and trust that it knows what to do. I’m going to live.

I’m sharing because I know that other people feel this way. I’m also sharing because this important for me as I step fully into my body.

Happy No-Diet January!

11/20/2019

Raise your hand if you experience Social Anxiety 🙋🏽‍♀️. Reading this article reminded me of some of my own experiences and the misconceptions people have had about me and my social anxiety over the years.

When I was a freshman in high school I moved from NC- where I was born- to South Florida. At school I would sit at a lunch table in nearly complete silence while surrounded by people who were laughing and joking with one another. Every once in awhile someone would ask me, “Do you ever talk?” and I’d squeak out a “Yes”. What I couldn’t explain is that I was much more gregarious around family and friends with whom I was much more comfortable. A year or so later, I got involved in the step team and started feeling much more comfortable socially, so much of my gregariousness came out.

I viewed my freshman year of college as a time to “reinvent myself” and be a more outgoing person. I became the President of my all-freshman floor, I had a bunch of friends, and I was involved in campus activities. But, I would get sick to my stomach even in a crowd of people I felt pretty comfortable with due to social anxiety. One time I was reading a book about being shy, and my close friends laughed at the thought that I believed myself to be shy because they only saw gregarious Krystal.

At present, I avoid unstructured social and networking events; the thought of walking into a room where people are already talking and needing to integrate into an existing group and make small talk ( ) is my personal nightmare.

So- what to do about this? I actually just read an excellent book by called “Sorry I’m Late, I Didn’t Want to Come” in which the author, a "shy introvert", spent a year learning more about how to branch out socially. She spoke to experts and offers up some great advice. You can also meet with a therapist. Here in the DC area, for instance, Larry Cohen LICSW (featured in the VICE article!) offers Social Anxiety groups that are excellent, and participating in a therapy group in general would be a great way to work through your social anxiety.

Feel free to drop additional tips in the comments! @ Re-New Psychological Services Silver Spring

10/25/2019

I’ve been thinking a lot lately about the death/life cycle. Until recently, I thought of it mostly in terms of tangible reality (e.g., someone or something is either dead or alive), but lately I’ve been thinking of it in the abstract.

I’ve had this orchid for a few years now. Orchids are interesting- they bloom, then they die, and it can seem that they will never bloom again, but one day they do. Recently I noticed a long offshoot branch- I didn’t make much of it- but then it started blooming- prolifically! There are currently 5 blooms and 6 buds. Who knew that this was developing below the surface?

Life is like this. Sometimes it feels that things are dead- the relationship we want isn’t working or is nonexistent; we can’t find a new job; our future seems bleak. But we never know what is “at work”. This plant has been watered and exposed to light over the past few years, but I didn’t know what would come of it. It’s been a pleasant surprise to see this bloom.

My encouragement to you is to water your “plants” and expose them to light. Nurture them and give them a healthy and welcoming environment to bloom.

The next slide is an extension of my message.



@ Takoma, Washington, D.C.

10/13/2019

1 hour- make the time
(I'm talking to myself here too)

10/11/2019

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Reminders ! Reminders! Read all about it! 🏳️‍🌈 .
***r ***an

08/22/2019

We offer all new clients a FREE 30-minute, face-to-face consultation with a therapist prior to the first therapy appointment. This is something I've been doing since I started my solo practice in 2010 as a newly-licensed psychologist.

The consult is a good opportunity for clients to get a feel for the timing to get to the office, assess goodness of fit with the therapist, ask any questions about treatment, and, since we confirm benefits after the consult and prior to the first appointment, understand what would be their financial obligations.

The consult is not just for the clients; therapists benefit from it as well because goodness of fit goes both ways. All therapists are charged with understanding their areas of competence- which clients and concerns they are trained to and feel comfortable treating. While there is no way to fully predict whether treatment will be successful, a consult helps the therapist ascertain whether they believe they might be able to help a client.

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When you aren't really sure what therapy is supposed to feel like, it can be really confusing to try and figure out if a first session or initial consult actually went well. .
Asking questions about experience, training, specialities, and method can be helpful, but research indicates that these things matter less than the degree of trust that therapist and client build together. Here's my list of questions to ask yourself after the first contact to get a sense of whether this is a person you could work well with. .
Printable high-resolution download available through Patreon (link in profile) . .

08/08/2019

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I'm currently in Chicago attending the annual convention of The American Psychological Association. I heard this lyric today while walking through the footbridge from my hotel to the convention center.
This song has a catchy beat- or, as the young people say, it's a 🙃- and the chorus reminds me of the work I do.

It's a rather common theme in therapy that being oneself is scary and often doesn't feel fun. We are all wired for connection and our biggest fear is that we will be rejected by others. As a result, we try to be who we think others want us to be so that they will like and love us; calls this "hustling for worthiness". What is ironic is that this inauthenticity actually leads to disconnection- both from ourselves and others. Trying to be someone else is a lot of work and is not at all fun.

is a great way to learn how to reconnect with oneself and to have authentic relationships with others. If you are not sure who you actually are, the can help you begin to discover this.

My hope is that everyone gets to be themself and have a good time doing it 😊.