Adam Benjamin

Adam Benjamin

Licensed Clinical Social Worker

You don't need to get hijacked by old, unresolved wounds. Let's work together to get back to your own sense of empowerment and wellbeing.

Client Status

waitlist

Contact

503.481.4067

4829 SE Steele St.

Suite 200

Portland, OR 97206

At a Glance

Me

Rate: $110-$130

Provides free initial consultation

Provides telehealth services

Practicing Since: 2011

Languages: English

Services

  • Individual

Insurances Accepted

  • Out of Pocket
  • Out of Network
  • Regence Blue Cross/Blue Shield

My Ideal Client

I work with people who wish for lasting relief from limiting feelings and self-beliefs. Your challenges tend to be relational -- stemming from old, long-standing expectations of others. So, living well mean developing flexibility in the habitual reactions and responses you developed way, way back. The best outcomes happen when we can get curious together about your sensations, thoughts, feelings, memories -- the subtle machinery of your experience and your range of choices.

My Approach to Helping

My style of therapy uses mindful introspection and experiential techniques to pay close attention to clusters of feelings, negative beliefs, and self-defeating patterns of behavior. Healing means growing out of old patterns. I don't offer quick tricks and I don't promise quick fixes. I want to join with you where things feel painful, confusing, or stuck. It's important that we work collaboratively as we sort through conflicting impulses, locate knots where you've gotten contracted around old feelings, and build more flexible awareness and empowered choice. You need to feel that your therapist is attuned to you, in whatever experience or stress you're dealing with. I believe we know when someone is really tuned in to us -- we have a "gut feel" for it. That's why I offer a free consultation so you can see what I'm like. Your intuition needs to say, "Yes, this is the right guide to help me grow into the more secure and empowered self I want to be."

More About the People I Treat

I am a Licensed Clinical Social Worker, currently working only with individual adults. I have advanced training in techniques of mindful and experiential therapy, especially dealing with attachment patterns and early wounding. I have a particular interest in working with individuals who grew up with a dysfunctional or mentally ill parent. It's important to be transparent about my scope of practice: I work with traumatic childhoods but I do not have specific training in dissociative identity. Also, to clients seeking to resolve traumatic events, or to manage active addictions, I would refer you to other practitioners with specialized training. Therapy is my calling, but it is not my first career. I also have a PhD in Communication Studies and taught college courses before turning toward psychotherapy. I enjoy repairing and riding old motorcycles. I grew up in the New York area and have lived in Portland since 2001.

Techniques I Use

Specialties

  • Attachment Theory External link

    A thorough grasp of attachment theory is foundational to understand most forms of dysregulation or mental illness. I consider attachment patterns as I seek to tune in to each client's suffering. I also have training in attachment-based therapeutic techniques.

  • Hakomi External link

    Hakomi is an approach to therapy that brings mindful attention to bodily experiences, and an experiment-based approach to insight and change. I have extensive training in Hakomi and tend to use some of its techniques in most of my sessions. I borrow from Hakomi an attitude of compassionate respect for each client's organic process, and a basic stance of seeking to follow and unfold that process.

  • Mindfulness-based External link

    'Mindfulness' as used in my training background means 'sustained, non-judgmental attention and self-study.' This kind of mindfulness is not meditation; it is a therapeutic technique applied explicitly to promote insight and relieve distress. Mindful observation of one's feelings, sensations, and reactions, is a part of many therapy sessions, and may be done eyes-open or eyes-closed, as a client's comfort allows.

Issues I Treat

Specialties

  • Historical Trauma External link

    I can provide help understanding the impact of historical or complex trauma, including the vagal and brain systems it often affects, and help you develop ways to manage its effects on your nervous system.

  • Loss or Grief External link

    We encounter many forms of grief in our lives. I have conducted bereavement groups for those who have lost loved ones. I am also attuned to the grief that accompanies a lost childhood (for instance, when a parent has major mental illness), or lost innocence (the sense of safety, for instance, that disappears due to abusive or chaotic upbringing).

  • Self-Esteem External link

    A wide-spread problem in our society, the corrosive effects of poor self-worth, and shame in particular, limit our capacity for flexible thinking and the range of choices we perceive in many situations.

  • Depression External link

    Depression and anxiety are often situational, but just as often they are rooted in a core experience of ourselves that has persisted a long time, and resists any efforts to think our way clear of them. The mindful and experiential techniques I utilize allow access to the deep, core experiences and beliefs that need to be changed so that we can feel different and live with renewed energy.

  • Men's Issues External link

    I have a particular interest in working with men to overcome the legacy of toxic masculinity and the persistent burden of shame that it engenders.

Contact Adam

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