Hello, I'm a Licensed Clinical Professional Counselor, Certified Rehabilitation Counselor, Licensed Sex Offender Treatment Provider, Licensed Sex Offender Evaluator, and a Certified Alcohol and Other Drug Counselor in Illinois. I received a Master in Rehabilitation Counseling from Southern Illinois University- Carbondale. I have been working in the behavioral health field for 17 years. I help adolescents and adults who struggle with problematic behaviors that negatively affect their daily lives to learn how to become healthy emotionally and live up to their potential.
What can clients expect to take away from sessions with you?
These are the main issues I can help you with are behavioral and coping skill issues, as well as various addictive behaviors. Completing a thorough intake interview to determine core clinical issues. Collaborative treatment goals would be measurable to ensure progress, while using solution and future focused therapy that requires client to complete assignments outside of sessions.
Explain to clients what areas you feel are your biggest strengths.
Having worked in the behavioral health field for 17 years, I've developed a set of unique skills that allows me to individualize my approach for helping you (a) identify the root cause of your challenges and (b) create a tailored plan that leads to measurable progress.
About Paula Lawrence
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1011 Broadway St, Mount Vernon, IL 62864Appointments
Virtual & in-personMy treatment methods
Cognitive Behavioral (CBT)
I have been implementing CBT with clients to aid them in recognizing unhealthy thoughts and beliefs that cause/increase anxiety and negative feelings about themselves. Once, clients can identify the thinking errors, we can work together to identify what is and what is not true about the thoughts. This in turns allows them to lower anxiety while increasing self-esteem and feelings of adequacy.
Psychoeducation
Working with clients that have struggled with substance use, gambling, or other impulse control issues over the last 15 years, I believe that everyone is different and the approach with each client should be different. In order to provide the client with the appropriate therapeutic service, I feel that therapist should always be open to teaching techniques from various approaches. The ultimate goal as a therapist, is to aid the client in addressing their issue, sharing with someone, then letting it go, without forgetting it.
Motivational Interviewing
I utilize motivational interviewing by asking open ended non-judgmental questions in order to get clients to start considering ideals and thoughts that are new to them in order to help them find solutions to the issue that brought them to therapy.