Services - Mental Health Counseling

 

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Michelle Bernier-Capaldo, LMHC, Practice Manager

Michelle is a Licensed Mental Health Counselor and has been practicing for 9 years.  She received her Master’s degree in Counseling from Framingham State University in 2010. Throughout her training, Michelle has provided therapeutic services to a culturally diverse clientele including adults, adolescents, children, and families that live with mental illness and substance abuse.  Michelle has been dedicated to early childhood development and improving the lives of children and families through emotional and behavioral support, advocacy and community outreach.

Michelle has experience providing diagnostic evaluations and therapy services to treat a wide range of complaints including depression, anxiety, trauma, grief, self-esteem, social skill building, and life transitions.  Michelle’s therapeutic style is supportive, Solution-Focused with a Cognitive Behavioral Therapy approach. She believes that therapy is a collaborative effort and she offers individualized treatment to meet each of her client’s unique needs and challenges.

Michelle’s goal is to reduce the stigma of seeking counseling, to help her clients develop emotional wellness, and to improve their relationships and daily functioning. She is committed to supporting her clients by providing the tools that will help them better understand their experience and to find solutions for their challenges. 

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Michelle Stakutis, LMHC, Clinical Director

I believe that counseling can help us uncover our authentic selves and our strengths so we can meet life’s challenges with self-compassion and confidence. We can all grow and heal from old patterns, painful experiences, and trauma. My work is client-centered, strength-based, and I strive to be fully accepting and inclusive. It is my priority to provide a safe space to allow clients to explore their feelings and participate in the creative process of self discovery, healing and change. I am trained in CBT, DBT skills, pain management, and my work is trauma-sensitive.

I obtained my MA in Counseling with a holistic concentration at Lesley University in 1997, and have a background in science and public health. In over 20 years as an LMHC, I have worked with young adults as a bilingual clinician in middle and high school, with children and families in community mental health centers and with students in a college setting.

I am also a certified yoga teacher through Breathe for Change and teach social-emotional wellness strategies and the use of mindfulness-based techniques.  While my practice is informed by science and evidence-based treatment, it is grounded in compassion, relationship and mutual trust. When I’m not working, I love spending time outside in nature and in the mountains, listening to music and hiking with my dogs.

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Sue Schmitz, LMHC, ATR, Clinical Supervisor

Sue is a Licensed Mental Health Counselor and registered Art Therapist. After studying psychology and studio art at Dartmouth College, Sue attended Lesley University’s Mental Health Counseling and Art Therapy program, graduating in 2012. Sue has worked with adults and children with depression, anxiety, trauma, thought disorders, and substance use, as well as oncology patients, homeless and low-income women, and youth on the autism spectrum. 

Sue previously worked at Beth Israel Lahey Health Behavioral Services, overseeing state-funded children and family programs. Sue is passionate about helping individuals achieve better functioning by implementing healthy lifestyle changes, improving communication and relationships, and increasing resiliency.

Sue offers art therapy as a cathartic modality that can provide a sense of “flow”. Creative processes help bring awareness to internal thoughts, beliefs, and desires. In better understanding our internal experience, we can identify priorities and make conscious choices that fit our needs. She also utilizes motivational interviewing, cognitive behavioral therapy, and dialectical behavioral therapy to support individuals in developing more adaptive ways to regulate internal experiences. She uses a person-centered, strength-based approach, believing that each individual is capable of driving their own healing and personal growth.

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Harvey Atkins, LMHC

I am a Licensed Mental Health Counselor who has been practicing for over thirty years. I most recently served as Counselor and Transitional Services Director in a private special educational program. I worked with adolescents in finding strengths that could facilitate their inner growth and develop plans that could initiate their personal career and life development.

Prior to that I worked in a private clinic and was a member of a diagnostic team that evaluated complex cases and provided individualized treatment strategies. I provided counseling to individuals from ages four to sixty, presenting with various mental health and life challenges. During that time, I conducted court evaluations for juveniles at Uxbridge District Court and provided mental health services at the Blackstone Valley Regional Tech High School. This was part of the school-based health center and included an annual depression day screening.

My clinical perspective is that people should be seen through their individual thoughts, emotions and behaviors, and that this should be grounded in the social and familial history that guided their development. I believe that neuroscience can contribute to a comprehensive understanding of people but my emphasis is to see a person as a unique being. Along the way I have been influenced by many, but two practitioners in particular have impacted me. One is Richard Gardner who taught me to always remember that counseling is a creative art, and Elkhonon Goldberg who deepened my understanding of brain biology.

I have always respected the varying nature of each person’s story, as each provides a new challenge to learn and join in a process of change. I have great respect for those who seek ways to improve their capacity to live more successfully and accept their unique strength.

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Tatiana Samara Melo, LMHC

Therapy is a journey of self-awareness. We have so many layers of who we are. We often have patterns of behavior do not serve us well. At times, we have difficulty communicating and understanding others and ourselves. We also might have expectations about ourselves and other that are not realistic. I have been working with children, adolescents, adults, elders, couples, and families for 20 years. My role, as a mental health therapist, is to be at your side with your questions and exploration, and to support you to create a life that is more meaningful and content.

My approach is client centered and strength-based, while integrating cognitive behavioral (CBT) strategies, mindfulness, motivational interviewing (MI) and the VCR model. Through these approaches, I hold space for your self-exploration of emotions, thoughts and behavior patterns with nonjudgmental and respect.

I am compassionate and love what I do. I can support you with a variety of life questions and relationship concerns so you can become more authentic with your true self and live the life that you desire. I am trilingual in Portuguese, Spanish and English.

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Kathy Benson, LICSW

Kathy is a Licensed Independent Clinical Social Worker with over 30 years of diverse experience in clinical, medical and hospice settings, working with individuals from 18 to 99 and their families. She specializes in working with people who have traumas of various types, loss and grief, anxiety, depression, adjustment to chronic illness, aging and caregiving.

She is a group facilitator with training in Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction, IFS (Internal Family Systems), Finding the Deep River Within, Reiki and bereavement work.

Kathy views counseling as a collaboration and invites frequent feedback from clients about the process. She brings compassion and empathy to her work with clients and believes self- care is an important element working with individuals. She often recommends exercise, yoga, creative arts and meditation to support healing. Kathy is passionate about personal growth, reading, dance, travel and finding joy in the simple things in life.

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Audrey May, LMHC

Audrey is a Licensed Mental Health Counselor with 9 years of clinical experience. She holds a Master’s Degree in Mental Health Counseling and a Master’s in Criminal Justice Studies, both from Suffolk University. Audrey has worked in a variety of settings including in-home, group/residential settings, and outpatient services, with an emphasis on reaching under-served communities. She works with teens, young adult, and adult populations with a specialty in trauma treatment, mood disorders, and high-risk behavior.

Audrey uses a Person-Centered approach to counseling, in which the client/therapist professional relationship is a partnership, and goals are carefully tailored to meet client’s individual needs. Audrey draws upon Cognitive Behavioral Therapy, as well as Dialectical Behavioral Therapy, to teach a range of coping and interpersonal skills.

In addition to her background in counseling, Audrey is a certified Kripalu Yoga Teacher and is in the process of becoming a certified Meditation Teacher. Audrey enjoys bringing these teachings and tools into counseling sessions as applicable to each client’s needs.

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Corinne Spangler-Baccam, MA, LMHC, CEIS

Working with people has always been her passion. Whether it be working as an educator, an art teacher, a developmental specialist, an art therapist or psychotherapist, it has been her love for children, people, art and nature combined that has formed Corinne into the therapist she is today.

As a mental health provider, Corinne considers herself an extremely dedicated and present clinician. One who truly enjoys working with all who come into her practice. Her belief is each person is truly unique and special in their own way and that somehow, in their journey through life, they may have lost sight or never quite grasped what that special something might be. A large part of her work is helping people find that special something, or at least feel content with who they are and embrace their own love for self.

As a graduate from Lesley University with a Masters in Counseling Psychology and Expressive Art Therapies in 2003, Corinne has become well versed in the uses of varied treatment modalities that consist of art, play, the expressive arts, CBT and mindfulness practice to reach her clients. The use of these modalities helps her to better understand and connect with her clients and help her clients better connect with themselves. She believes not only in talk therapy or CBT but in that the expressive art therapies support personal processes in managing difficult thoughts, emotions, feelings or in changing behaviors.

With nearly 30 years of experience in working with children in education and mental health, Corinne has a special niche for treating young children and has made great progress working with tweens, teens, as well as young adults. Her experience through her professional life brought her to amazing work environments such as The Walker Home and School in Needham as an intern, The Community Therapeutic Day School in Lexington as a second year intern, Thom Mystic Valley Early Intervention as a Developmental Specialist and Psychologist for her post-graduate clinical hours, Safe Studio in Ipswich as an LMHC and Art Therapist and Criterion Early Intervention in Framingham, as a Certified Early Intervention Specialist and LMHC. Leading up to joining Synergy, Corinne had been running her own successful private practice in Northborough for over a decade. With a strong belief in treating the whole person, Corinne is very excited to be part of the collaborative holistic healing environment Synergy Wellness Center has to offer.

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Michael LaPointe, LMHC

Michael is a Licensed Mental Health Counselor with 5 years of clinical experience and he received his Master’s Degree in Mental Health Counseling from Fitchburg State University. After graduating, he worked as an in home family therapist for a non-profit organization with a focus on under-served and low-income families until joining the team at Synergy.

He has worked with a variety of caregivers and most of his time in the field has focused on youth ages 5-22, addressing trauma, anxiety, depression, and mood disorders. He utilizes a person-centered approach in working with clients and primarily draws inspiration from Cognitive Behavioral Therapy and from the ARC model of trauma-informed care.

He believes in providing nonjudgmental and affirming care to all individuals and feels that therapy should be a collaborative process where empathy, compassion, and understanding are at the forefront. He also firmly believes that everyone has the capacity to improve in their overall wellness, self-care, and self-esteem, that everyone’s journey is unique, and that all should be made to feel welcome, valued, and appreciated.

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Julia Sherwood, LMHC

Julia is a Licensed Mental Health Counselor with 8 years of experience working with children, adolescents, adults, and families in various mental health settings, including residential programs, in-home family therapy, school counseling and outpatient therapy. In 2014, Julia had the opportunity to study abroad in Tibet, where she explored meditation and other mindfulness skills, and has since worked to integrate them with evidence-based therapeutic treatment. She received her master’s degree in Clinical Counseling Psychology from Assumption University in Worcester, MA, where she graduated with emphases in Cognitive Behavior Therapy (CBT) and Child & Family Interventions.

Julia draws from approaches such as CBT, problem-solving, Family Systems Theory, Emotionally Focused Therapy, Motivational Interviewing, trauma-informed treatment, and mindfulness strategies to support those with trauma, depression, anxiety, mood disorders and other challenges. Julia is passionate about utilizing a holistic, strengths-based approach in therapy. She strives to continuously integrate cultural humility into her work, with a particular emphasis on providing therapeutic support to the LGBTQIA+ community and acknowledging the effects of intersectionality on mental health. She firmly believes that emotional wellness is a journey—not a destination—with therapy providing a safe space for individuals and families to grow, learn, and explore at their own pace.

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Amanda Bara, Clinician, MA

Amanda is a mental health counselor who holds a Master’s Degree in Clinical Counseling Psychology from Assumption University. She has a strong focus in evidence-based approaches of Cognitive Behavioral Therapy with experience utilizing Dialectal Behavioral Therapy and trauma-focused interventions. Amanda has worked with a variety of disorders including anxiety, depression, trauma related disorders, ADHD, and Autism Spectrum Disorder. She has a strong basis in behavioral therapy and teaching parent management strategies.

Amanda utilizes a collaborative approach with her clients as she believes in working with one’s own strengths to help foster personal growth. She aims to provide a welcoming and non-judgmental environment in which clients can be their true and honest self. Amanda prides herself on building safe and supportive relationships with the children, adolescents, and adults she works with. Amanda values the individual stories and uniqueness of every individual who shares their journey with her. Through a client-centered approach, Amanda places high importance on the client’s needs and wants throughout the therapeutic process.

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Mary Pratt, MA

Mary is a client-centered practitioner who offers a collaborative therapeutic relationship grounded in empathy and understanding. During sessions, a safe space is provided to explore thoughts, feelings, and goals. Mary works with clients’ unique needs to support their processing, healing, and growth. As we work to identify clients’ strengths and values and learn coping skills, Cognitive Behavioral Therapy, Dialectical Behavioral Therapy, and Mindfulness techniques are utilized in session. Mary’s prior experience is working with a diverse clientele at an eating disorder facility that specializes in trauma-informed treatment with co-occurring diagnoses.

In addition to a Master’s Degree in Mental Health Counseling, Mary is a certified Yoga and Meditation Teacher, Nutritional Therapist, and a Reiki Master.

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Elana Richmond, MA

As a Marriage and Family Therapist, Elana looks at life challenges from a systemic perspective. She supports clients in exploring the many relationships in our lives–with family, friends, significant others, and with ourselves–with the goal of decreasing stress and increasing understanding.

Elana has training in Narrative Therapy, Solution-Focused Therapy, Emotionally Focused Therapy, Structural Family Therapy, and Cognitive Behavioral Therapy techniques. She holds a degree in Marriage and Family Therapy from the University of San Diego and has worked with individuals, couples, and families in both in-home and outpatient settings.

Elana practices therapy with curiosity and humor. She believes that her clients are the experts on their own lives and should therefore be at the center of their own treatment. Her emphasis is on a collaborative approach to therapeutic work, amplifying client voices and using client strengths as the foundation of personal growth.